There is little doubt that online reviews play a big role in the travel purchase decision for many consumers.
But what of how businesses respond to reviews left by consumers? Is there money to be made from who in the hotel hierarchy responds to a review and how much they write?
The University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business has found that revenue can be improved when businesses respond but, there's more to it than that.
For example, it seems that upscale hotels do better when it's frontline staff that respond with longer replies while mid-market and budget properties appear to do better when it's an executive that responds and replies are tighter.
Karen Xie, assistant professor of hospitality management and co-author of the report, says:
"In addition, the speed of responses is important for full service and above-average hotels and conciseness of responses is critical to budget traveler hotels.”
Back in May, a Barclays study revealed via some economic modelling that there was £3.2 billion to be reaped, over the next decade, if the sector becomes more responsive on online review sites.
The research also showed that 57% of businesses could correlate online feedback with more business.
Many businesses, 67%, also saw benefit in terms of repeat business which is something the Daniels College study also picks up on and also points out that speed of response can also have influence on customer satisfaction.
The University of Denver research looked at 7,979 managerial responses and 51,801 online reviews on TripAdvisor and then matched them with financial data for more than 2,500 hotels in 427 cities in Texas.
Related reading:
Cornell study analyzes TripAdvisor reviews to help hotel managers
TripAdvisor and Booking.com take half of luxury hotel reviews on the web
NB: Image via BigStock.