Travellr.com news http://blog.travellr.com News and updates from the Travellr team! posterous.com Thu, 30 Sep 2010 00:56:00 -0700 Announcing World Nomads Answers http://blog.travellr.com/announcing-world-nomads-answers http://blog.travellr.com/announcing-world-nomads-answers

Over the past month, we've been working with WorldNomads.com to bring our Travel Q&A service to their customers and community. 

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We're pleased to announce that World Nomads Answers has officially launched! You can now access our growing set of community-powered travel questions and answers from WorldNomads.com as well as from our home at Travellr.com.

So what does this mean?

We're growing the Travellr network across a network of like-minded partners, so that you can tap into a collective community of thousands of travellers world-wide to get the best answers to your travel questions.

If you are interested in partnering with us, then please get in touch.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Wed, 29 Sep 2010 22:49:00 -0700 Announcing badges http://blog.travellr.com/announcing-badges http://blog.travellr.com/announcing-badges

We're excited to announce that we've launched badges! Badges recognise people who participate and are helpful in our Q&A community - such as answering questions, rating answers, and asking new questions. 

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Over the coming weeks we'll be adding new awards based around topics and destinations to recognise local expertise in the community. Head over to the badges page for a list of the awards you can receive and who's been awarded them. 

Once again, we'd like to thank you - our knowledgable travel community for the continued feedback, suggestions and comments. Keep them coming!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Thu, 16 Sep 2010 17:27:00 -0700 New release of Travellr! http://blog.travellr.com/new-release-of-travellr http://blog.travellr.com/new-release-of-travellr

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For the past six months the Travellr team have been squirrelling away at our home inside World Nomads building a super stealth new version of our Travel Q&A service. Today, we're very excited to announce that we've officially launched!

In 2008, we set out to solve a simple problem - how to get fast, relevant advice to your travel questions from locals or past visitors. Two years on, and we've answered thousands of travel questions across hundreds of destinations world-wide - from mega-cities such as Paris and Tokyo, to beautiful far-away countries such as Laos and New Zealand. And all thanks to our ever-growing community of explorers, vagabonds, wanderlusters and seasoned locals who share a collective wealth of experience and expert knowledge around the globe.

So what's our goal? Simple. We want to help you find the best answers to your travel questions. Whether you want to find out about backpacking in Istanbul, how to travel overland from Kunming to Hanoi, or boutique hotels in London, our global community of experienced locals have the answer!

We've put a lot of hard work and love into our new release, so here's the lowdown on what's new:

  • A fast, slick, beautiful user interface, built from the ground up.
  • Streamlined notifications about your new answers, comments, ratings and messages
  • Comments so you can, uh, comment on other member's questions or answers
  • Community ratings, so you can find the best answers quickly
  • New topic system, so you can explore questions and locations by interest (ie: hiking) 
  • Favorite questions, so you can keep track of useful content for when you're on the road
  • Improved search results, with highlighted matches to your search query
  • Updated Partner Toolkit so you can easily bring content from Travellr into your website or blog
  • Plus loads more improvements under the hood

Got any comments about our new release? Good or bad, we'd love to know what you think!

Cheers!

- The Travellr team (brought to you by Jai, Michael, Chris, Karla and Ian)

 

 

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:39:15 -0700 Travellr in NYC http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-in-nyc http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-in-nyc
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The very limited edition Travellr t-shirts from our launch last year are still making appearances around the world! The most recent sighting was from the streets of New York City, featuring Niko our intrepid Aussie expat from Portugal. 

If you live in NYC and you happen to see Niko wearing our Travellr t-shirt, give him a hug from us.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Mon, 19 Jul 2010 00:10:00 -0700 Travellr listed in Best Travel-Advisory Websites list http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-listed-in-best-travel-advisory-websi http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-listed-in-best-travel-advisory-websi

This week the folks over at Travel and Leisure.com listed Travellr.com in their "Best Travel-Advisory Websites" list. We're thrilled and thought we'd share the news!

Mark Orwall writes: "Have a question about security (or almost any other topic) in your destination? Just ask Travellr, where your query is answered by an international community of globe-trotters who volunteer their expertise."

From the list we also liked worldtravelwatch.com, which is a compilation of news reports from two adventure-travel journalists. They website provide in-depth travel warnings and news about specific area.

