I can understand an owner writing a fake review on TA, but just asking guests to do it doesn't seem to me a fullproof way to guarantee a rave review. I've only been asked once to write a favorable review for a hotel, but wouldn't have done it if I didn't love the place. Just because you're asked doesn't mean you have to do it. As I said above, perhaps some of my reviews are suspect because they are what some might consider "over the top," but I've only expressed my true feelings about whatever I reviewed.

Fake reviews:
Often contain the name of the owners or hosts (real reviews seldom do) - if you find a string of reviews with a wording like: "The owners, Bob and Susan, were always helpful and gave us advice on where to go etc..." they are fake.
Often contain specific information that I suppose the owner has asked the fake reviewers to include, like "although the hotel is on the outskirts of town, it is an easy ten-minute walk" "There is a bus to the beach every ten minutes" "The fresh organic breakfast included free coffee made from local beans"
You will find that this type of information is repeated in several of the reviews for the same place.
I suspect the fake reviewers have a catalogue of blurbs, and insert specific information at the request of their clients.

Real reviewers, even those who are good writers, will almost always be more rambling and more focused on their subjective experience.

I normally check trip advisor for the reviews that are sort of bad (the worst ones are often worthless, because some people will whine about anything). Also, the nationality of the reviewer is important - some Americans are often obsessed with things like the size of the room or the bed, whether there is an elevator and amenities like a flat screen TV, etc. Depending on where you are going, this may be irrelevant or even contrary to what you would like your hotel to be.

We spent the night at a B&B in Santa Fe in February. A couple of days later, the owners emailed us asking us to give them positive reviews, if we enjoyed our stay, on TripAdvisor and a couple of B&B sites. They said if we had criticisms, we should email them directly.

Instead, we chose to write the kind of review we would want to read before choosing lodging, highlighting the positives and negatives of our stay.

Lee Ann

My practice is to review hotels and restaurants irrespective of whether my experience was good or bad. But if it it was bad or had a bad aspect, I share it with the property manager either at the time of my stay or before posting it on this forum or TA. I think it is important to give a property manager notice and an opportunity to correct.

I posted this on a TripA dvisor web site and had a lot of input - mostly on the side of the hotel. Do you all agree or not?

I saw on TA a poor review for the Inn on Bourbon because somebody had to cancel a reservation at the last minute and the hotel wouldn't refund their deposit. I'm sorry, but hotels have procedures, and to give them only 2 stars when you didn't even step foot in the door is wrong. We've lost money in the past at other hotels because of having to cancel at the last minute and while I hated it, it wasn't the hotel's fault. Am I off base here?

Scarlett,

Like you, I see a lot of value in the TripAdvisor Forums, but unless I have seen the person participate in those, I give little weight to reviews there.

bradleyturton,

Getting people to go to a Forum just to review your business can be counter productive. It doesn't look genuine. I canceled a tour I had already booked last year after seeing a bunch of glowing TripAdvisor reviews & forum posts by people that only went to Tripadvisor once to make the 5 star review.

To your benefit, I also don't trust the super negative reviews by people that just come to do them.

In one summer resort town, I swear that half of the reviews are posted by business owners and their competitors during the long, slow winter.


No one has talked about the fake reviews on Google. There are clearly firms at work there. My business has been approached by them. If, for example, you go to http://qr.net/bgdz and look at the two 5 Star reviews (from a couple of weeks apart), click on the reviewers and you will see that their only other reviews are 5 Star reviews of unrelated industries in other parts of the country. Clicking on the other people who have reviewed those businesses, you will see an interlocking pattern.

More other review sites:

Although it would be fairly easy to game their system for positive reviews, it doesn't seem to have happened at Travelocity. Those reviews are only posted by people who have booked the hotel through Travelocity and the reviews seem genuine.

On the other hand, Rewards Dining only has reviews by people using that service, but overall, the reviews on their site are much too positive. 5 stars given for average food. The people that like a restaurant go many times and give many positive reviews, while the ones that don't like it go once and give one negative. A couple of years ago, they didn't even publish a negative review of a restaurant which I posted on their site.

It is to Rewards Dining's advantage to get people to go to their restaurants, even if the customer has a bad experience.

ccolor, I think you were right.

I use TA and write reviews. Usually my reviews are positive because I know what I expect for the amount of money I'm willing to pay.

The other day I read a review on TA. The reviewer went on about how rude the service was, the room was small (Paris, come on) and then as an after thought said there were bed bugs. Shame on them.

