Yahoo Travel found in a recent survey that 61% of people now go online for vacation recommendations.
That means travelers are no longer just searching for a hotel based on price, but instead are mainly looking for user reviews, user ratings and photos.
“When it comes to travel, perhaps more so than any other industry, word-of-mouth is king. Travelers make decisions on where to stay, where to eat, and what to do based on recommendations from friends,” says MediaPost.
No surprise, then, that many of today’s niche social networking sites are built around travel: WAYN, TravelPod, TripAdvisor, IGoUGo, and SideStep.
Travel marketers have responded by advertising on general and niche networks, building their own networks, and collecting feedback consumers leave on other sites.
Report by David Wilkening
