innkeeping.org

These reviews are independent and every effort is made to ensure that they are unbiased. While I currently do freelance SEO and website work, I do not work with nor have I ever worked for any Bed and Breakfast or Inn directory sites. Of course, they are also in a large part my opinion. You may see me use YMMV, which is geek speak for Your Mileage May Vary, which is often the case with these directories. What works for some may or may not work for others. I try to present a technical look at the quality and reach of each site.

The sites are rated in several categories. Each site is tested in IE5, IE6, Firefox and Opera. Page load times are tested and scaled relevant to a DSL connection (1MB). These are some details as to the categories and specifics used to determine a score in each.

Site Design. This is the most subjective portion of the review. I rely on my extensive experience in this category and my degree in design (told you it would pay off mom!). I look for a site to present itself as current with industry trends and attractive in layout and overall appearance. I take into consideration fonts, colors, image selection and placement, advertising use and display. Some coding is considered here, including the use of css or tables and the w3c compliance of the design choices. These elements are rated on a 10 point scale. Points are awarded for things like:

• Full css stylesheets and w3c compliant layout of design elements.
• No front page advertising for any non-inn entity.
• Clear easy to read fonts, font size selector.
• Fluid width pages, ajax or similar in browser calls to prevent page reloads as required
• Minimal use of flash or browser plugins.
• Printer friendly pages or links to same.
• Clear links to inn websites and availability when available well integrated in site look and feel.
• Clear page titles that are bookmark friendly.

Site Content. This rating considers the content of the site overall. The rating is based on a 10 point scale and points are awarded based upon items like:

• Detailed city or region profiles with travel and visitor information prominent and unique (not cut and paste).
• Descriptive listings have several pictures, details on rooms, amenities, rates, reservation policies, payment methods, etc.
• Weather and area weather profiles.
• Map based information.
• Local area non-inn information, including banks, ATMs, dining, arts, activities etc.
• Listings include contact info, innkeeper names, rates, payment methods.
• Unique content is highly weighted here as it seriously affects the SEO value of the site.

Site Usability. This category considers a users interaction with the site. Each site is tested my myself, as well as another (less tech savvy) party and the rating is a blend of our views. Usability is essentially rating the process of finding an inn up to and including making a reservation. The difficulty of search, the visual presentation of the results and the links as well as the length and formatting of pages are considered. Points are awarded for things like:

• Multiple effective ways of locating inns.
• Must be able to locate likely inns in a specific area without knowledge of the geography of the area.
• Detailed maps available for searching/finding B&Bs.
• Search for specific city or specific Inn.
• Filter searches by amenities, features, restrictions or qualities.
• Nearby Inns or “Similar to” search results are returned.
• Extremely efficient load times.
• Appropriate / limited use of scroll.
• Screen design is easy to use and logical.
• Search is efficient and well integrated.

Site Reach. This is a measurement of the effectiveness of the site in reaching the audience. This is based on statistical information which is included in the review as well as general Google and Yahoo searches for 3 random areas with the suffix of B&B, Bed and Breakfast, Inn and Getaway. A sites reach can vary by region, and even specific inn. They are also volatile measurements, which can change with a “Google Dance” or other search engine change. Therefore, the Alexa Rank of the sites main page is also considered. Rather than points being assigned for specific reach, this is a rating in comparison to a benchmark. Currently the benchmark site is TripAdvisor.com (this benchmark was based on the total traveler reach of that site and its match to the demographic of the Inn going audience). The benchmark may change depending on its own performance, if the benchmark is changed, the reach ratings will be adjusted automatically. In addition, this rating takes into consideration the number of pages that are indexed in the Google search engine.

Browser / W3C Compliance. This is a measurement of the sites ability to be viewed and utilized on multiple platforms. These platforms as standard include Firefox, Internet Explorer v5, Internet Explorer v6, Opera and a mobile client emulator (simulates site use via a cell phone or pda). W3C compliance is based upon a set of standards published by the www consortium, designed to standardize browser code and present a unified experience for the user. While this section is rather technical, it is important to innkeepers as it impacts the presentation of your advertising to a section of your audience. Points are awarded for things like:

• Complete interoperability between browsers with no visible difference to users.
• Mobile integration or support for text only browsing and searching.
• W3C standards met on all content.
• Friendly error pages.
• Page load times relative to browser type.
• Preload browser checks.

