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Secrets to Writing Hotel Reviews Like a Professional Travel Blogger

How to Write Hotel Reviews Like a Pro: Top TripAdvisor reviewer personal secrets on writing professional hotel reviews to secure more brand partnerships and comp stays.

Everybody loves reviews! Whether you are chatting with your friends about your amazing vacay or writing a complaint on TripAdvisor, quality hotel reviews are nowadays akin to liquid gold for the travel industry. Traveler reviews are both expected, anticipated, welcomed, and feared… Knowing how to write an effective hotel review is something every travel blogger absolutely has to master. Some of us, professional travel bloggers, are even making a living by writing hotel reviews, and you can too!    

There are pages and pages of websites dedicated just to reviews. Before starting my travel blog, I have been a member of TripAdvisor since 2007 and have written over 350 reviews for hotels, resorts, restaurants and attractions, and by now have over 230,000 readership. Writing hotel reviews is an excellent way to share your travel experience with your followers, and to showcase your quality reviewer skills to brands who would [hopefully] want to work with you in the future. 

Here are some of my own secrets to help you writing hotel reviews like a professional travel blogger.

***This post may contain affiliate links and we may earn compensation when you click on the links at no additional cost to you. All product recommendations and feedback are ours and based on personal experience. Please refer to our Disclosure Policy. 

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Mindset – The Key To Writing a Good Review

The decision on whether or not you start writing a review on a particular hotel or experience always starts with being honest with yourself first. What would your message be?

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Was your hotel stay amazing and impeculiar? Or did you find yourself in an absolute nightmare? Is your review going to be positive? Or are you not planning to write a hotel review at all but a massive complaint letter? 

It is a personal choice of every travel blogger of what content to create for your blog of course. 

Here are a few thoughts for you to consider if you decide to trash someone on your blog: 

• If you were a brand considering working with me on a campaign, would you risk inviting me to stay at your place if you saw trash reviews posted about other places? Probably not… 
• Hotels are starting to bite back against negative reviews, some even threat reviewers with legal action. Does it mean you should not leave a bad review if your experience was bad? Of course not. Just make sure your review is factual and can be supported by photos or witnesses. …and try not to get sued!
• If you are venting out, using swear words, calling people names, using over exaggerated language, are you to be taken seriously by your readers or would you be perceived as hysterical? Swear language is never ok, by the way.

I personally prefer to stay positive on my travel blog. If I am writing a hotel review and posting it here, it means in general it all went well, good or excellent… I will provide practical recommendations on things that could be improved, and be honest in relating my personal experience with the property.

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If something did go terribly wrong during my stay, I would typically try to sort things out on-site with the property directly. Sht happens to everyone, you know. It is only fair to present the hotel management with facts and give them the opportunity to remedy the situation right then and there. Then on your blog, you can put a positive spin on it and write about the heroism and wonderfulness of the hotel staff who went above and beyond in mitigating your horrible situation. If anything, this will add some drama and an ultimately positive outcome. Both your readers and the brand will appreciate the honesty. 

If the resolution is unsuccessful however, and I am still upset, I may write a detailed fact-based non-emotional review on my TripAdvisor account. But not here. PerfectDayToPlay is my positive happy place. 

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Be Honest

I am only writing reviews about hotels that are “tried and true”. I would not even consider writing a positive review about a non-resolved horrible stay, or place I have never been to, even if offered payment. 

In addition, I have a standard clause in my collaboration contracts: if you are a brand and you want to collaborate – excellent! I will try you out and if all goes well – you get a positive review on my blog, otherwise no review, but a private letter with details of what happened and recommendations for improvement.

Some travel bloggers suggest that if your overall experience was outstanding, it may not be worth mentioning minor details that didn’t really matter to you in the long run… I somewhat disagree and prefer keeping my reviews factual, as something that did not matter to me, could be a make-it-or-break-it decision for some of my readers. 

Plus a too good to be true hotel review sounds fake, and you risk losing trust of your audience if all your reviews are uniformly A-mazing!

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Be Personal

Ok, so you decided you’ll go for it. 

