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My name is Kristian, and I am recent graduate from the Design Products Master course at the Royal College of Art in London.
For my final project I designed „Ping“. Ping is a tool that improves the experience for absent hosts who are renting our their flats and their visiting guests. Using Ping hosts are able to prepare a digital and interactive guide book for a more personal communication. Physical touchpoints („Pings“) around the flat allow guests an entry into the guide book by tapping them with their smartphone. Where further feedback is required, guests are able to directly communicate with their hosts through a built-in messaging system or a voice call option.
Beyond information about the flat itself, the system allows hosts to enter information about their favourite places, restaurants, cafés etc. around the flat.
Please follow the link for an introductory movie:
You can find more information on the website:
Since I am working on getting the project to the market and commercialise it, I would be keen on getting your feedback / thoughts on it. Would you use Ping as a host in your home? What are you missing? And what would be the price you would be willing to pay for a set of three „Pings“ / touchpoints?
Ooh, nice idea. So guests need to download the app right?
Feedback regarding the promo vid: the music is a little TOO upbeat. In my (professional) opinion it should be cheerful, yes, but a little more relaxed to convey how easy it is to use your product. The music is a bit too goofy at the moment.
Another thought - ping allows guests to contact hosts yes? But can this be linked to the Airbnb messaging system? One piece of advice that often comes up on this forum is that “issues” should be dealt with via the Airbnb messaging system so that there is a (virtual) paper trail in the event of things escalating. It’d be good to see this as an option I think.
And how about offering some kind of translation service?
Do you maybe know other solutions similar to Ping? I’ve been thinking about installing something like that (but rather with QR codes not NFC) in my place for the guests to provide them with all necessary info during their stay. So they don’t have to text me every single time with typical questions e.g. what time is the checkout, etc.
