The bane of the hospitality industry is a website called TripAdvisor.com, which carries reviews of accommodation establishments, restaurants and tourism attractions in cities, towns and villages around the world.   The reviews are written by travelers, and are extremely candid in presenting their feedback, often with photographs.

 

Travelers have become very confident in documenting their feedback, especially when it is negative, and so it is quickly evident that the majority of reviews tend to be negative – unhappy guests tend to express their views, while happy ones literally use word-of-mouth rather than TripAdvisor to communicate their happiness with a tourism product.   Yet the website carries a high degree of “credibility” amongst trip planners, in making their accommodation, restaurant and tourism attraction decisions for their holidays.

 

Whilst the intentions of the website owners was very honourable in setting up its website, it appears to not have understood the human nature of both reviewers and of tourism product owners.

 

Tourism product owners have known for some time already that TripAdvisor is used by many vindictive guests, who may have experienced something to their dissatisfaction during their stay/meal/visit, and then tend to use TripAdvisor as a blackmail tool – “compensate us fairly or we’ll go to TripAdvisor”.  Those tourism product owners that stand firm against blackmailing guests run the risk of a string of negative reviews on the website, and unfortunately one negative review can set off another reviewer and colour the content of the reviews.   Tourism product owners have also observed that in their vindictiveness, the reviewers do not hold back in their abuse in disparaging the management of the establishment concerned, in exaggerating detail, in dishonestly describing the details, and in not giving credit for any reductions, freebies or any other compensation given to the guest.   Guests who have read the negative reviews, and still decide to visit a tourism product, are much more sensitive and judgemental, and could become negative reviewers themselves.

 

TripAdvisor offers tourism product owners the opportunity to send a Management Response, but they have very strict guidelines in the content they allow – one may not say that the guest (reviewer) is not telling the truth, one may not mention the name of the guest (most are written anonymously), one may not disparage the reviewer in any way, even if the management have been disparaged, or if the guest made mistakes or broke the rules.   A Management Response on TripAdvisor can come across as being very defensive, especially when written by an emotional owner/manager, and may do more damage than not responding at all.

 

Something tourism product owners have also picked up over time is that some negative reviews are written by competitors, who wish to slate their fellow hoteliers, restaurants and tourist attractions, to gain more business.   This is a low form of doing business, but is not visible to guests.   TripAdvisor would listen to an owner’s feedback if such a review has occurred, but the affected party will not be able to prove who the perpetrator is, and that it is not a guest writing a review.

 

It has also understood that some tourism guests are offered incentives by tourism product owners to write positive Tripadvisor reviews.

 

Now the shoe is on the other foot, in that TripAdvisor has received negative media publicity about its shortcomings, and has had to admit that many positive reviews have been written by the owners/management of the tourism products, a practice that product owners have known to be going on for many years.  News reports of late show that a number of TripAdvisor’s 400 000 products have been flagged as such by TripAdvisor on its website, until the owners can prove the contrary, reports Die Welt.  The red box next to a product states that TripAdvisor has reason to believe that the property has tried to manipulate the popularity index and rating of the product. As soon as the products show they are keeping to the rules again, the warning is removed by TripAdvisor.

 

Where does this leave travelers who want to plan their trip, and who relied heavily on the website?   Perhaps they should consider the following:

 

1. How long ago was the review written?  Most establishments are devastated in seeing a review, and will address a reported deficiency immediately, if they have not done so at the time that the guest stayed. 
2. How many reviews are there per year/month?  The average guest house would have about 100 couples visiting in a month, and if a review frequency is only every 6 months, then the review only represents 0,2% of the total visitor numbers, and therefore should be ignored. Even one review a month represents 1 % – no establishment can run at zero defect, and because product staff are human, and their guests are human, it is inevitable that one cannot please all the guests all the time!
3. Is the review constructive, even if it carries negative information, and does it praise at least some aspects of the product?  If there is nothing to praise at all, the reviewer shows his/her bias
4. Read between the lines – put yourself in the owner’s shoes, and evaluate whether the response and actions attributed to the owner/manager are reasonable, especially if the product has been operating for a number of years.
5. Check for a pattern – is the same complaint coming up, or is it a rant about a different aspect of the property each time.  Understand that maintenance and repairs are a constant challenge for hospitality establishments, and it is reasonable to expect that something could be operating less than satisfactorily.  The establishment must be given a chance to fix the problem or to make good to the customer in another way, before TripAdvisor is approached.
6. Read other websites to obtain a full-rounded picture of the establishments, and do not rely on one website such as TripAdvisor only.   In South Africa all professional accommodation products are graded between 1 and 5 stars, and every year the properties are re-assessed, adhering to ever more stringent guidelines.  Check with the Tourism Grading Council if the TripAdvisor reviews reflect the property, for an alternative opinion.
7. Try to speak to guests who have stayed there before – they will be best able to give a fair review, even if they have not written a review on TripAdvisor
8. Check the length of the review – the longer it is, the angrier the reviewer is, and the less likely it is to be balanced.
9. Check the rating of the review – it is evident that most reviews are 1 out of 5, or 5 out of 5, rarely in the middle.   This does not provide a balanced picture, and often a pattern of a positive, followed by an extremely negative, review is observed.  No product can range between extremely fantastic one month to extremely terrible the next month.  What usually differs is the guests, and not always the product.

The writer of the Hotel Marketing Strategies blog spoke to Michele Perry, Vice President of TripAdvisor, and asked her for some guidelines regarding TripAdvisor.  Her advice was as follows:

 

1. Owners should read the feedback and should improve problem areas.
2. Do not offer any incentives to guests in exchange for a review – “a free night, a coupon off the next stay, a discounted meal, etc. – is strictly against our rules”.
3. Owner are invited to register on www.tripadvisor.com/owners, to learn about the TripAdvisor tools for owners/managers.
4. Negative reviews should be addressed via the Management Response service on the website.   “…how a property reacts to the criticism is more important to prospective guests than the negative comments themselves.”

Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com