Award Distinguishes Top-Performing Businesses as Reviewed by Travelers on the World's Largest Travel Site

New York City Tops Ranking of U.S. Cities with Most Winners, Las Vegas Climbs to #2 Spot

NEWTON, Mass., May 19, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- TripAdvisor®, the world's largest travel site*, today announced the 2015 Certificate of Excellence award recipients. A total of more than 78,000 hospitality businesses in the U.S. have been awarded this year. Now in its fifth year, the award celebrates hospitality excellence worldwide and is given to accommodations, restaurants and attractions listed on TripAdvisor that consistently achieve outstanding traveler reviews on the site.

When selecting Certificate of Excellence winners, TripAdvisor uses a proprietary algorithm to determine the honorees that takes into account the quality, quantity and recency of reviews and opinions submitted by travelers on TripAdvisor over a 12-month period, as well as a business's tenure and ranking on the Popularity Index on the site. To qualify for the award, a business must maintain an overall TripAdvisor bubble rating of at least four out of five, have a minimum number of reviews and must have been listed on TripAdvisor for at least 12 months.

"TripAdvisor is pleased to honor exceptional hospitality businesses that have received consistent praise and recognition by travelers on the site," said Marc Charron, president, TripAdvisor for Business. "By putting a spotlight on businesses that are focused on delivering great service to customers, TripAdvisor not only helps drive an improvement to hospitality standards around the world, it also gives businesses both large and small the ability to shine and stand out from the competition."

Top 10 U.S. Cities with the Highest Number of Certificate of Excellence Winners:

(+/- denotes change in ranking year-over-year, 0 is no change)

As 2015 marks the fifth anniversary of the award, TripAdvisor is announcing its Certificate of Excellence "Hall of Fame." This special designation is awarded to businesses that have earned a Certificate of Excellence for five consecutive years and winners will receive a special Hall of Fame certificate and window sticker to promote their accomplishment. There are more than 8,000 Hall of Fame winners in the U.S.

Certificate of Excellence Benefits to Businesses

According to data collected by TripAdvisor, the Certificate of Excellence award is correlated with increased business inquiries and traveler engagement levels for accommodations. Certificate of Excellence award-winning accommodations see on average four percent more online travel agency (OTA) propensity (clicks from travelers on an external booking partner link). Moreover, accommodations that are both Business Listings subscribers and Certificate of Excellence winners, see on average 28 percent more activity to their Business Listings (e.g. call click, website click, Special Offer click) compared to non-winners.

The Certificate of Excellence awards also increase traveler engagement levels for eateries and attractions: eateries with a Certificate of Excellence see nearly 14 percent more page views per session compared to non-winners, while attractions businesses with a Certificate of Excellence see nine percent more page views per session than non-winners.

"Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group is honored that so many of our hotels have earned the TripAdvisor Certificate of Excellence. We're proud to have more than 580 winning hotels around the world earn this prestigious award for exceptional achievement," said Roger Chacko, executive vice president and chief branding & marketing officer, Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group. "There is no greater seal of approval than being recognized by our customers. With the TripAdvisor Certificate of Excellence based on customer reviews, the accolade is a remarkable vote of confidence to our continued business success and commitment to service excellence."

TripAdvisor provides businesses with a suite of free resources to help winning properties showcase their success. For example, all winners receive a Certificate of Excellence, which they can display at their establishment, an online badge for use on their website as well as guidelines and best practices on how to promote the achievement locally.

For more information about the Certificate of Excellence program, as well as access to promotional services and tips for successful public relations campaigns, please visit the TripAdvisor Management Center.

About TripAdvisor

TripAdvisor^® is the world's largest travel site*, enabling travelers to plan and book the perfect trip. TripAdvisor offers advice from millions of travelers and a wide variety of travel choices and planning features with seamless links to booking tools that check hundreds of websites to find the best hotel prices. TripAdvisor branded sites make up the largest travel community in the world, reaching 340 million unique monthly visitors**, and more than 225 million reviews and opinions covering more than 4.9 million accommodations, restaurants and attractions. The sites operate in 45 countries worldwide. TripAdvisor also includes TripAdvisor for Business, a dedicated division that provides the tourism industry access to millions of monthly TripAdvisor visitors.

TripAdvisor, Inc. (Nasdaq:TRIP) manages and operates websites under 24 other travel media brands: www.airfarewatchdog.com, www.bookingbuddy.com, www.cruisecritic.com, www.everytrail.com, www.familyvacationcritic.com, www.flipkey.com, www.thefork.com (including www.lafourchette.com, www.eltenedor.com, www.iens.nl and www.besttables.com), www.gateguru.com, www.holidaylettings.co.uk, www.holidaywatchdog.com, www.independenttraveler.com, www.jetsetter.com, www.niumba.com, www.onetime.com, www.oyster.com, www.seatguru.com, www.smartertravel.com, www.tingo.com, www.travelpod.com, www.tripbod.com, www.vacationhomerentals.com, www.viator.com, www.virtualtourist.com, and www.kuxun.cn.

*Source: comScore Media Metrix for TripAdvisor Sites, worldwide, December 2014

**Source: Google Analytics, average monthly unique users, Q1 2015

CONTACT: Kevin Carter

         (617) 795-7577

         kcarter@tripadvisor.com