How effective are your current hotel management systems? If you’ve experienced a series of no-shows, poor customer reviews, or a drop in reservations, perhaps it’s time to investigate the latest trends in hotel industry technology.
If you’re also experiencing a high employee turnover rate, you might be looking at options for employee retention. Hotel management systems can assist you with this and other important business goals.
The Cost of Losing Client Loyalty
Great customer service should be at the top of your list. While each customer will usually have their own definition of what this means, there are usually a few common elements.
Have you noticed a large number of complaints? While some of these issues may initially appear minor to you and your employees, chances are this isn’t the case for your customers.
CEB recently conducted research on customer loyalty. They found that 96% of their participants were likely to be disloyal when they needed to expend a considerable amount of effort to resolve a problem.
In 2011, Harris Interactive/RightNow conducted a customer experience consumer review. They found that 86% of their participants stopped conducting business with a company due to a “bad” customer experience.
How does disloyalty translate? In addition to posting poor reviews, sharing their experience on social media, and not returning to your hotel or Bed-and-Breakfast again, unhappy customers may resort to other means . These include writing letters, barraging you with emails, and calling your establishment repeatedly to complain. Needless to say, this can interfere with day-to-day business operations and create an air of tension for you and your employees.
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Creating a Positive Customer Experience
How long does it take for your website to load? Is it easy to maneuver and accessible across multiple platforms such as smartphones, iPads, and other devices? Do you have photographs and other graphics? Descriptive texts? Is your contact information easy to locate? These and other questions are important to ask because they’re an integral aspect of the customer experience.
When planning a trip, travelers will usually conduct about 17 Internet sessions prior to booking. Mobile devices are a convenient way to locate travel-related information, and inquiries on these devices have increased over 50%. As a result, approximately 53% of travelers will use mobile devices to engage in travel-related research.
After conducting mobile research, 46% of travelers will complete their arrangements on another device. Given the daily average no-show rate of 10%, it’s possible that this is partially due to potential customers locating the proverbial better deal. Another reason may be that they’re experiencing difficulties when attempting to complete an online booking or are unable to reach a live person at the reservation desk.
When Bed and Breakfast travelers conduct research, price and location are usually at the top of the list. After this, they’ll be weighing their options based on these issues:
- Consumer reviews: 50%
- Photos: 47%
- Friends’ recommendations: 46%
- Flexible cancellations policy: 43%
- Ability to book online: 43%
When people have a positive experience, they tend to revisit an establishment. This was the case with 74% of travelers. Baby Boomers in particular enjoy taking multi-generational family trips, and 26% of the participants stated they planned to do so in 2016. While over half of Millennials and Gen Xers stated that the cost of leisure traveling was an issue, just 45% of the Baby Boomer generation indicated that this was the case for them.
If cost is an issue for travelers of any generation, this makes delivering a positive customer experience even more important. Just imagine families, couples, college students, and other individuals planning and saving for a trip only to have it be less than satisfying. While there are other reasons a trip may be disappointing besides hotel accommodations, it’s important to consider this situation.
The Benefits of Client Loyalty
When you deliver a positive customer experience, you’ll be able to increase loyalty. Were you aware that all it takes is to increase your customer base by 5%? This can potentially lead to a per-customer profit increase between 25% to 100%.
Having effective hotel management systems can assist you with delivering this experience. When you have the best hotel management systems, your employees be able to perform their jobs more efficiently, and your customers will have a memorable experience.
