If you’re wondering how to edit a Tripadvisor review, or how to respond to one, you’ve come to the right place. In this guide, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know about reviews on the popular online platform.
Why are Tripadvisor Reviews important for a company?
Tripadvisor reviews are essential for growing and established companies because they help develop customer loyalty and make it easier to reach more people.
Many consumers these days place a lot of stock in online reviews before making a purchase decision, so it would be naive for a business-owner to dismiss the free marketing power they can provide.
Can You Edit Tripadvisor Reviews?
Unfortunately, as of the time of writing, it isn’t possible to edit Tripadvisor reviews. However, what you can do to retract something you wrote, is delete the original review and type it up again.
How to Edit Tripadvisor Reviews?
To edit Tripadvisor reviews, all you have to do is the following:
- Head to your profile on the Tripadvisor website
- Find the review you posted and click on the three ellipses in the top right corner
- Click the ‘delete’ button, and now you will be able to leave a new review in its place.
What else should you think about?
There are other factors to consider with regards to Tripadvisor reviews, so if you’re keen to learn more about them and how they can help your business or help you find the right business for you, read on.
How to Respond to Tripadvisor Reviews?
Responding well to Tripadvisor reviews can have a hugely positive impact on your business’ reputation, as new customers will see you as a company that engages with and adapts to constructive feedback.
This can influence prospective consumers’ purchase decisions regarding the products and services you offer, so it’s worth knowing the best ways to respond.
In a nutshell: the more you engage with customers and respond to the reviews they leave, the better off your business will be.
Drawing in vast numbers of views, Tripadvisor is an excellent tool for your business, provided that you first register with the Management Center of the website.
Once registered and approved Tripadvisor, you can start to manage your business’ profile by heading to the ‘Your Business’ tab in the top right corner of the Management Center page.
From there, you can easily respond to user reviews. Here’s how to do it in 3 simple steps:
- Open the ‘Reviews’ tab and click ‘Respond to Reviews.’
- Locate the Tripadvisor review you’d like to respond to, and click on it. You can find the most relevant, current reviews by filtering them by date, rating, and title.
- Now, simply write your response in the text box, and then click the ‘submit’ button when you are ready to post it.
Before you respond, though, first have a quick read of the website’s Management Center Guidelines.
What are the Best Ways to Respond Well to Tripadvisor Reviews?
To give you a good idea of how you can respond to different reviews left by customers, both positive and negative, we’ll take a look at some of the most effective ways to reply, as seen on Tripadvisor.
Responding to Specific Complaints
The best way to get off to a good start is by thanking the customer for leaving a review.
After this, one approach you can take is to respond to specific complaints made in the review, so the customer feels satisfied you have addressed their issue/s.
If their experience wasn’t up to your company’s standards, you can dig into the reasons for this and ask how you can improve it for next time.
You should also mention how you will go about fixing the issue, or at least that you’re working on it.
Seek First to Understand
Seek first to understand before being understood.
This age-old advice is useful for responding to Tripadvisor reviews, as if there’s anything a customer wants to hear from a business, it’s that they have truly understood what the issue is.
Understanding the issue implies that you as the company have taken the time to read through the review and think about it before responding.
State your understanding of the issue clearly as you respond, and then you can go from there.
Be Prompt
The sooner you respond to a review that’s been left, the better.
If customers can see that you have made it a priority to respond to user reviews, they will know that you’re serious about providing the best customer service.
Demonstrate Professionalism
Even if something goes catastrophically wrong for the customer, or their review is full of only negatives, it’s crucial that you maintain a sense of professionalism.
If you prove to customers that you can respond in a professional manner and that you will take the criticisms to heart in order to improve the experience you offer, then it’s harder for them to stay angry or frustrated with you.
Be Grateful
By remembering to thank the customer who left the review, regardless of whether it was positive or negative, they will surely appreciate it.
Praise the Customer
This shouldn’t be overdone, but praising the customer is a great way to invite more reviews.
A simple comment such as how you appreciate their feedback or how clean they kept the room, for example, is enough to build trust and contentment among your customer base.
Prioritize the Positive
If you have plenty of positive reviews, then you should bring attention to them as much as possible.
This will create a better first impression of your business to new customers.
Provide Solutions
While it’s good to both thank the customer and apologize to them, they are more likely to feel truly satisfied unless you provide a solution to their issue.
