TripAdvisor.com is a travel website that assists customers in gathering travel information, posting reviews and opinions of travel-related content and engaging in interactive travel forums. It is part of the TripAdvisor Media Group, operated by
Expedia, Inc.Expedia, Inc. is an American company headquartered in Bellevue, Washington that operates several travel brands including Expedia.com, Hotels.com, Hotwire.com, Egencia , TripAdvisor, Expedia Local Expert, Classic Vacations and eLong. Expedia, Inc.’s companies operate more than 90 branded points of...
TripAdvisor is a pioneer of
user-generated contentUser generated content covers a range of media content available in a range of modern communications technologies. It entered mainstream usage during 2005 having arisen in web publishing and new media content production circles...
. The website services are free to users, who provide most of the content, and the website is supported by an advertising business model.
Description
TripAdvisor Media Group operates seventeen travel brands including TripAdvisor, Airfarewatchdog, BookingBuddy,
Cruise CriticCruise Critic is a cruise review community website which also has information for cruisers written by editors, news on cruising and a forum. They offer over 225 reviews written by editors and members of the site, and information on cruise ships and over 135 ports of call and includes information...
, Family Vacation Critic,
FlipKeyFlipKey is an online vacation rental marketplace. It has an inventory of more than 100,000 rental properties in over 5,000 regions. FlipKey is a Web 2.0 site that puts a strong emphasis on the value of qualified, user-generated reviews of vacation rentals....
, Holiday Lettings,
Holiday WatchdogHoliday Watchdog is a UK-based travel website which is part of the TripAdvisor Media Group and hosts user-generated hotel reviews.The site primarily focuses on Mediterranean and beach holidays with an emphasis on destinations such as Egypt, Spain, Portugal, Cyprus, Greece and Turkey as well as more...
, Independent Traveler, OneTime,
SeatGuruSeatGuru.com is a website that features aircraft seat maps, seat reviews, and a color-coded system to identify superior and substandard airline seats...
, SmarterTravel, SniqueAway, Travel Library,
TravelPodTravelPod is an online service which allows users to create travel blogs. According to TravelPod, it was the first website to offer this free service when it was founded by Luc Levesque in 1997, pioneering the concept of the travel blog, which is also known as a travelogue or travel journal...
, VirtualTourist and Kuxun.cn. TripAdvisor operates websites internationally, including in the U.S., the U.K., France, Ireland, Germany, Italy, Spain, India, Japan, Portugal, Brazil, Sweden, The Netherlands, Canada, Denmark, Turkey, Mexico, Norway, Poland, Australia, Singapore, Thailand, Russia, Greece, Indonesia, and in China under the brand daodao.com and kuxun.cn. TripAdvisor is headquartered in
Newton, MassachusettsNewton is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States bordered to the east by Boston. According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the population of Newton was 85,146, making it the eleventh largest city in the state.-Villages:...
.
History
TripAdvisor was founded in February 2000 by Stephen Kaufer. Original financing was obtained from Flagship Ventures, the Bollard Group and private investors. The company was purchased by InterActive Corporation in 2004.
IAC spun off its travel group of businesses under the
Expedia, Inc.Expedia, Inc. is an American company headquartered in Bellevue, Washington that operates several travel brands including Expedia.com, Hotels.com, Hotwire.com, Egencia , TripAdvisor, Expedia Local Expert, Classic Vacations and eLong. Expedia, Inc.’s companies operate more than 90 branded points of...
name in August 2005.
In May 2007 TripAdvisor acquired Smarter Travel Media operator of SmarterTravel.com and BookingBuddy.com;
SeatGuruSeatGuru.com is a website that features aircraft seat maps, seat reviews, and a color-coded system to identify superior and substandard airline seats...
.com;
TravelPodTravelPod is an online service which allows users to create travel blogs. According to TravelPod, it was the first website to offer this free service when it was founded by Luc Levesque in 1997, pioneering the concept of the travel blog, which is also known as a travelogue or travel journal...
.com; and Travel-Library.com
Also in May 2007, TripAdvisor acquired The Independent Traveler, Inc., publisher of
Cruise CriticCruise Critic is a cruise review community website which also has information for cruisers written by editors, news on cruising and a forum. They offer over 225 reviews written by editors and members of the site, and information on cruise ships and over 135 ports of call and includes information...