Clicks to link. This is a ranking based upon the number of clicks required to reach the link to your website. The ideal here is no more than 3 via standard search method. For example, main page click on your state, second page click on your city or region, next page a link to your inn appears. These links can be supplemented with links to detail pages etc, on the host site. A 10 would be awarded to a site that listed all inns on the main page (although they would likely lose points in several other categories for this same design). Each click removes one point. This rating is significant in both ease of use to the visitor as well as search engine optimization and PR sharing for your website. The closer to the “top” you are, the more pagerank is shared with your site (typically of course, this is a generalization).

Internal Pagerank. This is a gauge of how many pages and how deep pagerank runs on the directory. A well optimized site will have one PR point less for each level of internal page. For example, if the main page had a PR of 5, the state page would be a PR4, and your page would be a PR3. Some sites using dynamic calls or scripted ways of page presentation may not have any internal pagerank. There are many factors that can affect this, again its all subject to change of Gooogles algorithms and the “Google Dance” but it is important to an innkeeper when it comes to pagerank sharing as discussed above. In this rating, every page having pagerank down to PR1 (using the trickle down method described earlier) would receive a 10. For each subset of pages that does not receive pagerank at all (i.e. inn pages have PR of 0, state pages have PR0 etc) 2 points are subtracted from the 10.

Credibility / QA. This rating scores the site on its credibility and its presentation of quality assurance to a guest. The score is based upon items like:

• Clearly presented phone number and contact information for the inns.
• Clearly presented phone number and contact information for the site iteself.
• Sitewide links to privacy policy.
• Site participation in a recognized online security / standards program.
• Independant author reviews of properties (not guest reviews), with guest feedback system.
• Guest review system (with innkeeper response / moderation ability).
• Prominent display of accreditations and ratings of inns and / or site.

Value. This rating compares the cost of the basic membership that includes a link to your site to the overall rating of the remaining categories. Lower cost, higher reach for example would score high in value.

A description of the Stats section.

This should help you to decipher the information presented in each review. It is not meant as a technical guide, but more of a form of guidance as to what the numbers mean and how they are calculated.

Age of Domain. This is the age (rounded to years) of the domain name that the site does business under primarily. Google and other search engines give greater value to older domains. This can also act as a guide to the longevity of the site as a business. Typically, older is better.

Main Page Pagerank. Pagerank is a term used by Google to place a numerical value on the content and links to a page. It is a complicated system that is constantly changing. However, higher is better. For those curious, Pagerank is essentially a measurement of how many relevant and “good” sites link to the site in question. Pagerank is shared from one site to another. For example, if many PR5 sites find and link to an interesting related site that is new and has a PRo, in time, that PR0 site will be “given” pagerank from the PR5 sites, and it may receive a PR4 of its own. This process is far more complex than that (its what has made Google so successful) but thats the 1 sentence version!

Number of Inbound Links. This is the number of outside sites that link to the main page of the website. If you have a link on your homepage to paii for example, you would be giving paii a single inbound link. Your link on these sites adds 1 (or more) inbound links to your site. The more the better.

Alexa Rank. This is a rank of the percentage of all internet users that visits the website in question. The rank is a combination of Reach and pageviews. It represents the percentage of all global internet users combined with pageviews and ranked in order of highest to lowest. The lower the better. For example, Google.com has an Alexa Rank of 2.

Alternate Domain Names. This indicates if the site operates under any aliased domain names. This is not uncommon and it actually creates additional perceived inbound links. This statistic is not considered in any rating, but is presented for your information.

Direct Links to Your Website. This explains where the direct link happens, compared to the cost / package.

Least Expensive Membership. It is what it says.

Most Expensive Membership. Same here.

Notes. Some brief notes about the difference in plans or membership options.

Medal Winner Categories. We have decided that in order to improve our own reach we will be instituting a new medal system for high achieving websites. The categories will be Gold, Silver and Bronze. A Gold medal will be awarded to any website or product that achieves a rating of 80% or higher overall. A Silver medal will be awarded to those who achieve a 70% or higher and a Bronze to those 60% and higher. It is important to realize that the scoring system is not the same as school work. A 80%+ is an excellent site and should so be recognized.  In order to maintain the integrity of the image, they should link back to the review on this site, or this sites home page.  This will prevent sites from displaying the image without a corresponding review.