Why TripAdvisor Hotel Reviews Will Continue To Remain Important

What’s in it for me?

From registering your business on TripAdvisor to getting reviews on this platform for your property listing, every step is important. This is because of the platform's aggrandizement due to its high popularity ranking which is only highly likely to increase in the future. Hence this post is a reminder to all the properties to ramp up their efforts to collect more TripAdvisor reviews.

TripAdvisor hotel reviews are very important

TripAdvisor is the largest travel guidance platform in the world that helps hundreds of millions of people almost every month across the globe to have a better traveling experience with the help of TripAdvisor hotel reviews. This includes every aspect- from the very first stage of planning to booking, and eventually taking the trip to TripAdvisor hotels.

“It is one of the leading sites for your travel needs with over 1 billion reviews and opinions from nearly 8 million businesses.” 

The popularity of this platform has been ever-increasing and the extent of its popularity is primarily due to the transparent policies imposed by it. This leads to travelers turning to TripAdvisor to meet their travel-related queries along with finding the best deals on travel review hotel, booking experiences, discovering major tourist attractions nearby, or reserving tables at popular and delicious eateries around the area. 

About TripAdvisor

TripAdvisor is the leading online travel portal

TripAdvisor is an online travel organization that operates a mobile application and a website with a comparison-shopping feature and user-generated content. TripAdvisor’s net worth is $3.47 billion with headquarters in Needham, Massachusetts. 

TripAdvisor is a platform where we visit to criticize, purchase and praise our way through the inhabited world. At its core, TripAdvisor is a guestbook, a place where people record the lows and highs of their holiday experiences for the benefit of future guests and hotel proprietors.

It is estimated that every month about “456 million people – about one in every 16 people on earth – visit some tentacle of TripAdvisor to plan or assess a trip.”

How Does Tripadvisor Work

Getting more information through TripAdvisor hotel reviews

The world-renowned travel guidance platform provides a wide range of services such as offering online reservations of hotels, travel experiences, lodging, restaurants, and transportation bookings. As a travel guidance organization that is available in over 22 languages and 43 markets, TripAdvisor helps take care of your trips from planning to taking the trip. TripAdvisor hotel reviews help you derive knowledge about your destination and make better decisions about your trip. 

What Is The Importance Of Reviews

Online reviews help make or break hotel business

Online hotel reviews on TripAdvisor have become important for businesses across the line as more and more consumers are in favor of consulting reviews before purchasing/subscribing to a service. 

Customer reviews on TripAdvisor are important for both the hotels and the guests. While hoteliers can improve customer contact and enhance visibility through reviews,  on the other hand, prospective guests can utilize this particular tool to make better decisions. Therefore, a customer-centric approach on your behalf can lead to a massive surge in both reputation and profitability. 

89% of the consumers are not willing to book a hotel without going through reviews. This implies that not only do people consider TripAdvisor hotel reviews to be an integral part of their booking decision, but it also simultaneously indicates the high level of confidence and trust potential consumers have in the opinion of their fellow consumers. 

In the case of having to decide between two similar properties, almost 79% of travelers are likely to reserve a room with a higher rating. In addition, 52% of travelers are not willing to book a property without any reviews.

Hence, it has become critical for hoteliers to realize the relevance of TripAdvisor hotel reviews. The greater the presence on the site, the larger the size of the pie. 

More TripAdvisor Reviews Lead To Higher Demand 

TripAdvisor popularity ranking algorithm for reviews

TripAdvisor metrics such as page views, average review points, and property listings when combined with the existing model of Tourism Economics, the Global tourism flows. It was found that when the TripAdvisor metrics were added to the data, the accuracy of the model improved drastically. This means that TripAdvisor had a massive contribution to the surging demand for travel. 

Furthermore, the researchers believe that hotel reviews are directly proportional to the number of trips taken along with the spending. The average money spent and the duration of a guest’s stay are said to be greatly influenced by the review scores. Hence hotels need to be on the lookout for increasing their TripAdvisor reviews

How To Advertise On TripAdvisor

TripAdvisor Ad Express for advertising on TripAdvisor

Hoteliers need to drive direct bookings to their websites. As the hospitality and travel industry continues to rebound globally, TripAdvisor Ad Express provides businesses complete control to advertise on TripAdvisor. 

