In 2013, hoteliers enjoyed better review scores and improvements in service and management response rates, despite declining Internet satisfaction, according to the latest findings that compare user-generated hotel reviews for 2013 with the year prior.
TrustYou, working in conjunction with Donna Quadri-Felitti, Ph.D., at New York University, Preston Robert Tisch Center for Hospitality, Tourism, and Sports Management, has developed its first global reports identifying key trends in travellers’ reviews and hotel satisfaction across North America, Asia Pacific (APAC) and Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA).
Based on a sample of more than 14 million reviews from across 250-plus sources, the data and insights are segmented by each region, by select countries/sub-regions and include major markets within each region. Review scores are based on TrustScore, TrustYou’s aggregate score out of 100, pulling from all reviews written worldwide.
Some of the highlights include:
Volume and importance of Reviews are on the rise
As travellers turn increasingly to reviews to help with their hotel booking decisions, hotel management is under constant pressure to focus on and improve review scores of their hotel portfolios.
In 2013, hoteliers rose to the pressure, with the majority of regions/countries and major markets posting an increase in scores. The U.K. (+2.0%) registered one of the biggest percentage gains.
The volume of reviews has grown by double-digit percentages in APAC, EMEA and North America, with most major review platforms seeing gains, showing the continued importance of reviews on the travel industry.
Five-Star Reviews drop in major markets across the globe
Despite an increase in TrustScores and volume of reviews in 2013, nearly all major markets in APAC, EMEA and North America have seen a decline in the percentage of five-star reviews.
This decline may be a result of increased consumer trust in reviews: they may adjust their expectations as a result of hotel reviews, creating greater demands on hotel management to exceed expectations.
Service shines but satisfaction with hotel Internet/WiFi continued downward spiral
Travellers’ appear to be more satisfied with the service they receive at hotels, with TrustYou Service Scores increasing in most regions compared to a year ago. Even with an increase in Service Scores, travellers became increasingly unsatisfied with hotel Internet/WiFi availability. Internet Scores dropped by up to double-digit percentages in all countries/regions in this report. Internet service is something that nearly all destinations need to address as the global and constant connectivity of travellers is ever growing.
For the full reports click here
About TrustYou
Since 2008, TrustYou has set the standard for reputation management with solutions for hospitality-industry businesses to analyze online reviews, tweets and posts across the social web, to gather trusted reviews directly from its customers, and to use the authentic conversations to successfully market online reputations.
TrustYou’s monitoring dashboards capture sentiment and opinions from millions of comments in one easy-to-view place from sources like TripAdvisor, Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Yelp and more across 23 different languages. In addition, TrustYou provides free online customer satisfaction surveys and marketing tools for all hotels. TrustYou’s international team hails from 23 countries and speaks more than 20 different languages. The company already has more than 12,000 customers in 60 countries and monitors over 400,000 hotels, provide an extensive base for competitive analysis. TrustYou’s clients include individual hotels, independent boutique chains, destinations and major global brands such as Accor, Marriott, Starwood, Hard Rock Cafes and Best Western Hotels.
To learn more about TrustYou click here