I must admit this is a bit of a blow for me as my Ronda audio guide sells the most via GYG. I understand sim cards and hire cars but audio guides too? What does VoiceMap think about this and have you made an appeal or anything directly to GYG? @iain@Brent@alicia@lisa
GetYourGuide is removing several categories from its marketplace and has written to suppliers to inform them of the move.
In an email shared with PhocusWire, the company said the move is “part of ongoing efforts to optimize our platform and offering.”
The Germany-based company said that effective July 31, categories including self- or mobile-guided audio tours, exploration games and scavenger hunts as well as eSIMs and SIM cards are being removed. Vehicle rentals without an associated tour/activity or driver are also included.
Yes, this is a blow @clive. @lisa has spent a good part of the last six months getting us from 200 or so tours on GYG to nearly 450, and there’s been a lot of work to optimise each listing.
I’ve appealed to some people high up at the company. We’ll let you know if they appear willing to make any exceptions, and for the time being you can assume that no news is good news.
I’m not optimistic about this. We’re small fry overall and my guess is that this comes down partly to the fact that audio tours are cheaper than other tours. While this might be good for the customer, it isn’t good for GYG, which spends a fortune on advertising to acquire each customer. If they buy a $15 tour instead of a $100 tour, GYG’s numbers don’t add up.
I have my finger crossed that @Brent will come up with a good result from the cruise company contact I gave him and Travelpayouts create the reseller affiliate system for Voicemap as that would put our products in touch with many thousands of travel bloggers
It seems to me that GYG made a mistake listing the esim cards and hire cars and our audio guides have been lumped into the clean up…
It still doesn’t make sense to me though that a product with 150 mostly positive reviews and labelled as a “Top Pick” is going to be deleted.
This is from 2021 @clive. There’s lots of speculation about why they might have done this, but until GYG actually tell us, it’s all just that: speculation.
If you’re interested, you’ll find a range of theories in the comments on my LinkedIn post here.
This is not the end of the world. The experience is better when people purchase from us instead of the OTAs and it’s not like GYG are continuing to offer competitor’s products in Ronda. People who want to do a tour will have to look elsewhere, especially if they’re looking for a last-minute option.
Is there any official news about this subject from GYG?
I see that some audio guides and the scavenger hunt in Ronda have been removed and only two remain (Mine which was, and still is the most expensive and the cheapest one (AI driven) which is $2!)
Just browsing some of get your guide products for my own holidays and I note that audio guides from companies called TouringBee and Clio Muse are still listed on their platform for some cities including Dublin and Ronda. In fact Clio Muse put up a linked in post to say they had recently made presentations at a Get Your Guide event. Therefore seems to be a selective nature to their removal of these products.
It makes no sense whatsoever to remove the high quality VoiceMap guides and leave 2 euro guides with bad reviews and ratings of 3 on GYG. I noticed that the touringbee guide for Ronda has been published for sale AFTER My Ronda guide was removed… Very frustrating.
GYG are still promoting some audio tours on their platform…
Unbelievably I just earned a 1.50 euro commission from a GYG ad on my Cádiz website promo page for MY audio guide by selling the one below! Sigh! (Unfortunately some of the GYG ads I can’t control as the system produces ads relevant to the content.)
Hi @clive We haven’t had any updates or communication from GYG, but we’ll let you know if that changes. Their process for phasing out self-guided tours has been pretty inconsistent, which we know is frustrating.
For now, we’re still focusing on growing direct sales and other ways to help publishers reach their audience.
What with the latest G updates and the loss of GYG my sales have plummeted. I have resorted to going back to travel forums and “very carefully” aiding people and nudging them in the direction of my sites and audio guides.
I share your frustration, and if GYG had communicated with us we’d tell you. But it isn’t accurate to say your sales plummeted @clive, is it? Are you not up year-on-year overall, with only a small dip in Ronda and much better sales through Viator?
The platform as a whole had its best month immediately after losing GYG because of a spike in direct sales. To a significant extent, they were only serving existing demand, not creating it.
Earning 1.50 Euro as an affiliate instead of the royalties for your own tours isn’t great. Is it because of the choice of tours they display to users that you persist with them?
We have an affiliate scheme with Awin here. Why not link to that instead?
Hi @iain thanks for the reply and I know the GYG thing is a case of when you know anything we’ll know something.
Re sales, I am using just the English version of the Ronda guide and I see sales down… I also get a bit confused in the dashboard stats when I see this… Is there no way for me to see which reseller has sold a guide and indeed where and who the resellers are? (Maybe this topic need a new thread? hehehe…)
$11.55
50.0%
158
0
0
0
158
0
0
$11.99
50.0%
3
0
0
0
3
0
0
$11.99
50.0%
2
0
0
0
2
0
0
$11.99
50.0%
1
0
0
0
1
0
0
$11.55
50.0%
12
0
0
0
12
0
0
$12.00
50.0%
13
0
0
0
13
0
0
Re the affiliate, maybe I didnt explain correctly… I don’t sell VoiceMap audio guides via any affiliate but I do earn a good proportion of my income from affiliate links to GYG from all of my sites… In the case of the 1.50 that was for a sale of an audio guide for Ronda that auto displayed on my own page at Ronda Today about my audio Ronda audio guide… I have no control over the GYG widget content as the system places ads relevant to the content on the page. There aren’t even supposed to be any audio guides on GYG! But the one I sold was even recently uploaded.
Re Awin, I didn’t know that you had that up and running yet… I’ll join and switch all the links to my synergy page about other VoiceMap guides in Spain, that way I can track how that page is actually doing and maybe even add a few more euros to the bank!
