How immersive user-generated content benefits travel companies
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Unlike physical products, tourism services cannot be experienced before they are purchased. So looking for recommendations has become a big thing for travelers. When picking a hotel for a trip, their choice often depends on reviews and photos left by previous guests. Recommendations can also make a difference when booking a table at a restaurant, or choosing sights worth seeing. All of this demonstrates the significant impact of user-generated content (UGC) on today’s customers. Let’s see how travel companies can make UGC more engaging and effective with immersive technologies.
Why user-generated content matters
UGC includes any content such as reviews, photos, videos, blog posts, etc. created by customers. UGC is seen as more authentic and trustworthy than branded content as it comes from real people who have experienced the product or service. It provides social proof that a product or service is worth experiencing, and naturally, helps travel companies build customer trust.
By showcasing UGC that highlights positive experiences travel companies can convince potential customers to choose their product or service over competitors. According to a recent study, 82% of consumers stated they believed that UGC played a significant role in their decision-making process. On top of that, UGC improves customer engagement by encouraging the sharing of experiences and opinions.
Thanks to its ability to show exactly what a tourist can expect from the product or service, visual UGC has a massive influence on their decisions. It has also the power to evoke emotions and help customers connect with the service on a deeper level. By showcasing visual UGC featuring positive experiences, travel companies can create emotional connections with potential customers and increase their engagement.
How to enhance UGC with immersive technologies
Until recently, visual UGC in the travel industry has included only regular formats like photos and videos. This is because other formats of visualization either overload websites or are too complicated to produce. Cappasity is here to change that. After 7 years of R&D, we launched Mertsy SDK, allowing travel platforms to integrate the 3D capturing mode feature directly into their mobile apps. Thanks to it, tourists can now easily create 3D content while traveling using only a smartphone camera and then share it with other users of the platform. Thanks to its additional interactivity, immersive content is much more informative and engaging than flat images and videos.
Here’s how a 3D visualization of sight can look in the 3D View format (data format developed and patented by Cappasity):
To provide users with the opportunity to create and share immersive UGC, a travel company adds a “Create 3D photo” button into its mobile app. The user needs to launch the capturing mode by pressing this button and start circling around the object. When the shooting process is over a 3D View is automatically created and the user can share it with other platform users. Since the 3D capturing technology is integrated into the app, the user doesn’t need to install any other apps to create, edit, and share their 3D content.
Mertsy SDK comes with different shooting modes, so travelers can shoot literally anything in 3D, from small museum exhibits like jewelry to monuments and vehicles.
It also features panorama shooting mode, so tourists can create interactive 3D Views of apartments and then share their experience of staying at a hotel with others. The solution supports a wide camera that allows for more of a scene to be captured.
When a travel platform is small or doesn’t have its own app they can choose another scenario — provide 3D capturing functionality through a third-party app. For this purpose, we offer the 3DShot app, a standalone application that is based on the Mertsy SDK.
To create 3D content, users will need to download 3DShot from the App Store or Google Play. They can then launch the app and start the shooting process. The resulting content will be saved to the user’s Cappasity account, where they will be able to generate a link and insert it into the platform.
To integrate Mertsy SDK into your app, contact our team at support@cappasity.com