This helps them allure and engage probable or potential users who are seeking exciting places to stay and eat. If you’re willing to promote your property or business on TripAdvisor for free you must register your business first followed by claiming your listing on the platform. You can easily move up the TripAdvisor rankings by having a great plan for dealing with all the attention that you’re going to receive.

How Do TripAdvisor Hotel Reviews Influence A Traveler's Booking Decision

TripAdvisor hotel reviews influence a traveler's booking decision

After the emergence of TripAdvisor and other such travel review websites, the guests or travelers gained much more power to make or break hospitality businesses. The extent of the impact that reviews have on the decision-making process of the travelers can be understood from the stats that “83% of respondents indicated that reviews help them pick the right hotel’’ and “80% read at least 6 – 12 reviews before booking”.

What Are The Benefits Of Tripadvisor

Increased visibility due to TripAdvisor listing

TripAdvisor is regarded as the largest travel review website in the world and TripAdvisor reviews for hotels have become an important tool for travelers worldwide. Travelers nowadays are increasingly looking to devote less time to search the most suitable hotels in their dream destination. 

In this particular context, TripAdvisor plays a critical role by providing a one-stop platform for helping travelers in every phase of their travel. The type of review usually impacts the hotel’s ranking and visibility among the potential guests and is also open for them to see. Let us have a look at the TripAdvisor insights in-depth which are as follows:

  • Getting listed leads to increased visibility: Travelers utilize the TripAdvisor app and website to go through the 860 million opinions, and reviews of almost 8.7 million restaurants, accommodations, airlines, cruises, and experiences. 

Therefore, getting your hotel listed on TripAdvisor provides you with an enormous pool of potential guests. It also helps in increasing your visibility among the users and, in turn, increases the chances of getting more bookings. 

  • Helps in securing more reviews from guests: TripAdvisor hotel reviews are an important source for travelers to share their experiences with the rest of the world. Therefore, you need to address TripAdvisor review responses, as it not only depicts your sincerity and caring attitude towards your guests but also helps garner more attention from potential clients. 

  • More bookings: Increased visibility and active presence in the online domain more often than not help in securing more bookings for your hotel. However, a mere increase in visibility does not guarantee a surge in the booking. Various other factors such as your ability to satisfy your guests, having a proper strategy to address the issues raised by your guests, and responding to both positive and negative reviews also play a crucial role in securing more bookings. 

Thus it is for all of us to see that TripAdvisor reviews are an integral part of the decision-making process of modern-day travelers.

  • Contributes to the growth in popularity: This is yet another benefit of getting yourself listed. The majority of the hotels do not possess sufficient amounts of money to market themselves or project the quality of service provided by them. 

Travel review websites like TripAdvisor provide you with a level-playing field with these properties to garner support and gain popularity through the sheer quality of services offered by them. They do not need to overspend for marketing themselves as satisfied guests are often the best person to promote a business. 

So, all you need is to provide high-quality service and a personalized experience for your guests along with addressing bad TripAdvisor reviews and reap the benefits of a loyal client over the years. 

Read more about the benefits of TripAdvisor for hotels here!

How Many TripAdvisor Reviews Are Fake?

According to Forbes, Tripadvisor removed or rejected nearly 1 million fake reviews from its platform and identified a swathe of new sites selling bogus reviews in 2020. The latest transparency reports published by the travel organization highlight the ongoing efforts by the platform to ensure users are protected from fake reviews. Let’s check some facts regarding fake TripAdvisor hotel reviews below:

  • In 2020, among the 943,205 reviews submitted to Tripadvisor—3.6% of total reviews submitted—were determined to be fraudulent.
  • TripAdvisor is said to have removed or rejected more than 2 million fake reviews from the portal. 

