When you’re looking to book a holiday, the chances are you are looking for choice, value and information, and while most travel companies offer this, many vary in the way they present this information to the user.

In this article we take a look at a cross-section of the travel market and rate each website on various criteria including functionality, usability and content.

Lastminute.com (www.lastminute.com)

Lastminute.com by its very name creates a sense of urgency and seeing as last minute deals are generally low-cost (or at least, perceived to be by many); an illusion of exclusivity and value is added to the site. The branding is pretty funky and there is always a lot of movement on the homepage.

Functionality

In terms of how the site functions, there are multiple interactive elements on the homepage. A slideshow of ‘last minute’ deals rotates immediately below the main menu whilst additional offers exist in a tabbed format beneath. The striking colours contrast one another and entice you to click and explore further.

The search functionality, at first appears rather detailed, with multiple radio buttons and select boxes; to the less experienced web user this could appear quite intimidating. There are many things on offer here, from spa breaks to car hire, and if it were not for “holidays” being the first item on the list I may very well lose interest.

What is pretty unique to lastminute.com is the type of holiday option that allows you to filter out holidays that you are not interested in and pinpoint the ones that take your fancy. For example, I’ve worked very hard this year and I know I want to go on a relaxing beach holiday, so I choose “beach & resort”.

The next decision to be made is the departure and destination, and I especially like the ambiguity offered here – I know I want a beach holiday, but I don’t know where I want to go; I want THEM to tell ME, thankfully, lastminute.com does this very well indeed. I live in Yorkshire and am flexible as to which airport I am departing from, so I choose appropriately. I’m also flexible on my destination, so I select “I don’t mind”.

When the results appear, an overview of your search displays in the left columns and the holidays themselves show in the central column. From this page you can perform basic actions such as sort by price.

Without going much further into the functionality of lastminute.com I think it’s pretty fair to say that a lot of research has gone into creating its compact search filter, which is easy to use and very efficient in return it’s results.

Functionality: 4/5

Ease of Use

Thanks to the colour scheme and the almost modular arrangement of its content, lastminute.com is quite straightforward to use. Upon first entering the site there is a lot of movement which could potentially overwhelm the more unwitting user but after exploring the content for a few moments it becomes quite obvious what you need to do to achieve your goal, besides, most users will probably head straight to the search form anyway.

In terms of information architecture, everything is where you would expect to find it; the account links and site search field are located in the top right, the main menu is horizontal and in tabbed format so you know exactly which page you’re on and the footer contains company information.

What doesn’t grab me enough is some of the interactive panels, which at first don’t actually appear to be particularly interactive.

To a web developer like myself the black buttons at the bottom are obviously clickable – this is a controllable accordion menu – but when placed amongst the other black and pink colours which are also used for table headings, fonts and background colours, it is less-than-obvious that these parts are interactive.

Lastminute.com could probably increase their homepage click thru rates immediately by expanding this content out into headed lists.

Overall I can appreciate that laying out the vast amount of content available on Lastminte.com must have been hard for even the most skill collection of people, but they have managed to pull it off by using simple colours, consistent navigation and by providing a search function for every section, ensuring even the slowest of users never get lost.

Ease of Use: 4/5

Content

The actual content on offer here is vast and continually updating. Lastminute.com is probably the first website I visit when looking for deals from the theatre to a weekend away. I must say however, whilst I have used Lastminute.com many times to locate nice hotels, interesting plays and stunning holiday locations, I rarely book them here. This is because I can more often than not find it cheaper elsewhere, or by booking directly. My girlfriend and I were on the brink of booking a short trip to Jersey late last year and at the “last minute” decided to look at the hotel’s website only to find they were holding an offer for that weekend which would enable us to save around £80, as we had removed the need for a hotel, we also booked the flight through the flight company.

I’m sure that booking individually can offer a cheaper alternative than using a third party to “package” it together for you, but in some cases Lastminute.com fails where it professes to deliver.

Content: 3/5

Thomas Cook (www.thomascook.com)

Thomas Cook is one of the travel veterans, technically beginning life in 1841 by a cabinet-maker based in the midlands. Now, in 2010, it is a worldwide travel company with a vast online presence serving millions of people every year.

Functionality

When you enter the Thomas Cook website you are presented with a large form to find your package holiday, cruise or insurance package.

The search form is the most important call to action on any travel website because it is the starting point for most users. So, why Thomas Cook have chosen to complicate matters by including irrelevant search options such as “board basis” and “star rating” is beyond me – sure, they are important to a lot of people but this is when you refine your search, not begin your search. The form could be cut down significantly to make it more focused.

When the results are returned, you have the obligatory options to filter and sort the data, all of which is presented in a reasonably easy to use way.

