Redefining personalization in the customer experience

In a world increasingly lived through screens, it takes a lot for any digital experience to feel new or special. For brands to break through the monotony of automation, their users need to feel truly seen, heard, and engaged through personalization. Over the last year at Tripadvisor, we’ve discovered that some of the most impactful ways to foster that type of engagement come from thoughtful words placed at just the right moment.

In a world increasingly lived through screens, it takes a lot for any digital experience to feel new or special. For brands to break through the monotony of automation, their users need to feel truly seen, heard, and engaged through personalization. Over the last year at Tripadvisor, we’ve discovered that some of the most impactful ways to foster that type of engagement come from thoughtful words placed at just the right moment. Through these data-driven, copy-focused interventions, we’ve introduced new ways for users to personalize their experiences with our products.

Getting to the heart of personalization

Personalization in e-commerce is, unsurprisingly, table stakes. A recent report from McKinsey revealed that about 71% of customers expect personalized experiences when shopping online, and 76% get frustrated when they don’t see them.

But in that same McKinsey study, when consumers were asked to define what personalization meant for them, they “associate [personalization] with positive experiences of being made to feel special…when brands demonstrate their investment in the relationship, not just the transaction.”

At its core, personalization isn’t just about displaying a name or remembering a previous purchase. It’s about understanding where the user is in their journey and meeting them there, with exactly what they need to move forward confidently. The emotional, qualitative parts of personalization — checking in on someone’s experience, offering up guidance, building trust through action and language — are what stand out most.

We’ve been exploring ways to lean into this more emotional side of personalization, using existing research and encouraging UX copy to offer more pathways to guidance for our travelers. What we’ve learned is that sometimes the smallest interventions, like a simple question or a reassuring piece of information, can heavily impact users’ sentiment and motivation.

AI anchor points: show me around the neighborhood

Travel planning can be overwhelming when you’re trying to maximize time in a new place.

We built our current AI trip builder with that experience in mind: to bring some ease and expertise to this period of discovery. But even still, our research with users indicated that they wanted more customized guidance — 57% of them wanted to center recommendations around a specific place, like a hotel, an attraction, or a specific neighborhood. We hypothesized that by adding a more contextual entry point into the AI trip builder flow on attraction pages, we could drive trip creation, saves, and bookings.

The AI anchor point feature addresses this need by providing a pathway for personalized recommendations around a selected point of interest directly from the attraction detail page. Planning a trip to Florence and exploring Ponte Vecchio? This feature can recommend nearby stays, restaurants, and other sights and sounds to make the most of your trip.

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