Some might say, and I would agree, that I suffer from analysis paralysis. I pride myself on at least doing sufficient research to put together great pricing. I will review all aspects of a trip beginning with the area in general then getting more specific with flights/drive times, hotels then events.
My primary sources for information are:
Trip Advisor: lots of great information from travelers and their reviews as well. Truly, a wealth of information can be found here
Google: good old fashioned google search will yield lots of great information. See below for search tips.
Fodors: before the internet had infinite amounts of information, I would buy travel books from Fodors. Great site with reviews of places from travelers and Fodors staff. Of course, their books are still readily available online and in stores.
Frommers: same as above-used to buy their books. Now great travel site with reviews from travelers as well as Frommers staff. You can buy their books online and in stores as well.
In addition to the sites above, the cruise specific site Cruise Critic is very helpful. Yelp is particularly helpful for restaurant reviews and is now providing reviews for contractors and other home services.
Once I have narrowed the field of information, I look across sites for specific reviews on the individual items. For example, if I’m booking transportation from the airport to a hotel, I’d start with Trip Advisor and find a provider that gets great reviews. After that, I’ll do a search using a search engine like google or yahoo to find more information on the provider. If I can find a name of a driver that several people liked, I’ll ask for them. I do this for multiple reasons, it’s important for companies to know that people are paying attention to their good work and come back for more. For the employees that are working hard enough to get named, they deserve additional business. Cliche but true, money talks and I like to spend my money on people/companies that are glad to have my business and treat me accordingly. Service matters and when someone does a great job, it shouldn’t go unnoticed.
Search Tips:
One of the keys to success in finding information is knowing how to search. Having tested software in a previous life, the key to getting hits is in how you structure you search. For example, if I want to find out information about the best Italian restaurants in New York City, I would go to any of the sites I’ve listed below and type the exact phrase that follows: “new york city” and “best italian retaurant”. This will give me results that include both NYC and the phrase “best italian restaurant”. It will include personal reviews and is likely to include professional reviewers from local, regional or even national magazines. Once you’ve narrowed your trip information down, you can gather detailed information by using searches like this.