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Most of us understand the growing importance of customer reviews on sites like TripAdvisor, Yelp and the more recently launched - Google Local Guides. Given the popularity of Google Maps and Google’s location based data, Google has found a way to collect user generated content via the new Google Local Guides program, a community-driven platform where users can submit reviews of the places they have visited.

So what exactly is Google Local Guides and how can it benefit activity operators? Well, we are talking about a phenomenon that could potentially be an alternative to TripAdvisor. That's right - it's has become very popular among travellers and could possibly be the next big booking source in the making!

1. Generate Awareness of Your Brand

Using communities like Google Local Guides is a great way to gather knowledge and information about the industry competition and get your own brand out there. With Google Local Guides, you can list your business for free which also puts you on the radar to be found on Google Maps. This listing can then be used to be reviewed by customers.

2. Find Potential Partners

There's no better place in the digital market to find potential partners or collaborators. You can use Google Local Guides to find the places trending in your locality and use that information to partner with them.

3. Discover Market Segments and Trends

Find out the interests of your local guides. Explore their reviews and invite some of them to review your business, if they haven’t already. You might discover some niche markets or pick up some big influencers to improve your word-of-mouth advertising.

Additional Benefits from Obtaining Reviews

If you are an activity operator without any profiles on review websites, the first step is to generate and publish your profile and then actively start collecting reviews. An obvious way is to directly ask for a review from your customers. Many operators often retract from participating in review sites in the fear of getting negative reviews. Research has shown otherwise, augmenting the fact that a small number of negative reviews do not influence customers but rather add more credibility and value the positive reviews.

There are several other benefits from obtaining reviews. Like how do you know what to improve if you do not receive any feedback? When people want to book a trip or a tour, they really want to hear about past experiences as a form of validation. In fact, many travellers only search for activities in OTAs such as TripAdvisor or Yelp. Having recorded online reviews adds so much to your business visibility.