Travel is my passion. I love planning trips and then taking them.  In fact, much of the joy of travel – for me – is in the planning.  Others use the terms planning and booking interchangeably but I differentiate between the two.  When I say planning I mean– deciding where to go, when, where to stay, what to eat and what to do.  So, I thought I’d do a review of a major travel planning site — Trip Advisor.    Why TripAdvisor?  It has terrific content and great potential.  Unfortunately, the experience doesn’t deliver on its potential.  The travel planning category, for the most part, falls into two camps:  1) dated sites with unattractive interfaces but rich content, and, 2) Web 2.0 sites that offer a much richer user experience but are light in specific content. 

At Organic, site reviews are part of what we do everyday.  On the eight criteria we use for site reviews, Trip Advisor scored a 3 out of 5 points (with 5 points being an exceptional experience).  Why?  Great content but poor design.  Read more about the review on the next page.

Before I jump into the review of Trip Advisor , it might be helpful to talk about how I plan a trip and where the sites in my “favorites” file fit in.  Here are the major steps in my purchase path and the sites associated with each step:

1. Find inspiration – I like interesting but out-of-the-way destinations, from Bhutan to Vietnam.  I find inspiration talking to friends, reading travel magazines and visiting their sites (like CN Traveller) and perusing subscription newsletters like Gallivanters. Just for kicks it’s fun to search on destinations at Flickr  or even sites like Google Sight Seeing  or Vcarious. 
2. Dig in, get dirty, then make the call – once I have a destination in mind, I dig in to figure out when to go, where to stay, etc.  Sites like Wiki Travel , World 66 , My Travel Guide,   Travel Yahoo, Travel Pod  and Real Travel , have a lot of good content and are a nice way to make a long list of destinations.  Paul Kaihla, a writer for Business 2.0, turned me onto Escape Blog .  The blogger describes it as “…a blog on customs, norms and cultural differences which could help make travelling around a lot easier.” It has some amusing posts.  Paul also shared Fly Away Cafe. I’ve been there before and enjoyed a recent post on Oakland, California.  Metro Blogging  and Geeky Traveller    have interesting travel stories as does Grid Skipper  which shares gritty insights about travel and destinations. Boots ‘n’ All   has a lot of good content and a thriving community board on locations around the world.  Gadling  is a travelers blog.  I read a good story there called "Hacking the Himalayas".  As I was researching sites for this article, I stumbled across The World is Not Flat  which could be a great destination once they have built a larger travel archive.  It features smart posts on more obscure destinations. Connected Traveller  has interesting travel-related stories. Travel Post   is good in concept but the content is thin.  When you search for places like Bali or Dublin to check out hotel reviews, you get every listing with Bali or Dublin in its name.  My search on Dublin produced a lot of listings for hotels in Dublin, Ohio, which was not exactly what I had in mind. 
3. Plan it –  Most of the major sites like Travelocity, Expedia and Orbitz are focused on the “lower funnel.”  They’ve spent a lot of money on branding and many of the sites you’ll visit on your journey feature their advertising.  You can’t miss them.  I don’t usually use them for booking purposes (for personal travel, that is, although we do for business) as I prefer to go direct to the airline, where possible.  Once you’ve decided on a carrier and a flight, Seat Guru is very useful for finding just the right seat for a long haul.
4. Do it, share it –  On the trip or after you return, it’s always great to share your travels with friends and family.  Photo sites like Flickr, Kodak Gallery, Snapfish, Photobucket, My Life of Travel all let you share images of your trip.  Of course, my all time favorite is Where the Hell is Matt?

So that’s my purchase funnel…now on to Trip Advisor …When we review our own work at Organic, we look at how the experience stacks up against eight criteria:

• Thoughtfully solves a problem
• Focuses on user needs
• Is based on compelling consumer insight
• Has a design that is on-brand
• Is well-designed and well-executed
• Offers great content
• Has strong emotional appeal
• Delivers business results

This extensive assessment isn’t always possible when reviewing other sites, but it provides a good guide.  Using these criteria, I gave Trip Advisor a score of 3.0 on a one to five scale (five being exceptional):

• Thoughtfully solves a problem = 4  If you can look beyond the unattractive interface and interruptive advertising, the reviews are very, very good because they provide different perspectives that allow you to get a feel for a place.  I tested six destinations and got a good number of relevant reviews in each search.  Bhutan has 38 reviews, Laos 16, Guatemala 250, Cameroon 8, Tasmania 250 and Patagonia 250.
• Focuses on user needs = 2  It’s a heavily promotional site.  When you do a search for consumer reviews of a destination, you get to the results page that is dominated by a booking engine and ad units.  You have to scroll down to read what others have said and only about 30% of the real estate is devoted to real content.  It’s possible to delight the user and offer advertisers great opportunities to get their message in front of users without detracting from the experience.
• Is based on compelling consumer insight = 4   People want real and unfiltered perspectives on different locations and properties.  This site is all about the reviews.
• Has a pleasing design that is on-brand = 2  This isn’t the worst site I have ever seen but for one that is important in the category, it deserves a much better design.
• Is well-designed and well-executed = 2   See comments above.
• Offers great content = 4  This site has a superb collection of reviews and good information on different destinations.  Marry this site with Wiki Travel, redesign the experience and add a well-functioning photo sharing and blogging component and you’d have a winning proposition.
• Has strong emotional appeal = 3  For passionate travelers, reading others’ views is very compelling so I’d say the content evokes a strong and positive emotional response but the design does not.
• Delivers business results = NA   I don’t know how the site performs.

Trip Advisor  has super content.  It’s deep and it’s relevant and it could form the foundation of a major travel portal.  Here are some quick thoughts on areas TripAdvisor should explore:

• A new design that puts user experience ahead of ad units.
• A more thoughtful approach to advertising.
• Additional content from third parties to enrich the reviews and listings (think Wiki Travel).
• More Web 2.0 features that enable community building among visitors, like Flickr photo feeds and a blogging platform where travelers can document their trips. Or, as one of our senior information architects – Charles Zicari – suggested,this would be a great opportunity to have your own  Loc.alize.us   for keeping your travel photo album.
• Sample travel itineraries that are organized in an innovative way — maybe like playlists on iTunes.

I’d love to hear your opinion on this site and any others you frequent.  I look forward to your comments.