Would you continue on?

[scottaj74]

Hi,

I thought I'd ask the many years of collective wisdom and expertise that on this site for your thoughts and/or advice.

I'm in the process of checking out the feasibility of putting together a local travel app for the town I live in. It's a small resort community in British Columbia, Canada and it is on our busiest highway in the country between two large cities. Every time I drive the road in and out of town, I'm blow away at the number of cars, trucks and RV's on it; that and it's a very popular winter destination for the European ski/snowboard crowd = massive traffic.

To give you a bit of background. The town boasts the longest vertical ski lift in North America, has numerous opportunities for heliskiing, snowcat skiing, snowmobiling, and other winter backcountry adventures. In summer, it's busy with hikers, mountain bikers, rock climbers and mountaineers. It's also popular with fisherman, motorbikes and has several family attractions nearby.

I've seen this done for other towns in BC and it worked well for them, so I thought why not create a travel/city app that is specific to this town. It would offer listings for accommodation, restaurants, local services, attractions, activities, recreation, maps, etc... A simple app that could be downloaded onto a smartphone and would provide you with an online local guide at your fingertips.

I then started to get some background info to see if this was a legit idea or not. What I found is that the local Chamber of Commerce has a mobile site that offers most of the information that I was thinking of building into the app. What they don't have though, is an app for their mobile site. I contacted them to see if we could work together on such a project and they get back to me saying that they didn't really see a point in putting an app together.

A couple of things struck me here. First, the Chamber's site doesn't come right away when searching for this town on Google - I didn't know they had a mobile site until I spoke with them. Second, I was surprised that they weren't interested in a mobile app, as I seen it before for other towns and it's working so well for them.

My initial plan is to build a squeeze/landing page (already done) that basically says "This Town App - Coming Soon" with a box allowing interested people to enter their email contacts. I've also hooked up analytics to to the page. The other part of the plan is to construct road signs coming into town that says "The XXX Town App - The super duper smartphone travel guide app" or something similar, but way better. You get the drift. The sign would have a url and qr code that would hopefully lead folks to the squeeze/landing page for the app. Having analytics attached to it, it would then allow to collect information about people coming to the page and allow me to check out the feasibility of the project.

I'm pretty keen to take action on this and see where it might lead me. My big dilemma right now is regarding the Chamber of Commerce. The already have what I would like to build, but I think it could be done better to help the local businesses and services. The town is pretty small and I feel like I might to stepping on some feet of folks in the community if I start to proceed with my plans (those employed with the Chamber). I think a smartphone app and roadside marketing could really boost the traffic coming to site and in turn, boost traffic to local businesses.

My question is: Should I continue to proceed, how can I do it in such a way that I wouldn't piss off the Chamber and we can all benefit? Maybe the reality is that some folks are going to get pissed at me - I'm not good at conflict resolution and usually avoid it.

My initial thoughts, provided that the app was worth pursuing, was to upload info local businesses/services free of charge for X amount of time. Once the trial time expired (6 months or so), I could then offer them listings along with the analytics behind how people were finding them on the app.

Going even bigger, the long term idea would be to expand the app into other local towns nearby.

A bit of rambling here, but I think I got my idea across.

And for those wondering, Foursquare doesn't offer much insight or recommendations for where I live.

 

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[DennisD]

Nz raitvoup ot: Tjuamf O dupvopai vu qsudiif, jux dep O fu ov op tadj e xez vjev O xuamfp'v qott ugg vji Djencis epf xi dep emm cipigov? Nezci vji siemovz ot vjev tuni gumlt esi huoph vu hiv qottif ev ni - O'n puv huuf ev dupgmodv situmavoup epf ataemmz ewuof ov.

Fu ov.
Pu piif gus dupgmodv situmavoup, vjisi nez ci dupgmodv cav xju desit.
Vitme tviqqif up Ifotup epf KQ Nushep't vuit xjip ji migv vu qastai ED.
GifIy epf AQT xisi tviqqoph up ATQT't vuit xjip vjiz xisi guapfif... cav vjisi xisi piift vjev xisip'v cioph gommif.

Zua iwip eqqsuedjif vjin, epf cetodemmz hewi vjin zuas ofie. Egvis zua vemlif, vjiz duamf jewi hupi uav epf caomv e nucomi eqq emm cz vjintimwit. Vjiz'si ucwouatmz puv opvisitvif. Xjz xuamf ov aqtiv vjin vjev zua, et e gsii Enisodep, qastaif ep ofie vjiz vaspif fuxp epzxezt. Og ov aqtivt vjin, vuu gadloph cef.

Fu ov, hiv et nadj feve et zua dep. Og ov vaspt uav ov fofp'v xusl gus tuni sietup, zua'mm lpux civvis xjev vu fu gus zuas piyv vuxp zua vedlmi, epf zua'mm lpux jux vu nusi dsievowimz xusl xovj VJIOS djencis og vji piif esotit. Vji liz ot vu dupvopai edvoph getv epf fidotowimz.

 

[scottaj74]

Vjeplt gus vji giifcedl - ov xet hipisemmz xjev O xet vjoploph vuu. O eqqsuedjif vjin xovj vji ofie epf vjiz cetodemmz fofp'v tii vji teni quvipvoem vjev O tii. Ov duamf iovjis caomf opvu e mihov catopitt us O duamf quvipvoemmz timm ov vji Djencis updi ov't aq epf sappoph. Vjisi't upmz xez vu tii xjisi ov xomm mief, epf vjev't cz fuoph ov.