Hellenic Chamber of Hotels Presents New e-Tourism Guide for Athens
The Hellenic Chamber of Hotels on Tuesday presented a new electronic tourism guide for Athens and Attica named trip2athens that focuses on online booking, organizing travel and boosting business partnerships within the tourism industry of the Greek capital.
The chamber aims for the multi-dimensional digital platform, funded by the National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF) — aka ESPA — program of the Municipality of Athens, under a budget of 920,000 euros, to become the central point of promotion of all tourist activities in Attica.
What’s new for the visitor
The trip2athens e-guide displays all tourism activities (accommodation, catering, entertainment, shopping, etc.) in seven languages (Greek, English, German, French, Spanish, Russian, Chinese), encompassing all touch points from planning stage through to memory sharing.
Through the platform, visitors from around the world can live out the “dream – plan – book – visit – share” experience: plan their journey to Athens from the beginning to the end, choose their transportation, choose the hotel for their stay, choose the attractions they are interested in visiting and make all the necessary reservations.
Visitors can create a virtual diary of their trip to Athens, share with friends via social media and also “download” the e-guide to their mobile device through the available applications so they can access all of the platform’s content, at any time, without having to be connected to the internet (off line).
A useful ‘tool’ for Athens’ businesses
The trip2athens e-guide is also a business “tool” for enterprises as they can use it for their promotion to the international e-tourism market.
The platform encourages synergies between different tourism service providers for the offer of personalized services to travellers that will strengthen and improve the overall visitor experience.
The trip2athens platform is open to all businesses related to tourism without any financial obligation or cost.
Hoteliers can accept bookings for their rooms through the platform, or simply use the platform booking engine on their own site. Those who receive bookings through the trip2athens platform will not be burdened with a commission.
Today the platform counts 2,000 companies, 470 hotels, approximately 1,000 sites, hundreds of activities and other places of interest in Athens and Attica.
All professionals on the platform can promote their businesses and increase sales through the guide by making a company profile (which can include photos, opening hours, contact details, interactive map, etc), upload offers and discount vouchers (guests that have used the platform will be notified of all available offers).
During the e-guide’s presentation, the chamber’s president, Yiorgos Tsakiris, invited all businesses in Athens to take advantage of the platform’s possibilities.
“The most fundamental factor that will determine the success of the platform in terms of B2C (business to consumer) is if Athens’ professionals embrace the idea and accomplish B2B (business to business) cooperation”,” he said.
Mr Tsakiris underlined that the platform’s concept is aimed at promoting Athens based on best international practices.
“All tourism-related businesses can participate in the platform, showcasing and offering their services cooperatively and in combination with other businesses, to the city’s guests. At the same time, we have adopted and incorporated tools in the platform that are used by all major hotel chains worldwide for the promotion and support of their members”, he said.
On his part, the General Secretary of Tourism, Gerasimos Zaharatos, referred to the e-tourism guide trip2athens as a “very positive step.
“The next phase of the platform should see its expansion to cover the entire country”, he said.