| Journal: TWUK | Section: |
| Title: | Issue Date: 28/08/00 |
| Author: | Page Number: 83 |
| Copyright: Other |
meetthe
MD
This week: Matt Gillam, managing director, Holiday Wizard
Age: 34
My first brush with the travel industry was enough for me to decide I was maybe better suited for the technical world at the time.I was hired by Matthews Holidays, an industrious family-owned operator of mobile-home holidays, helping in its reservations department at the tender age of 20.
My excitement at getting into travel was soon tempered with the reality of detail, planning and the day-to-day grind that went into organising the upcoming summer programme.
Then in March the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster in Zeebrugge happened, not the best of news for an operator selling self-drives with ferry crossing.
I soon decided this was much too much like hard work, so headed off to Greece for a summer of travelling.
Returning home, I spent the next 10 years in the wilderness (well – from the travel angle) of the software industry.
I soon arrived at my own perspective on computer systems – largely that the user experience comes before fancy technology and the computer is useless if it doesn’t make life easier.
I think it’s not about data, it’s about behaviour – too many technical people miss that. By autumn 1998 Ihad become technical director at UK Data, implementing its Internet credit-reporting system while learning the details of accounting, cash flow and client management.
I was 32 years old, young enough to attack new projects with enthusiasm but old enough to temper that with experience and common sense.
For most of my computer career there had been no distribution medium available for start-up software firms. I could write a great system but it would rely on expensive distribution channels.
But by this time, the Web had arrived – a cheap interface on to any system I cared to build. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity.
Travel is full of opportunities – it’s a subject consumers will research during their leisure time. That’s crucial when building a Web site that depends on inbound traffic for revenue.
I found it was just too damned hard to use the Web to find interesting holiday companies. Major portals such as Yahoo didn’t have the sector expertise to do the job properly as they were very broad and most on-line travel sites seemed more interested in selling bargain-bucket flights.
Of course, I could guess at a Web address from a company name but what about the swelling ranks of regular users joining via Freeserve and the like? Why should they have to be experts in your products?
Being a keen skier, I’m a great demographic target for ski companies but it still took me a great deal of research on the Web to find a list.
The final straw was when I found myself – an early Internet adopter – choosing my January 1999 ski holiday from a hard-copy brochure. I still like the tactile experience of the brochure, see the pictures, feel the quality of the paper, read it in bed and browse for ideas.
I may book on the Net – although a phone call is usually easier – but for research, the whole fun process of picking a holiday, the brochure is still a fantastic interface between operator and consumer. But it was tough to get a selection.
It was through this idea that Holiday Wizard was born. The aim – to make it easier to find holiday ideas, without forcing the consumer down a particular booking option.
We see our job as being the starting point for each successive holiday purchase, hopefully several times a year for each one of our users.
Holiday Wizard test launched in July last year, with the true launch in October after a professional design makeover was made.
Our valued client base has grown steadily, with each addition making the site more useful for the visitor – and therefore more valuable to our clients too, in a virtuous circle.
Now we’re coming to nearly a year of traffic data – we’re identifying more and more repeat users who are coming back for more.
CURRICULUM VITAE
1984: various jobs in factories, shops, pubs. All on the ground floor, where the real work gets done!
MY TOP TIPS
l Holidays are an aspirational product, choosing them should be fun and an integral part of the experience.
* Remember the 20/80 rule. The first 20% effort delivers the first 80% of return.
* Have high personal standards for the quality of your work.
* Value yourself. Most businesses’ biggest problem is finding enough good people.
* Business is relationships.