Safe travels!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Thu, 08 Jul 2010 23:05:00 -0700 Travellr student project in the news http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-in-the-news http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-in-the-news
Our student project with the University of Tasmania, explore.travellr.com, got a couple of mentions on travel industry websites Tnooz.com and Thumbrella. 

Kevin May from Tnooz wrote:  "Nice job from students at the University of Tasmania in Australia where a project to work out how to find and display travel content from the web has become a fully functioning site."

If any travel websites would like to be included in the project then please get in touch with us – we’d love to include more content!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Thu, 08 Jul 2010 22:58:00 -0700 Travellr gets a mention in the Irish Times http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-gets-a-mention-in-the-irish-times http://blog.travellr.com/travellr-gets-a-mention-in-the-irish-times

We love hearing other people's experiences using Travellr.com. The Irish Times gave us a mention in a list of useful travel research tools - 

"If you have questions about a destination then travellr.com is a remarkable resource. Post a question about a place on the site and it gets routed in real-time to a local or visitor from the online community. You can also browse other people’s questions by topic and destination."

Got any good answers from Travellr that have helped your travels? Let us know - we'd love to hear from you!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Thu, 08 Jul 2010 22:50:18 -0700 Google Dev Fest Wrap up! http://blog.travellr.com/google-dev-fest-wrap-up http://blog.travellr.com/google-dev-fest-wrap-up
Last week the Travellr team headed along to Google Dev Fest in Sydney to talk about Travellr.com's use of Google Maps. It was a really fun event and we enjoyed sharing our experiences with the Google Maps API and meeting other geo developers and the Google Maps team. 

As part of the conference, we also published a technical article for the Google Australia blog on how we extract locations from our travel questions - so if you're technically inclined then feel free to take a look at the article. We'd like to thanks Google Australia for inviting us along and for supporting Australian developers!

Google Dev Fest is hitting Europe and South America later this year so check out the event calendar for a conference near you.

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See the full gallery on Posterous

Travellr_Google_Dev_Fest_Talk.ppt Download this file

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Mon, 31 May 2010 00:47:30 -0700 Explore.travellr web-mashup demo released! http://blog.travellr.com/exploretravellr-web-mashup-demo-released http://blog.travellr.com/exploretravellr-web-mashup-demo-released
We're very pleased to announce a preview of an exciting project we've been working on together with a group of computing students at the University of Tasmania.

explore.travellr is a web mashup created by university students from the School of CIS in Tasmania. It allows users to search and explore travel-related content from Travellr, World Nomads Adventures, Flickr and Twitter.

The purpose of the project is to explore different ways to find and display travel and destination information from the web. For example, searching for "Skiing in Japan" on explore.travellr will bring up questions from Travellr, Flickr photos, Tweets, and recent journal entries from World Nomads. 

The technical nitty gritty - the project was developed using the Mootools Javascript Framework, and utilises JSONP-based APIs that allow the browser to consume external data sources. RSS feeds (such as World Nomads Journals) are brought in using Yahoo Pipes. The entire application runs in Javascript, which is pretty cool, huh?!

The project is a work in progress (and it does have bugs) but we thought we'd share it with the travel community for open discussion and to share ideas on ways to enhance the experience of trip planning on the web.

So head over to explore.travellr to take a look, and if you have any feedback or would like to suggest a data source then let us know! 

Explore_travellr_screenshot

Explore.Travellr PPT.ppt Download this file

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Thu, 20 May 2010 00:07:30 -0700 Is the volcano in Iceland erupting? http://blog.travellr.com/is-the-volcano-in-iceland-erupting http://blog.travellr.com/is-the-volcano-in-iceland-erupting
Isthevolcanoerupting

Want to a quick way to find out what's happening with the Icelandic Volcano? If you want to find out if your favourite volcano, affectionately named "Eyjafjallajoku" by the Icelanders (making it the world's most difficult word to pronounce!) is erupting or not, simply visit isthevolcanoerupting.com to find out the answer! 