I don't want to tell anyone how to write a fake review but that was obvious.

Good point, cmcfong, and we did that as well, but we got the impression that the B&B owners didn't want us to publicly post anything negative about their establishment.

Lee Ann

cpletten: I don't agree that reviews which mention the names of the owners are fake.

Since I do a lot of research before choosing my b&b or guesthouse, I already know the names of the owners before I meet them. I always email the owners by name and ask lots of questions before my arrival, and they write back to me. So if my experience is very positive, and especially if the owners took the time to chat with us, I always mention their names in my reviews.

On the other hand, you are correct about real reviews often being long and rambling. Yep, that's me...I love to ramble!

If you want to read long, rambling reviews by a real traveler (Me)...you can read my reviews on tripadvisor, which often mention the names of the owners. I also have 1 hotel review here on Fodors, and lots of trip reports... I often mention the names of the owners, and I remember their names for a long time. I think it's because I don't like the feeling that I'm staying with strangers.

The same destination expert from TA that I mentioned way upthread (Feb 27) who owns a hotel, tried to join Fodors just recently posing as a tourist, in order to pump his hotel and businesses of his associates! A few of us flagged him and luckily he has been removed from Fodors..kudos to the editors for trying to keep Fodors free from this abuse. Of course I have no issue with owners of tourism businesses giving advice here, as long as they are honest about their self-interest. But to pretend to be a tourist..too much!!

My account was disabled on Tripadvisor after almost 7 years of contributions for speaking up against the postings of corporate shills and those receiving "special treatment" for what was written. Who's really advising your trip? I would be just as leery of a glowing review from a first time contributor as I would be of someone touting the same resort in over 26,000 forum posts and bragging about executive management knowing he screenname and receiving over $5,000 in perks during just one trip. I prefer my reviews to be from honest, real travelers, not those meeting with managers and given gifts related to his TA screenname. His insistence that this does not influence his recommendations and the reviews are unbiased is laughable. One who says they earn a living helping improve business' customer service and "per-click revenue" internet sites. Suspicious to those who know the whole story but must pull in all kinds of clicks and revenue for Tripadvisor and Expedia.

Glad to see that others are surprised that business owners can be Destination Experts. I was told that Tripadvisor welcomes the contributions of these locals (no matter that I point out that some use it to promote their own business in what is mislabled "Traveler's Articles") but it makes me suspicious if real customers are actually the ones doing the recommending or is it a local owner recommending his/her own business or that of a friend. Unless you know where to look and check it may not be obvious the recommendation or information came from the owner, not a real customer.

I was the lone voice for years about anything to do with NON-ALL-Inclusive travel to the Playa del Carmen area but I guess that can't compete with 26,000 posts touting one giant corporate chain resort and the click revenue that must bring in.

I write reviews mostly on bad experiences at hotels as I think these are more useful to prospective guests. We once stayed at an Inn in Palm Springs where the owners gave us a card with Tripadvisors web site on it and asked us to submit a review of their Inn. The Inn was ok but needless to say I did not write a review as I did not like the fact they were pushing me to do one.

I also checked reviews on booking sites, where only those people who stay at a hotel and booked through the site can write a review, like Booking.com. I always booked places with a score that was high and was not disappointed. You need to read a few reviews to get an idea. There will always be some people who are not happy about something. I think the solution is to read lots of reviews.

colorado wanderer,
I actually like the reviews from the 26k forum post person, as they are putting their forum advice on the line. The 26k person is normally a DE with skin in the game, probably a significant relationship in the trvel industry. If they have any fake reviews to help their business interest, they set up new accounts

Looks like hotel owners may be looking to sue TA regarding fake reviews that are libelous:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/26/bu...tels.html?_r=1


Now what can travelers do to owners who post fake reviews that are blatently false or misleading?

Actually, suzie, if there were a cause of action again TA regarding libelous fake reviews, there'd probably be a cause of action against TA regarding false advertising by the owners who post false or misleading reviews. But I don't think either will hold up

I guess owners are looking for recourse when the review is patently false. Like one restaurant tried to get TA to remove a review that said the owner was entertaining a prostitute in the restaurant.

Some reviews could result in loss of business so it's not really fair that reviews containing lies are allowed to stand. I guess it would take alot of staff at TA to research the truthiness of reviews that owneers flag as false.

Hey sorry but that article is nearly 2 years old. I guess I should have looked more closely. My apologies.