NEEDHAM, Mass., January 30, 2007 - TripAdvisor®, the largest travel community in the world, today made trip planning as easy as "save it and go." Whenever a traveler sees a green "save this ... " button on a www.tripadvisor.com page, they can click and file the review or insider secret into their personal "My Trips" folders - a new TripAdvisor personalization feature. They can customize and expand their plans by adding maps, photos, their own notes and travel plan details.
"Brilliant new feature! Gone are the days of copying and pasting or forgetting an answer and not being able to find it again," said a TripAdvisor devotee who tested the new feature and goes by the screen name TOtoNY. "I'll be able to keep all my travel information in one place and print it off before my trip."
Early users of the TripAdvisor "saves" tool have already filled tens of thousands of virtual folders with all sorts of plans, including:
Dreaming - Filled with wanderlust, one busy traveler filled one folder with 336 attractions and restaurants from 24 destinations from Australia to Xanadu - crisscrossing the globe in what must be a trip of a lifetime.
Honeymooning - What do you do in your precious onshore time on a two-week honeymoon cruise? One bride-to-be has identified hundreds of honey-dos from secluded beaches to island power shopping.
Wining and dining - In destinations where great food can be found on every corner, how do you decide where to spend your precious mealtimes?
One traveler has built a list of hundreds of highly recommended restaurants in Paris, Florence and Rome, presumably preparing for an incredible gastronomic European tour.
"With more than five million reviews, tips and insider secrets on hotels, restaurants and attractions, we believe we have the answer to virtually any travel question - from what to do around the corner to around the world," said Christine Petersen, senior vice president of marketing at TripAdvisor. "Now with the ability to quickly save and file the most useful information you find on TripAdvisor, planning and going are both a breeze - just pull up your folders and get going!"
A convenient green "Save" button is featured on each of the TripAdvisor hotel, restaurant and attraction descriptions and reviews, along with postings in the site's popular forums, collaborative guides, maps, photos and many more types of information. Once a user clicks on the button, they save it to a personal folder. Travelers can organize their trips in whatever way makes the most sense to them - organized by day, side trip or excursion - however they choose.
When it's time to take the trip, users can forget cramming expensive guidebooks with post-its and clipped articles, and instead print out a custom guidebook to take along for easy offline reference or even refer back to their trip plans online from an internet cafe or laptop.
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