Such is TripAdvisor's increasing focus on restaurants that it is now making a big effort to evangelise about the impact of reviews on diners.
The push comes four months after TripAdvisor bought restaurant booking service La Fourchette.
To understand what is driving engagement between restaurants and users on the site, TripAdvisor examined the 25 most reviewed eateries between the 7 July and 7 August this year, featuring cities including London, New York, Rome, Paris, Berlin, Bangkok and Marrakech.
The top-line finding from the study was the use of user photographs increased engagement on restaurant pages (in other words: encouraged consumers to find out more information about a restaurant or triggered clicks).
The next most compelling driver was management photos, the total number of reviews and then a pretty basic level of detail: opening hours.
TripAdvisor claims not having any images to having SOME images saw an increase of 73% more engagement with users, with a jump of 107% when 35 or more photographs were featured on a listing.
The classic "management response", which TripAdvisor has espoused to hoteliers for years, works in the same way for restaurants, too, TripAdvisor argues.
Travellers are apparently 12% more engaged with a page when an owner gets involved in the conversation, such as responding to reviews.
But does it have any impact on the actual reviews?
With a bit of number-crunching, TripAdvisor claims the following when it comes to management engagement with reviews:
- With a 0% response rate the average review rating is 3.91
- With a 5%- 40% response rate the average review rating is 4.02
- With a 40% - 75% the average review rating is 4.06
- With a 75%+ response rate the average review rating is 4.21
NB:Restaurant online review image via Shutterstock.