There aren’t many websites devoted to talking about sharing economy services, a space I obviously find quite interesting. So I’ve been paying close attention to Compare & Share, a site that describes itself as “the comparison site for sharing”
Of particular interest to me is their directory of sharing economy companies, which is significantly more broad than my sharing economy travel database and house swap listings, as they attempt to cover all of the sharing economy services out there. Probably a result of the breadth of verticals they cover, Compare and Share doesn’t have an entirely comprehensive list of the travel-related sites that I focus on, but if you want a broader search tool for sharing economy services, this is a good resource.
Compare and Share’s launch of transportation and accommodation search functionality lines up with my observation that there is significant interest in using sharing economy services for travel. On the lodging front they are offering a metasearch engine similar to other peer to peer rental lodging metasearch sites. Compare and Share currently aggregates across seven rental sites (see logos here for complete list). For transportation their search engine includes both ridesharing sites and peer to peer rentals, a unique and very useful combination that I haven’t seen anywhere else.
In both lodging and transportation the search results from Compare and Share are still somewhat limited. The lodging metasearch is not yet as comprehensive as can be found in other similar sites. And the transportation search has great coverage in the UK but limited results in other countries. But as the only website with both a listing and a search engine across a range of sharing economy services, Compare and Share is positioned to have a big impact on peer to peer travel with the resources and connections to deliver comprehensive searches in the future.
Recently I had the opportunity to talk with their Digital Marketing Manager, Blanca Balaguer, about the goals and content of Compare & Share.
ShareTraveler: When I first came across Compare & Share you just had a directory of sharing economy businesses. It looks like you have focused more recently on the travel industry with both lodging and transportation searching engines. Is this a change in direction?
Blanca Balaguer: Not at all! We’re a small start up, things take time! Our vision is to create a gateway for a sharing lifestyle, a place where you can find all things sharing, compare prices and book. We started with the transport vertical (car sharing), then we launched accommodation (1.4 million properties all over the world) and today we are launching food (meal sharing). The idea is to build verticals/categories that give you access to the entire lifestyle.
ST: Can you tell me what are the next few verticals we can look forward to seeing?
Blanca: We’re focusing on accommodation, transport and food for now, and investigating what could come next.
ST: Your accommodations search engine looks across multiple peer to peer lodging sites, can you tell me more about this?
Blanca: We’re an aggregator of the Sharing Economy so what we do is establish partnerships with many different companies and import their data so we can offer the user a comparison of their services. We are constantly working on new partnerships to offer users range of choice, so it’s work in progress.
ST: For your transportation search, it looks like you can both rent cars and find rideshares on there. What sites does this search across? Are you able to do metasearching on ridesharing sites like BlaBlaCar?
Blanca: We currently aggregate rides from Liftshare, Freewheelers, BlaBlaCar, Gocarshare, City Car Club and Zipcar. In our members-area (free to register), we also offer additional discounts that you can apply to your bookings.
ST: Your directory service has evolved since I first played around with it: the categories are more specific and the listings appear to be more accurate. How do you source this data?
Blanca: The Directory is at the heart of what we do. It is the most comprehensive Sharing Economy Directory out there – but it’s also a work in progress. There are so many companies emerging in the collaborative economy arena, we’re constantly updating it. We source the data manually. We connect with companies through social media and offer them a platform where they can connect with customers – all free.