 

 

One of the particularly nice features of the Thomas Cook website is the ability to change your travel dates on a per-holiday basis in a dynamic manner. Take for example this holiday to Marmaris:

I can change my dates and flight details within the search result block making it very easy to find available options without having to run another search. This is pretty intelligent functionality, but from my experience can be temperamental.

Thomas Cook deals with its plethora of options very well indeed but it does have detrimental effects on the site. Pages can take a while to load and scrolling can be jerky because of the amount of content being served. I shudder to think how the site would perform in IE6 on an older machine.

Functionality: 3/5

Ease of Use

Because of the aforementioned functionality and the effects it has on both the user and the performance of the site, I am very much in two minds about how Thomas Cook measures up in terms of usability. The options to find your ideal holiday are there, it just might take some time and a lot of patience.

The layout is not too dissimilar to what you might expect from a travel website but I can’t help feeling that many of the banners and much of the copy exists to get users to the site or simply to keep them reading. Unless you use the search form, viewing the rest of the site seems a little pointless. When you follow links from one page to the next, you’re never really led anywhere. I think there should be more guidance toward a goal which will leave the user feeling more satisfied and result in a higher conversion rate for Thomas Cook.

Ease of Use: 3/5

Content

On the absolute flip-side of what I just said about ease of use, the content on the Thomas Cook website is vast and informative. They have reams of copy on just about any location you could think to visit and it is structured in an easily readable format.

Another notable addition is the “latest travel updates” which is highlighted on the homepage. For passengers looking for information on volcanic ash, for example, this is a great resource.  

Content: 4/5

Co-Op Travel (www.cooptravel.co.uk)

The Co-op Travel website is rather different from the previous two we have covered; it has recently undergone a re-design which has drastically improved various elements of the site. 

Functionality 

Upon landing on the homepage, the user is not presented with a form. They are instead given text and graphical options such as “find a holiday” and “search for a flight”.

After clicking on “find a holiday” you are presented with a generic-looking form:

As with the previous two websites I have entered my details and submitted the search – but wait – I have to select a destination. Many people might know exactly where they want to go, but as I mentioned in the lastminute.com review – I want to browse. This is where Co-op Travel falls down for me - I’d like to see what options are available to me and then make my choice on that basis. (On a side note, just to throw in an accessibility gripe, I’m glad I have good vision else that red text on the dark blue background might be very difficult to read!).

Okay, so suppose I do know where I want to go. I went to Majorca last year and enjoyed it thoroughly, so I think I’ll go again this year. So I perform a search and my results are returned. The results are very similar to other sites of this nature, but with fewer options. All you can really do is read more information on the holiday or book it.

There is the option to add to eBrochure but at the time of writing this feature did not work.

A handy addition to the results page is the price calendar which lets you see when you can travel and at what cost. This is similar to the feature available on Thomas Cook’s website but not as dynamic.

Functionality: 3/4

Ease of Use

Because of the lack of intuitive functionality throughout the search form and results page I am inclined to brand “Co-op Travel” as negligent to what most users will actually want. I wasn’t impressed that I had to navigate into the site before I even found a search form.

Returning to the homepage and I can see four main options and a rolling banner advert. After a few moments I notice that the rolling banner has a “close” option in the corner, which is odd, so I clicked it. This revealed four more options! Now I can look for all inclusive deals, find a hotel, search for a villa or look for a city break. Why on Earth were those four options covered up?!

Overlooking this huge usability screw-up, I decided I wanted to take my girlfriend to Paris for the weekend. So I clicked on “city breaks” which to my surprise presented an almost perfect page; a table detailing dates, airports, durations, ratings and price.

This is almost magical in its simplicity. I’ve cropped the list but there was a range of airports and destinations, the prices look reasonable and let’s be honest I don’t need to know much more information than this.

In terms of how information is presented on Co-op Travel we are again seeing a horizontal main menu and a vertical sub-menu. These provide various options that should cater for a good portion of the user-base.

Ease of Use: 3/4

Content

As with all our subjects, there is a lot of content that needs to be presented in an easily digestible way. Along with each holiday package you will find the usual holiday brochure write-up with a few grainy, low-quality pictures, but this is it. Unlike Thomas Cook you will not find well-written, tailored web copy for each destination. This leaves you feeling slightly deflated and that Co-op Travel offers not a lot more than a no-frills booking system.

On the other hand they do seem to be quite at one with social media integration, advertising their Facebook page and Twitter feed quite prominently on the homepage and in the footer.

Content: 2/3

Comparison

This wouldn't be a true comparison without some sort of geeky table that details our opinion of each website. So without further ado...

	Functionality	Ease of Use	Content
Lastminute.com	4	4	3
Thomas Cook	3	3	4
Co-op Travel	3	3	2

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