More and more people are booking hotels online. We’re all becoming internet-savvy and using digital technologies to our advantage. In fact, 93% of people looking to book hotels check the reviews online, regardless of how they book their stay.
Around 53% of people even say they would never consider booking a hotel that doesn’t have reviews online. It’s clear that online reviews play a significant role in hotel reputation management and help create a strong online image to boost visibility and ensure more bookings.
The most well-known review site in this industry is Tripadvisor, and, naturally, all hotels want to get the best possible reviews and comments, as most customers read reviews on this platform. With that in mind, here are a few tips on getting to the top on Tripadvisor.
Reputation is essential
Each positive review impacts the growth of all your KPIs. With great reviews, your occupancy, ADR, and loyalty will grow. On average, 79% of travelers looking to book a hotel go through 6 to 12 reviews before making their final decision.
Around 88% of those people trust the reviews they read as if they were personal referrals, while 65% of travelers aged 18 to 29 say that they find online reviews very important when choosing a hotel. That’s just proof that younger generations pay more attention to the internet and like to find reputable hotels they can book within a few clicks.
The best way to get great reviews is through your staff
Hotels need to hire people who love hospitality and want to make other people feel special. Hotels have to invest a lot of time and resources in training, supporting, and empowering their employees with the right culture, skills, tools, and mindsets to excel at their work.
That way, they will have the freedom, creativity, and knowledge to tackle all guest issues on the spot. They will also be willing to go out of their way to provide guests with that special service they’re looking for and inspire great reviews.
The culture of the whole organization needs to be well defined
The whole team working in a hotel needs to pay attention to reviews. Everyone needs to do their best to make the guests feel comfortable and welcome – they should all be caring and treat guests with the same level of care as they would a family member.
To do this, however, you need proper leadership. The leaders need to set an example and coordinate the right strategies across the whole organization, establishing a culture where professionalism and hard work are rewarded.
General Managers should address negative reviews
Each negative review represents an opportunity for a hotel to look at its services and see what could be improved. In other words, they should be looked at from a broader perspective and not just as a micro issue. Yes, hotels should have someone write responses to reviews, but this shouldn’t be GMs.
The GMs should be actively involved in helping with the response, learning about the broader picture, and coming up with necessary solutions for the future. However, someone else should be there to write and post the responses.
The DOSMR should be involved
The Director of Sales, Marketing, and Revenue needs to pay a lot of attention to reputation optimization. Why? Simply because without it, there is no good revenue optimization.
Since online reviews are critical, all user-generated content can affect how these reviews look. In other words, the success of revenue optimization is directly tied to reviews. With every ad, call, blog post, or any other content, someone will check the reviews.
Using a CRM tool is a must
A good customer relationship management tool is essential for managing customer reviews and their overall experience. However, one important thing is to find a CRM that allows hotel teams to communicate with management and guests.
It’s essential to tackle issues as they come along with all the relevant people involved. That’s how people can collaborate quickly and find the best solutions for the pain spots of employees that could be the difference between a positive and a negative review.
All hotels should focus on getting 5-star ratings
Getting 4s might not seem so bad, but it actually says a lot more than that. When someone gives this rating, it means that they’ve had a “neutral” experience. Their stay was pleasant, and the staff was polite, but it didn’t make their dreams come true.
More importantly, these guests are quite likely to look at other options the next time and probably won’t stay at your hotel. On the other hand, a 5-star rating means that guests would definitely come back again in the future.
How guests choose hotels based on reviews
Research by Trust You has shown that travelers will choose hotels with better reviews 3.9X more often if all the other factors are similar. In other words, hotels with the same level of service, prices, and location will win over customers if they have better reviews.
Travelers will also pay more money to stay at a hotel with better reviews. Over 59% of travelers that look for hotel reviews online check them at TripAdvisor. In other words, most people check TripAdvisor before anything else to figure out whether a hotel is worth their money.
Use an integrated hotel PMS!
Modern hotel PMS solutions let hoteliers manage both their front-office and back-office processes. These systems help hoteliers have a detailed overview of their operations and efforts. A cloud-based PMS with the right features allows customers to have easy check-ins and check-outs, get housekeeping at their fingertips, integrate all payment methods, and so much more.
In other words, they help hotels provide better experiences which can later result in more positive reviews. More importantly, a PMS centralizes your guest data, allowing better analytics and reporting capabilities. It’s possible to determine which guests are giving you positive reviews and why. You can then adjust your approach to get as many positive reviews as possible.
Bottom line
Your revenue, online reputation, and reviews of your hotel are definitely tied together. If you want to learn more about their relationship and how you can optimize various aspects of your processes to boost your TripAdvisor reviews, feel free to check full ebook on this topic and learn more.
