Hotel Reputation Management and Google (Part I)

If I know nothing else, I know that Google is a bear—sometimes the kind you want to cozy up with and sometimes the kind that sends you screaming for your life. It’s also one of the most important aspects of online marketing/social media/reputation management for hotels to really “get.” So, welcome to a six-part series on some of the ins-and-outs of hotel reputation management and Google. It’s not comprehensive by a long shot, but I’m covering aspects of everything from reputation management to Google Hotel Finder to paid search—something for everyone.

Let’s start with what’s happening with reputation management, Google, and hotels. Google actually managed to make user reviews even more important than they already were when they added the Zagat score to every listing. The Zagat score is showing up in the Promoted Hotel ads (we’ll talk about this in Part V) as well as in the Google Hotel Finder listings the come up on the SERP (see below).

The Zagat score appears first, followed by the number of Google reviews the hotel has. The Zagat scores are honestly pretty vague. Anything above 16 is Good (or better) and from 21-30 the range is Very Good to Perfection.

If you need more positive Google reviews, just ask your guests for them (via email, survey, etc.). A reasonable percentage will respond. So get out there build it up! How is a traveler to decide between a 21 and a 25 when there’s seemingly not a vast difference ? Probably the user reviews, which means they become a real deciding factor in Google’s format, especially when a traveler gets over to Google Hotel Finder.I’d venture to say even the volume of reviews a hotel has on Google is important, since it’s appearing on the SERP.