
Travels&Guides Proposal - TravelAndGuides
We want to launch a website and an app to help you to travel in a cost effective way.<p>Our application will be able to connect you with local guides in any country. Thanks to this solution, everyone can share its culture, discover a new environment, new habits according to its centers of interest, in a cost-effective way.<p>This service will be based on the UBER model, because the guides could be professionnal or not. It could be students, active people, retired persons, ...<p>We want to target the students with a low budget, the families, and retired person (in couple or in group)<p>What do you think about this idea?
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brudgers
A. I would suggest targeting people with ample budgets rather than low budgets
because this allows higher prices. The benefit of higher price is:

    
    
      1. More money for development.
      2. A willingness to pay a meaningful price 
         is better validation of the idea and concept.
      3. Charging money is what businesses do.
    

B. Launching a website is not the first step in building this sort of
business. The first step is to implement the guide service. Probably by
serving as a guide yourself.

    
    
      1. It will provide first hand experience with
         traveling customers.
      2. It will provide first hand experience regarding
         the needs of guides.
      3. It will provide first hand experience with processing
         payments.
    

C. Compared to Uber, a guide service has long running transations (on the
order of days). One of the engineering challenges Uber has faced is that in
computing terms it's transactions are very long running though they complete
in minutes.

D. Quality of a tour guide is highly subjective and good tour guides are not
nearly as fungible as competent drivers. Uber's rating system reflects the
ease with which driver's are replaceable.

Good luck.