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Wed, 19 May 2010 23:36:00 -0700 Top 3 Travel Gear Chosen by Travelers Around the World http://blog.travellr.com/top-3-travel-gear-chosen-by-travelers-around http://blog.travellr.com/top-3-travel-gear-chosen-by-travelers-around

Dina from Vagabond Quest (a blog by a permanent pair of travellers, Ryan and Dina) just posted a fantastic article about the Top 3 Travel Items to take with you on your travel adventures. Aside from the regular list of techno-gear such as iPods and laptop, there are some really interesting suggestions from travellers - including a travel guitar, green tea, headlamp, and incense! Head over to Vagabond Quest to read the article, and don't forget to follow their adventures on Twitter.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Sun, 09 May 2010 21:48:00 -0700 Building long-term online reputation through Travellr.com http://blog.travellr.com/building-long-term-online-reputation-through http://blog.travellr.com/building-long-term-online-reputation-through
[The following guide was originally published over at the Travel and Tourism Technology Trends (T4) blog]
 
Are you a savvy tour or travel operator and looking at how you can build the reputation of your brand across travel sites like Travellr.com? The following guide provides three rules for building your brand's online reputation on Travellr through our community-powered Q&A engine.
 
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Travellr.com is a question and answer website for travelers to get answers from locals who know. The site works by recommending questions in real-time to other members who are nearby and likely to know about the topic of interest. 
 
Not only is Travellr a smart website for travelers to find and share travel knowledge, it enables you to build long-term referrals to your travel company and grow your online reputation.
 
When you answer a question on Travellr the audience is much greater than just the site’s membership. Travellr’s questions and answers are indexed by Google and shared across the web, providing a great opportunity to build long-term traffic via the search engine optimization (SEO) work that Travellr performs. 
 
It’s easy to build referrals and reputation on Travellr.com for your business - so long as you follow three simple rules.
 
Rule 1. Build reputation by being helpful
As a tour or destination operator you have a wealth of local knowledge - so why not share it online? Answering questions about your local area will help establish you as a local expert and build your online reputation. 
 
Here’s a good example -  the InterContinental Sydney Hotel answers travel questions about the city of Sydney, offering advice from vegetarian restaurants to good spots to go kayaking. By helping travelers with advice and tips about Sydney, the InterContinental has established a positive online reputation that provides long-term sales leads and brand awareness. 
 
Rule 2. Be honest about who you are
Nobody can sniff out a business owner pretending to be a “satisfied customer” quicker than an online community! When you create an account on Travellr, use your business name and upload your business logo so everyone knows who you are. This also means that every conversation you have will proudly display your brand!
 
Rule 3. Add value in your answers (and Travellr will add value to your business)
If you write a well written answer to a question it will receive more votes and get ranked higher in search results on the site. Add detail to your answers - simply replying with “check out my website” or “see here for the info” with a link to your website will result in a poor conversion of click throughs, and you might get also marked as spam. 
 
It’s that simple. If you follow these three simple rules, then you’re well on your way to building your onlinereputation and growing long-term visitors to your business through Travellr.com
 
How do I sign up to Travellr?
  • Sign up to Travellr.com (http://travellr.com/sign_up)
  • Fill out your profile and upload a profile picture
  • Enter in topics your are interested in - this will help Travellr recommend questions to you.
  • Set how often you want to be notified about new questions (all the time, daily, or weekly)
  • Explore or search for questions in your region to answer.

 

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Sun, 09 May 2010 20:24:00 -0700 Kangaroo Fever (via Vantastic) http://blog.travellr.com/kangaroo-fever-via-vantastic http://blog.travellr.com/kangaroo-fever-via-vantastic

We thought we'd share another bit of travelling comedy gold from Vantastic's Andrew and Willie. Hit the video below, enjoy!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Sun, 09 May 2010 20:04:00 -0700 Five days in Sydney (via MojoTrotters) http://blog.travellr.com/five-days-in-sydney-via-mojotrotters http://blog.travellr.com/five-days-in-sydney-via-mojotrotters

Globe trotting couple MojoTrotters (that's MObile JOurnalist) have written up a great five day guide to Sydney, including a list of things to do and see, and tourist traps to avoid. If you're heading to Sydney this is a good read and contains a good list of local tips!

