Questions for TripAdvisor’s Hotel Relations:

Sorry… for asking so many questions!

1)      In regards to management profiles, how much should we fill out?  I note our profiles are identical to reviewers, which means:

a.       I can message other users?  IE, the function seems turned on for me to PM reviewers?

b.      Either I turn off most of the profile features and look closed off as a management respondent, or keep them open and appear quite transparent (which is good) as to what properties I am writing for… which causes a problem for two separate owners that I write for that don’t want to dilute or clash with another brand/hotel?  If that makes sense?

2)      It suggests we start reviewing, as a normal reviewer.  Is that correct?  Or is that simply the management profile being the same as a normal reviewer, and we are not supposed to use the profile in this manner?

3)      I know you condone hotels writing responses…. And I am sure you know they might not have the skill (like grammatical errors I need to fix), time, or labour to respond to reviews, or to become an active participant in this “conversation”.  Not to compare you to yelp (heaven forbid… I would never do so), but they are okay with consultants writing reviews on behalf of hotels.  It seems you are as well, with the way you word “hotel representative”, etc.  I want to make sure this is correct before I proceed.  As a consultant, I would love to amicably talk and wax about social media, and the user vs. owner, plus any future plans you have lined up that you can talk about.  Your site is fascinating, and would love if there was someone I could chat with?  It might go through this list much quicker, anyway.  Sorry about that.

4)      Is there a plan or conversation about verification processes or ideas to help verifying that reviewers actually stayed at the property (or that management is truly management?)

5)      Are you willing to talk about or give numbers on your reviewers?  Like, how many reviews does the average reviewer write, or what percentage of reviewers write a single review?  Just wondering.

Please have someone call me, I would love to talk shop, and get a better understanding of how you do things.  Cheers, and I hope this finds you well!

Sincerely,

(me)