Do You Believe in Online Hotel Reviews?

Do You Believe in Online Hotel Reviews?
Christopher Elliott recently posted a simple question on his consumer advocate blog: Do you believe online hotel reviews? To date, the poll that he is conducting reveals that over 90% of respondents believe online reviews are very reliable or somewhat reliable.

Luxury Travel Magazine recommends these tips when reading hotel reviews:

• Assume the truth lies "somewhere in the middle".
• Look at the overall picture, as there are complainers who write especially negative reviews, and not all glowingly positive reviews may be legitimate.
• Focus on recent reviews that show the current situation at the hotel.
• Take reviews more seriously if there are a lot of them for a given hotel.
• Look at negative reviews specifically, to see if the reasons for a complaint are about something important to you, and also to see if the hotel has replied and shown it can fix the issue described in the review.
• Some experienced travelers even look at the tone of different reviews to evaluate if a review may be fake, and look at the reviewer's profile where available to see how they have rated other properties.