This is the first in a series of application reviews - VRM Labs app catwalk. Our source are applications that are seen, claim to be or are mentioned in connection with VRM which are then reviewed according to VRM-based criteria. Suggestions of applications that you wish us to look are welcome. adriana dot lukas at gmail dot com. We aim to one every week.

I first heard about Ryanair Bargains from Fergus Burns of Nooked in 2007. When I did my session on VRM at IIW in December 2007 I mentioned it as an example of VRM-like functionality. I decided to write about it here as the first review for our VRM ‘app catwalk’.

The application can be found on the Ryanair website, in the bottom left-hand corner. It was created and is powered by Nooked and - as I understand it - was intended to shift the delivery from email to alerts specified by the customer.

The original version had two ways of receiving such alerts about Ryanair bargains. One option was to download a widget to your computer, the other option was to enter your preferences into data fields on the website. The first one would deliver alerts to your desktop, not dissimilar to the current app. The second one would generate feeds that you could then add to your feed reader. When there were new offers that fit your criteria, the feed would be updated. At the time I tested and it worked fine. The only quibble I had was that I had to enter amount I was willing to pay for a flight, which for me personally was a bit limiting especially without the ability to provide more context for my preferences but that may be just me. I am sure that for some this would be a desired featurer.

Here is a screenshot of a simple RSS feed from Ryanair in my old feedreader. As you can see, the feed doesn’t function anymore.

Now there is only one way to get such alerts and that is by downloading Ryanair Bargains to your deskop (explanation from the website):

1. Once you have downloaded Ryanair Bargains a Bargains pop up will appear on your desktop toolbar. This indicates that your download has been successful.
2. Once the Ryanair Bargains download appears on your toolbar, you are now ready to receive special offers. When Ryanair sends out a special offer a pop up will appear on your desktop providing you with details of the latest offer.

Here is a screenshot of the preferences. As you can see, there is only one option for ‘home airport’.

This is a screenshot of the pop-up that appears on your desktop after you select destinations.

Technical issue & information:

• the app appears to be for windows only

Usability issues:

• only one London airport can be select, which means that if the destinations you are interested in go from different London airports, bad luck
• application installs an icon to your desktop toolbar, which is intrusive and taking up valuable ‘desktop real estate’

Open or closed platform, data and format:

• data created only within the app and cannot be exported
• format is closed (even if RSS or Atom is used, I cannot use them in such format i.e. put them in my feed reader), previous version data was delivered in an open RSS format

Data:

• data type related to a specific topic, travel
• no data ownership by the customer
• data displayed and rendered through the desktop alert app
• not exportable
• user cannot add value to it

Sharing:

• none possible as bound to desktop
• original version with RSS feeds indirectly shareable, e.g. shared in google reader

Privacy:

• from user point of view - total or complete because closed and not shared
• from vendor point of view - depends on Ryanair privacy policy; we inquired whether the data could be used further e.g. Ryanair passing (anonymised) preferences collected via the app to third parties, data mining etc but haven’t yet received a response.

Third parties and service providers:

• Nooked, Ryanair

Business impact:

• a shift from email to alerts; from push to more pull style communication
• have inquired but not aware of Ryanair using the preferences to negotiate better rates with hotels and other suppliers, or analysing preferences to determining the sales structure

Payment model:

• free… though Ryanair logo is permanently visible on desktop toolbar

Relationship:

• minimal - specifiying preferences on the vendor’s terms and platform; the level of details and the nature of details is not determined by the customer
• offers are not specific to me, they are filtered alerts by my preferences; options for expressing those are currently very limited

Next week: chi.mp