Does Oyster.com have the mussels to compete with the big boys?
Something you should know is that I love seafood. One of my "food sins" when I go back to my home country is to have a full "plateau de fruits de mer" or just a dozen of oysters (Gillardeau usually).
Could it be a website about oyster delivery? My dream finally comes true - especially in England where oysters are not so popular and very hard to find in fishmongers. Or could it be a website about this blue Oyster card we have to use on the London Underground?
My instinct was wrong. Oyster.com is another player who decided to battle against TripAdvisor to bring more "relevant" reviews written by independent j
So it there such a thing already in the marketplace? Well, we do have hotels reviewed in paper newspapers like The Sunday Times. We also have hotels reviewed in lifestyle magazines like CondeNast Concierge. Online, we have websites like The Hotel Guru in partnership with Worldreviewer (founded by James who I interviewed last year). or TravelIntelligence who found a niche in boutique, design and original hotels around the world. Finally, you can argue that everyone is an expert - once you stayed in a hotel - to review your hotel stay. You don't need to be a professional writer. You just need to be honest.
So what Oyster can bring more that we don't already have?
Better structure of reviews, more pictures (meaning hundreds) and professional writing.
In a way this seems to me the alternative of reading a 2 pages review of a hotel in a travel specialist magazine. Surely, there is a share of the population who gets inspired and take decision on where they are going to spend their holidays by reading these professional reviews (I am not one of them).
Yes the website is very nice and pages are well structured. For instance, it's very easy to find what the reviewer thought about the food, the scenery or even better whether it is family friendly.
2 questions come to my mind.
1/ What makes me a professional reviewer? On which criteria Oyster select their writers?
2/ Do I get paid by review submitted? If yes, how much?
As you can read, I am divided by the relevancy of the content in the long run. It looks to me that Oyster is trying to do a better job than what hotels publish on their website in terms of description/pictures. They just orgarnize the information much much better. Is that sufficient to make this venture a profitable business in the long run? Time will tell.














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