Just because your cruise didn't go as planned, DON'T DO THIS...........

So, your cruise wasn't perfect. Most aren't, despite our best efforts. Now comes the time to write a review of your vacation. Well, it's ok to tell everyone about your personal experience. What was good, what was not so good.....but please....DON'T WRITE THE FOLLOWING ADVICE ( insert any cruise line ) ;

Seriously - DO NOT CRUISE WITH NORWEGIAN

telling everyone to Not Cruise a Particular Line, because you had a bad experience, is just plain stupid. Because I guarantee, someone else on that same cruise, had a great time.

We've sailed NCL 7 or 8 times, with another booked for August. Obviously, our experiences differ. Some people swear by RCCL. Not us. It was our worst cruise to date. But I would never advise against sailing RCCL.

13 Answers

Thanks Simon - of all the forums, this is the one I find provides the best feedback and most thoughtful responses. :)

The review that inspired this post isn't, but the vast majority of our reviews are Verified, which means that through our partnerships with cruise-specialist travel agencies we know the reviewer sailed on the cruise they are reviewing. Much easier to trust.

We've seen very little evidence that users are generating/posting low-value content simply to accrue loyalty points.

Members receive 3 additional points for every 'helpful' vote their review receives, which is to encourage quality reviews. We're working on some changes to the review writing process that we hope will encourage more detailed and useful reviews. Stay tuned.

BAK1061,

You raise a very important point, especially for this site. I look at other people's reviews as a way to gauge possible future cruises that my husband and I book. It isn't the only factor, but it weighs in significantly. A review title of "Never again on XXX cruise line" gets my attention but more often than not these review are not the least bit helpful, especially when the content does not articulate the reasons for such a hostile rating.

There are many reasons that people post both overly positive or negative reviews. One that is very important to a review and networking site is competitive business bashing. When there is an organized effort to bash a particular business, it impacts the rating average and can cause a significant amount of damage to both reputation and future business. While a single bad review isn't going to torpedo an entire cruise line, when a trend begins to appear, it bears monitoring and investigation.

Another thing to consider is that this site's incentives are point based. There is an inherent conflict built into the system because quantity is rewarded as opposed to quality. For someone wanting to climb the status ladder, posting a review presents as a relatively easy way in which to garner a significant number of points. To counter this, perhaps there is some way to incentivize a well-thought out and complete review - be it positive or negative?

We all have suffered through bad days while on vacation but a well-adjusted person will get over a momentary blip and enjoy the balance of their vacation time. Fixating on one or two issues and allowed those to overshadow an entire vacation (and its resulting review) is neither productive nor healthy. As an aside, we vividly recall a cruise we almost didn't get to take. We faced a seemingly endless series of mishaps to the point that climbing under a rock presented as an attractive option. We barely made it out of Boston before a historic blizzard shut down the city for days. I ended up in a San Juan ED trying to get antibiotics for a developing strep throat for hours prior to boarding (finally got them after we boarded). I self-quarantined for 48 hours (in an inside cabin) before I felt human enough to return to the land of the living. Was it a great vacation? Nope... but none of what happened was the cruise line's fault. In the end, the cruise ended up going very well overall despite the rocky start.

One action I started taking is to flag pointless rants or an attack posts for admin review. Both types of interaction are needless distractions, create unnecessary discord, and do nothing to add value to the discussions taking place here.

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