1. Do not underestimate the importance of online reputation management
We all know that modern travelers rely on reviews from other travelers before making any hotel booking. Moreover, as more and more travellers have started trusting online reviews and it has become an important part of travel planning, maintaining, a positive online reputation is critical to the success of hotel business.
2. Develop a customer-obsessed environment in your hotel
The most important aspect of online reputation management takes place at your hotel itself. Hence, you have to confirm that no stone is unturned to ensure that your guests have the best stay experience. This, to some extent will guarantee positive feedback from guests.
Train and empower your staff to exceed guest expectations, handle any bad experiences on the spot and prevent on-property issues from escalating to online complaints. Device a social media policy and guidelines for your hotel staff to ensure that employees know how to conduct themselves with guests both online and in person. Your staff should be well aware of the risks and repercussions of mishandling guests.
3. Establish and share your reputation objectives and strategies clearly with the team
Set an objective of what kind of reputation you want to establish for your property. What is it that you want your hotel to be known for and want is that your guests should say about your hotel after they leave. Plan and work towards achieving that objective. Analyze your hotel's ratings and reviews on key review sites, and identify what are the positive and negative things that your guests write about you and then work from there. Strategize how you will meet your goals.
4. Reputation Management is a team task
Share your reputation related objectives, vision, and strategies with your entire hotel staff, and ensure that your entire team understands their contribution, role & responsibilities in fulfilling these objectives.
5. Optimize and own your online presence
Own your profile online. Claim and update your profiles on key review sites like TripAdvisor, Google Business, Yelp and Online Travel Agencies. Add descriptions, images and contact information, and ensure that the information is correct and up to date.
6. Analyze guest reviews
Closely analyze your guest reviews and look for any specific patterns that need special consideration. Pay attention to identify key differentiators or core strengths that your consumers are talking about and put you a level up from your competitors to influence direct bookings. Further club feedback in guest reviews with the feedback from guest surveys to get a 360-degree view of guest satisfaction score and Net Promoter Score.
7. Take regular meetings with your ground staff and then plan next action
Interact with your customer-facing staff, take their feedback, and use it as a productive learning insight to improve your service. Take the necessary actions to fix problems and prevent recurring complaints. This will help generate a steady stream of positive reviews.
8. Incentivize and reward your Employees
Only making strategies is not enough, you have to also work towards it and provide regular updates on the status of achieving your reputation objectives. Incentivize and reward your hotel staff for achieving the goals defined. There are ORM tools available that help you set and track goals for your team. Recognize their efforts and reward them.
9. Select and prioritize to respond to guest reviews
Responding to guest reviews confirms your interest in what your consumers are saying about you. Moreover, this is an opportunity to show to other prospect guests also that you care about guest feedback. In addition, it gives you a chance to change incorrect perceptions about your hotel and comfort the prospective guests that you are keen on taking measures to ensure no unpleasant experience for your hotel guests.
However, you cannot respond to all the reviews, hence prioritize and select reviews that demand an apology, an explanation or expression of gratitude. However, do ensure to update the concerned guest about any measures you have taken to solve the issue they faced. In addition, in extremely bad situations, offer guests some incentive or discounts on next bookings.
10. Choose the right Online Reputation Management Tools
Social media and online reputation management are real-time. With so much action in digital space, it is practically impossible to keep up with the pace manually. To ensure that you do not miss a thing, use an advanced ORM tool to give you a holistic picture and collection of guest reviews from more than 120 review sites. A modern reputation management tool will help to automate this process and will make responding also a cakewalk.
Incorporate these simple steps into your daily processes and culture of your hotel and you will witness an improvement in the guest satisfaction level and increased direct bookings; guaranteeing a long-term success for your hotel.
