You may have survived 2009, but the hospitality industry still has a long way to go. To assist hoteliers in this transition year, AH&LA has identified six key areas where hotels are best positioned to do more with less:
- Customer service is free.
- Use green to get green.
- Prevent anti-social media.
- Teach an old staff new tricks.
- F&B choosy.
- Talk to the hill.
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Here are some things other hotels are already doing to offer premium customer service to their guests:
- Leave personal notes from the GM in guestrooms (or at least for repeat guests)
- Have employees make eye contact with guests when they’re within 15 feet and personally address them when within five feet
- In severe weather, give guests free in-room movies
- Pretend each guest has VIP status.
We asked a few frequent travelers – guests who book upwards of 75 nights per year – about some of their best customer service experiences, and here’s what they had to say
“Once when I was staying at a hotel in Chicago, I checked in and was sick from traveling so much. Later that night when I got back to the hotel they had brought me a box of Theraflu.”
-Brian Silengo, director of digital sales, Questex
“I remember checking in to a hotel and mentioning that I to run. Later I found a local jogging map in my room. I had a similar experience when a concierge saw me in jogging clothes and stopped to hand me a map. Paying attention goes a long way.”
-Andrea Bitz, director of national sales, USA Today
Take a look back at past issues of Lodging Consumer Insight. In each issue, Word of Mouse details key words in online reviews that trigger higher or lower ratings, letting you know exactly what you need to work on to improve your ratings.
Get your staff trained on best practices in customer service and save up to 40% with the Educational Institute, the world's leading supplier of hospitality trainining and certification.
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The great thing about protecting the environment is that it also protects your bottom line. Here are some easy ways to get fast ROI:
Many hotels have a linen and towel reuse program. But take a look at these two different ways for guests to participate:
1. “Place this card on your bed if wish to participate.”
2. “Place this card on your bed if you do not wish to participate.”
Scenario #1 asks the guest to do something, whereas #2 does not. Although a small task, this shift in wording can save a 250-room hotel as much as $15,000 per year in reduced costs associated with laundry.
- This strategy is courtesy of Jeff Slye, Five Winds International, an organization helping companies integrate environmental issues and social responsibility into their core practices to achieve a competitive advantage
Here are some other to make going green work for your bottom line:
- Take linen and towel reuse one step further and offer incentives for guests who forgo housekeeping altogether. Take a look at this Wall Street Journal article to learn more about what hotels are already doing.
- Make sure housekeeping keeps the curtains open in the winter, allowing sunshine to naturally warm the room, and to close them in the summer to keep out the heat. Save even more energy by making your guests aware of this tactic as well.
- Take advantage of rebates for buying energy-efficient appliances and products. On the federal level, you can save up to $500 per purchase, and take a look here to see if your state has its own incentive program.
Have any green-related question research and answered by the Green Guru free of charge.
Download Green Consumer Tips to help your guests have a more eco-friendly stay at your property.
Track and manage your water, waste, and energy via GreenQuest, a free, online system courtesy of Burton Energy Group, or through ENERGY STAR.
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According to TIG Global, an AH&LA allied member and leader in social media, the following are tactics each property should have in place:
It’s vital to create and disseminate a social media policy to all employees to ensure your property’s online reputation is protected – as well as your employees’ reputations. When determining your policy, define what is acceptable both on and off the job. Here are some questions to consider:
- Is it okay to send personal tweets while at work?
- Can employees update their Facebook status on the job?
- Can employees use your company’s, vendors’, or clients’ names online?
- Who will have access to the hotel’s Twitter account and Facebook page, and how often will they be updated?
Be proactive with finding guest’s reviews of your hotel.
- Look through travel review Websites (such as TripAdvisor, Travel.yahoo.com, Fodor’s, IgoUgo, etc.)
- Sign up for Google Alerts to receive notifications when your hotel appears in a news articles.
- Check blogs, forums, and social media updates by searching for your hotel name in Google, and selecting any of those in the “Show Options” menu.
If a guest writes negative comments about your property or staff online, the best thing to do is respond directly to that post, acknowledge the concern, and explain how your team is taking strides to rectify the situation.
If a guest writes positive comments about your property or staff, thank them for taking the time to write about their experience.
When it comes to Twitter, even if you’re not Tweeting yourself, search Twitter on a regular basis to find out who’s talking about your hotel. After you sign up for an account, enter your hotel’s name in the search box in the right hand column. You can also utilize services such as TweetDeck and TweetBeep to automatically alert you when someone Tweets about your brand. Be prepared to address concerns or to thank people for praise through Direct Messages or @replies. Whether the comments are good or bad, the information being shared is public and you need to help control the message and protect your brand image.
Create both Twitter and Facebook-only specials. It’s a great way to get more followers and fans and build brand loyalty.
Visit www.ahla.com/socialmedia to learn how to best utilize Facebook, Twitter, and more.
Engage staff members who know social media better than anyone – millennials. Get them involved in the Under 30 Gateway, a membership group offering tailored benefits and resources, and maybe they’ll show you a thing or two about friending, tweeting, and cloud computing.
Become an AH&LA Facebook Fan and be the first to know about new benefits, events, and special offers.
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“We have quick, pre-shift discussion topics that take between 5-10 minutes to keep training alive and ongoing. Topics include service standards, compliance issues, safety, privacy matters, etc. These short sessions do not take employees off the floor for hours at a time and we can weave training into a near daily routine.”
