Executive Voices: Hotels on competing in the age of reviews
Nowadays, if you don't rank high on TripAdvisor you don't even register with travelers. While hotels once simply worried about word of mouth when it came to subpar experiences, now they must avoid being blasted all over social media and review sites. And because we rely so heavily on peer reviews to choose our hotels, negative feedback can cost hotels a lot of money. Complicating things even further, is that it's difficult for many consumers to tell whether reviews are even real. So how do properties cope? We asked a few hotel executives to weigh in.
1. Cathy Ross, CEO of Exclusive Resorts. Our goal for The Source, our proprietary web application and community forum, was to utilize new technology to deliver an even more personalized experience. It was designed to provide a mobile-friendly member environment where travelers can make automatic adjustments to their itineraries and rate their experiences in a destination – from restaurants and tour guides to their favorite villa or spa therapist. Unlike more widely used review sites where travelers have varying expectations on service, accommodations, cleanliness and amenities, our members trust each other’s opinions because the expectations surrounding their vacation experiences are the same. People today are looking for that validation from friends, family and like-minded travelers, and The Source gives our members a trustworthy forum to do just that.
2. Javier Rosenberg, chief operating officer, Americas, Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group. We have spent significant time working primarily to educate and train hotel management teams with regards to the importance and impact of reviews; making sure there is an understanding that the social emergence and connectivity allows reviews not only to become a tool for references and recommendations, but also become a tool for feedback and an opportunity to engage a customer in a conversation and part of the customer journey with our brands. One tool that we provide our hotels’ is called Revinate, which helps consolidate all their reviews and responses from social media to OTA’s into a single dashboard providing a one-stop tool for collecting, reviewing, tracking and responding to guest reviews. Over the past few years, the role of a general manager has shifted to include significant hours spent responding to reviews and engaging personally with customers; keeping the interaction on real time and sincere is vital to ensure there is transparency and commitment from the hotels towards the customer experience.
3. Robert McDowell, Senior Vice President, Global Marketing and Distribution, Choice Hotels International: It’s very important to Choice Hotels that our guests feel confident when making hotel reservations on choicehotels.com to visit friends, family, and business colleagues. To provide guests with confidence in booking online, we launched review functionality on ChoiceHotels.com, called Verified Reviews. Guests who post reviews on ChoiceHotels.com are required to provide their booking confirmation number to ensure the guest actually stayed at that hotel. Verified Reviews guarantees choicehotels.com provides real reviews from real guests.
Jessica Festa is the founder on the solo and offbeat travel blog, Jessie on a Journey, and the online responsible tourism and culture magazine, Epicure & Culture. She's constantly searching for local experiences beyond the guidebook. You can follow her travels on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.