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You can read their article over at mojotrotters.com.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Tue, 13 Apr 2010 21:54:00 -0700 World Nomads Travel Tribe Soccer Match Review http://blog.travellr.com/world-nomads-travel-tribe-soccer-match-review http://blog.travellr.com/world-nomads-travel-tribe-soccer-match-review

Last weekend Travellr.com joined in the Travel Industry Soccer match, organised and hosted by Footy Fans Downunder. Our team - the WorldNomads Travel Tribe (sponsored by WorldNomads.com) - played our way miraculously to the finals, thanks to some star recruits and ring-in's on the day. This was no easy feat since the soccer tournament was played at Wentworth Stadium, and for many in our team it was the first time we'd played 11-a-side soccer! 

The day was great fun as our side played undefeated into the finals, 2-0 (def. Scruffy Murphy's team #2), 3-0 (def. Meso Creative), and 0-0 (draw with Base Hostels). The finals were a nail-biting climax, and victory was snatched from out grasp 1-2 to Scruffy Murphy's stronger (and far more serious!) side. 

Thumbrella.com.au covered the match and have posted up a match review, and if you were there on the day or just want to read a good yarn, check out Michael Ball's detailed match report. 

Thanks again to everyone who played!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Tue, 13 Apr 2010 21:27:00 -0700 Willie and Andrew's Vantastic Outback Adventure continues... http://blog.travellr.com/willie-and-andrews-vantastic-outback-adventur http://blog.travellr.com/willie-and-andrews-vantastic-outback-adventur

We've been following the Van-Tastic road trip this month as it makes it way through Australia's Northern Territory with Willie and Andrew. The two have posted some new footage from their outback adventure, which you can watch below!

Roadtrip Australia: NORTHERN TERRITORY - HOLEY PEDY!!

Roadtrip Australia: NORTHERN TERRITORY - THE TOLL OF THE WILD

Roadtrip Australia: NORTHERN TERRITORY - THE TOLL OF THE WILD

 

 

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Sun, 28 Mar 2010 20:15:14 -0700 Urban Art Guide hunts down street art in Berlin, Hamburg http://blog.travellr.com/urban-art-guide-hunts-down-street-art-in-berl http://blog.travellr.com/urban-art-guide-hunts-down-street-art-in-berl
If you plan on visiting Germany then you should check out this website to guide you to some amazing urban street art and graffiti.

Urban Art Guide (english translation here) keeps track of graffiti and street art in the cities of Berlin and Hamburg. The websites features a blog of recently found artwork, and provides an interactive city map showing you where the artwork is. If you have an iPhone or Nokia you can also download for free the Urban Art Guide application, which is useful when you're on the road or just want to explore the cool street art these cities have to offer!

If you have any other websites for urban artwork in your city or town then let us know in the comments!


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See the full gallery on Posterous

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Wed, 24 Mar 2010 20:31:00 -0700 Van-Tastic Roadtrip Northern Territory begins! http://blog.travellr.com/van-tastic-roadtrip-northern-territory-begins http://blog.travellr.com/van-tastic-roadtrip-northern-territory-begins
The great Australian roadtrip Van-Tastic has just begun its Northern Territory leg for a six week roadtrip across the Australian outback! Filmakers and comedy duo Willie and Andrew from Miami and Baltimore in the USA have been given a video camera and keys to the van, and sent on their adventure.

We'll keep you posted on their roadtrip videos, and if you're curious about what to expect, have a look at their hilarious entry videos here:

Have fun guys!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:52:30 -0700 USA State tourism tweeters http://blog.travellr.com/usa-state-tourism-tweeters http://blog.travellr.com/usa-state-tourism-tweeters
Maria Wygnal from @PureMichigan has a compiled great list of tourism tweeters for almost all states of the USA.

Maria's list can be found here: http://twitter.com/mwygnal/tourism-state-dmos

If you have any other good twitter lists for tourism or travel then please let us know in the comments!

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr Sun, 21 Mar 2010 21:19:00 -0700 Local Travel Movement http://blog.travellr.com/local-travel-movement http://blog.travellr.com/local-travel-movement

If travelling like a local is your style or if you have a local travel blog, then take a look at Local Travel - a new initiative (set up by WHL Group and Spotted By Locals) to promote the local way of travelling. It's free to join, and the project aims to share and discover ideas, news and developments in Local Travel. 

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/421634/travellr_logo_vertical_white.png http://posterous.com/users/3tk2BvfiZ9Xr Travellr Travellr