TripAdvisor seeks to curtail fake reviews. According to the claims made by TripAdvisor and some of the hotel chains, they have been trying to take certain drastic steps to take care of this issue and they seem to have been making some headway for the past few years. 

Here’s how to remove a fake review from TripAdvisor!

Are TripAdvisor Reviews Trustworthy?


‘Can I trust Tripadvisor reviews?’ If someone has this question on their mind, the answer might not be as straightforward as one might think. While TripAdvisor promotes itself as the platform that provides “trusted advice from real travelers,” however, a lot of people might wonder about the extent of trustworthiness of the advice received by them in the form of reviews. 

A simple search on Google for “fake TripAdvisor reviews” might help one have an idea about the seriousness of the matter. The unfortunate but obvious reality is that many hoteliers if provided with the option of boosting revenue and reservations through the usage of fake TripAdvisor hotel reviews are going to go for it. It has been a problem for a long time. 

Why Do Tripadvisor Reviews For Hotels Continue To Remain Important

TripAdvisor hotel reviews will continue to stay significant


TripAdvisor is to travel as Google is to search, as Amazon is to books, as Uber is to cabs – so dominant that it is almost a monopoly. A study conducted on Yelp by researchers, which is one of the main competitors of TripAdvisor found that a one-star increase meant a 5-9% increase in revenue. 

The rise of the so-called “reputation economy” has also led to the rise of the shadow industry of fake TripAdvisor hotel reviews. For a business like TripAdvisor which primarily depends on real reviews posted by real people, the phenomenon of fake reviews amounts to an existential threat. One of the major problems with the surge of fake reviews is that they have endangered the genuine ones. 

As organizations like TripAdvisor are taking various steps to deal with the issue of fraudulent reviews, they have often ended up taking down some of the genuine ones, too. We need to remember that TripAdvisor reviews of hotels are not merely restricted to complaints about peeling wallpapers, and bad quality of service but might consist of far more serious claims of theft, fraud, and sexual assault. Hence their removal is a matter of grave concern. 

However, the massive contribution of the world-renowned travel portal over the past 2 decades in the domain of travel and tourism is beyond any doubt. Recently, TripAdvisor has touched the milestone of 1 billion opinions and reviews. To mark this historic occasion, it has released its newly researched title “The Power of Reviews.” 

This analysis of the content related to reviews on its platform attempts to address the reasons behind the long-form TripAdvisor hotel reviews which are qualitatively graded above other similar platforms, especially concerning the extent of influence they have over the booking decisions of the travelers. 

What makes them different from their competitors is these long-form reviews that provide travelers with in-depth insight and invaluable guidance. In addition, the sense of community offered by TripAdvisor to the millions of travelers who drop by their website each month has contributed to the success and remarkable growth in content. 

How Does TripAdvisor Manage To Stay Relevant Among Its Customers And Travelers


In 2021, in partnership with a 3rd party market research firm, TripAdvisor surveyed approximately 9000 customers across five different countries such as the U.S, Italy, Australia, Singapore, and the U.K. This was done to have a better understanding of how different types of reviews influence the decision-making and travel planning process of the travelers. Some of the key findings of the study have been provided below:

  • 40% of travelers opined that long-form TripAdvisor hotel reviews mattered the most while going through reviews. 
  • 88% of respondents regarded long-form reviews as very high quality.
  • 3 out of 4 respondents believed that online reviews were ‘very or extremely important while making travel decisions. 

The extent of TripAdvisor leadership in this domain can be easily gauged from the fact that it has comfortably managed to leave its competitors behind in this particular category with 100% of reviews related to accommodations being long-form. 

  • Pandemic Effect On Tripadvisor

According to a 2020 GlobalData Global Coronavirus Recovery survey (fieldwork undertaken 2 – 6 Dec), “33% of respondents said they would continue to use review websites, while a further 20% said they would spend either ‘slightly’ or ‘significantly’ more time on such websites.”

This means that TripAdvisor hotel reviews have helped inform people regarding the safety measures and social distancing protocols undertaken by properties in various destinations during the pandemic.