.com and IndependentTraveler.com
In February 2008, TripAdvisor acquired
Holiday WatchdogHoliday Watchdog is a UK-based travel website which is part of the TripAdvisor Media Group and hosts user-generated hotel reviews.The site primarily focuses on Mediterranean and beach holidays with an emphasis on destinations such as Egypt, Spain, Portugal, Cyprus, Greece and Turkey as well as more...
a user-generated travel site in the U.K.
In July 2008, TripAdvisor acquired
VirtualtouristVirtualTourist is a free, travel-oriented community website featuring user-contributed travel guides for locations worldwide. VirtualTourist is one of a number of travel websites on the Web, which include websites like Tripadvisor and Cruise Critic...
, a travel website with reportedly over 1 million registered members and OneTime.com a travel comparison site.
In July 2008 TripAdvisor acquired a majority stake in FlipKey.com, a vacation-rental website. In October 2009, TripAdvisor purchased Kuxun.cn, China’s second-largest consumer travel site and hotel and flight search engine.
In April 20009 TripAdvisor launched its official site in China
daodao. Since then it has indexed more than 20,000 hotels and restaurants information and customer reviews, and made all kinds of top lists, becoming one of the biggest travel websites as of now.
In June 2010, TripAdvisor acquired the United Kingdom's largest independent vacation rental website, holidaylettings.co.uk. In September 2010, SmarterTravel, part of TripAdvisor Media Group, launched SniqueAway, the first members-only site where each travel deal is endorsed by the people.
In April 2011, it was announced that Expedia would split into two publicly traded companies by spinning off the TripAdvisor brand of travel sites. According to Expedia CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, the move, "allows the two businesses to be pure plays and to operate with the proper amount of focus to grow respectively."
Criticism and Legal Action
TripAdvisor has been criticized for allowing completely anonymous reviews to be posted by anyone about any hotel, B&B, Inn or restaurant, without the need for any supporting evidence. In September 2010 a group of over 420 hospitality operators considered taking TripAdvisor to court over unfounded and unedited reviews posted by the website’s visitors. A number of hotels have been reported to somehow "pay" their guests in return of a positive review, which is an illegal practice in many countries.
TripAdvisor claims that reviews are systematically screened by TripAdvisor's proprietary site tools that are continuously upgraded. Their large and passionate community of more than 40 million monthly visitors help report suspicious content. Also, a team of quality assurance specialists investigate suspicious reviews. Despite these claims from Tripadvisor, more Hotels, Inns and B&B's are joining up with the original 420 properties with the intention of taking legal action against trip advisor for failing to remove fictitious reviews even when they are brought to Trip Advisor's attention.
In September 2011, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) launched a formal investigation into TripAdvisor after receiving a complaint on behalf of thousands of hotels that its claims to provide trustworthy and honest reviews from travellers are false.
In response to investigation from the ASA, TripAdvisor amended its Hotel review section slogan to read 'Reviews from our Community', this replacing the slogan used for many years of 'reviews you can trust' indicating that they acknowledge that many reviews may be false.
In growing criticism of Trip Advisor, several websites have been set up by owners of Hotels, Inns and B&B's to collectively pursue joint action against Trip Advisor, the main lead in this being http://www.KwikChex.com/ with others like http://www.ihatetripadvisor.org.uk/ providing a political lobby group for Hoteliers.
Hoteliers have started to hit back by utilising the web based 'Guest Black Listing' service provided by Guestscan.co.uk whereby guests who fail to pay their bill, damage the Hotel or leave false reviews are blacklisted thereby warning all other accommodation providers in advance.
Legal action has been started by one Hotelier who has had a warning notice placed on the Hotels listing on Trip Advisor accusing it of trying to subvert it's listing system. This is the first believed Legal Action to take place against Trip Advisor by an individual Hotelier for loss of revenue.
Sponsorships
TripAdvisor sponsors the livery of
Mega Global AirMega Global Air Services Private Limited, operating as Mega Maldives, is a Maldivian charter airline established in 2010. It was awarded AOC on 22 December 2010, and its first chartered flight was from Malé to Gan on 28 December 2010....
's aircraft.
External links