Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
flightfox.com
Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
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Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#2These guys are awesome. I used them to get a flight from SFO to SYD (return). It's usually $1400 and they got it down to $900.
Cheers,
Marcus
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#3I loved their friendly customer service when I approached them for help to change my flight dates after booking it.
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#4These guys are awesome. I used them to get a flight from SFO to SYD (return). It's usually $1400 and they got it down to $900. Cheers, Marcus
What is the difference in price really going to be, for what option you choose? I'm willing to through away $30 on a gamble of getting a cheaper flight than I can usually find (and I consider myself pretty good at flight finding), but they offer a higher-paid option and it's not clear what benefits that will have.
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#5My first thought was: what's to stop someone from waiting for some responses and then running over to Kayak to book once they know the best dates/airlines.
But it looks like they take the finder's fee upfront. It would be nice if there were an option to only pay the finder's fee if someone significantly beats the best price you were able to find.
Everyone does at least an _initial_ search to get an idea of price when they're considering a trip, right? And presumably the experts have an idea of the typical price on given routes and can decide whether the "price to beat" is attainable?
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#6My first thought was: what's to stop someone from waiting for some responses and then running over to Kayak to book once they know the best dates/airlines. But it looks like they take the finder's fee upfront. It would be nice if there were an option to only pay the finder's fee if someone significantly beats the best price you were able to find. Everyone does at least an _initial_ search to get an idea of price when…
Hi drags, co-founder here...
We tried your suggested method, but there were too many complications in practice. Many people quoted fake prices and, of course, prices and availability change regularly.
Most of all, we'd rather not create a competitive relationship with the customer. The idea of the concept is to relieve you of all the time and stress related to flight search (especially on more complex itineraries). So asking you to first search yourself and post a price is somewhat contrary to our vision.
We may revert to this method in future, because we're constantly testing, but at this stage we think we have a reasonable balance between customer and expert.
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#7These guys are awesome. I used them to get a flight from SFO to SYD (return). It's usually $1400 and they got it down to $900. Cheers, Marcus
What is the difference in price really going to be, for what option you choose? I'm willing to through away $30 on a gamble of getting a cheaper flight than I can usually find (and I consider myself pretty good at flight finding), but they offer a higher-paid option and it's not clear what benefits that will have.
Hi marquis, co-founder here...
Flightfox is still very much an MVP. We're changing pricing regularly, including the associated copy. Essentially, you should choose a price based on the value you expect. For a simple overseas flight on which you just want peace of mind (that you're getting the best price), just go for the cheapest option.
At the other extreme, we've had a group of 20 people flying overseas, so paying $200 is not unreasonable in this case. We saved this customer over $10,000. One of the experts achieved this using an agent who had consolidated stock (discounted) directly with an airline. This price was unmatched online, so it made sense for the contest holder to get experts working to this level.
Appreciate the feedback; we're so far finding it a little difficult to articulate our variable pricing.
Some people just want to absolve themselves of the stress, some want the absolute lowest price, some want general advice, and others want complicated itineraries built using frequent flyer points. When we had all of those options set at different prices, people just got confused. :)
We'll keep iterating and get there soon. Thanks.
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#8Part of me thinks if you made "starting contests" free for customers, you'd get more traction. On the other hand the other part of me thinks that you've already tried this approach, or at least thought about it. So, which part of me is right?
Also two tiny notes about your front page:
1. I, personally, get really pissed when I'm informed about fees of a service in any step of the process other than the first one. So, I'd suggest show the fees somewhere above the fold.
2. This is more of a UX thing. In the "How it works" box, make the titles clickable.
I love the idea. Simple, yet has a lot of potential. Will be start my own contest someday soon.
Rock on.
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#9I love this idea guys - v. cool
Re: Crowd-Sourced Flight Search
#10Part of me thinks if you made "starting contests" free for customers, you'd get more traction. On the other hand the other part of me thinks that you've already tried this approach, or at least thought about it. So, which part of me is right? Also two tiny notes about your front page: 1. I, personally, get really pissed when I'm informed about fees of a service in any step of the process other than the first one. So,…
Hi Hamid, (full disc: we've worked alongside Hamid, awesome coder).
1. Good point about knowing about the fees upfront. Will update in our next release. Somehow went missing after experimenting with pricing too often.
2. They are clickable. Aren't they? Uh, oh... What OS/browser? Opens Vbox
Would love to iterate faster with more engineers. Any chance we can poach you from setkick.com?
Thanks again.