Did TripAdvisor Make a Big Mistake in Removing Reviews? The case involves Mr. Ziggy Hussain who runs the popular Ziggy’s Spice House in downtown Halifax (Nova Scotia), Canada. According to the Halifax Courier, TripAdvisor summarily removed 280 reviews after its “fraud detection system indicated suspicious activity.” The result: Hussain’s restaurant was demoted from the number one position in the town ... Read More »
How TripAdvisor Bested Expedia The Wall Street Journal report pretty much says it all: At $6.9 billion, Expedia is now worth 40% less than TripAdvisor, which is worth more than $11billion. How did TripAdvisor, a recent former subsidiary of Expedia, pull off such a gain when just a year and a half ago, it was an Expedia holding? Hotelmarketing quite ... Read More »
The Perfect Travel Website Seeking the perfect travel website is a bit like seeking the Holy Grail. A long, usually fruitless endeavor. But if the perfect travel website is ever built, we’re pretty sure “they will come.” And maybe the website that Fi designed is it. For now, at best, most if not all travel web sites are pretty “ho ... Read More »
Travel, or Refrigerators and Stoves So, it was an easy chat with a friend who knew I had something to do with the travel biz. He knew I traveled. He knew I produced content (videos, Audio PostCards, travel news reports, trends) for our own site, New Media Travel, Technorati Travel, Tripatini, and others. But he was fixated on the actual ... Read More »
Collaborative Consumption: Where Travel Access Trumps Ownership In a very compelling article somewhere in Lonely Planet’s Blog, Vivek Wagle, head of content and marketing at Airbnb makes the compelling argument for “collaborative consumption,” the basic business and ethical underpinning of his wildly successful “places to stay” service and website. Basically, he points, we are living in a world of “social accommodation ... Read More »
Airbnb 101: Using Social Media’s Hottest “Places to Stay” Site By Angie Picardo (with Kaleel Sakakeeny) As Airbnb says, “Find a Place to Stay.” With participants in 34,183 cities in 192 countries, it’s small wonder that the site has become the “go to place” for places to stay. And what may make the popular short term rental site even more ... Read More »
Is Social Media Killing the Destination Travel Article? If HuffPostTravel can declare that the “Old Travel Show is Dead, Long Live the New York Travel Festival,” then we might be right in declaring that “Travel Destination Articles Are Dying, Long Live Social Media Travel Content.” So, when a senior editor at Technorati told me that, going forward, all travel-related content ... Read More »
Video Book Reviews (VBR) So, authors, publicists and publishers, truthfully, how many media releases have you sent out promoting a book or author, and how are they working for you? Simply, video brings your book to life with action and effects, and video motivates the undecided or marginally interested 42% more effectively than print or text. New Media Travel and ... Read More »
Chasing Gold: Do Top Rankings Really Increase Hotel Revenue? Hotels live and die by the number and kinds of reviews they get. Especially on TripAdvisor, because the quantity, quality and frequency of reviews a hotel receives there, determine a hotel’s all-important ranking. Very little is said about the authenticity of a review, but regardless, even a small change in TripAdvisor’s ... Read More »
Will Google and Facebook Dominate Travel? Of course Will Google harness its awesome search capacity, plus its Youtube, plus social indicators from a person’s searches to make travel suggestions and shape travel experiences? And book travel too. We say, yes. They say, “yes” too. It’s widely accepted that travelers are seriously unhappy with online Travel Agents (OTA’s) – the big-box ... Read More »
