NEWTON, Mass., April 11, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- TripAdvisor®, the world's largest travel site*, today launched its "Friend of a Friend" feature that highlights trusted reviews and opinions from friends of Facebook friends. Representing the next step in making travel planning more social for the TripAdvisor global community, travelers are now ten times more likely to see personalized travel advice on TripAdvisor.

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"Travel advice from friends is incredibly useful, but your inner circle may not have all the answers on a particular hotel or destination you are researching," says Adam Medros, vice president of global product for TripAdvisor. "The Friend of a Friend feature increases the probability of an even greater personalized TripAdvisor experience by highlighting opinions from a larger network of travelers that know the people you trust."

Friendly Advice - And More of It
Every day, Facebook-connected people write one out of four reviews submitted on TripAdvisor. Each of these travelers has an average of 190 people in their friend network[1]. With access to friends of friends, the average network can soar to tens of thousands, making social travel planning exponentially more useful.

How It Works
When researching a hotel, restaurant, or attraction, people will see their friends' reviews first, followed by reviews of their friends' friends. They can use the TripAdvisor private message service to ask anyone in this network for further advice. As always, reviews from the greater TripAdvisor community will also be displayed below friends' reviews so travelers can continue to benefit from the wisdom of the crowds.

Travelers can adjust their privacy settings within their Account Settings on Facebook to limit what their Facebook friends can see on TripAdvisor. Travelers who do not want access to their friends' travel advice, or don't want their friends to see their own reviews, can opt out.

The "Friend of a Friend" feature is now available on TripAdvisor sites worldwide with the exception of China and Egypt. To experience Friend of a Friend, please log in to Facebook via www.tripadvisor.com.

About TripAdvisor
TripAdvisor(®) is the world's largest travel site, enabling travelers to plan and have the perfect trip. TripAdvisor offers trusted advice from real travelers and a wide variety of travel choices and planning features with seamless links to booking tools. TripAdvisor-branded sites make up the largest travel community in the world, with more than 50 million unique monthly visitors*, and over 60 million reviews and opinions. The sites operate in 30 countries worldwide, including China under daodao.com. TripAdvisor also includes TripAdvisor for Business, a dedicated division that provides the tourism industry access to TripAdvisor's millions of monthly visitors.

TripAdvisor, Inc. (NASDAQ: TRIP) manages and operates websites under 19 other travel media brands, and together the sites attract more than 69 million unique monthly visitors**. TripAdvisor's travel media brands include www.airfarewatchdog.com, www.bookingbuddy.com, www.cruisecritic.com, www.everytrail.com, www.familyvacationcritic.com, www.flipkey.com, www.holidaylettings.co.uk, www.holidaywatchdog.com, www.independenttraveler.com, www.onetime.com, www.seatguru.com, www.sniqueaway.com, www.smartertravel.com, www.tingo.com, www.travel-library.com, www.travelpod.com, www.virtualtourist.com, www.whereivebeen.com, and www.kuxun.cn.

*Source: comScore Media Metrix for TripAdvisor Sites, Worldwide, January 2012

**Source: comScore Media Metrix for TripAdvisor Inc. and its subsidiaries, Worldwide, January 2012

©2012 TripAdvisor, Inc. All rights reserved.

Facebook(®) is a registered trademark of Facebook Inc.

[1] Source: https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-data-team/anatomy-of-facebook/10150388519243859

SOURCE TripAdvisor

SOURCE: TripAdvisor