5 Million Travellers Visit HolidayIQ

HolidayIQ.com, India's leading tourism information site powered by India's first travel community has attracted over 5 million travellers to the site, since its inception.

Bangalore, India (PRWEB) January 9, 2008 -- Some time last month, as the team of LLIS (Leisure & Lifestyle Information Services Pvt. Ltd.) was busy brainstorming product enhancements and discussing strategic partnerships, HolidayIQ.com, the website they built, got its five millionth visitor. What passed off as a silent milestone, put in perspective, is of very high significance. An Indian website, primarily meant for and powered by the Indian traveller, made a mark in the fledgling online travel industry in India by attracting a huge number of travellers by providing highly valuable information to them.

Click here for a glimpse of HolidayIQ's milestones.

India Resorts Survey, the previous avatar of HolidayIQ started operations in 2004 with an aim to create India's first travel community and getting the community to contribute feedback on tourism destinations and hotels across India. HolidayIQ has since then become the most trusted and most comprehensive source of information for travel and holiday planning for the Indian traveller. With more than a hundred thousand registered members, HolidayIQ is the largest travel community in India. Other statistics that testify the comprehensiveness of the site and the depth of its content are the 7200 hotels that are listed on the site and the 280 destinations that are covered.

For a website targeting a niche audience, especially in an uncharted territory, this is no mean achievement. "We were the pioneers in many ways" says Hari Nair, Founder and CEO of HolidayIQ. "Establishing an India-specific travel information website was a bold step, let alone the fact that it was going to be purely based on user generated content. There were and there are travel business sites, but there were none in the travel information and advisory space. We identified the gap and had the conviction that it would succeed. Today, the site is practically run by the thousands of travellers who contribute to and benefit from HolidayIQ. We have been a web 2.0 company from before the term was coined."

The industry too has acknowledged the leadership position of HolidayIQ. Indiastreet.com, India's leading online provider of investment information hailed HolidayIQ as one of the best travel websites seen anywhere on the web. It saw HolidayIQ as a game changer and voted it as one of the top 11 disruptive websites in India. Bennett Coleman & Co Ltd, the holding company of the Times of India group (the largest Indian media conglomerate) recently bought a significant minority stake in the company. Google, the global leader in the internet search business selected HolidayIQ for providing hotel listings and reviews for Google's India local search. This is a testimony to the depth, quality and richness of HolidayIQ's content.

HolidayIQ keeps innovating and new features are added to the site regularly. Recent features added include travel maps, itineraries, an e-magazine - Vacationer and a holiday Question and Answer forum - XChange. HolidayIQ is increasing its presence in the offline media too through contributions to travel features in publications like Hindustan Times and Bangalore Mirror. What keeps them ticking? "Ours is a team of avid travellers", explains Hari. "All of us have switched from other successful careers to pursue a passion - that of providing Indian travellers a reliable & trustworthy source of information and advice".    

Visit www.holidayiq.com for information on Destinations, Hotels, Resorts, Home-stays and other accommodation options in India.

###