You might have started hearing about it more often recently; however, corporate reputation has always been a critical issue. Having a look at giant companies of not only the past but also today, you will see that their reputation has played a major role in their success.
It would be safe to say that reputation is even more important in accommodation industry which is supposed to be in close contact with customers. Rapid circulation of information, thanks to the digital age we are experiencing today, necessitates hotels to pay particular attention to their reputation for protection and management of their reputation.
As Warren Buffet, famous businessman with 53 billion dollar wealth, once said: “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it..”
Then, what should you do for reputation management which has been more important than ever in the age of the Internet?
Reputation management plan
One of the most important issues when it comes to reputation management is its perception by people as a slightly abstract concept. This also applies to customers. It is not easy to give a concrete explanation as to how and when customers have a negative or positive feeling after hearing the name of a hotel. That’s exactly why you need to be aware of what you’re doing while managing an abstract concept in a tangible way. In this article, we will try to share the steps that should be taken as a part of this plan.
Being visible on the Internet
A potential guest, having never heard of your hotel but seeking options, will first search those options on the Internet. Your name that pops up in the search results lays the foundation of the feeling a potential guest will have about your property. Therefore, you need to be able to ensure your visibility by ranking among the first results in the search. It would be an advantage, if your accounts on various social networks also come up in the first page along with your website. This is another reason why you should create accounts on social networks such as Google+, Instagram or Pinterest as well as Facebook and Twitter.
Online comments
There are quite a few websites where people can share comments about accommodation facilities. The idea of seeing comments about your property might sound perfect but note that some of those comments may sometimes be negative. Some hotel runners are a bit concerned about the Internet, since even a minimum level of dissatisfaction with their hotels might look higher on the Internet than it actually is. Indeed, the probability of a dissatisfied guest sharing comments is higher than satisfied customers sharing positive comments. In order to balance that out, you could encourage your guests to share on the Internet their comments and impressions they had during their accomodation in your hotel. It might also be helpful to distinguish guests, who love your property and are willing to act as a voluntary brand representative, and distribute little gifts or organize events for them.
Tracking and measuring
No matter how big or small your property is, you would definitely find users on the Internet commenting about you. In order to manage the reputation of your name, you need to be able to understand what people are saying about your property. To this end, you may consider using Google Alerts or similar free-of-charge services, or asking for advice from a specialised firm.
Reputation management has become more important than ever. The concept of reputation is also more fragile than ever. Therefore, it is about time for you to appoint at least one member of your personnel for reputation management. This is how you can avoid ruining your reputation which you attained not very easily.
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