-Doug Patrick, senior vice president, human resources, Hyatt Corporation
"Our By Request Manager is a loyal member of the Wyndham family and has filled a variety of different positions within our company. As soon as we learned there was a training opportunity to assist another property in their By Request needs, we offered her this opportunity and immediately confirmed her participation. Even though the property she was initially working at was sad to see her go, it's been a rewarding way for her to expand her career, while further developing her skills as a manager."
-Arturo Ortiz, regional director of human resources, Rio Mar Beach Resort & Spa, a Wyndham Grand Resort
"Making employees feel valued and appreciated doesn’t have to cost a cent! Here are a couple of ideas:
- During your shift, take time to notice what employees are doing right. Then, during a morning staff meeting, share your accolades in front of the team.
- Involve your entire team in giving recognition. Challenge each team member to catch one teammate doing something right during a shift, perhaps on a particular topic like guest service. Then allow each person to share their story at a shift meeting.
- While email is great, an old-fashioned hand-written note is always a welcome surprise. Take the time to write a couple of thank-you notes each week to team members telling them why you’re glad they chose to work at your hotel.
Most importantly, take time to connect with your people – no matter how busy you are. Greet them with a smile and remember their names…just as you’d have them do for your guests."
-Becky Wedemeyer, VP, organizational development & learning, Choice Hotels International
Is your property a place where all employees feel included and welcome? Perform a self-audit and find out.
Save 20-40% on all training material from the Educational Institute, the world’s leading supplier of training and certification.
Capture the best talent by using your 20% discount to post opportunities on the AH&LA Career Center, powered by Hcareers, the nation’s leading hospitality job board.
Ensure your benefit and compensation packages are competitive in your market through WageWatch, and take advantage of your 10% discount.
Help your female associates accelorate their careers by getting them involved with AH&LA's Women In Lodging (WIL).
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When assessing your F&B, be sure to grab the low hanging fruit:
- Limit your hours to just peak times
- If you have more than one restaurant, prevent cannibalization by alternating hours of operation
- Opt for a seasonal menu, based on which ingredients are the lowest cost
Use F&B to increase your approval ratings on travel review sites, by paying attention to breakfast:
When travelers are pleased with the food & beverage offerings of a hotel and surrounding restaurants, they rate the hotel higher than when they were dissatisfied. Regarding the specific words used in guest comments when rating hotels, 'breakfast' was the third most frequently mentioned word across all categories, mentioned in 15.6% of all guest rating comments. Travelers consider breakfast often when rating hotels. The word 'breakfast' maintains a high frequency across all traveler rating categories, ranking in the top 10 for each rating category.
Breakfast was mentioned more frequently and moved higher in the rankings as traveler ratings improved, indicating that guests assigning a higher rating to a hotel mention breakfast more often than guests assigning a lower rating. Considering the frequency and pattern of the word 'breakfast' in guest comments accompanying hotel ratings, hoteliers should show extra concern to the breakfast offerings in their hotels to improve traveler ratings of their hotel.
For the full article, AH&LA Members can take a look at the December issue of Lodging Consumer Insight.
-Article courtesy of Dr. Betsy Bender Stringam, assistant professor, Hotel, Restaurant & Tourism Management, New Mexico State University, and John Gerdes Jr., associate professor, Technology Support & Training Management, School of Hospitality, Retail & Sport Management, University of South Carolina, have been analyzing data posted on Expedia.com spanning 60,648 comments across 10,537 hotels in the 100 largest U.S. cities to determine correlations between key phrases and overall ratings.
Share ideas and best practices with other F&B professionals via AH&LA's Food & Beverage Committee.
Find out how to make your kitchen more eco-friendly by consulting with AH&LA's Green Guru.
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Here are some helpful steps for making sure your voice is heard at both the state and national level:
- Use personal stories when communicating with your Representatives.
- To identify and contact your legislators use this Website, or visit www.congress.org.
- If you end up speaking with a staffer – who may be fresh out of college – treat them as if they were the member of Congress themselves. They hold more power than you might think.
- Become an expert on the issues impacting the hospitality industry by viewing the issue briefs found at www.ahla.com/government.
Take advantage of hotelLOBBY, AH&LA’s grassroots organization, helping you communicate easily and effectively with your legislators.
Get timely updates sent straight your inbox whenever there is a vote, ruling, or change in procedure that affects your business.
Unite with other hoteliers in D.C. at the AH&LA Legislative Action Summit each March to amplify your voice and ensure our industry’s perspective is heard.
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The following are just a few of the benefits available to AH&LA members and their properties. Visit the members only section for full details. To learn more about becoming an AH&LA member, visit www.ahla.com/membership.
- Have any hospitality-related question researched and answered within three business days at no charge viat the AH&LA Information Center.
- Give your entire staff an extra benefit at no cost to you – the Prescription Drug Card saves 10-35% on prescriptions, regardless of insurance standing.
- See how you stack up to the competition with savings on benchmarking reports via the AH&LA Data Center, powered by STR.
- Network with hoteliers and learn the latest trends and innovations via your free admission to the AH&LA Fall Conference, held in conjunction with the International Hotel/Motel & Restaurant Show.
40-60% on office supplies with Staples
Up to 29% on shipping services with FedEx
25% on regional advertising with USA Today – an exclusive offer for AH&LA members only
Up to 6.5 cents per gallon of gas with the BP Fleet Management Card
1-5% on music licensing fees with ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC
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