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TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

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Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#2
Google controls search. Google launches a competitor to a web service presented through search. Competitor takes enough of a hit layoffs are needed.

This screams of a problem. Especially for consumers and a competitive market. The kind of thing that traditionally caused governments to step in.

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#3
That's a bummer. I've found that TripAdvisor reviews tend to have a higher signal to noise ratio than some other sites (including Google's own reviews, where you can tell a lot of the reviews are just being cranked out so that power users can get points and "level up")

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#4
This is what happens when you pay huge amounts of money on Google Ads and traffic. They notice that you must be quite profitable if you afford to pay so much, so they come for your market. It will happen more and more and the more you pay to Google the more you help them take you out of the market.

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#5

This is what happens when you pay huge amounts of money on Google Ads and traffic. They notice that you must be quite profitable if you afford to pay so much, so they come for your market. It will happen more and more and the more you pay to Google the more you help them take you out of the market.

1 more thought on this - Expedia and Booking are next on their menu...

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#6
"...The company had just over 3,800 staff at the end of September.." I am surprised why they need such high number of staff when the functionality of the website is limited to content, reviews, search itineraries. Unless they hire field agents and ask them go inquire and write about a new place.

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#7
It really hasn't been covered enough just how much Google has replaced organic search results with their own features.

In some cases it's almost all of the above the fold real estate and for shopping they are starting to take over the checkout experience as well.

It's significantly reducing organic traffic and turning e-commerce sites into Google suppliers.

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#8

This is what happens when you pay huge amounts of money on Google Ads and traffic. They notice that you must be quite profitable if you afford to pay so much, so they come for your market. It will happen more and more and the more you pay to Google the more you help them take you out of the market.

Actually this is all about Amazon.

Apparently in some countries users are going to straight to Amazon for their shopping searches and bypassing Google entirely.

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#9
Any business without physical inventory that can be automated in a way to sell/buy should really worry about Google. Eventually Google will come for that market as their new crop of managers/execs will want to make the number to get their bonus and move up the ladder.

I know a guy who used to work at tripadvisor years ago. At the time Google was trying to start up their own hotel search business but they didn't have the reviews. So Google was initially using reviews submitted to tripadvisor by tripadvisor's reviews. I believe there had been prior agreement for Google to use tripadvisor's reviews for a fee/beter-search-ranking in return? Anyhow, tripadivisor didn't like what was happening so was in the process of telling google that they will stop the arrangement.

And a google exec in the meeting threatened tripadivisor execs that google will lower tripadivisor in the search results, if tripadvisor did stop the arrangement.

This bit was apparently shared in a regularly scheduled company wide meeting.

Re: TripAdvisor cuts hundreds of jobs after Google competition bites

#10
Trip Advisor has been fairly hit and miss for me. The star ratings especially for hotels have a weird value judgement in them that isn't at all congruent with mine. I'll see run down crappy hotels with 5 stars while much much nicer hotels with better amenities and locations are rated with 3 stars.

Some way to specify the profile of the rater's you care about would be a huge improvement. Things like traveling with children, back-packing, splurging on vacation, would be helpful criteria to make the reviews more relevant and informative to me.

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