Hotel video guides are a vertical that has started to grow from nothing in the last nine months. We covered Trivop in June 2007, a site billed as the first video guide for hotels. Then came TVTrip, another videoguide for hotels that scored $4.8 million in funding in July. Both sites rely on professionally recorded video.

New comer Tripr.TV is embracing the move towards compensating user contributions with a videoguide for hotels that pays 33% of their commissions for every booking made via a user contributed video. To quote Tripr.TV on how much that might be:

A normal booking averages around 400 Euros. The average commission Tripr.TV receives is between 7 and 10 percent. The filmmaker will receive 33.3 percent. As a calculation example this would mount up to 400 x 7% = €28,- x 33,3% = €9,32 per booking placed through your video. Payment follows 30 days after the end of the month.

It’s not huge money, but it’s certainly better than nothing and if you’re holidaying in the hotel anyway, you can put your video camera to use. There is a few requirements though to qualify: videos must have “Good camera work,” good lighting, video with sound, so original noises are audible, “Don’t just film people or details, rather show a complete and representative view,” and the video clips should be a minimum of 30 and a maximum of 90 seconds long.

It will be interesting to see whether there is enough people out there willing to make and submit videos of hotels they visit, but any program that offers compensation for user contributions is a positive step forward in a broader marketplace which still mostly doesn’t compensate users for their time and contributions.

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TvTrip is offering a multimedia hotel guide with videos professionnally produced helping users choose better the hotels and even the rooms they will be staying at (read our initial review here). This startup hearquartered in Belgium with offices in Paris London and Singapour launched in June and is backed by 2 european VCs, Partech and Balderton. They are now out of beta (check out the absent mention by the logo) and will be launching tomorrow a brand new version of their hotel search engine although the new site can already be accessed.

The new design is rather nice but the key point of attraction is an advanced video player which enables you to access rich information regarding the hotel without having to leave the player itself including in full screen mode. The execution is really good and it is probably best to give it a try to understand. For example you can launch other videos related to the hotel directly from the player, you can read the hotel basic description details and reviews from other users and even launch a comparison check for the best rate.

I regret a few elements that could be easily improved: the videos cannot be embedded (useful for travel blogs), the sound is set by default to zero and the control is not available in the right position. I think they also urgently need to take that cheap stock music off their videos and replace it with either quality music (hint: local hits would be interesting) or even a sexy voice to accompany the images. After a short chat with the team i understand they will be working on it. The site itself is much richer and has a lot of options for search, filtering and navigation. I like the VideoWall result page (see here in London). They also have a map mashup from where you can run directly the videos.The site has already some good traction with a 100k unique visitors a month accross 5 languages. 600 hotels are covered accross 48 cities and this will soon raise up to 1000. Another 2200 hotels can be added at any time according to users’ votes. Asia will soon be covered too. Another startup based in Paris providing the same service by the name of Trivop, recently launched a new version of their site.Video guides for hotels make total sense from a consumer point of view. The question i still have in mind is whether this is a value proposition strong enough to create a destination site or whether this is a good addition to existing booking sites? Too soon to say

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A month after launch, TVtrip has secured another round of financing from Benchmark’s European Branch, Balderton, and Partech, which will be announced tomorrow. Along with the financing they’ve also expanded their directory of hotel videos and added some more travel executives to their board.

Their directory has moved beyond London and Paris, now including Germany, Italy, and Spain. Erik Blashford (CEO of Terrapass, Former CEO of Expedia), Thierry Antinory (VP Marketing & Sales of Lufthansa) have joined the advisory board.

Trivop is also pursuing a multimedia directory for hotels.

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Earlier this week we covered Trivop, which billed itself as the first video guide for hotels. Today, Tvtrip, another European startup, is launching their own guide. Counter to Trivop’s straightforward mashup of videos and Google maps, Tvtrip is focusing on “experiencing” the hotel and location overall before you rent. And yes, the names are ridiculously similar an confusing.

Tvtrip’s listings include maps, ratings, pricing and videos touring the hotel’s different classes of rooms, amenities, and exterior compiled by their teams of videographers. They have a library of 1500 videos, including 25 European destinations. You can see an example here. Over the next couple of months Tvtrip will be adding several more elements to enhance the user experience, including nearby geocoded Flickr photos and integration with Eventful and Plazes. I’m sure they’ll be adding more imaging features as mapping services like Google incorporate them, such as streetside view.

Tvtrip does have some drawbacks, however. In depth information about hotels is great news for price insensitive consumers, but you still have to hop to one of their affiliates for the best deal (Expedia, Venere, Booking.com). Competitor Trivop, instead, relies on TripAdvisor for their deals. Video guides also take a great deal of time to put together. Tvtrip is also only available in London, Brussles, Paris, and Berlin because of the large overhead involved in compiling the in depth information. Trivop is currently only available in London and Paris.

Tvtrip.com was founded by 4 former managers of Expedia Europe: Marc Ruff (former Vice President Europe), Fabien Bourdier (former managing director France), Marc Pfohl (former marketing director France) and Anja Keckeisen (former managing director Germany). They are currently angel financed, but expected to close another round of financing next week.

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