the power of guest reviews · is spent reading a hotel’s reviews prior to booking. are read, on...
TRANSCRIPT
THE POWER OF GUEST REVIEWS Presented by: Michael Menzel
24 November 2015
Hello! I am Michael Menzel Thank you for inviting me to TMI 2015.
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0. WHO WE ARE
and what we do
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“ First they ignore you,
then they laugh at you, then they fight you,
then you win.
Mahatma Gandhi
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DATABASE
SEMANTIC ENGINE
CRAWLING
SURVEY
MATCHING
API
Monitoring
Survey
Mobile App
Meta-Reviews
Technology Platform Overview
Monitoring
Mobile App
Based on 70+ man years of research, cooperation with Munich University (LMU) 27+ languages // 400,000+ concepts per language categorized in 120 main categories (room, location, food, pool ) 95% precision, 80% recall
Combination of machine learning + linguistic systems + user feedback (3000 inputs / month)
Technology Platform Overview
1. IMPACT OF REVIEWS
Let’s start with the first set of slides
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Online Success = Reputation x Price x Availability x Marketing
If one factor = 0, success = 0 too
Magic Formula Online Tourism
Reviews And UGC Rank As The Most Important Factor In Making Booking Decisions
72% business travelers
69% leisure travelers
Rate reviews and consumer opinions posted online as extremely/very important in their booking decisions
Travelers Are Willing To Pay More For Hotels With Higher Review Scores
Travelers are 3.9 times more likely to choose a hotel with higher review scores when the prices are the same.
When hotel prices are increased for hotels with better review scores, travelers are more likely to book the hotel with the higher score even when it costs more.
76% of travelers were willing to pay more for a hotel with higher review scores, when asked explicitly.
3.9x
76%
Review Data Has A Significant Impact On Travelers’ Booking Decisions
95%
is spent reading a hotel’s reviews prior to booking.
are read, on average by leisure travelers.
7 Reviews 30 Min of travelers read reviews prior to booking a hotel.
Summarized review content: • is easier to consume than full-
text reviews
• gives travelers the most useful overview of a hotel compared to full text reviews
• is more mobile friendly
• travelers prefer a combination of the two to feel most confident in making a booking decision
Travelers Want A Quick Way To Make Their Booking Decisions
72% of respondents are saying that the summarized review content was mobile-friendly
40% of respondents are saying the same for full text reviews
61% prefer to see only a review summary during their mobile bookings
Summarized Review Content Is The Most Mobile-friendly
Influence presence and review scores on other sites like Kayak, Google, Wego, trivago and hundreds more
More quality engagement and more conversions
Summarized Review Content Makes Travelers Feel More Confident In Their Purchase Decision
Make the research process more
traveler-friendly
Increase direct bookings and boost
SEO
Give travelers a summary on the true highs and lows of a
property
Survey Reviews Have Significantly Higher Scores Than Reviews From Other Sources
Surveys = More Reviews
Hotels using YourHotel surveys have significantly more reviews, and the search engines eat this up. In search world dominated by OTAs, this can make the difference in whether a hotel appears for its own brand.
More Reviews = Better Search Engine Rankings
The volume of reviews influences the level of trust a traveler has in the feedback. The difference between a hotel that has 300 reviews and a hotel that has 3,000 reviews is noticeable unless scores are the highest of the high.
More Reviews = Increased Confidence with Travelers
YourHotel surveys should easily integrate with your website and can be pushed out to third-party travel sites like Google to help drive higher rankings exactly where you need them.
Improved Presence
On review sites, the traveler controls the conversation
Your Surveys = Guiding the Conversation
Influence the way travelers recall their experiences and how they respond
In a survey scenario, the hotel guides the conversation.
Millions of people use Google every day to look for products, services, or information
Paid search Organic search
Earned content
Owned content
Curated content
Traveler reviews
User generated content
Ad Clicks
Ad impressions Ad CTR
Ad Avg. CPC
Ad Avg. Position
70% of the links search users click on are organic
70-80% of users ignore the paid ads, focusing on the organic results
75% of users never scroll past the first page of search results
The higher you rank, the more people click on your website
On the first page alone, the first 5 results account for 67.60% of all the clicks and the results from 6 to 10 account for only 3.73%
How can you improve SEO for a better presence?
Reviews are fresh, unique content for search engines. They account for 19,8% of your overall ranking factors
Reviews 9.8%
Source: Moz.com Overall Ranking Factors
Listings that had at least 3+ star reviews took 87% of clicks
Reviews perform well on mobile, too
61% of clicks went to listings that had at least 4 reviews
Source: Thinkwithgoogle.com
2. GET REAL
A/B Testing Impact Of Reviews
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3. WHAT TO DO
Quality, Quality, Quality
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IMPLEMENT QUALITY
ASSURANCE PROGRAMS
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MAKE THE VOICE OF THE GUEST YOUR PARADIGM
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PROPERTIES THAT USE QUALITY ASSURANCE
INSTRUMENTS HAVE SIGNIFICANTLY
BETTER SCORES
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The higher the Q-Label, the higher the Score
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ESTABLISH KEY PERFORMANCE
INDICATORS AND MEASURE QUALITY
OF PROPERTIES
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KNOW YOUR DESTINATION VALUES/
BRAND VALUES
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EDUCATE PROPERTIES (THAT DO NOT MEET THE
EXPECTATIONS OF YOUR DESTINATION/
BRAND)
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EXCLUDE PROPERTIES THAT DO NOT MEET THE
EXPECTATIONS OF YOUR DESTINATION/
BRAND
4. BEST PRACTICE
Serfaus – Fiss – Ladis
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“ A journey of a thousand miles
begins with a single step.
Lao-tzu
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