Optimize Your Tripadvisor Listing to Attract More Guests

When it comes to making travel purchasing decisions, TripAdvisor plays an enormous role. Thousands of travelers around the world share reviews on this travel platform.    

The strength of online reviews reinforces the value of online reputation management for hotels as a critical driver of bookings. 

In TripAdvisor’s newly released research, Phocuswright surveyed global users to find out how critical reviews are to travelers (spoiler alert: they are very important). 

  • When booking a hotel, 96% of Tripadvisor users consider reviews necessary.  
  • TripAdvisor receives 270 reviews every minute. 
  • Before making a reservation, 80% of travelers read 6-12 TripAdvisor reviews. 
  • 84% of travelers trust online reviews. 

Tripadvisor business listings require attention to every last detail. It is essential for the success of your business that you dedicate time and attention to it. 

Here is how to create a high-performing Tripadvisor business listing.   

Claim Your Tripadvisor Listing  

According to TripAdvisor lists over 7 million locations — restaurants, hotels, and tourist attractions. As the biggest travel advisor online, TripAdvisor has 490 million monthly active users. Nearly every hotel in the world is on Tripadvisor.   

Your hotel may already have a Tripadvisor Business Listing; you can either claim it or create a new one.  To ensure you have control over your brand, at rezStream we recommend you claim your Tripadvisor listing ASAP.  

If your business is already listed, there’s a good chance that a guest at your property initiated a business listing simply by reviewing your business. An excellent way to establish if your business is on the Tripadvisor list is to check Tripadvisor Listing.  

If your business is in the search results, you already have an existing business listing. Click “Claim Your Business” to sign up for the platform Management Center.  

If your business name isn’t on the search results, follow this process to create a listing or talk to us and we can help you out.  

  • Visit this page and choose your business type from restaurants, hotels, accommodations, or attractions.  
  • Fill out the form that asks for basic information about you. 
  • Enter your business information.  
  • Pin your business location on a map. Drop the marker as close as possible to your business’ entrance as a tip.  
  • Add your contact information.  
  • Provide property details.  
  • Describe your property.  
  • Add your profile photo.  
  • Submit your listing.  

Add Your Website URL to Your Tripadvisor Profile  

After claiming your business listing, the other crucial thing you need to do is add your site’s URL to your profile. Go to your Manage Listings on your profile and click on Name & Description.  A designated box will appear where you can add links to your website, providing you with powerful backlinks to your website. It will make it easy for anyone who views your business on Tripadvisor to find your website.  

Upload at Least 30 Quality Images  

The more photos, the better the engagement.  As Tripadvisor says, businesses with 30 or more photos have 41% better engagement than those with ten or fewer. Make sure you let travelers see what they can look forward to, whether it’s an adventurous walking tour or a beautiful outdoor park.    To upload quality photos of your facility, go to your Tripadvisor business page, click on Manage Listings, and select Photos. The Add More Photos button allows you to make your profile as attractive as you want it to be.  

tripadvisor listingsMonitor and Respond to All Reviews   

Your work of building a top-notch Tripadvisor profile doesn’t end in claiming your listing. The next most important thing is ensuring you manage your business profile reviews. Reviews say a lot about your business.  

Given that Tripadvisor is one of the most influential review sites in lodging, you want to ensure your property attracts positive reviews on this platform. Here are more tips for business owners to use to help enhance their expanded listing on TripAdvisor.  A Tripadvisor user can see your business’ overall star rating, category ranking, and total number of reviews. You’ll navigate to the review section when you click on any of these numbers.  

Here, you can see a breakdown of your online reviews by rating, time of the year a user visited your profile, and traveler type. You can filter reviews from a list of specific keywords if you want to see detailed reviews.  

Here are a few highly proven steps that will help you get more TripAdvisor Reviews:

  • Provide a great guest experience. Happy guests generate more reviews. 
  • Surprise and delight customers. Guests remember the special things you do. 
  • Provide a contactless guest experience.
  • Text guests a few days after their stay that you’d love their feedback. 
  • Send post stay emails. 
  • Send SMS messages to customers. 
  • Create review reminder cards. 
  • Give comment cards at check out. 
  • Do post stay phone follow up. 
  • Use review widgets. 
  • Review QR codes. 
  • Promote your review link on social media. 
  • Add a review link on your website. 
  • Invite them to review the facility directly on Tripadvisor. 

Reputation Management  

After viewing your reviews, you need to engage users by responding to their comments and feedback. Doing so is crucial for your business reputation. Here’s what to do:  

  • Influence online discussion: Gaining control over the reputation of your lodging business starts with proactive online review management. To attract more customers, leverage positive reviews to highlight your facility’s differentiating features. Also, look at the negative reviews, respond to them positively, and look for areas of improvement.  
  • Set realistic expectations: Avoid cheap talk on your profile, and don’t make promises you can’t keep because customers expect them to be true. It will disappoint them if what they get in real life doesn’t match what they see on your profile.  
  • Maximize efforts: Ensure all your team members work together towards maintaining a solid reputation. Everyone should know they’re a crucial part of the overall customer experience.  
  • Start now: Don’t wait until later to take control of your reputation management. The sooner you start making changes, the better the outcome. Customers always look at business reviews, and especially so in lodging, to find a reason to pick one property over the other. You want to be that business they choose to select.  

Update the Profile Seasonally  

Take and post photos of your hotel during all seasons so that people can look at how your hotel looks when they are thinking of visiting. Your guests will be happy to know what to expect at what time of the year.  

Final Thoughts  

Tripadvisor for hotels is a huge advantage for the entire hospitality industry. You can use it to share positive reviews on social media and all of your other marketing channels.  

A top-notch business profile on Tripadvisor could mean a lot of business for your establishment. The vast majority of travelers rely on the information they find on review sites to help decide whether to visit a place or not.  

The secret to having a strong Tripadvisor profile is a robust review portfolio. The tips above can start you off. You can also entrust professionals to help you with the entire process. If you think you could benefit from some expert support, rezStream would be delighted to help you build a high-performing Tripadvisor profile. Contact us to schedule a demo before you make any commitments. 

If you liked this article, you may enjoy these additional topics.    

 

 

Published: October 5, 2022