TripAdvisor Review

I visit TripAdvisor before booking any hotel or planning to visit any city or attraction.  It has great benefits but it also has some negatives.  I suggest everyone visit TripAdvisor before any trip you plan!  It's not a one-stop shop, but it does give you a lot of valuable information.

What Do You Find?
The site has everything organized by location.  So if I search for Chicago, I'll find the city of Chicago with links to display Hotels, Attractions, Restaurants, and more.  Everything you'd possibly want to know before you go... In fact, there's even a "Know Before You Go" section where other traveler's who have been there before share their tips on how to get there, what the weather is like, or whatever else they think is useful.

Who Writes this Information?
Well, I do, you may too, everyone can!  What makes TripAdvisor great is that it is so easy for someone to rate any place they have been.  The site is meant for the every day traveler as opposed to the "reviewer" so people young and old, computer savvy and not, come to this site after a trip to post a short summary of their thoughts.  This can be good and bad.  The good is that you have 100s of reviews on any given hotel, and usually there will be reviews written within the past month or so.  You will almost always see updated reviews to see what is going on with the hotel, destination, or whatever else you are reviewing.

The bad is three-fold.

1. Some people rate things very harshly, yet once you read their review you find they like 95% of the trip and there was just one thing that ticked them off.  I don't think a 95% satisfaction rating equals 1 out of 5 stars!  So you have to take the ratings with a grain of salt.  I read a lot of the negative reviews to see if the thing they are complaining about is really a big deal, a lot of times, it is not. 
2. Opinions are not always well detailed.  People will say "we had a great time, we did this that and the other, our room was only ok but my friend got the better room and liked it, but otherwise awesome!"  Well, this happened to me this week and all I can say is "What room did you stay in????"  All the rooms for this hotel have names, and there are a dozen different room types.  How am I supposed to know which room to stay in?  This is where the site is lacking.  People there are not generally "reviewers" so you may not always find all the info you need.  For more detailed reviews, sites like Viewpoints are always an improvement.
3. Finally, recent news shows how easy it is for competing hotels to diss other hotels by reviewing them down OR paying people to rate down the other hotels.  This is why you cannot take any one review for the truth.  Instead you have to read all reviews and then decide.

Photos
One thing that makes TripAdvisor even better than the hotel website is the Photos feature.  Traveler's can add any photos they want related to the hotel, destination, etc.  I LOVE this!  I looked at almost every picture of the Sandals Resort I'm looking at and it really shows you what to expect.  The hotel website will publish photos to make them look perfect, however traveler's will post photos that may show things that aren't the best about the place.  In addition, traveler's will post photos that show you cool things the hotel website might not have mentioned.  Pictures sure do speak 1000 words!

But do they really cover everything?
Well... no.  When I was planning my Naples honeymoon, I found that there were people reviewing local things and there were people in the Naples forum, however not every attraction I had planned to visit was covered.  I found that smaller, lesser known areas, may not have a lot of information for you... but it's still worth the visit because if you can't find it on TripAdvisor, you probably won't find it on the internet at all.

Final Reason to visit AND Register
Besides the fact that it is 100% free, you should register because as a member you can save almost anything.  Want to remember that Photo you saw?  Save it to your trip folder!  Want to come back to see more reviews on those three Chicago hotels later?  Save them all to a Chicago folder.  Also as a member, you can participate in the forums.  I have used them for my last few trips and a lot of time locals will answer your questions.  You can tell they are real people and not sales people b/c they will not say "this place is the best!" but instead give you pros and cons about what you should do.  It is almost like having a friend or family member's advice.  This is great when you don't know anyone who has been to a place.  So visit TripAdvisor today and get your account ready to go.  Enjoy!!