After reading a UK Tourism brochure, it said that maximising the size of your banner will also increase the advertising potential. They said "Carefully scheduled, cleverly positioned and properly managed banner advertising can actually add to the appeal and scope of your destination website and of course is another way of generating extra revenue from your online presence." I obtained this information from the new vision section of the Destination UK booklet, issue 37. I feel that the above quote put it into perspective, one of the main features of the website that will catch the user's eye.
"The Google Maps API is one of those clever bits of Google technology that helps you take the power of Google Maps and put it directly on your own site. It lets you add relevant content that is useful to your visitors and customise the look and feel of the map to fit with the style of your site." - Google Maps Team
After checking out other similar travel comparison websites I have an idea of what I want to do, but the question is can I do it? It may take some time but I will keep looking at tutorials to find my way around the aspects. I had been looking at Google API and how my website would benefit from them. I have looked at various websites and seen how they have used them which I feel adds to the website it gives more visual and interactive aspects for the user to take a look at.
Below is a great website for help with Google Maps API. I t begins with the basics and goes right up to the advanced end of the spectrum from how to add markers to Geocoding UK Postcodes. I have looked through some of the points and found them interesting yet quite difficult. Here is a piece of code just to begin with that I was toying with:
var point = new GPoint(-79.90138, 43.65654);
GEvent.addListener(marker, "click", function() {
marker.openInfoWindowHtml("Something");
});
map.addOverlay(marker);
var point = new GPoint(-78.89231, 43.91892);
GEvent.addListener(marker, "click", function() {
marker.openInfoWindowHtml("Something else");
});
map.addOverlay(marker);
There are over eighty pages of information on Google Maps API for beginners, advanced and just for the fun of it!
I looked at another piece of code from it to see how I could use custom events such as a to and from output to "get directions" from A to B to C. Firstly I create the map:
// create the map
var map = new GMap2(document.getElementById("map"));
map.addControl(new GLargeMapControl());
map.addControl(new GMapTypeControl());
map.setCenter(new GLatLng(43.907787,-79.359741), 9);
The Next thing I do is figure out code to get the latitude and longitude of the markers:
var request = GXmlHttp.create();
request.open("GET", "example.xml", true);
request.onreadystatechange = function() {
if (request.readyState == 4) {
var xmlDoc = GXml.parse(request.responseText);
// obtain the array of markers and loop through it
var markers = xmlDoc.documentElement.getElementsByTagName("marker");
for (var i = 0; i < markers.length; i++) {
// obtain the attribues of each marker
var lat = parseFloat(markers[i].getAttribute("lat"));
var lng = parseFloat(markers[i].getAttribute("lng"));
var point = new GLatLng(lat,lng);
var html = markers[i].getAttribute("html");
var label = markers[i].getAttribute("label");
// create the marker
var marker = createMarker(point,label,html);
map.addOverlay(marker);
}
Once this is added there are some more small features that are to be added to make the map fully functional and it will turn out like the image below:
Image Courtesy of http://www.bisphamchurch.org.uk/ - http://econym.org.uk/gmap/
The first website that i took a look at was www.nationalexpress.com which allows the user to input their postcode and the the map will show up bus stops near the selected area.
I thought that this was a good idea as it would be easy for someone not familiar with the area they would be able to get a visual view on it. My own idea would be focusing on Northern Ireland and so may be worth having this type of API as Northern Ireland is a great tourist friendly area so people from outside the country would be able to use the transport to get around.
Also after looking at an IMD Student's work from last year belfi.co.uk I saw how they made use of Google Maps API to show all of the wifi hotspots within the Belfast area. Each hotspot is represented by a wifi symbol and enables the user to see any hotspot near them. When the user clicks on the certain hotspot it gives feedbeack of the address of the free wifi and lets the user rate it with a five star rating scheme.
After looking at APIs, I was looking at other user input feeds such as twitter. I was looking at maybe having some sort of mobile texting feed so that if there were delays such as accidents or weather conditions that the operator could text into this feed or tweet to it providing it was safe to do so giving a live feed to the public. I have noticed that more and more companies are using twitter and linking it to their own website as an update feed, such as the IMD website, which is great for checking updates and seeing what people have to say with regards to the subject.
