Footprints Maps For Business: Making Local Discovery Easy to Manage
USER EXPERIENCE DESIGN
WEB DEVELOPMENT
Overview
Footprints Maps for Business was created as the partner portal behind the Footprints Maps advertising model: a simple place for local businesses to control how they appear inside the app. While Footprints Maps helps travellers discover regional destinations, the Business Portal helps those destinations manage their presence without needing technical confidence, marketing experience or ongoing support.
The platform supports two key partner features: Destination and Spotlight. Destination gives Koala Partners a rich business profile inside the app, including photos, contact details, opening hours, location information, categories, experiences and reasons to visit. Spotlight gives Quokka Partners a more promotional placement, allowing them to choose a partnered location, upload a feature image, write a short message and drive travellers toward a website, booking page, product or experience.
The landing page positions this clearly for small businesses: “Be found by travellers exploring Australia,” with two pathways for discovery – driving traffic online through a Spotlight, or bringing visitors to a physical location through a Destination profile. It also frames the portal as the ongoing management layer, where partners can edit their listing anytime and stay in control of how they are represented
Footprints Maps For Business: Making Local Discovery Easy to Manage
USER EXPERIENCE DESIGNWEB DEVELOPMENTOverview
Footprints Maps for Business was created as the partner portal behind the Footprints Maps advertising model: a simple place for local businesses to control how they appear inside the app. While Footprints Maps helps travellers discover regional destinations, the Business Portal helps those destinations manage their presence without needing technical confidence, marketing experience or ongoing support.
The platform supports two key partner features: Destination and Spotlight. Destination gives Koala Partners a rich business profile inside the app, including photos, contact details, opening hours, location information, categories, experiences and reasons to visit. Spotlight gives Quokka Partners a more promotional placement, allowing them to choose a partnered location, upload a feature image, write a short message and drive travellers toward a website, booking page, product or experience.
The landing page positions this clearly for small businesses: “Be found by travellers exploring Australia,” with two pathways for discovery – driving traffic online through a Spotlight, or bringing visitors to a physical location through a Destination profile. It also frames the portal as the ongoing management layer, where partners can edit their listing anytime and stay in control of how they are represented
Our Strategy
The core design challenge was to make advertising management feel approachable for regional businesses. Many potential partners may not have dedicated marketing teams, polished digital assets or time to learn a complicated platform. The portal therefore needed to feel closer to creating a Facebook profile than configuring an advertising product: familiar, guided, forgiving and easy to return to.
The onboarding flow was designed around a clear setup checklist. Instead of dropping users into a blank dashboard, the home screen gives them a visible path to go live: build a Destination profile, choose a partnered location, create a Spotlight and add backup account details. This turns setup into a sequence of small, achievable actions and makes progress visible from the first session.
A key principle was flexibility. Businesses needed to feel comfortable editing, saving, leaving and coming back later. The portal separates saving from publishing so users can build their profile gradually, review their content and publish only when they are ready. This was especially important for small businesses who may need to gather photos, check opening hours or refine copy over time.
Previewing was another strategic priority. Since the portal directly affects how a business appears in the Footprints Maps app, partners needed confidence that what they entered would translate well to the traveller experience. The Spotlight editor includes a live card preview, helping users see exactly how their message, image, business name and call-to-action will appear. Users can also preview their Destination, making the relationship between portal inputs and in-app representation clear.
The Destination experience was designed to encourage completeness without feeling punitive. The profile strength indicator gives businesses a friendly signal of how strong their listing is, based on the information they have provided. This benefits both sides of the marketplace: businesses are encouraged to present themselves more accurately and compellingly, while Footprints Maps receives richer, more reliable data for travellers using the app.
The landing page extends this same strategy into acquisition. It explains the advertising model in simple, outcome-led language: show up at the right moment, make a strong first impression and give travellers a reason to stop. Pricing is presented through two clear partner tiers – Quokka and Koala – so businesses can understand the difference between online traffic and destination-based discovery before entering the portal.
The Results
The result is a business portal that turns a potentially complex advertising product into a guided, self-managed experience. Partners can understand what they need to do, complete setup in manageable steps and maintain control over their content after launch. Instead of relying on manual onboarding or back-and-forth content updates, the portal gives businesses a direct way to manage the information travellers see in Footprints Maps.
For Koala Partners, the Destination profile creates a richer in-app presence that can support real-world visitation. Businesses can describe who they are, explain why travellers should stop, add visual content, provide practical details and strengthen their profile over time. This makes their listing more useful to travellers and more valuable to the app ecosystem.
For both Koala and Quokka Partners, the Spotlight feature offers a lightweight promotional tool that appears in context with a chosen location. The editor keeps the process simple: one image, one message, one call-to-action and one clear preview. This restraint helps businesses create focused promotions without overcomplicating the experience.
The portal also improves the operational model behind Footprints Maps. By encouraging businesses to complete all relevant fields, the product increases the quality and accuracy of location data in the app. By allowing draft edits and controlled publishing, it reduces the risk of incomplete or accidental updates. By making previews visible, it gives partners confidence before their content goes live.
Together, the landing page and portal create a complete partner journey: businesses can understand the value proposition, choose the right advertising pathway, register interest and then manage their presence in a system built for clarity, confidence and ongoing control.
We've created a world class experience that empowers Footprints Maps customers to successfully manage their business advertising.
Sean Smith
Managing Director / Go To Apps