Speak to the specific problems they wish to bring to your attention, and address them as best you can.
Keep Calm
The worst thing you can do for your company’s reputation is fly off the handle and respond to a negative review in a petulant or dismissive manner.
Address Even the Positive Reviews
Yes, while most of your responses will likely be to the negative reviews, you should still try to reply to some positive ones too.
You can, of course, express gratitude for the praise heaped on your company by the user, and then go a step further to pick out any constructive criticism in there and address it.
This way, any new consumers who read your reviews can see that you operate with the highest standards and are concerned with all feedback regardless of its significance.
Quickly Identify Negative Reviews
As much as the quality of your response is important, so is the speed.
If you have a damning negative review that is left to sit unanswered for a day or two, it can damage your reputation so much more than if you were to respond soon after it was posted.
This is especially true for companies that offer a premium service since if even the slightest thing goes wrong for a customer, that can be a good enough reason for them to slate you in a review.
Use the Right Software
Responding to Tripadvisor reviews can be a very time-consuming pursuit for any business.
With that in mind, if you can’t afford to spend time responding to reviews regularly, then consider investing in some software that can make it easier for you to do so.
How Not to Respond?
Just as much as it’s important to know how to respond well, it’s also good to know how not to react to Tripadvisor reviews.
A lousy company response to a review can do so much harm to your reputation. More, in fact, than the bad review, you’re responding to.
Don’t Criticise the Review
The last thing you want to do when responding to a user review on Tripadvisor is to criticize them for their grammar, spelling, or anything else for that matter.
Even if you are 100% correct in what you say, this won’t help your business at all. And the worst-case scenario is that you stand to lose future business since people don’t like to be criticized by anyone.
While you may be a perfectly nice person and someone who would never say anything disparaging of someone else, we can all reach a breaking point.
We’ve all had moments when we succumb to anger or frustration, especially when dealing with a person or situation we think is unfair.
In these moments, you have to make sure you’re nowhere near a keyboard and don’t try to respond to reviews.
If reading through negative reviews makes you seethe with anger, and feels like a personal insult, then you should either delegate the role of replying to someone else or take a moment to respond in a calm and composed manner.
Don’t Insult the User
If you or the person replying to the review came into contact with the one behind it, the last thing you want to do is pass comments on them.
Even if they were drunk and mainly at fault for the unsatisfactory experience they claimed to have with your business, you can’t stoop to the level of insulting them.
There’s often no way back once you’ve insulted a customer, so this is non-negotiable.
Your reputation will be dented if it does happen, which can be very damaging if you have a smaller business.
Why is it important to Respond to Reviews?
If you don’t already respond to Tripadvisor reviews left by previous customers, then you really should start doing so.
Here are a few compelling reasons to reply to Tripadvisor reviews:
- Tripadvisor is the top website for travel planning, so if you only respond to reviews on one site, this should be it.
- Many Tripadvisor users agree (83%) that they feel more assured about making travel decisions after looking at reviews. Many brands (96%) claim that a lot of booking is secured through user reviews.
- Those companies that do respond to Tripadvisor reviews often enjoy more user engagement and are far more likely to receive future bookings.
- Plus, the businesses that respond to user reviews on the website tend to enjoy a better overall rating.
Why is it important to Report Fake or Malicious Reviews?
Fake or malicious reviews can have a big impact on the overall rating of a business.
One review slating the management of the company or the services provided could cause an avalanche of negativity which could be hugely detrimental to the company’s goals.
As such, it’s crucial that you report fake or malicious reviews whether you are just a customer and suspect something is wrong or you are a business owner and are wary of undue slander.
How do you Track Your Tripadvisor Reviews?
To track your Tripadvisor reviews, your best bet is to sign up for email notifications when a new one is published.
That way, you can stay in the loop and find out the moment a new review is posted.
To activate email notifications, go to the top right corner of the website homepage and click the menu next to your username. From there, scroll down until you find the ‘subscriptions’ button.
Here, you’ll see an ‘Emails for Owners’ tab, under which you should click on the ‘Subscribed’ bubble.
There is another way to track reviews, too, which is to seek out websites and software designed to take care of the process for you. You can track reviews on Tripadvisor as well as dozens of other platforms with Trustindex.