Stockholm Arlanda - The Locals Guide

Stockholm Arlanda - The Locals Guide

Every now and then this report highlights marketing campaigns launched by airports, high-speed rail operators or consumer brands at high-traffic locations that can serve as an inspiration for airlines. This initiative from Stockholm Arlanda Airport shows how social data can be used to give travellers a real-time snapshot of what’s going on around the world.

Arlanda Airport in February of this year launched a new app called The Local’s Guide www.thelocalsguide.se which uses real-time updates by city residents on photo-sharing platform Instagram to enable travellers to discover new locations through a personalized travel guide.

Currently available for tourists heading to one of ten global cities — Amsterdam, Bangkok, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Dubai, London, New York, Paris, Prague and Rome — the app uses open Instagram feeds to collect live photos being taken by locals in each city. Each photo comes with a geotag, showing the name of the venue it was taken, and if users like the look of it they can save it to their personalized guide. When they’ve finished, they can download an offline guide which offers a map and details of the venues they bookmarked.

In an interesting real-world twist, Arlanda Airport has also installed a large touchscreen kiosks with the same functionality in several of its gate areas lounge. This video explains more about the platform.