Should I stay or should I go?

Remember when you were trying to find some information about your future holiday? “Where am I going to stay? Is the hotel perfect?” Before the World Wide Web was invented, people were using the word-of-mouth, but that changed with the development of the internet. In special, the increase in social media selection and online bookings has made word-of-mouth much more efficient and noticeable. (Viglia et al., 2016)

Since the booming of the social media, including blogs, networks, chat rooms, online reviews, and user-generated websites, has become the major component of consumers’ marketing and communication decisions. The information social media has about their users is extensive, allowing companies to develop targeted marketing programs on social media. Many travel sites, such as TripAdvisor and Expedia, contain an impressive number of users’ ratings of travel products, made to ease the customer information searching. Even though a traveller does not personally know the users that were posting, they view these reviews as being reliable, and that is because those people have tried the product (Lodging Interactive, 2015).

Bowen (2015) talks about how millennials, people born between the late 1970s and mid-1990s, have taken over the travelling market as they are the generation that lives life through social media. They shared their memories, their thoughts, and also their encounters and based on that TripAdvisor has offered the possibility for them to share their experience in a particular restaurant or hotel. In the same time, with the vast opportunity of being fully informed about an individual product comes a higher risk of misinterpretation. Burn-Callander (2016) talks about how TripAdvisor reviews, made anonymously are affecting one in five organisations, which have to pay as much as £30,000 to put right. As the majority of review are subjective, the perception of the restaurant or the hotel can be deteriorated. With almost 230 user contributions per minute, the image of a business can change in seconds (Smith, 2016). In his article, Starmer-Smith (2016), discuss the significant impact that negative reviews, which can be made using fake accounts, can affect a small business with a few visitors. From food poisoning to racist comments, many restaurants and hotels faced false complaints posted on TripAdvisor.

Reference list

Bowen, J., (2015) "Trends affecting social media: implications for practitioners and researchers", Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes, Vol. 7 Iss: 3, pp.221 – 228

Burn-Callander, R. (2016). Bad reviews and online 'trolls' cost UK businesses up to £30,000 a year.  Available at www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/businessclub/11635195/Bad-reviews-and-online-trolls-cost-UK-businesses-up-to-30000-a-year.html (Accessed 12 Dec. 2016).

Lodging Interactive (2015), “Lodging interactive expands reputation management and social media marketing to restaurants”, available at: www.hospitalitynet.org/news/4069404.html (accessed 12 December 2016).

Smith, C. (2016). 23 Amazing TripAdvisor Statistics. DMR. Available at: http://expandedramblings.com/index.php/tripadvisor-statistics/ (Accessed 12 Dec. 2016).

Starmer-Smith, C. (2016). Tripadvisor reviews: can we trust them?. [online] Telegraph.co.uk. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/hotels/8050127/Tripadvisor-reviews-can-we-trust-them.html (Accessed 12 Dec. 2016).

Viglia, G., Minazzi, R., Buhalis, D., (2016),"The influence of e-word-of-mouth on hotel occupancy rate", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 28 Iss 9 pp. 2035 - 2051

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