The Secret to Understanding Your Guests’ Needs

I finished Netflix last night, so I moved on to my second favorite activity to pass the time in quarantine — looking at beautiful hotels. As I perused photos and online reviews, it struck me that while some of the reasons people love to stay in hotels — location, furnishings, the serenity of your own space — are the same in today’s pandemic, many things have changed. The rocking rooftop bar, the warm greeting upon check in, the spa…these are likely no longer part of the experience for the foreseeable future. 

For some guests, the seemingly pared down experience will dramatically affect their satisfaction. They might feel like their stay is sterile or they’re being short changed. Some may look at the cleaning efforts and be annoyed that they can’t escape the pandemic, even for a short while, to enjoy some time away. Others might look at things differently and appreciate the thoughtfulness that goes into keeping guests and employees safe by following social distancing guidelines and limiting service. 

The fact is that guest expectations have changed and it’s much harder to predict what guests are looking for from you when they walk through your doors. During a webinar hosted by Cornell at the start of the pandemic, Raymond Martz, Executive VP and CEO of Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, shared an anecdote to remind listeners of this fact. He said that many guests of his Florida property surprised him by saying that they did, in fact, want their rooms cleaned every day, even though that meant people would be in and out of the guest room, thus raising the risk of Covid-19 spreading. When asked why, the guests said they were tired of being home taking care of themselves and were looking for someone to take care of them for a bit.

In order to meet your guests where they are, hoteliers can no longer assume they know what guests want from their stay. Too much has changed. Everyone looks at the pandemic differently and opinions shift day to day. That’s why many hoteliers are now adding surveys to the pre-stay process, ensuring that they know what the guest is looking for so that they can exceed expectations with personalized service. Hotels that empower teams to adjust the guest experience in real-time will be the same groups to receive glowing reviews and ultimately succeed in capturing demand as it returns. 

If you’re looking for ways to understand your guests’ expectations before their visit, Revinate has the solution: Revinate Guest Feedback. While survey technology is proven and has been around for a while, the use case is new and is the perfect solution for collecting information about guest sentiment before the stay.

With Revinate Guest Feedback, hoteliers can analyze feedback trends to identify when guest expectations are shifting and deliver against them, easily respond directly to individual guests to make an impact in real-time, evaluate and optimize guest engagement to gather more feedback and automatically attach survey responses into guests’ Rich Guest Profiles, which is important or segmentation and providing personalized service when the guest is on property. 

Try it now, risk free and never have to wonder what your guests want again.