Understanding Google My Business & Local Search
TripAdvisor Continuing to Limit Reviews in Google Places
Over the weekend, we reported that TripAdvisor reviews, while not showing up in UK, were returning to US listings. Apparently, it is just a fluke as TNooz reports that TripAdvisor is continuing their restrictions on Google using Reviews in Places. From TNooz and TA:
“Despite the rumours, we are continuing to restrict TripAdvisor content on Google Places as we don’t think it benefits users at this time with the experience of selecting the right hotel.”
The company adds that it is in “constant discussions” with Google – details of which are not disclosed.
TripAdvisor has also responded directly to my query; “There are reports of reviews showing in the US but NOT in the UK….Has there been any change in position? Are you still not allowing your reviews back into Google?”
Mike,
There has been no change in position. We are continuing to limit the TripAdvisor content on Google Places at this time, as we don’t think it benefits users with the experience of selecting the right hotel.
Amelie
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Comments
10 Comments
Hey Mike,
How do you think they are doing this? I am thinking they have some kind of trusted feed relationship which they are turning off. I don’t see any robots commands on their site that would stop GOOG from picking up the content.
@Andrew
I assume that TripAdvisor, like CitySearch, has a direct feed of some sort… perhaps with time to live of some sort so that over time the reviews we are seeing will disappear if they don’t come to some agreement…
Well if CitySearch has a direct feed I wonder why one of my smb’s has seen its CitySearch revu’s go missing for about 1 week.
Geez: Real reviews, real people, real sentiment.
I am sure it will only be a matter of time before TripAdvisor see that they are simply allowing their competitors reviews (snippets) to become much more prominent on Google.
The bigger sites have direct feeds (I used to work for one of them).
Tripadvisor reviews appear to be be back up in the UK, at least for my primary listing. They dropped out of the review count for a week or so, but fortunately they are showing again.
@Derek
Who knows what their intent is…. my sense is that they are just prepping for bigger wars… and this was a shot across the bow
@Dan
Thanks… would love to hear more!
@Claire
It comes, it goes, glad to hear that they are back for you… I assume given the PR statement that we might see more intermittent losses but who knows what they are thinking.
I said yesterday that I was surprised that people were saying that there was some kind of resolution:
http://tripadvisorwatch.wordpress.com/2010/12/14/tripadvisor-reviews-are-not-back/
Well done for getting TA to confirm it 🙂
Phil
At this point I wish Tripadvisor would continue blocking Google as there are many mistakes on google’s end.
Google is pulling a bad hotel review and showing in a music school places page. That is misleading users and hence decreasing the CTR. It’s been reported in the google places forums but seems that google doesn’t read it. http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Places/thread?tid=21752b5af96e8173&hl=en
Hi Mike – I’ve just has a client who’s business has been in operation for more than 50 years, and had a significant amount of reviews from TripAdvisor.co.uk. As a consequence, their place listing has dropped about 15 spots, and any trace of their listing on TripAdvisor.co.uk has vanished. There are still traces of referencing from surrounding businesses.
Didn’t realize how much reviews from TripAdvisor were worth, and for them to drop a legitimate business out of their index (that’s been there for years) is reflecting poor management. As you can tell, I’m not pleased as we’ve done a significant offline campaign to generate reviews from this site at store level.
Any ideas of another directory that successfully merges with Local and has the same strength of tripadvisor?
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