A survey conducted by One Poll on behalf of Plum Guide found that many American read through reviews before buying something. The study of 2000 American vacationers found that more than half of the respondents would go through reviews before settling on a vacation spot.

About 67% of the respondents considered themselves obsessed when it came to looking through online reviews. This was despite 46% admitting they had once been misguided by a bad review.

The average respondent felt you should go through at least 17 reviews before choosing where to vacation. Another 48% were unwilling to choose a destination before seeing other people’s opinions, with 33% losing sleep over the matter.

Americans had come across dishonest reviews

The researchers found that even well-known destinations had some negative reviews. These include the Flatiron Building, Brooklyn Bridge, and Guggenheim Museum.

About 75% of the participants admitted they had had bad experiences from false reviews. Despite this, 72% were still willing to trust a review before buying or booking something. This was not surprising as many Americans spent a lot of money on vacations each year.

The average amount Americans spent on vacation this year was $325 more than they had spent in 2021. They spent an average of $4849 each year on holidays. About 58% of the respondents felt stressed when booking vacations. For this reason, 81% wanted to have a more accurate system in place when they chose vacation spots.

There are no reliable review sources for booking online travels 

According to the CEO and founder of Plum Guide, Doron Meyassed, there aren’t any reliable systems for booking trips. For instance, people have to rely solely on reviews when those looking for restaurants could use the Michelin Star.

For this reason, Plum Guide decided to project some of the online reviews to some of the most iconic locations in New York and London. This exercise was meant to show the absurdity of online reviews.

Since there aren’t any reliable sources before they books trips, people often rely on sites like Google Maps for people’s opinions on the tips. Although there are a few good reviews, it is not always easy to pick out the genuine ones as some reviewers could receive payments for a good or bad review.