Travel and discover with social media

July 6, 2011 | Posted by Dan Rigby

Travel is about discovery. New places, new people, new cultures, new food and new experiences. Aside from guide books, a recommendation is often the best way to find good restaurant/bar, unique sites or good accommodation in a foreign city. In my last post I talked about how we used mobile technology on our trip to Europe. Social media and sharing was part of that as well. It allowed us to extend our "recommendation" network. Cities like Rome are filled with tacky tourist traps. (Not to mention all the street peddlers.) So it really helped us to find out what to avoid as well.

Where to stay

Finding affordable and reliable accommodation while traveling can be difficult. Hostels are great but they can be extremely varied in quality. A quick check to see how many people have liked or commented on a hostels Facebook page was a good indication of what we could expect. It can also told us what else was in the area. The site we booked through, hostelworld.com, provided it's own way for travelers to rate and comment. We found this great B&B through their tips and comments.

Where to eat

Italy is known for it's food but if you're in their major cities, you might not find what you'd expect. Trucked in frozen food or processed frozen meals from a grocery store warmed up and served for 15+ euro is not uncommon. Actually a lot of places had a disclaimer saying "not frozen food" on their menu. So a quick search on social media gave us some good recommendations and confirmed what our hostel people told us. If you're going to Rome, the Trastevere neighborhood was the best place to find authentic Roman/Italian food and atmosphere. As Cam mentioned in his comment to my last post, Yelp and Urban Spoon provided him a great way to find local spots while traveling in Florida.

Sharing only works if it's easy

With all of these ways to share, businesses have to make it easy for travelers to use their social avenues to broadcast their recommendations. QR codes in businesses windows allowed you to scan them to 'like' on Facebook, 'check in', or to see other content were very popular. One hotel we passed had the QR code at about 1 foot X 1 foot on their window (see below). Quick, simple and easy. After each hostel, hostelworld.com send a quick survey via email to make rating, sharing and commenting on our stay very easy.

James and Foursquare at SXSW

So there were basically two scenarios Foursquare really came to the rescue while attending SXSW in Austin. The first was deciding where to eat. It was incredibly easy to tell which restaurants were busy and which were not in order to save time. However, there were two sides to this coin. How many people were checking into a location was also a direct indication of how good the restaurant actually is. Being able to check the Foursquare map and instantly recognize the quality food-joints was a god-send.

Second was figuring out which sessions to attend. Just like restaurants, the number of foursquare checkins were a direct indication of the quality of session. We knew what was stellar and what to avoid with a quick check of our iPhones!

Those little places you find off the beaten path are the ones you remember most. Social media is just another avenue to help make those discoveries or at least provide a starting point. Do others opinions influence where you go on your travels? What about in your own city? Do you use social media to discover your own city?

Read my previous post for more info on travel and mobile technology