While you, as a hotelier, enjoy reading some glowing reviews about your hotel, your staff and your amazing location or beautiful decor, you also can’t help but dread and loathe the odd negative review that slips through the cracks.
NB: This is an article from Oaky
But do you really know the power that all reviews – both good and bad – hold for your hotel? Reviews give you a window into your guests’ wants and needs, as well as their likes and dislikes.
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They are also a little opening into the reality of your hotel for other potential guests, where they get to find out what the hotel is like behind all of the glossy images and styled videos.
Tracking and managing your reviews can be a golden ticket to improving your hotel experience, guest satisfaction, marketing strategy and learning how to get the most out of your upselling endeavours – review analysis is an excellent way to increase your bottom line.
Why it’s important to monitor your online reviews
Monitoring, collecting and consolidating online guest reviews is a secret weapon in the hospitality industry that can pack a huge punch. The benefits of online reviews are both promotional and operational for the hotel.
- Firstly, they create positive word-of-mouth advertising for your business in the form of social proof. Potential guests are much more likely to trust the information being given if it comes from a past guest than if it comes directly from the hotel itself. In fact, according to Tripadvisor “83% of Tripadvisor users will “usually” or “always” reference reviews before deciding to book a hotel”.
- Furthermore, feedback in reviews provides insight into your guests’ wants, needs, likes and dislikes. By consolidating the information in online reviews and tracking them over time, hotel managers are able to assess what areas of the hotel’s operations, facilities or staff need to be addressed, celebrated or optimised. Properly monitored feedback can also give you insight into how your newest improvements are faring, or if there need to be further upgrades in a certain area.
- Reviews go hand in hand with marketing and upselling. As you track your guests’ feedback, you can more accurately define your target segments and buyer personas, and link these to unique and personalised product offerings and marketing communication. When guests feel cared for and like their personal needs are considered, they are more likely to take you up on those tailor-made recommendations.
- Having a large number of reviews also impacts your ratings on review sites, as well as search engine ranking, making it more likely that potential guests will see your site and review site listings when they search for their next trip. You can often increase your marketing reach and direct bookings by appearing top of the search results both on the online travel agent listing pages as well as a Google search. Tripadvisor, for example, looks at recency, quality and quantity of reviews when deciding on ranking a property.
How to keep track
While monitoring your guests’ feedback is the secret that can solve many a manager’s woes, it is also tricky to keep track of the myriad of platforms available for guest reviews, think Booking.com, Tripadvisor, Google, and Facebook to name but a few.
