My Favorite Tool for Making Travel Plans

Jake Kloberdanz, founder and CEO of OneHope, a California winery with a social mission, explains how he uses Trippy.

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My company does branding and marketing for different causes, including autism and AIDS awareness, and I travel often to meet with investors, partners, and celebrities. When I'm planning trips, I don't like relying on online reviews written by strangers. A few months ago, I started using Trippy, a free service that helps me get travel recommendations from trusted social-media contacts.

Here's how it works: Before a trip, I log on to Trippy's website or iPhone app and enter my destination and travel dates. The service pulls up a list of Facebook friends who are likely to know about my destination based on their profiles. Next, it prompts me to ask them for advice by sending a message to them on Facebook or writing on their Walls. My friends can click on a link in the message to enter suggestions on my Trippy account. Then, I can add the ones I like to my itinerary, which I can pull up on my iPhone as I travel. I can also share my itinerary with employees visiting the same city using Trippy's Copy Trip feature.

So far, I've used Trippy, which also works with Linked-In and Twitter, to plan about 20 trips. Thanks to the service, I no longer waste time reading tons of anonymous reviews. Instead, I get meaningful input from a handful of people I trust. —As told to J.J. McCorvey