While many hotel companies tout Customer Relationship Management (CRM) as the way to increase customer loyalty, the ability to deliver highly personalized services still seems to be elusive. Sure, hotels are getting better at remembering what type of pillow a guest may like or if they only want a king sized bed, but when it comes to collecting wildly disparate bits of data and knowing what to do with it is mostly uncharted territory.
Though the panacea of CRM has been touted for years, only now does technology offer the initial chance it will become reality. It’s good timing too. Today’s hotel guest is typically well versed in traveling and has stayed at many more hotels than those guests of a generation ago. Throw in the expectation of luxury in all facets of life -- think Starbucks -- as well as the impact of decades of amenity creep, hotel consumers have ratcheted up what they believe is the basic service standard of hotels.
Now hotels must successfully wrangle technology to deliver the right information at the right time and also back it up with training that imbeds the mantra of exceeding guest expectations. But be warned, today’s more emboldened guests aren’t interested in getting something for free. True loyalty is being built by hotel brands striking up relationships that bring a sense of value to the consumer. Oh yeah, you’ll also need to convince your guests to give you personal details about their preferences to tailor their stays more effectively.
“Recognition is much more powerful than reward,” says Scott van Hartesvelt, president of gCommerce, an affiliate of management company Gemstone Hospitality. “It is absolutely about customizing people’s stay. But people are afraid [many hotel employees] can’t get them through check in. They are reluctant to even say if they like Diet Coke or Diet Pepsi.”
van Hartesvelt says convincing guests to provide them with information is essentially a trust building exercise. He stresses that when a guest does provide you with information, the hotel’s staff must follow through and execute. Failure to remember and utilize the information the guest provides, could wind up having a negative impact on their experience.
For example, at the Mosaic in Beverly Hills the property’s staff is trained to react to information gleaned in an organic fashion. One time during the reservation process, the agent learned a particular future guest had recently had twins and was going on her first business trip without the babies. When the guest got to the hotel and checked into her room there were two small teddy bears with the babies names embroidered on them. Another guest who stayed several times a month lamented that he hated to travel because he missed his family so much. The next time he stayed at the Mosaic his wife received a dozen roses.
“CRM is not a blanket approach. It’s about recognizing the unique aspects of each customer and having a heart. Our core strength is recognizing and developing each customer on their terms rather than doling out forgettable rewards,” said van Hartesvelt.
Next-generation CRM is also about utilizing technology to create customized packages that encourage the guest to stay.
Bernard Rannou, Senior Manager, Product Management, Amadeus, says modern technology makes it possible to create ever more personalized offerings and the major hotel companies are rapidly embracing this concept. Additionally, it also allows hotels to set prices based on loyalty.
“With technology its possible to determine the right price for the right guest. For loyal guests there needs to be recognition and this can be included into the pricing system of the hotel,” says Rannou, noting that future rates can be selected on the overall value of the guest.
Another company at the vanguard of the CRM movement is Intrawest. According to director of corporate communications Daniel Teachey, with DataFlux, Intrawest’s technology partner, the destination resort developer and operating company has been working on CRM for several years.
Slowly Intrawest has been gathering bits and pieces of data to determine the aggregate value of a customer based on all their transactions. It also allows them to better understand their customer’s interests and desires. Once the understood their customer better, marketing initiatives would be more on target and get a better response.
Now the company is able to send offers based on someone’s stage in life. Now people in their 40s with children get different offers than those people in their 50s who might be more inclined to have vacations in only warm weather environments.
“Every company is trying to figure out a way to make their data work harder for them,” says Teachey. “This technology gets larger companies back to being a mom and pop business where they know about you and your family. Those that adopt this technology will to make better offers to their customers and make smarter decisions on how they treat them.”
