Sizeable and interesting upgrade to Expedia‘s presence on Facebook today with the simultaneous launch in the US and UK of a new TripCompanion service.
The TripCompanion Facebook application has been kicking about in Beta form since November 2010, but the second version is a marked improvement on the original with a string of new features included which Expedia says are aimed at helping travellers once they are on the road and back at home.
The application works by asking the user to enter details of a trip (dates, location) to create an itinerary.
Once a trip is in the system, a module is automatically built to sit within a user’s Facebook profile page for quick reference.
On the quirky side of things the box counts down each day to the trip but, more importantly, tools such as weather planners, currency converter, things to do and maps have been added to the system.
On an embedded Google Map, a user can see points of interest including restaurants and bars at the destination, as well as pictures and other bits of content (which can be filtered by the user).
The destination content is brought in via Expedia sister-company TripAdvisor and also includes ratings and reviews attached to each product.
Once an itinerary of things to do is created the user can print off a summary of the planned items.
The new version of TripCompanion is launching at the same time in the UK and US, with plans to introduce to other markets in Europe over the course of the next six weeks.
Not wanting to miss out on some repeat business, of course, TripCompanion now also welcomes home the user from a trip with a “Where’s Your Next Break?” message, throwing in special offers as well reminding the user to add a review to some of the places they visited on the previous trip.
Expedia has promised in recent months that it will be focusing massively on social media and mobile services, with officials promising more features in the first half of 2011 than in the past five years.
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