Online reviews have proliferated in recent years. TripAdvisor has become the most important platform, and many potential guests read online reviews before making a decision. Therefore, many hotels and restaurants have started to reply to online reviews, in particular to the negative ones, as part of their online reputation management. Although research has started to investigate the effectiveness of such a reply, little is known about how to reply. Across two studies, we investigate the impact of response strategies on hotel booking intentions and the perception of trust. Study 1 tests four different response strategies (i.e. no reply, public explanation, private message, public explanation and private message) in an experimental setting. We find that a public explanation combined with a private message has the strongest effect on trust and booking intention of potential guests. Moreover, taking the conversation offline without any further explanation leads to lower levels of trust and booking intention. In study 2, we additionally manipulate the severity of the service failure described in the online review and show that this is an important boundary condition. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.