Tripadvisor

1. Why do consumers write reviews? Most users were pleased with their hotel or travel experience, so they wanted to share them to others. On the contrary, some write review because they aren’t satisfied with hotel’s service or facilities and feel disappointed. A few want to have a conversation or take it as a shortcut to reach management. In summary, consumers write reviews because they feel that it is useful to get advice from the website and want to exchange useful information and experience with others. 2. Why is Tripadvisor appealing to consumers?Tripadvisor displays detailed ,rich and relevant data for use by consumers in their travel planning. Tripadvisor can guarantee authenticity by examining all data entered to insure that no fraud data. A sophisticated algorithm is used to calculate the ranking taking into consideration the quantity, quality ,age of reviews and external data . So it provides unbiased information which win the trust of consumers. Potential cons umer can use this vast pool of data to help evaluate alternatives during the consumer decision making process.This â€Å"world of mouth† information is perceived as being more vivid, easier to use and more trustworthy than marketer-provided information. 3. How would you measure how â€Å"engaged† people are with Tripadvisor? Can you suggest some â€Å"actionable† metrics that Tripadvisor might be using in how it interacts with its user base? There are several measures can evaluate how people â€Å"engaged†: * Registration date * Log-in frequency * Numbers of reviews ,photos or videos posted * Update frequency of reviews, photos or videos. How long people remain activity status * Ranking of reviews or photos * Interactive with others on the forums * Average days each user spend on TA * Average time each user spend every log-in. 4. What do hotel owners and property managers feel about Tripadvisor? How does Tripadvisor manage to create the balance between co nsumers and hotel managers? 5. How does Tripadvisor monetize its UGC? How does it differ from many of the other UGC sites on the Internet (pick a few for comparison)? Tripadvisor use three main sources to monetize its UGC: Text links take users to hotels which could charge to TA on a cost-per-click basis. Once user click into the hotel link,the hotel should pay TA from $0. 25 to $1. * Display advertising on the basis of cost-per-thousand impression. That is showing advertising for thousand time then charge once. * â€Å"Business listing† service business owner to promote their TA listing by adding contact information or discount to consumer via coupons. There are many UGC website, some have the same profit model, some have different profit model.Take â€Å"secondlife † as example, its main business are virtual  community and games,its profib model are rental of virtual land, membership fee, Exchange fee of virtual goods. ect. One Chinese SNS website named â€Å"Kaix in†,its profit model are advertising,virtual money to buy game tools. 6. Why has Tripadvisor been so successful in hotel reviews? Why is it not known for restaurants even though it has user reviews on over half-a-million restaurants? 7. Can Tripadvisor replicate its success in China, vacation rentals and flights?If so, how would you prioritize them? So far, it is hard to say whether it is success in China or not. It has several challenges and competition is serious. * China is a huge potential market , but currently there are relatively small portion of population travel frequently, and most travel place are in China. International background is not the unique advantage. * Small portion people will choose online travel booking , most of them will rely on travel agency especially when they are going to travel abroad.When they travel in China,they are prefer to call the hotel for booking rather than online. As we know ,large amount of user are basis of UGC website. Without it, i t is hard to make profit. * There are more than 5 strong local competitors such as â€Å"qyer†,†mafengwo†in China market. These local competitors have the same business model with Tripadvisor but are more familiar with Chinese markets and Chinese travel habits So far ,these UGC travel website are all in the stage of attracting user to visit website and