Do you travel much? Not, dash to a city, have a meeting, and eat at the hotel travel, but real travel. The kind where you spend days in one place, exploring a new city and eating new foods?
If you haven’t traveled like that in awhile, you may have forgotten how stressful it can be. Where do you go in a new city? What do you eat? More importantly, what do you avoid?
The guys at Inside Travel Guides feel ya, and they’re using local writers to produce guides for cities all over the world. Right now you can download guides for cities as diverse as New York, Paris, and Reykjavik.
Check out our Q&A with Inside Travel Guides below, and get to seeing the world already!
Travel guides written by locals. We sell $10 travel guides to cities around the world that show you a day by day itinerary of what a local would recommend their best friend doing.
3) What’s the story behind your idea?
The cofounders are avid travelers and want to see more people explore the world. The #1 reason people are not traveling more is because they feel lost. Our mantra of ‘never feel lost’ matches great information and a beautiful mobile design letting you explore.
At Chicago Techweek 2012 we met Tim Hines the founder of BT Social. BT Social is “The Business Traveler’s Social Meeting Place”. It’s geared towards business travelers that travel a lot. Whether they travel by plane,train or automobile, as long as they stay in hotels and “travel” this is a place for them.
Think about that George Clooney Movie Up In The Air, where Clooney plays the role of a man who travels all over the country firing people. He lives a very disconnected life, he is rarely home and then meets a woman who travels just about as much as him. They spend the night they meet each other comparing loyalty cards and loyalty status for airlines and hotels.
Although it’s just a movie there are people out there in the world that travel as much as Clooney does in the movie.
Wouldn’t it be great if you could make travel buddies. You could find out if one of your travel buddies is in the hotel lounge that you’re staying at or maybe picking up a bite down the road. You could share travel itineraries with friends a lot and get alerts when you and one of your travel buddies is in the same city/state as you.
Well now you can as BTSocial has finally launched to the public.
The BTSocial team is solving the traveler’s problem of drinking alone at hotel bars or reading the same tired newspapers during airport layovers. The new app puts the power of networking in the hands of business travelers while on their trips. “Business travelers can now find current friends and colleagues and meet new ones through the app,” said Tim Hines, President. “The app is for business travelers looking to get out of their hotel rooms and create a social experience by meeting other travelers in real life,” he continued.
Built for the mobile web, the BTSocial Travel App is accessible on web-enabled phones, tablets and traditional web browsers. “We built a responsive app so that it works on any device business travelers prefer,” said Karl Jackson, CTO. “All of our features, including check-ins, function on any device. Plus users can avoid the clutter of a multitude of apps on their devices,” Karl continued.
The app’s features are what really set it apart from other travel tools. Users can check-in to any location around the world, whether it is a specific venue or an entire city. Once checked-in, users are visible to other users within the vicinity. “Checking-in is our way of raising your hand and saying ‘Hi. I’m here and I’d like to network,’” said Hines. “Check-ins are what truly drive the social experience of the app.”
Users can also use the Trips feature to plan to network during their travel downtime. Unlike other travel apps, it doesn’t ask for your itinerary, but focuses on the gaps of time during trips. When users create a trip, they can enter gaps like layovers or time between meetings to meet other travelers. The Trips feature also allows users to see other travelers that share similar gaps of time to entice meeting up.
The most unique feature of the app is Socials, where users can plan their own social events during their trips. Whether hanging out in the hotel bar or airport lounge, users can create a Meetup using the simple feature and invite other travelers. In addition, the events are visible to users that check-in in the vicinity.
In addition to the social features, users can also store their loyalty account numbers to avoid carrying those pesky cards. That’s not all, BTSocial even packed in a stats tracker so users can see how active they are on the app.
For more information on the BTSocial Travel App and to access it today, visit app.BTSocial.com.
Check out this Chicago startup that’s caught first lady Michelle Obama’s eye.
Comments Off on Chicago Startup: BT Social Is The Social Network For Business Travelers INTERVIEW0LikeLike 1,559
At Chicago Techweek 2012 we met Tim Hines the founder of BT Social. BT Social is “The Business Traveler’s Social Meeting Place”. It’s geared towards business travelers that travel a lot. Whether they travel by plane,train or automobile, as long as they stay in hotels and “travel” this is a place for them.
Think about that George Clooney Movie Up In The Air, where Clooney plays the role of a man who travels all over the country firing people. He lives a very disconnected life, he is rarely home and then meets a woman who travels just about as much as him. They spend the night they meet each other comparing loyalty cards and loyalty status for airlines and hotels.
Although it’s just a movie there are people out there in the world that travel as much as Clooney does in the movie.
Wouldn’t it be great if you could make travel buddies. You could find out if one of your travel buddies is in the hotel lounge that you’re staying at or maybe picking up a bite down the road. You could share travel itineraries with friends a lot and get alerts when you and one of your travel buddies is in the same city/state as you.
Now you can make plans with friends you may not otherwise see. You can stop ordering a six pack and watching reruns on HBO and go out and do something, even during travel time.
Hines has some interesting plans for partnerships and also monetization. Hines plans to partner with major travel providers to offer perks to those signing up for BT Social from an airline or hotels loyalty program.
Social networks are nothing new. There seems to be a social network everywhere you turn. This idea is new though and it has potential to do great things.
Comments Off on Chicago Startup: FlyWhim Wants You To Imagine If You Bid On Airfare Like Hotwire0LikeLike 1,472
Are you familiar with Hotwire? Most people who travel all the time have either used Hotwire, checked Hotwire or know about Hotwire. They were the first on the hotel booking scene with blind box bidding on hotel rooms. The way it was originally designed to work is hotels would load up their unused inventory, you would see a price and general location but not the hotel name and you could get between 40%-70% off your hotel stay. They would tell you the name of the hotel and the address after you booked.
Hotwire doesn’t quite work like that anymore. Sure they still do blind box bidding but you get the same deals as you’d get with just about any hotel site. For last-minute booking the only app really doing it right is Hotel Tonight, but that’s another story for another day.
Nibletz Staff
Kyle