I believe that this sort of update feed would benefit my website as I would be able to allow operators to update services that they may be on, at that moment in time so that they will be able to tell their passengers that they will be late turning up due to collisions or traffic congestion.
I took a look at how translink have may their customers aware of problems. Translink have their own feed which they update on a 30 minute basis which interacts with the customers as they are able to see which service is affected and for how long. I really liked this idea because it keeps the audience always alert and is an incentive to keep them coming back all the time for informative updates.
Here is a piece of code I have found that would link my own twitter feed up to my website if I was to insert the following:
<script src="
http://widgets.twimg.com/j/2/widget.js%22%3E%3C/script>
<script>
new TWTR.Widget({
version: 2,
type: 'profile',
rpp: 4,
interval: 6000,
width: 250,
height: 300,
theme: {
shell: {
background: '#333333',
color: '#ffffff'
},
tweets: {
background: '#333333',
color: '#ffffff',
links: '#ffffff'
}
},
features: {
scrollbar: false,
loop: false,
live: false,
hashtags: true,
timestamp: true,
avatars: false,
behavior: 'all'
}
}).render().setUser('Declan_Mc_Anulty').start();
</script>
This is the source that I use on my own page to incorporate my own twitter account on my webpage. The code allows twitter to send new updates that I post on it to my website so people can view what I have said without logging into twitter. This is the sort of feature that I wish to include on my Journi website so that updates can be made easily whether it is by internet or via their phone.
I have also been looking at hotscripts.com which is great and full of ideas for adding pieces of code. It will give me help on a variety of things from blogs, mailing list managers to user management and ASP. It has given me ideas on linking up blogger account so that the feed will appear on my own website. I also thought that user authentication was a good idea maybe for a client area within my website and had thought about a forum or discussion area so that users could compare and rate the various operators in Northern Ireland.
forms of user login and registration from toddwoolums.com
If I decide to use a forum on my website I have also been looking at spyka.net which will show me step by step guides of setting up my own forum. Below is what the end product would look like if I were to use the aided tutorials as well as the start off template for the forum.
Is a forum good or bad?
A forum sounds like a great idea so that commuters can tell everyone else about their experience of the service that they used an whether or not that they would recommend it to others. On the other hand a forum can sometims cause controversy, although I will have control over it I have seen from other forums and message boards how people's identification has been used without their permission to slate others which could bring a very negative aspect to my site, if one person isn't satisfied with a service they then tell everyone and the operators numbers decline due to one negative comment.
Facebook...
I will have a facebook profile for my website also, as it is best to keep up to date with the younger audience with accounts, such as university students as facebook has over 500million active users, with more than 150million mobile users, there is a greater chance of younger audience "adding" this to their own portfolio so that they can regularly check on information.
How does Facebook help others advertise and grow their business?
I have done some more indepth research on how it can improve your popularity with your customers and growth of the business. One company's Facebook page who are in the transport sector is J.J. Kavanagh Coach Hire. Kavanaghs have over three thousand fans that follow them on Facebook. This demonstrates the reputation that they have grown and how Facebook has helped to develop it even more with the youth and commuters. Kavanagh's use Facebook to promote their vast majority of services throughout the country. They also use it to keep in contact with their customers which helps improve their image. On their Facebook page they have a wall alike everyone else where they communicate on a daily basis with their passengers who may have questions that they need answered before travelling. They hav also created other "pages" where they have posted their service timetables along with a reviews section where customers have created their own opinion of the service that was provided to them.
I think that if Journi was to use Facebook it would promote the service even more alike Kavanaghs, it will have its own website but to keep in touch with others it will have a Facebook page also to communicate with commuters that will be benefiting from the main site.
Below is an image of Kavanagh's Facebook page allowing you to see the various comments that people leave and how they get such quick responses. I have seen from this page that they are also "friends" with other coach operators, so this must mean that it is the norm for most coach operators to be able to promote their services.
Image source courtesy of http://www.facebook.com/JJKavanagh#!/JJKavanagh?v=wall
