Colorado Hotel

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Colorado Hotel Lodging Association October 29-31
Maximizing Blogs and Travel Sites
Presented by Anne Banas Executive Editor of
SmarterTravel.com October 30, 2008
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Maximizing Blogs and Travel sites

• What is user generated content (UGC) and why is
  it so important?
• How to join the conversation.
• How to market your hotel through UGC.
• Summary.

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What is UGC and why is it important?
WHAT

• According to Wikipedia User generated content
  (UGC, often hyphenated), also known as Consumer
  Generated Media (CGM)1 or User created Content
  (UCC),2 refers to various kinds of media
  content, publicly available, that are produced by
  end-users.
• Types of UGC include user reviews/ratings, blogs,
  podcasts, forums, wikis, and other forms of
  social media.
• Affecting hotels the most user reviews/ratings.

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What is UGC and why is it important?
Websites with hotel-specific UGC
Booking sites with hotel reviews
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Why?
What is UGC and why is it important?

• Travelers make decisions based on what others
  are saying.
• While people look at combination of expert and
  user reviews, UGC is growing.
• Have no fear! UGC is largely positive and can
  help improve your business.

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What is UGC and why is it important?
Source Jupiter Research
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Consumers in general care about ratings and
reviews
What is UGC and why is it important?

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Travelers care about ratings and reviews, too.
What is UGC and why is it important?
Source Forrester
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Have no fear!
What is UGC and why is it important?

• Reviews are largely positive.
• A few bad reviews wont hurt you people look at
  overall ratings/rankings.
• Self-identification People look for info from
  people like themselves and weed out what doesnt
  apply.
• Rankings Can help set specific groups apart.
• Communities are self-policing.
• When all else fails, you can use your voice and
  join the conversation.

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What is UGC and why is it important?
Reviews are largely positive
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A few bad reviews wont hurt you
What is UGC and why is it important?
People are more likely to trust the 150 positive
ratings and 1 ranking over the handful of people
who claimed to have had a bad experience.
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What is UGC and why is it important?
Some sites help readers customize reviews
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Rankings Can set specific groups apart
What is UGC and why is it important?
Clearly, New Yorks Pod Hotel isnt for everyone.
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What is UGC and why is it important?
Communities are self policing

• Inappropriate behavior, errors, and fraud are
  not tolerated.
• Other members will report problems.

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What is UGC and why is it important?
Yahoo Travel report abuse
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How to join the conversation

• Dont try to control the conversation Join it!
• Deal with bad reviews and customer complaints in
  a positive way.
• Act fast and nip it in the bud.
• Find out whos writing about you and follow up.

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How to join the conversation
Deal with bad reviews and customer complaints
positively

• You cant undo whats be done, so move forward,
  not backwards.
• Use the situation to your advantage.
• Listen and be responsive.
• Reach out and make changes if necessary.

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How to join the conversation
Responding to bad reviews

• Review sites Some will allow you to post owner
  responses yourself others will help you
  directly.
• Every policy is different regarding what you can
  and cannot do, so read each sites help section.
• Most sites are good about correcting factual
  errors, but wont remove bad reviews.
• Blogs Add comments/write directly.
• NOTE Always disclose who you are.

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Review sites
How to join the conversation

• TripAdvisors Owners Support section details
• Dealing with changing ownership and bad reviews.
• Submitting a management response to a review.
• Manage your hotel listing.
• Things you cant do
• Post your own review.
• Have reviews/ratings removed or changed.
• Offer incentives for positive reviews.

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How to join the conversation
Management response on Trip Advisor
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How to join the conversation
TravelPost.com bad review info
Recent compete.com research indicates that
responding to a negative review improves a
hotels image in 58 of the population.
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Hotels.com asks you to send an email and they
will post your response for you
How to join the conversation
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Blogs
How to join the conversation

• Responding to bad reviews in blogs is less direct
  then with most review sites, but still possible.
• Post a response in comments section.
• Reach out to the blogger (via about me or
  email me link).
• Humanizing your business can go a long way.
• Believe it or not, but most people just want to
  know the hotel cares about their issue.

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How to join the conversation
Manager Response Dos

• Thank the poster for reviewing your hotel.
• Highlight any positive aspects of the review.
• Apologize for any legitimate complaint.
• Explain how youll take action.
• Take the conversation offline and help the guest
  directly.

Tips taken and condensed from Advice for
Managing Negative Reviews of Hotels or Small
Businesses by Andy Beal Marketing Pilgrim,
April 15, 2008
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How to join the conversation
Manager Response Donts

• Get defensive.
• Waste time explaining how the customer is wrong
  or how he/she mishandled the situation (unless
  there was a factual error).
• Dont ignore the complaint.

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How to join the conversation
A good management response
GSTSVCMNGR, Guest Service Manager
(Management representative)
Apr 7, 2008
Aloha! Thank you for the positive review of our
hotel. We are very pleased that you enjoyed your
stay.We are disappointed that you didnt enjoy
the hot items at Breakfast on the Beach. Please
know that we constantly evaluate the menu in our
effort to provide a variety of quality food
items. We apologize for any negative
experiences you had with our elevators. We will
soon begin an Elevator Modernization Project
which will ensure that the elevators enhance the
overall experience at the hotel.
Source TripAdvisor LLC.
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How to join the conversation
Find out whos writing about you and follow up

• Search engines
• Review sites
• Blog aggregators
• Technorati
• Google blog search
• Once youve found them, subscribe
• Alerts (Google)
• RSS

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How to market your hotel through UGC

• Maximize your presence on hotel listings by
  adding
• Descriptions
• Photos
• Videos
• Testimonials lead to bookings Add or link to
  reviews on your website.
• Encourage guests to write reviews (but dont
  tell them what to write).
• Avoid fraud

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How to market your hotel through UGC
TravelPost.com FAQ
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How to market your hotel through UGC
Add or link to reviews
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How to market your hotel through UGC
Encourage guests to write reviews honestly
Source Trip Advisor
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How to market your hotel through UGC
Avoid fraud

• Dont write fake reviews.
• Sites like TripAdvisor will remove the post and
  penalize your rankings on the site.
• Not good for community, which is meant to be a
  open forum.

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Summary

• Embrace User Generated Content (UGC) Its here
  to stay.
• Dont be threatened by the conversation, join it
  and show customers that you care.
• Make UGC work for you and your business.
  Everyone is doing it and it works.