How do you write a professional hotel review? Where do you start?

Start with yourself. The easiest way to start off is to pretend your best friend wants to go too, and you are now telling her all about your trip all the way to the finest details. 

Talk about things like why did you travel and who did you travel with. Were you in town on business or as a tourist? Did you travel solo, with kids or with friends? Did you have your dog with you and how your pet was treated? 

When did you travel? Peak season or off-season? 

Was it easy to book? Was the price reasonable? 

Also, it is a good idea to let your readers know how often you travel so your reviews can be “weighted”. If you have traveled all over the world for years and the hotel you are reviewing is the best you have ever stayed at, this has more weight than if this is your first ever trip abroad. 

In our case for example, as mentioned earlier, we’ve travelled to 4 continents, over 20+ countries, 200+ cities, and have reviewed over 350 experiences on my TripAdvisor account where I currently have 230,000 readership.

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Be Specific

It is important to be descriptive and specific in your review. 

Instead of just saying the lobby was nice – explain why you thought it was. 

Example: the lobby had a feeling of an upscale but cozy countryside home, with satin sofas, velvet armchairs, gold colour floral wall-paper on the walls and a large crystal chandelier right in the middle giving soft warm light.

Writing hotel reviews is a skill akin to writing a good novel. Your readers should hear the buzz of the lobby, feel the warmth of the fireplace, smell the delicious aroma of freshly made shepards pie.. You got the idea? 🙂

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Be Fun

Throw in a joke or two here and there, tell an anecdote about your encounter with another guest [keeping privacy of course], make a funny comparison – everyone loves a bit of humour!

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Talk About the Location

When introducing the hotel, pinpoint its location and add their address. It may be a good idea, as I often do, to add a photo of a map and hotel’s location to the nearest landmark like an International airport or the city centre. 

How do you get to the property? Was your airport cab or a shuttle expensive? How long did it take? Is there a free airport shuttle hotel offers?

Describe what’s around the hotel: attractions, restaurants, parks, shopping centres, things to do. Tell you readers whether you have found the location to be convenient, or not as much. 

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Property & Amenities

When writing to describe properties in your hotel reviews, go into as much detail as possible. Give your readers a feeling of the property size, class and comfort. 

Start by sharing with your readers on how many stars the resort or hotel is rated within the industry standard, and then go into details on what’s included.

There is almost a standard list I usually go off in writing hotel reviews: 

• Property size
• Number of buildings (for resorts), floors
• Lobby
• Parking and availability of vallet
• Restaurants & bars
• Pool, hot tub, gym, spa
• Entertainment
• Meeting and event space, could it be a potential wedding venue?
• Business centre
• Outdoor garden and amenities (eg. bike rental service)
• Availability of concierge service
• Do I feel secure?
• Internet / WiF
• Notes on the style and the decor
• Is the property stroller-friendly and wheelchair-accessible
• Anything else specific to the property

As our family is very eco and sustainability focused, we are always on a lookout for eco-friendly practices and programs that brands are implementing. If discovered – we’ll include a special section on our hotel review promoting the hotel’s eco-effort. Otherwise, we will leave a suggestion to the management on what can be done better in order to achieve a greener score.

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How Was Your Room?

Your hotel room is your home away from home for the duration of your stay. So how was your room? Did you feel at home? 

Some room-related questions to consider when writing hotel reviews: 

• What was the room type? Was the room spacious or cozy? 
• Was the room clean? Was it cleaned every day? How did it smell? 
• Was the room quiet? Could you sleep?
• Bed size? How many beds? Was your bed comfortable?
• What other furniture did you have in the room?
• Did you have air conditioning? Was it working? Was it easy to figure out the controls?
• What other amenities did you have: TV, fridge, minibar, microwave, coffee maker, kettle, hair dryer?
• Were all the amenities free or did you have to pay for, let’s say, a microwave to be brought up?
• Did you have WiFi in your room?
• Did you have a safe or a locker? 
• Did you feel safe in your room?
• Did your room have a balcony? How was the view?
• Anything else specific to your room. For example, last time we stayed at Prestige Oceanfront Resort in Sooke, BC we had a TV in our bathroom!

