With the volume of online reviews at an all time high, hoteliers must be acutely aware of what is being said about their destination.
NB: This article is written by Margaret Ady, marketing director at TrustYou.
TrustYou, working together with Donna Quadri-Felitti PhD from New York University's Preston Robert Tisch Center for Hospitality, Tourism, and Sports Management, have analyzed a random sample of 6.1 million global hotel reviews to understand traveler opinions so far in 2014.
The studies are segmented by three regions (Asia-Pacific and Europe, Middle East & Africa and North America).
Each market is unique
Trends are emerging, but they appear to be unique to each destination’s mix of hotel types, price levels and traveler segments.
What is working in one city or region is not necessarily the same throughout the world, making it difficult to generalize macro trends. However, generally speaking:
- Travelers are more satisfied with service in Asia Pacific (APAC) and Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) compared to a year ago
- In many North American major markets, hoteliers are improving food and beverage options, as evidenced by an improvement in traveler satisfaction with food and beverage compared to a year ago
- Hotel internet/wifi receives the lowest scores across the globe, and scores continue trending further down
Destinations struggle to fire on all cylindersWhile there were improvements in review scores and some guest satisfaction drivers, most destinations struggled to achieve across the board improvements in compared to a year ago.
Notable exceptions were Orlando in the US and the Japanese city of Kyoto, both of which improved overall review scores, by +0.2% and +0.9%, respectively, as well as guest satisfaction scores for service, room, location, internet, food and price.
All other destinations, regions and countries in these studies posted year-over-year declines in at least one of the aforementioned categories.
Despite this trend, hoteliers in some major markets have seen an increase in percentage of five-star reviews.
Hoteliers diligent about responding to travelers
Hoteliers have embraced reviews more than ever before, with management response rates increasing significantly in the first quarter of 2014.
Hoteliers will want to continue improving management response rates, as it encourages travelers to write more reviews and builds trust among travelers in the public review environment.
NB: The full reports are available for free download.
NB2: This article is written by Margaret Ady, marketing director at TrustYou. It appears here as part of Tnooz's sponsored content initiative.
TrustYou aggregates millions of online reviews, social mentions and other user generated content and boils this data into usable, actionable insights that allow hotels, restaurants, destinations and intermediaries to improve their services and positively influence travelers’ decisions.
NB3: Laptop destination image via Shutterstock.