Holidaynights site pitches Mr Cheap v Mrs Nice

The On Holiday Group’s new Holidaynights site claims to integrate 10 million user reviews into its search system.

The On Holiday Group’s new look Holidaynights site claims to integrate 10 million user reviews into its search system.

The hotel booking site, at holidaynights.co.uk, now enables customers to search by price and user review at the same time.

The online agency, built in conjunction with technology partner RateGain, allows consumers to filter search results by price and view the aggregated score achieved by properties across external review sites.

The site revolves around cartoon characters Mr Cheap and Mrs Nice and their preferences for budget and quality respectively. The characters were modelled on members of the team: design consultant Steve Forbes and social networking manager Sophie Manning.

Chief executive Steve Endacott said: “What started as playful banter turned into a great way of explaining the new search tools we were implementing.

“For example, on the homepage we have a price calendar with a slider illustrating the battle between Mrs Nice, who wants the best reviewed accommodation, and Mr Cheap, who just wants the cheapest thing available.

“I am sure this battle goes on all the time in the real world and it went down very well in our user-group testing.”

Mrs Nice and Mr Cheap will now feature heavily in Holidaynights email campaigns and social networking campaigns on Facebook and Twitter.