A Look Behind the UpTake Private Beta

Recently, we asked other fearless beta testers to take UpTake for a spin, and received several comments about different features they would like to see. We are listening. Here are some changes we are working on right now:

Helping you find a specific something when you don't know exactly where it is
i.e. Where is LEGOLAND?

We received a note from a nice tester that they thought LEGOLAND was in San Diego and they couldn't find it on our site. Well, LEGOLAND is near San Diego, but it is really located nearby in Carlsbad. We call this "Proximity Search". We are adding regional data and soon LEGOLAND and all the other places with tricky addresses will be readily found wherever you think they may be.

Helping you find the great activities that make your trip unique and memorable
i.e. what should we do after we visit Monterey Bay Aquarium?

We have thousands of activities in our database and we are constantly adding new activities to the site. But it's time consuming because this information can be very "local" and the best ones can be hard to find. If you have an activity you want to recommend, think an activity was overlooked or want to suggest a site for us to add to our search catalog, please let us know at feedback@uptake.com.

Helping you make a decision by returning more information about products
i.e. tell me what other travelers and travel experts say!

We are trying to get more information on all the products we have in our search catalog. Sometimes the information just doesn't exist online or in an easy to access format. Then again, we may have missed it. If you know of a site we should be searching for results, please send your suggestions to feedback@uptake.com.

Helping you visualize the hotel, attraction or destination
i.e. you would like to see more photos!

More photos are coming. In fact, we have hundreds of thousands in our database already. We have to collect more, make some decisions about which photos to use and then train our "machines" to pick the right ones for the right trip.

Helping you find your favorite state or destination
i.e. there is more to travel than California and Hawaii!

To develop our personalized search and discovery engine, we needed to do some manual work and lots of testing to "train" our computers and algorithms - LOTS of manual work and TONS of testing. So, we started in California and Hawaii for lodging and activities because we want focused in-depth feedback from private beta users on a controlled set of data. Did we mention we wanted your feedback about what is and isn't working? Please be as specific as possible - feedback@uptake.com. After incorporating your feedback, we'll "tune" our algorithms and "scale" them for the rest of the North America and eventually the world.
Why CA and HI specifically? Their popularity and their diversity of products are reasons. But it's really because we all live in California and better understand what "relevant" results are. Why Hawaii? Because we all *wish* we could visit the different islands often enough to become experts and be able to personally recommend relevant results!

Helping you decide where to go
i.e. where should you go for a warm-weather, family-friendly beach vacation?

We envision helping you answer three core questions - where to go, where to stay and what to do. We started with the latter two because answering those allows us to help recommend destinations i.e. by knowing what family friendly things there are in Kauai - and how family friendly - we can better determine if it's a better destination for your 2 and 5 year old than say...Vancouver. Please tell us if there specific destinations or destination types you would like to have us roll-out first for our "destination search" - feedback@uptake.com

Helping you find what's nearby
i.e. what hotels are near the activities you picked? And helping you see other choices like the one you are considering.

We will introduce "related links" and "similar choices" to help you make the right overall choice. We will likely do this after we have been able to "tune" our algorithms based on your feedback.

Enabling you to compare prices and book
i.e. you like what you see and you're ready...now what?

Checking availability, bargains and making the actual reservation are critical, we know. There are already so many great sites that enable you do compare prices (e.g. SideStep or Kayak...), to shop for deals (e.g. Sherman's Travel, TravelZoo...), to book through an agency (e.g. Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity...), or direct (Hilton, Wyndham...). To make it easier for you, we will integrate ways for you to get to your preferred price comparison site, travel deal site, or booking engine.
We will also integrate flight booking options, even though almost 80% of you drive to your leisure trips!

Helping you share, collaborate, and get (and give) more feedback
i.e. you are traveling with someone, or you'd like a friend who has been there before comment on your trip plans.

We will enable you to clip the pages and products you find most useful into a trip folder, to annotate those pages and to invite friends and family into comment and improve. Likewise, we will eventually integrate ways for you to tell us what products are relevant, what reviews are helpful, and to add reviews and ratings of your own.

Helping you find specific activities in a specific place
i.e. dance clubs in Fresno.

We are focusing on two themes right now, family friendly (family represents 35% of the travel market) and romantic getaways. Very specific keywords searches have not yet been fine tuned. For now, we are giving general suggestions, we will get more specific as we add more data for more cities in the next few months.

Other questions? Please don't hesitate - email us at feedback@uptake.com

We thank you in advance for your feedback, and we look forward to improving UpTake based on your suggestions!