How Guest Outreaches Impact Your Hotel’s Success

The need for diversity in terms of communication methods is becoming more potent among modern travelers and hotels all around the globe are shifting their hotel-guest communication strategies towards direct messaging.

Doma Hotels is part of the large investment and development company - Doma Group - and operates five hotels in Canberra in Australia. The hotel group was quick to acknowledge the value and importance of direct and personalized communication and the positive impact that real-time feedback can have over a hotel’s success rate.

For this reason, Doma Hotels chose TrustYou’s Messaging solution and are now benefiting from an increase in positive guest reviews, improved scores across their departments, and operational excellence. The group has directed its focus towards engaging with guests throughout the entire guest journey and Doma Hotels reached the positive performances mentioned above by setting up three different outreach messages for their guests.  

 

Outreach 1: Pre-Stay Survey

In order to get valuable insights into what their future guests expect from their hotel stay, Doma Hotels send a pre-stay survey to travelers that have made a booking at one of their hotels and therefore oversee and manage guest preferences prior to their check-in. Around 11% of their guests respond with special requests and check in preferences, allowing the Hotels to manage check-ins more efficiently and guarantee positive guest experiences upon arrival.

 

“The opportunity to gather direct feedback from our guests before and during their stay is a huge advantage for us. Gathering guest preferences before their arrival allows us to make arrangements for guests up to 24 hours prior to checking in, making the process more efficient. ”

 Kathryn Carling, Hotel Manager

 

Outreach 2: Pre-arrival satisfaction check

The second outreach is a welcome email to all hotel guests. Checking in with guest upon their arrival is a great way to ensure that they are satisfied with the hotel and services. Doma Hotel uses the welcome email to encourage their guests to reach out to the hotel staff if they have any requests, concerns or issues. This ensures that the hotel staff is quick to respond and manage any negative situations that might arise, in order to avoid their development into negative post-stay reviews.

By using TrustYou’s Guest Messaging solution, Doma Hotels are able to proactively communicate with their guests. As 6% of all guests reply to the hotel’s Messages via text, Doma Hotels have managed to reduce the number of calls enormously. This allows the hotel staff to handle requests faster while managing multiple inquiries at once and therefore increasing operational efficiency.

 

Outreach 3: Personalized Messages

Another way to engage with guests is through personalized content. Doma Hotel’s Little National Hotel sends a scheduled outreach to their guests, inviting them to visit the bar in their guest lounge. Not only is this a nice touch from the hotel, but it also generates additional revenue.

 

“TrustYou Guest Messaging allows us to place more emphasis on guest experience. We are able to increase real-time engagement with our guests and respond to incoming requests faster, like late check-outs and additional amenities. If guests are traveling for their anniversary, we can offer suite upgrades that also generate more revenue for us. We are experimenting with different messages and guests seem to love the personalized experience.

Kathryn Carling, Hotel Manager  

 

TrustYou’s Guest Messaging solution plays a big part in the overall success of customer service at Doma Hotels and contributes to the increase of the overall performance of the hotel. The share of positive reviews (4 and 5 stars) increased from 89.21% in September 2017 to 91.30% in August 2018. The share of negative reviews decreased from 10.79% in September 2017 to 8.70% in August 2018. This has proven the importance and influence that direct engagement with guest has on the overall performance of a hotel.

Do you want to start engaging with your guests in real-time? Start a free trial now and see how you can improve the experience for your guests.

Catalina Brinza

Catalina is a social media and data enthusiast. At TrustYou, she's on a mission to bring the most out of travel and hospitality data. One day, she hopes to experience Japan's culture to its fullest.

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