The Importance of Reviews in the Hospitality Industry

Remember the last time you bought a product or service? With the widespread use of the internet, online reviews have become common, affecting businesses more than ever. Reviews often dictate our final decision – no matter what the industry.

Review sites provide transparent customer evaluations that allow consumers to decide where we want to spend our cash and our time. McKinsey research has shown that peer purchasing insights have more influence on consumers than any marketing strategy. Think about how you choose what movie or TV series, device, or holiday destination to go with – part of that would’ve most likely involved researching how other people rated their experience with the product or service.

It’s no different when it comes to the hospitality industry – people want to hear what others think. According to Fan & Fuel and a recent blog published by Dixa, consumers want to know about the experiences and problems customers have had, what the response was to complaints, consensus on whether or not the product or service lived up to the company’s claims and so on. They contend that 97% of participants said customer reviews factor into their buying decisions. In fact, 92% of consumers hesitate to make a purchase when there are no customer reviews, and 94% read reviews when they are available.

The power of a review is something we can’t ignore – whether good or bad.

Celebrate Good Reviews

Acknowledge, promote, and celebrate good reviews. Your customer has taken time out of their day to share their experience and endorse your product and service, so it’s vital that they feel seen and heard.

A few ways to celebrate and promote a good review include: personal thank you’s – calling or responding to the review with sincere gratitude, ensuring reviews that are shared on a public forum are engaged with; promoting positive reviews on your website and social channels – so customers who consult your owned channels receive a taste of what they can expect; and lastly, amongst internal staff – this will build employee morale and pride amongst your most important asset – your people.

As ever, the good reviews will come with the bad.

Engage Bad Reviews

It’s easy to respond to a negative review with the same energy, given it can feel like a personal attack. Just like with a good review, a customer sharing a bad review has taken the time to pass on their experience, and feedback should be acknowledged and engaged with.

Always approach a bad review with a sense of openness. Don’t be defensive; instead use it as an opportunity to learn from and improve your product or service, by taking the feedback on board – and implementing a solution. A follow up with the customer in question, where you outline the solution to the issue they raised will make them feel heard – and in most cases change their perception of your brand, so see it as an opportunity to win them back!

Encourage Customers to Share their Experience

As part of our service, we encourage our guests to share their experience with us at the end of their stay.

At Mirabilis, we pride ourselves on being quietly remarkable and wonderfully different and are fortunate to have received some great reviews from guests who have taken the time to share their experience with us.

We are humbled to have been recognised for the third consecutive year by Booking.com’s 2022 Traveller Review Awards for all three of our London-based apartments – with a 9.4/10 rating for our Bayham Place Apartment Block, 9,3/10 for our Bayham Street Apartment Block, and a 9.2/10 rating for our Wells Court Apartment Block. What makes this accomplishment so special is that it is decided by guests.

Our personal care and attention to detail is what our guests typically favour, and we look forward to hosting you at one of our award-winning serviced apartments soon…