Guoman and Thistle Hotels has announced the successful launch of its mobile-optimized sites, allowing travellers on-the-go to search and book hotel rooms from their mobile phones. Both mobile sites were created by leading technology platform Usablenet, one of the driving forces behind mobile commerce in UK and Europe.

The two mobile have seen a 25% increase in visits since their launch. Both sites feature a slick design with HTML5 capabilities specifically tailored for the best mobile browsing experience, making the site very easy to use and quick to navigate.

Features include:
Book a Hotel: Users can book a room at any of Thistle’s 32 hotels and Guoman’s 5 destination properties from any web-enabled mobile device. Calendar overlays make it easy to choose dates from a calendar without loading extra pages.

View Offers: Allows prospective guests to find special offers on accommodations, dining, or meetings and events, all searchable by city, hotel, or type of offer, and easy to book from a mobile.

Hi-Resolution Image Galleries and Videos: Viewing property images is highly important to travelers deciding where to stay. The mobile sites feature scrolling image carousels of the hotel properties, rooms and facilities, aiding users in their decision when booking hotels or meeting rooms.

Find a Hotel: View the entire collection of hotels under the Guoman and Thistle group, or use the Find Hotels Near Me feature that utilizes geo-location services.

My Reservations: Allows users to easily view and cancel existing reservations from their phone.

Advanced Navigation: Expandable and collapsible menus make it easy to navigate the site without loading extra pages making it a fast browsing experience for people on-the-go

Mithu Sengupta, eCommerce Director from Guoman and Thistle Hotels said: “The mobile channel has become an important travel planning and booking channel worldwide, especially for local and last minute searches. It was very important for us to have a mobile site that reflects our brand and provides the best experience for our customers with rich-media content and videos. We partnered with Usablenet to create a mobile site that caters to the traveller’s needs and understands what their user journey would be when accessing our websites via mobile phones. We are very happy with the response we had from our customers who have been on our mobile site and who have stated that we have provided them a seamless transition between mobile, tablets and desktops to effectively assist them in their travel plans.”

“Thistle and Guoman were very committed to providing the best user experience for their customers. Whether you’re a business traveler or a leisure traveler, customers can easily view and book rooms, and manage their hotel reservations easily via the mobile site,” said Nick Taylor, CEO of Usablenet. “With the rapid growth of travel bookings via mobile increasing each year, they understand the importance of the mobile channel and are proving to be true leaders in the space.”