  • TripAdvisor’s Importance In Today’s World

Irrespective of the nature of the reviews posted by travelers, the significance of TripAdvisor hotel reviews shall continue to enjoy prominence with its popularity expected to surge in the future. 

You must remember that reviews are the easiest way to assess a business and more reviews eventually lead to higher ratings and, in turn, help the businesses to evolve. 

Hence, the sooner a hotelier starts acting on this aspect, the better they’ll be positioned to reap the benefits down the line with a higher popularity ranking based on the quality, quantity, and recency of the Tripadvisor reviews.

The usefulness of reviews aims to emphasize the impact it has on a property and how marketing on TripAdvisor can turn out to be a game changer for your hotel irrespective of whether you’re struggling to stay afloat or simply looking to outperform your rivals and generate more revenue. 

A few TripAdvisor reviews with their response samples have been provided below:

  • Negative TripAdvisor Review

Good location, bad everything else.

Rating: 2 of 5 bubbles

By: Sam113

“As mentioned the location is great, but WiFi didn't work, and the room keys simply stopped working after two days. The staff was not able to help in either of the situations. The breakfast was a bad coffee and something that probably cost 50c in the two minute away store. Also it was very hard to sleep since you can't really get the room dark (not even at two in the morning) and it is very noisy.”

Response

Dear Guest, 

We are saddened to hear you did not have a good time at our hotel. While we're glad to hear that our location was the right fit for you, we are sorry that our amenities and services were not properly updated. We realize that you could not sleep well due to the light at night and the noise. We have informed our team to ensure that our Wi-Fi and room keys function normally. We deeply regret that our breakfast troubled your stay and hindered your experience. If you choose to stay with us again, we guarantee to offer you a lovely breakfast worth the visit. We shall also take care to resolve the other issues you mentioned, as your feedback guides us to enhance the guest experience. Thank you for sharing your honest thoughts and bringing these concerns to our attention, as we will review them with due seriousness and take possible actions to improve the quality of our services. Ultimately, we wish to have you back at the hotel as our guests so that we can make up for our missteps and provide you with an experience worth your time and money. 

  • Positive TripAdvisor Review

Great stay terrible breakfast

Rating: 5 of 5 bubbles

By: Janice

“The stay was great, and the room was nice. I went to breakfast before 8am and there was nothing hot to eat. You could make a waffle or toast. I am not sure what else was suppossed to be there but I think sausage links that were empty and maybe biscuits and gravy. All in all great place to stay, McDonald's was just down the road.”

Response

Dear Janice,

We're glad to know that your stay at our hotel, along with our services, worked out well for you. We are a hotel that takes pride in our convenient location and well-maintained rooms, so it is exciting to hear you compliment us on our property and comfortable room conditions. We are sorry that our shortage of hot breakfast choices affected your time here. We apologize for the case of poorly planned breakfast service and assure you that your comments will be appropriately reviewed to upgrade the standards of our morning meal. Your kind words humble us and give us the joy of knowing that we were able to satisfy you during your stay. We intend for our guests to experience bliss and peace and successfully meet their expectations at our hotel, so we hope there were no other lapses in our duties. It was a joyous opportunity to host you during this recent visit, and we would be more than happy if you chose to stay at our establishment again for your next vacation!

Conclusion

TripAdvisor has been a game changer ever since its inception 22 years back. The wide range of services has, undoubtedly, helped it to evolve into a modern-day behemoth in the hospitality sector. However, the phenomenon of paid and fake TripAdvisor hotel reviews has been a matter of grave concern for an organization that primarily depends on real reviews posted by real people. 

TripAdvisor has been dealing with the issue of fake reviews by analyzing hundreds of millions of reviews throughout the decade and by trying to find a behavioral pattern that usually doesn’t conform to the normal behavioral pattern of authentic reviews. The potential of TripAdvisor which has recently touched the milestone of 1 billion opinions and reviews is boundless and the time is ripe for hoteliers to get on the bandwagon of success. 

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Posted on
September 9, 2022

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