KLM launches customizable city guides for passengers

(KLM CityGuide)

KLM has launched a new service which allows passengers to create their own city guide ahead of departure.

The new KLM CityGuide website allows passengers to create their own personalized travel guide to one of the cities on its network.

After choosing the city they wish to feature, users can select three chapters which will make up the contents of the guide, choosing from items such as Music & Nghtlife, Nature and Parks, Shops and Lifestyle or Restaurants and Cafes.

Within those categories, users are then asked to give more specifics, before the guide creator automatically populates the guide according to most popular places and activities for the selected destination.

Afterwards, users can then see the suggestions, add them to their guide, and enter their postal address to receive the guide - for free - through the post within four to six weeks.

Custom city guides have been around for some time but have failed to eke out much of a ground against competitors such as Lonely Planet and Rough Guides, which tend to cover much more but have been investing heavily in technology to personalize content where necessary, and to make it easier to search.

Instead of buying a whole guide, consumers can now download individual chapters from Lonely Planet's website, for example, meaning consumers don't have to pay for large chunks of content they don't use.

Offbeat Guides, meanwhile, allows users to create and personalize extremely comprehensive guides to their destination, although the output is restricted to either a printed copy or downloading the output as a PDF.

Stay.com, a Norwegian startup which launched last year, offers a more flexible free option, providing customizable content which is accessible from a tablet or mobile phone.

Build a free guide with KLM: http://klmcityguide.klm.com/