For travelers, getting advice from someone who has been there, done that has become second nature with traveler advice sites like TripAdvisor, Yelp!, Google Maps and others. But most of the time, we have no idea who those people are that are giving the advice.
Social Networking should be smarter
Is it someone like me? or are they someone with different values, interests and attitudes. I know I’ve seen reviews for places I’ve stayed that in no way reflect my experience.
It’s a foggy area that can make it difficult to interpret the relevance of travel reviews for me. I want to know how much I have in common with the person leaving the reviewbefore assigning any level of credibility, validity or relevance.
The ideal travel review site would be a little more like LinkedIn and Twitter.
LinkedIn uses business connections to help me find people who are connected to people I know and easily network with people in my industry. Folks I’m connected to there have more in common with me than most, but the nature of my work, doesn’t fully define my interests and attitudes.
Twitter probably does the best job of finding people like me:
I’ve found quite a few people on Twitter, that I’ve later met in person and hit it off with from the get-go. I could have followed almost any early adopter on twitter and I would certainly have found a kindred spirit in the tech area, but these sort of connections clearly aren’t so easy for the non-techie. Twitters new “Suggestions of Users to Follow” tool may be a step in the right direction toward finding people who are a lot like me. Until now, twitter searches, twitter lists, Follow Friday advice has given me really neat, interesting people to follow, but it can be a lot of work. I wonder if Twitters algorithm, using people you follow and the people they follow as a starting point will offer users access to more people who are a lot like themselves.
Facebook integration with Travel Reviews
Many Facebook users I’m connected with have credibility and I trust their opinions because I already know most of the folks I follow there personally. User profiles, photos, uploads, status updates and activities give me a good overall picture of any Facebook user’s interests and attitudes.
Wouldn’t it be great to connect my trusted sources to my upcoming trips? Having my Facebook friends, Twitter followers, LinkedIn connections offer travel advice would be much more valuable than a collection of reviews whose credibility is in question.
As if in answer to this half-written blog post, along comes TripAdvisor TripFriends and Bootsnall Traveler Connect app. Both connect with Facebook to enhance travel experiences. TripFriends helps me connect with my Facebook friends to get advice from people I already know. As Steve Kaufer, TripAdvisor founder says, “Get great travel advice from your friends before you go.” Traveler Connect helps me find other travelers going to the same place I am, or connect with locals living there. According to Bootsnall founder Sean Keener, “I can ask travel questions, arrange to meet for a drink, and create some unique experiences not found in a guidebook.”
What’s Next for Travel Review sites?
I see a future where I’ll be able to get travel advice exclusively from people who share my outlook on the world. Connecting all my social networks to travel reviews will take time, but these two projects are a great start. Over time, I’ll be able to quickly bring into focus the 10% of travel reviews that really mean something to me.
Have you seen any social network that comes closer to finding people like you than Twitter or LinkedIn? Seen anything to rival the new TripAdvisor TripFriends and Bootsnall Traveler Connect projects?
{ 1 comment }