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Food: Feast or Femin

Food options, convenience and quality are as big of a part of your hotel stay as your bed. A good meal, a long wine list and a hospitable waitstaff can make it or break it for you.

Did the hotel have a restaurant on-site? How many bars did they have and when did those close? Were there any coffee shops? Did your hotel offer in-room dining (aka room service)?

Be descriptive and specific. 

Give your readers a general idea of the cuisine and the ambiance of the place. 

Did the restaurant have unique or local items on the menu?

What did you order? How did it taste? Would you order it again? 

If you have any special diet restrictions, could the hotel restaurant accommodate you? Are there vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, halal, kosher options on the menu?

Was the service quick? 

Was there live entertainment at the restaurant? 

What’s your impression on the total bill? Highway robbery or too good to be true?

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Thank the Staff

It is usually not the rooms nor the amenities that make a hotel stay a wonderful one or a horrible one. The ability to make you feel welcome, to care for your needs and requests, to provide effective and speedy resolution if something does go wrong, the smiles and attention… you may forget the colour of the wall, or the size of the bed, but you will never forget how the place made you feel.

During my university years I have worked at hotels in Toronto in both staff and management capacity. It is extremely hard to find and retain good people.

There is something special about people who work in hospitality. Most are not doing it for money: even with tips and benefits the money hospitality industry is paying is much lower than they could have gotten elsewhere. These are the people of passion, kind hearted, open-minded, fun and curious, they love to give and they love to care, they go above and beyond… and they want so very much to feel appreciated. Yet somehow, the smiles and service are silently expected, and if something goes wrong guests turn on them for a scapegoat. 

When you are writing hotel reviews, the very least you could do to show your appreciation is to include a few lines about the fantastic service and say Thank You. 

TIP: Whenever someone goes above and beyond for our family, I take a note of their name into my mobile notebook to refer back in a few days or weeks when I am writing a hotel review. 

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The One Unique Thing

In your hotel review tell you readers about one thing that you loved about the place most! It could be anything! 

Here are a few examples from our recent hotel reviews:

• When staying at Kahana Sunset in Maui, we had a private beach with large sea turtles right at the beach! 
• When staying at REO Rafting & Yoga Retreat in BC, the outdoor hot tub was the absolute hit after spending half a day in freezing water enjoying white water rafting.
• When staying at Prestige Oceanfront Resort in Sooke, BC our son was enchanted and blown away by a family of sea lions living next to their pier and boat launch. And also the hotel room bathroom had a built-in TV – not quite common for rural countryside accommodations.. 

What was your one unique thing that you will keep telling everyone about?

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Leave a Message to Manager

This is not a commonly used practice when writing hotel reviews, however we like to include a Message to Manager into all our reviews. From my personal experience working in the Hospitality industry for many years, I recognize that running a hotel is hard hard hard work. I use the Message to Manager section to show my appreciation, to highlight some of the things the brand did amazingly, and to provide recommendations for improvement in other areas. 

If you decide to include a Message to Manager section when you write your hotel review, keep it specific, factual, concise, but most importantly – keep it positive. 

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Rate Your Experience

It is always a good idea to put things in perspective by applying some kind of a rating system to your experiences when writing hotel reviews. You can adopt commonly used 5-star or 10-star ratings or invent your own.

Here is how we rate: 

We assign a rating to each review section – eg. location, room, food, etc. – and we also provide an overall stay rating at the very end.

In your hotel review conclusion answer the likely most important questions your readers have: 

• Would you stay again at the hotel you are writing the review about? 
• Would you recommend this hotel to your grandma or your best friend? 

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Add Photos

Include photos! Sometimes a picture really is worth a thousand words. 

TIP: it is always a good idea to confirm with the property if pictures are allowed in common areas, like the lobby or gym. Depending on where you are in the World, you might be surprised what is allowed and what is not.

If photos are allowed, try to make sure that there are no other people in, or that there are people whose faces are not recognizable.

