The fact is that the travel and tourism industry is the single largest e-commerce category with a potential for exceptional future growth. This sector boasts an established audience of Internet savvy consumers who demand online content that is informative, compelling and easy to navigate.  The more satisfied these consumers are with the content of a travel or hospitality-related Web site, the more likely they are to revisit it for additional information or to make future purchases from it. 

Where then, can the hospitality industry go to access high quality, dynamic visual content that is regularly updated and easy to use and upload, without incurring the high costs and frustrations that are associated with producing the content themselves; and who can they call to have custom visual content of their properties created?

One company offering a solution to the hospitality industry’s challenge is VRX Studios Inc. and its e-commerce Web site, MaxVR.com.  VRX Studios provides the online accommodation industry with the opportunity to engage potential guests – today’s sophisticated consumers - with an array of visually appealing and emotionally compelling property-related information. 

Thanks to VRX, hotels and resorts now have at their disposal a powerful marketing tool that will enable them to accurately and attractively showcase their properties with interactive illustrated maps and stunning 360 degree virtual tours. Consumers are initially invited to explore an interactive map and virtual tour of the specific destination. Following this introduction, they can drill down to peruse an illustrated version of the hotel’s floor and ground plans. These plans are dotted with easy-to-identify icons that click through to immersive 360 degree images of the hotel, giving the customer the opportunity to virtually experience the hotel prior to booking.

As opposed to traditional, static photographs, VRX Studios’ images are akin to standing on the spot and rotating in a full circle.  Consumers viewing VRX’s content are always in control of how quickly they want to view an image and in which direction they want to pan.  Hotel rooms, grounds, and amenities as well as nearby attractions can finally be shown in their full glory. 
 

VRX Studios’ product offering takes traditional 360 degree virtual tours to a new level by integrating each high quality virtual tour with interactive illustrated destination and property maps.  The mapping application complements the user’s online experience by geographically organizing VRX Studios’ extensive archive of virtual tours. In addition to locating the resort property, VRX’s maps enable travel consumers to access stunning views of nearby tourist attractions. This helps to not only sell the resort but also the destination itself. 

As an illustration, one of VRX's clients is the Mauna Loa resort in Maui. VRX customized a map of Maui to include an illustrated version of where Mauna Loa is located on the island. When users click on the Mauna Loa icon, they are shown a detailed, interactive map of the resort and its surrounding amenities.  The user is invited to take a virtual tour of the resort by viewing the pool area, hotel lobby, and golf course, among many other immersive images. The customized map of Maui also features VRX's attraction icons that click through to spectacular 360-degree views of the Island's site seeing marvels such as the Puu Loa Petroglyphs or White Sands Beach. 

MaxVR.com, VRX Studios’ ecommerce enabled website and the travel industry’s access point to VRX’s syndicated content, employs a distributed B2B model that provides a one-of-a-kind licensing service of virtual tours and illustrated maps. A sliding scale, monthly subscription fee is applied based on the number of images and maps selected.  Costs for virtual tours range from US$9.95 for any two images, to US$99.95 for unlimited access to the entire archive of images. Costs for VRX’s interactive destination maps range from US$19.95 for one map to US$199.00 for unlimited use of all of VRX’s maps and virtual tours.  These prices are for those clients whose web sites receive less than 100,000 unique visitors per month. Clients are charged for the number of virtual tours or maps in use at one time – not for specific content chosen.  Further, clients are given the opportunity to interchange virtual tours and maps multiple times without incurring additional fees. This service has been made available for those travel sites that offer multiple, revolving specials.

MaxVR.com's online archive provides extensive coverage of top vacation destinations and hotel resorts throughout the Caribbean and Hawaiian Islands, Mexico, the continental United States and Canada. 

Although no one is producing and distributing images like those of VRX Studios, related offerings are on the market trying to compete with VRX’s rich images, accessible platform, convenient format, and syndication network. Ultimately, the superior quality of VRX’s images is its greatest competitive advantage. Further, unlike the competition, troublesome plug-ins and lengthy downloads are not required as users view VRX’s images through a Java viewer.  Since more than 94% of Internet users are equipped with a Java enabled browser, VRX’s content is practically universally accessible.  Finally, for all its visual detail, appeal, and accessibility, each image comes in three sizes: small (<30K), Medium (<60K), and large (<100K)). This means each size downloads comparatively quickly - even for the millions of users who are still using 28K modems to access the internet. 

A leading company that is realizing the potential of VRX Studios’ product offering is franchising and marketing giant Cendant Corporation.  Convinced of the value that VRX’s products offer, Cendant Corporation’s traveladvantage.com, aoltraveladvantage.com and offlinetraveladvantage.com will utilize VRX’s proprietary mapping application and host VRX’s entire archive of 360 degree virtual tours. This will enable Cendant’s online travel consumers to take virtual tours of hundreds of travel destinations throughout the world – easily and from the comfort of their own homes or offices.

VRX Studios’ high-impact virtual tours, proprietary maps and syndication network are viable and reasonably priced marketing tools that support the online hospitality industry’s goal to attract new customers, increase their online look-to-book ratios, decrease their overall customer acquisition costs, and build customer loyalty.  By utilizing VRX’s virtual tours and interactive maps, hotels are able to provide Internet savvy consumers with the information they need to plan and ultimately book a trip.  Moreover, VRX’s products allow hotels to take advantage of an invaluable online resource without encountering the high costs, frustrations, and limited life span associated with producing and maintaining the product themselves.