Having good reviews on your website and on other sites such as TripAdvisor is often very important to hotel managers. In fact, this is definitely an important metric to keep track of, as not only does this put you in line against your competitors, but it’s one of the main things that guests look at when making their final decision on booking a hotel. As per survey, 95 per cent of travellers report using travel reviews to make booking decisions, and they are four times more likely to choose a hotel with a higher review score.
Guests are even willing to pay more for a hotel with better reviews, with 76 per cent reporting that this is the case. So, it’s clear that hotel reviews are important, but what can you do to influence these?
Well, in terms of the quality of reviews, all you can do is offer high-quality service and meet the expectations of guests in all aspects in order to ensure they are happy. However, you may find that many people aren’t active when it comes to leaving reviews. Unfortunately, a person is much more likely to leave a review if they’ve had a bad experience than a good one.
You should consider encouraging guests to leave reviews in order to boost the number of high-quality ones you receive. This can be done in many ways, either by marketing materials in rooms, or by sending a follow-up email upon check out. You could even incentivise this, for example by offering free drinks or a discount to a random participant once every month. Not only will this encourage someone to leave a review, but may also encourage them to return to you at a later date.
Of course, you’ll find that you can’t please guests 100 per cent of the time. With this in mind, you should try to solve any issues that a guest may have during their stay, before it gets to the point where they may want to leave a negative review. If they do have an issue, but you’re able to solve it, this could actually prompt them to leave a positive review because of how efficiently you handled their issue. It’s also important that you keep a close eye on social media, as this may be the place many people will turn to if they have a complaint. You need to make sure that you are handling all complaints that are made – even if the customer is quite obviously wrong. The best thing to do in the instance of an online complaint is to apologise, and then direct them to a private email address or contact number so that you can deal with the issue offline.
If someone has had a bad experience, then another potential guest may actually refrain from booking if they’re concerned about this, so it’s important that you stay on top of these and do anything you can to ensure that reviews remain positive.