It gets tricky when posting those photos to your own blog. If you are running ads on your post and getting income, the photos on the post are considered a commercial use. Depending on where you are in the world, you might need to collect consent of every person who is present in your photos and whose face can be recognized… Moreover, the “right to be forgotten” gives these people the right to ask you to put down your photos showing them. We like to avoid these situations, so we either explicitly ask before we take a photo, or we try to ensure others are not in our camera.

Regardless, your hotel review photos must be good quality and clear of noise. Add at least one photo per each list-item you are reviewing. If you have more than a few photos, I suggest you create a gallery to post at the end of your article, instead of adding all to your post as it could be too much!

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Be Professional

Make sure that in writing a hotel review you sound as intelligent as possible and have your facts straight.

The least you want to do is misspell the property name, its restaurant name or the name of one of the staff. 

Proofread and double-proofread your review before posting. It is important that you use proper spelling and grammar if you want your readers to take you seriously, and the brand in question to be impressed. If anyone is going to read your review closely – that would be hotel management and, if they like it, they will share it with all their staff and partners and through their social media channels! It would absolutely suck to look foolish because of a few spelling errors.

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How to Get Staff Names?

I always write the name of the staff down right then and there into my mobile notebook to refer back to it when writing a hotel review later. But I get it, sometimes things happen and you forget. So how do you track down that outstanding customer service example? 

Easy! Just ask!

Simply phone the hotel switchboard, ask about and confirm the proper name spelling. Say, something like: “Hi, this and this waitress at the restaurant at breakfast absolutely made my day and I want to thank her. Tall skinny girl with long dark hair, she was maybe 20 or 25.. Can you please help me with the correct name spelling?” Simple as that!

From my experience working in hospitality, even in larger properties everyone knows each other!

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Send Heads-up!

Once the hotel review is posted on your blog, send a note to the hotel general manager and/or sales & marketing director. Get their name and work email from the switchboard, same as you did confirming the staff name!

In the email include a little blurb about who you are, the link to the hotel review post on your blog, and links to social media posts for quick and easy social sharing. (you are sharing your new posts on social media right away after publishing, don’t you? wink-wink) 

This little gesture of an email intro and links to your article can help establish a positive relationship and can help you work together in the future. For once, if the brand likes your review they may consider inviting you to stay at their other properties (comping your stay!) in exchange for more reviews. They may even include you into their regular marketing campaigns or make you their brand ambassador. 

Oh, and the brand will send tons of traffic your way! They are likely to include the link to your blog into their employee newsletter, and may even link to if from their sales and marketing site. Having a professionally written hotel review from a travel influencer is a great opportunity to boast around the local hospitality industry “gang”. 

Then the domino effect happens: as the hospitality industry is a tight community (Yes, even in larger cities like Toronto hotel sales and marketing people all know each other!)  and the word will spread quickly – the hotel brand competitors may also want you to come write for them, you never know! 

Good things started happening to us once we started posting detailed dedicated reviews on our blog! Happy writing!

If you are still paying for your hotel stays though, check out the latest Hotwire Hot Rate Deals my fellow travel-blogger friend had found!

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How to Write a Professional Hotel Review – Examples

Check out some of our hotels and resorts reviews from this past year:

• Prestige Oceanfront Resort Review: Top Secret Best Place to Stay in Sooke, BC
• Kahana Sunset, Maui Hawaii – Family Review and Honest Feedback
• Starfish Varadero Resort – Family Review and Honest Feedback
• REO Rafting Resort: Glamping & White Water Rafting BC Adventure

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Well, I hope this article was helpful and useful. If you are just starting writing hotel reviews, remember it takes practice but eventually you’ll be able to do it with your eyes closed! I can totally see you becoming a “Pro Hotel Reviewer” very soon. 

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Are you a hotel brand and would like us to come stay with you? Check out our work with us page!

If you a re a fellow travel blogger and need help starting up or guidance and motivation moving forward, my travel blogging resources section is all yours!

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Enjoy!

Cheerfully yours,

Alexandra, Alex & Cosmos

Share your travel photos on social media! tag #PerfectDayToPlay to be featured on our Instagram! 

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