Over the last 7 years, we've learned a lot.
We've learnt that the days of travel booklets and destination brochures are over...
Young travellers are digital natives and find information and inspiration for travel online. And not just through search engines like Google, but social media.
Bali is loved by such a variety of travellers and holds a special place in so many hearts.
Those travelling to Bali visit for many different reasons, and do things very differently to what we may recommend in our guides… In understanding this, we've devoted the last 2 years into building and creating a completely new platform dedicated to Bali called ‘My Bali Bible’.
This new platform is designed to give all businesses in Bali an online presence for free, no matter how small or large. We wanted to include more than just your fancy hotels, but include the local warungs, the talented tailors, and even the iconic statues you see as you drive to your hotel from the airport.
We devoted thousands of hours to list 'all things Bali' on this new platform, but it was time for the next step. To enable anyone to share their intimate knowledge of Bali using our platform.
Once this was completed, we did a soft launch and then asked thousands of expats, locals and regular's to share their own insider knowledge on our new platform. After 25,000 users have signed up in the first 9 months, we've now got a wealth of inspirational lists and insider knowledge for almost anything on Bali.
We've made the default rank on our public favourites page by the number of views a list has had which means that scrolling through you will see the most relevant, and up-to-date lists.
We did all this so you can quickly and easily become an expert to Bali.
Now with over 16,000+ businesses listed under various categories, My Bali Bible is the ultimate travel companion for you to browse and discover places you never knew existed.
Want more information on The Bali Bible? Read a snippet of a recent Q&A article on us below...
How and why did you create The Bali Bible?
Lani and I love and adore Bali and found we were always sharing our local knowledge with friends and family. Lani had made this amazing PDF document which she shared with friends and family…
All of a sudden though, EVERYONE started requesting it, and each trip we were adding to it and sent out updates and people were really loving the new suggestions and ideas. It got to a point where were getting asked about this PDF document on a daily basis, so Lani and I thought it would be easier to manage by making a Facebook page – which we called “The Bali Bible”.
After a week of going live, the Facebook page had 1,000+ followers, a week later it had 5,000+.
To say we were blown away would be an understatement. From there we just kept working on it in our spare time, we both did (and still do) have full-time jobs, and it was just a hobby we did late at night or after work - we didn’t make a cent for almost three years, but just loved sharing our knowledge and helping people experience all this amazing island has to offer.
Over time, we started to outgrow our Facebook page and needed something more. I owned a web development company on the side, so I was fortunate enough to use spare resources to help work on the project, which then evolved into a really great website – and later a mobile app followed… over the next two years, it just kept growing and evolved into this amazing page full of ideas, guidance and advice on Bali.
With that being said, The Bali Bible was just our recommendations, but it was always Lani and my dream to be able to give people the ability to make their own version of 'The Bali Bible', and be able to share their own ideas and experiences with their friends and family.
After 6 years we have finally created a new site which lists every venue in Bali and allows people to make lists of places they want to go for themselves, or to provide for friends and family. We know Bali pretty well - but understand some people out there might know it better, have a different opinion, or be into different things we are.
We wanted to give people the ability to personalise their own suggestions, and this is what we launched a few months ago – My Bali Bible which is an amazing custom built platform dedicated to Bali which lets people plan, shortlist and build their dream holidays.
It’s easily the most exciting thing we’ve done, and have worked on it behind the scenes for 12 months (and continue to develop). It’s just such an amazing platform, and we hope soon (if not already) it will become the most informative, up-to-date resource on Bali anywhere.
We’re also expanding this custom built platform to new countries (which we call TRAVLR Guides). We've just launched Fiji and are working with partners to launch Maldives and all of the Pacific Islands, NZ and India in the coming months…
Back when we started off with a PDF document, we never thought we would be here, but with amazing support from our friends, family and followers – it's really turning into something special.
Why two years? What took so long?
Well there were a number of things… Coming from a web development background, we wanted to do this right, and we weren’t sure we had it 100% correct from just ‘our ideas’. We wanted to put our concept to followers, and then understand how they used the site we built for them.
Our team worked for over 12 months to list over 16,000+ venues (which was a ridiculouslly time consuming task) - our team did a truly amazing job.
Once we had the listings ready, we launched the BETA phase (a period of testing which is carried to a private / public audience).
We’ve just finished the BETA phase and are now rolling out our final, LIVE site. After undergoing 9 months of BETA testing, studying user behaviour analysis, and analysing 'google hotspot analytics' we’re completely revamping parts of the website based on how our audience used it, and to make this the best tool for Bali - and we’re 100% dedicated as a business to ensure we become exactly this.
We are also releasing an integrated mobile app for iOS and Android which lists 16,000+ venues, businesses and locations. The custom-built native mobile applications will also boast offline mode, will be integrated with the master website, and allows users to create favourite lists on the mobile app.
It’s all taken a longtime, but we’re pretty sure you’ll be happy and hopefully you all enjoy the end product.
To download the iOS app click here. | To download the Android App click here.
Below are a few snippets of how the design of the site progressed over the last two years!
Previous designs:
Current / New Designs:
What can people find on The Bali Bible?
Regarding our social media pages, website and our mobile applications, we work extremely hard to ensure it’s the ultimate resource on Bali and hope we can provide you with a user-friendly format and tool to build, showcase and plan amazing experiences that are available in Bali. With so much happening in Bali and so many new venues popping up weekly, the island is saturated with some of the world’s most trend-setting restaurants and bars. Our site has lists compiled by thousands of people of the very best of Bali food and drink, nightlife, getaways, and adventures.
How can people get started with My Bali Bible?
With My Bali Bible, you can make lists of restaurants you want to visit, activities you want to do or use it to shortlist potential accommodation. Browse any of the categories on our site, and clicking ‘Add to Favourites’ to start making your own list. You can then download these lists to a PDF or make them public for others to see!