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Suzanne Chong
Founder and Product Designer
San Francisco Bay Area

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Google Travel Admission Tickets



Background


When Suzanne lived in Zürich, Switzerland, she joined the Touring Bird team within Area 120, Google’s incubator for experimental ideas. The small team's mission was to enhance the research and booking experience for tours and activities. Touring Bird has successfully launched and transitioned to the Google Travel Things To Do Team, where Suzanne worked on Google Maps and travel experiences, including the official ticket purchase experience as shown below.




Introduction


Travellers currently go to POI official websites to get the most accurate ticket information based on research findings. How might we inform the official ticket prices to travellers while they are planning, exploring, or even during their trips? Starting with Google Maps app - we plan to cover ~10K attractions and surface the ticket data on Google Maps app Placesheet.


Objective


Users need to be able to compare official ticket pricing to Reserve with Google and 3P providers pricing. By placing official tickets pricing for multiple entry experiences on the placesheet, we prevent users from needing to research this information independently.


User Problems


Not using Google for booking activities

  • People don’t know of the option to book tickets via Google.

  • People don’t realize the ‘Buy Tickets’ button.

  • Mental model is set to: “I use Google for getting information before booking” - they use the webpage link to get to the official website.

Attraction Placesheets have several pain points

  • It’s difficult to get tickets (official tickets or 3P tickets).

  • It’s impossible to know where you can visit for free or not.

  • It doesn’t explain why this attraction matters - not inspirational.


Why Attractions matter


They are highly visited e.g. Louvre had 10M visitors in 2018 and Notre Dame ahd 13M. Attractions have stories for their relevance to their destination that people care about. Tourists visiting Attractions are less familiar with their surroundings and have limited time while on vacation, therefore having a greater need to understand if Attractions are of interest to them.


Google Maps POI Collaped Card Design



Problem: People don’t know that you can book tickets via Google on the Google Maps. They don’t realize the ‘Buy Tickets’ button.

Solution: How might we help travelers in findings ticket prices and POI information to make them feel confident about booking through Google Maps?


Expanded Card Design





Eiffel Tower Example