Guest experience is a major factor in how travelers choose, rate, and return to hotels. 73% of travelers say the quality of experience is a key factor in their accommodation choices, and 76% would pay more for a hotel with higher review scores.
For hotel groups managing multiple properties, that presents an opportunity and a challenge: how do you consistently deliver great experiences at scale?
A Customer Experience Platform (CXP) is designed to answer that question. It consolidates feedback from reviews and surveys, analyzes sentiment across categories like cleanliness and service, and gives your teams the tools to act — whether responding to a guest review, prioritizing improvements, or pushing positive feedback to Google.
In this guide, we’ll explain CXP, the key features to look for, and how to evaluate whether a platform is built to meet the needs of a large hotel group rather than just a single property.
What Is a Customer Experience Platform (CXP)?
A Customer Experience Platform (CXP) is a centralized system that helps hotels collect, analyze, respond to, and act on guest feedback at scale. It combines third-party reviews, first-party surveys, and operational insights to help you understand what guests say and where to focus.
While Customer Data Platforms (CDPs) unify guest identity across systems, a CXP focuses on sentiment and service quality. It answers questions like:
- How are guests rating their stay?
- What issues are impacting performance scores?
- Are specific properties outperforming or falling behind?
- How do we compare to competitors in key areas?
For large hotel groups, this kind of visibility is critical. Without it, feedback gets buried in a disconnected system or, worse, missed entirely.
And the business case is clear: hotels with higher review scores attract more bookings, and 95% of travelers read reviews before making a decision. A CXP helps you stay on top of that feedback and use it to drive measurable improvement across your entire portfolio.
Key Capabilities to Look For in a CXP
Not all Customer Experience Platforms are built for the complexity of managing multiple properties, regions, or brands. When evaluating your options, these core capabilities matter, especially if you want a system that scales with your business.
CXP Buyer’s Checklist
Feedback Collection Your platform should collect feedback from every meaningful source and make it easy for guests to share.
Why it matters: Hotels using post-stay surveys see an average 8% higher review score.
Analytics and Insight Raw feedback isn’t useful without structured analysis.
Why it matters: AI-powered sentiment analysis tools help your teams focus on what will make the most significant difference, rather than less impactful items.
Response Management Timely, thoughtful replies improve guest perception — but they take time.
Why it matters: Just one unaddressed negative review can reduce future bookings.
Reporting and Goal Tracking A strong CXP gives your team clear targets and the ability to track progress.
Promotion and Marketing Your best reviews can do more than sit on a dashboard — they can drive bookings.
Why it matters: 95% of travelers read reviews before booking, and strong review visibility directly impacts conversion.
Data Privacy and Compliance Your platform must be built to protect guest data and respect their preferences.
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What to Ask Vendors During Evaluation
Once you’ve narrowed down your shortlist, the real differentiators often include how the platform handles scale, support, and everyday operations. Here are the questions that can help you go beyond the feature list and uncover whether a CXP is fit for your hotels:
- How well does it support multi-property and multi-brand operations?
- Can dashboards roll up data across brands, regions, or flags?
- Can we customize survey distribution and templates per property?
- What does your AI do?
- Is sentiment analysis rule-based or machine learning?
- Can your AI generate multi-language review responses?
- How does it handle new or uncommon feedback themes?
- How flexible is the setup process?
- Can we self-manage surveys and categories, or is the setup locked behind support?
- Can you start small and expand later?
- Can we benchmark across properties or competitors?
- Is internal benchmarking included?
- How often is competitor data updated, and from what sources?
- How does the platform connect with our existing tools?
- Can we sync feedback data to our CDP or CRM?
- Is there an API for pulling CXP insights into our own dashboards?
- What support is available for rollout and training?
- Do you offer onboarding for large teams?
- Is there account-level support for enterprise clients?
- How do you handle change management across departments?
These questions will help you get beyond the “yes/no” feature matrix and uncover whether the platform is truly built for the scale and complexity of your business.
How to Evaluate Platform Fit Across Multiple Properties
Managing guest experience at a single hotel is challenging enough, but doing it across dozens or hundreds of properties adds layers of complexity. When choosing a CXP, it’s critical to evaluate whether the platform is built to handle the operational realities of a multi-property group.
Here’s what to look for:
Centralized Management with Local Flexibility
Can you manage surveys, response templates, and categories centrally, while allowing individual hotels to customize where needed?
Can different brands or property types have tailored feedback flows, without requiring separate accounts?
Portfolio-Level Reporting
Does the platform provide roll-up reporting across properties, brands, or regions?
Can you compare trends, performance, and sentiment scores side-by-side?
Role-Based Access and Permissions
Can you control who sees what? (e.g., GM vs. marketing lead vs. regional head)
Is access granular enough to support large, distributed teams?
Standardization Without Rigidity
Can you create standardized survey templates and reporting structures?
Is adjusting based on regional differences, brand tone, or property-specific amenities easy?
Support for Enterprise KPIs and Goal-Setting
Can the platform help you monitor performance against group-wide goals like NPS, satisfaction, or review response time?
Are dashboards tailored to different user levels (frontline vs. exec team)?
The right CXP won’t force you to choose between scale and personalization — it should give you both. When these features are in place, you can operate more clearly, consistently, and confidently across your entire portfolio.
Experience Is a Differentiator — But Only If You Can Measure and Improve It
A Customer Experience Platform gives hotel groups the structure to collect feedback, understand what matters most to guests, and take action at scale. It turns reviews and surveys into operational insight, gives teams clarity on where to focus, and helps protect and promote your reputation across every touchpoint.
The right CXP isn’t just a reporting tool. It’s the infrastructure that powers better guest relationships, more consistent service, and long-term brand strength.
