TripAdvisor has plans to make booking personal

The future of travel and tourism will be all about personalisation, driven by big data and technology, TripAdvisor's global head of product Adam Medros has said.

He said the review site has launched a “just for you” feature which aims to make recommendations and bookings more personal for users.

“Our ‘just for you’ feature is about trying to figure out what kind of traveller you are and the type of things you like. We look at your past review history and your browsing history and make recommendations. Based on how you interact with the recommendations, the feature learns and can adapt.”

He said TripAdvisor has 190 million reviews, with 100 million people accessing them per month on the app, and 300 million users on the website.

“The most recent reviews matter the most to people. They want to know if a hotel is under construction more than if someone had a bad experience last year.

“People do an Olympic scoring system. They look at the best reviews, they look at the worst reviews and they try to establish some trends, like if the hotel rooms have mould.”

He said that its scale helps to protect TripAdvisor against rogue reviews getting too much credence. “When you are getting dozens of reviews per week, it’s hard to manipulate the curve. We have algorithms and investigators constantly checking reviews. If we find a business is trying to manipulate reviews, we will put a badge on their page, showing they are doing so.

“It’s very bad for a business if they get a badge and they have to work hard to get it removed. It’s not a common occurrence because of what’s at stake. Owners know they can’t manipulate at scale and not get caught.”

He said it’s impossible for one bad review to ruin a business, adding that it normally takes a lot. “The average internet user knows that bad experiences happen sometimes. They also know that reviewers can sometimes be jerks.”

He said the engineering office in Dublin currently employs 20 people but is looking to double in size.

“We will double our team as fast as we can hire. The engineers working in Dublin are not some side show. They are integrated into teams across the world working on things such as the ‘just for you’ and instant booking features”.

Mr Medros said that TripAdvisor’s data shows that 60 per cent of the bookings are made by women.