>> NYC & Company is the official marketing and tourism organization for
the City of New York.
[pause]
>> Our mayor, Mike Bloomberg, has tasked us with creating
the most inviting, welcoming, customer service-oriented visitors' center in the world.
The NYC official information center is the source as the
official information for all of what the city has to offer.
nycgo.com is our new web site, which is dedicated to the
visitor, as well as to the resident.
>> Well, our goal with the redesign was to play to the mayor's
real objective of making New York City the most manageable
and customer-friendly city on the planet. And what we've tried to do is provide users
with the tools not only to orient themselves to New York City,
which can be a little overwhelming, but also to inspire them
to get out and explore New York City in ways they never thought
possible.
>> I mapped out the strategic and creative visions for
nycgo.com and for the information center. So our goal for the web site and for the information
center was to redefine the experience for our users so
that they were the focus of the experience.
When you come in to the information center, it was about
people looking for things that they wanted, versus us telling
them what they should see. The same thing goes for the web site, where
they're able to look for things to do and see, versus us defining
for them what they should be doing in New York City.
In the information center, we have these interactive tables that
allow you to explore the city. So you drag a little… a smart disc that
represents you; it says "you are here" on the disc actually.
And so you can drag the disc around; you can also drag the
map, the Google Map, around on the table. We've developed on the back wall this functionality
to do a kind of Google Earth flyover of New York City.
So it plots all of the locations onto Google Earth, and actually,
from kind of above, you see the entire city, and it
contextualizes the locations with the geography, which is pretty
amazing. You can see all of these, like, 3-D buildings.
>> The Google Maps API was incredibly easy to implement on
our web site and on the interactive map tables. We were able to get it put in within days,
sometimes within hours, what we were trying to do.
It provides a very easy platform. Well, Google has a great developer community
around the Maps API feature, and we were able to access
that when we had any questions.
And the Send To Phone technology that we developed on the
table, where you can actually send your custom itinerary to
your phone, and actually you can print it out in the back, that
uses a Static Maps API. Finally, on the back wall, sort of to inspire
visitors when they come to see their itinerary on a large multimedia
wall which features Google Earth API and shows them a
flyover view of New York City and all the things that they've
selected. Finally, at nycgo.com, we use Java Script
API to develop mapping technology around all our web site
and web page properties.
>> So if someone wanted to look for something-- say, a great
restaurant to dine at in New York City-- if they were on
nycgo.com, they might look for the restaurant through the
"dining" section; they might browse through, like, "great
romantic restaurants." They'll drill down into the specific restaurant.
There's a property page for each restaurant. And Google Maps is right there, front and
center. They can expand the map and plot where the
map is… or where the restaurant is on the map.
If they choose to, because New York is a pretty difficult place
to navigate sometimes, they can send the map to their phones.
>> Once you click the Google Maps for mobile link, it will see
a map that comes up and gives you a lot of different
information. One, you can get subway directions, which
is really important in getting around and navigating the city.
>> To me, the partnership with Google is a perfect one,
because it really didn't require any expenditure on the City of
New York. 47 million visitors to the city of New York,
from literally every city and every country around the world.
So we expect that to continue, and now that people know that
Google is partnering with NYC & Company, this will be an
even greater draw.