How should the hotel handle the evaluation on OTA?

The evaluation of online travel agencies has always been very important for hotels. Guests may stay in the hotel because of a favorable comment, or they may choose something else because of a bad comment.

When there are bad reviews, the hotel's coping style becomes the key, which can reverse the situation and may also make the hotel in trouble.

Recently, there was such a news that a Mr. Wang complained about a hotel by the West Lake:

"On May 6th, my friends and I checked into Su Yun Apartment Hotel near the West Lake. Located at No.27 Dongpo Road, Shangcheng District. Book through Ctrip. Com, 269 yuan/day. After living in it, I found that the sound insulation effect was not good, and I could still hear someone talking outside at three or four in the morning. After I left the hotel on May 7th, I gave the hotel a bad review on Ctrip. On May 17, the staff of Suyun Apartment suddenly added me a WeChat, saying, send me a red envelope and let me delete this bad review! I didn't agree, and the staff then began to scold me and say things like' go to hell'! "

In the end, the hotel was rectified and removed, and the market supervision bureau also intervened. This is undoubtedly the worst ending for the hotel. What should the hotel do in the face of bad reviews from guests?

What kind of bad reviews do hotels fear most?

According to a survey conducted by Ctrip. com, 60% of the guests browse bad reviews when booking hotels. So, what kind of bad reviews have the worst impact on hotels? It can be roughly divided into the following three categories:

The first is the long bad review content with pictures. Most people believe that "seeing is believing", and bad reviews with pictures as evidence can often be recognized by guests who have not checked in. At the same time, this kind of illustrated comments may be ranked higher by the system and will be seen by more guests.

The second is the bad review content that exaggerates the shortcomings of the hotel. When a guest is dissatisfied with the hotel, he may deliberately exaggerate the shortcomings of the hotel when writing comments. For example, when you check in, the front desk is not enthusiastic enough, which may become "the attitude of the front desk is extremely poor" in the bad reviews of the guests. Or deliberately hide some facts in the description, so that uninformed guests will misunderstand.

The third is the content of bad reviews written by the store for a long time. For hotels that stayed a year ago, guests' comments may be biased in memory, and some people even seem arrogant. Of course, there are also guests who directly vent bad reviews, and their contents are often different from the current situation of the hotel. Therefore, the time for Ctrip to write comments for guests has been shortened from 1 year after leaving the hotel to half a year, reducing the impact of such bad reviews on the hotel.

How to reduce the negative impact of bad reviews?

From 20 19 and 1 e-commerce law, it is clearly stipulated that consumers' comments on goods sold or services provided in their platforms shall not be deleted, otherwise they may face a fine of up to 500,000 yuan. Therefore, in order to reduce the negative impact of bad reviews on OTA platform, hotel merchants mainly have to start with "replying to bad reviews".

First of all, the hotel should reply to the bad reviews in time (preferably within 24 hours). According to a survey, more than half of the guests will pay attention to bad feedback, and they want to know whether the hotel has made improvement measures for feedback. The sooner the hotel makes an effective response to the bad reviews, the smaller the impact of the bad reviews on the order conversion rate.

Secondly, hotels should know what kind of bad reviews are effective. According to the category of bad reviews, reasonable and effective hotel responses can be divided into the following three categories:

1. Reply to the fact bad review

For the bad reviews put forward by the guests that are consistent with the facts, the hotel should conduct self-examination in time, deal with the problems that can be improved immediately, show the improvement measures in the hotel reply in time, and emphasize that this will not happen again.

▼ For the bad review of environmental facilities, the reply of a hotel in Qingdao means: apologize → take improvement measures → emphasize that it will not happen again.

Hotel reply: Dear guests, thank you for coming. I'm sorry I didn't bring you a perfect accommodation experience. We feel deeply guilty. We attach great importance to your problems, and have formulated rectification measures one by one: 1. The problem of fume in the lobby has been completely solved now. A few days ago, the exhaust pipe backfired because of the wind direction. It won't happen again. 2. At present, most beds in hotel double rooms are 1.2, so we can't adjust them at present. I recommend you to experience the big bed room. I sincerely apologize to you again, and hope you can give us the opportunity to serve you again and experience the new room.

▼ For the bad review of personnel services, the hotel's reply idea is: apologize → emphasize punishment → strengthen management and stop making mistakes.

Hotel reply: Dear family, I am very sorry to bring you an unpleasant accommodation experience. The survey you mentioned answered vague questions. We have educated and punished the relevant employees according to the first question responsibility system. Hotel leaders attached great importance to it and conducted training throughout the store. In addition, if you have any needs, you can contact our duty manager at any time. We will serve you wholeheartedly to ensure your satisfaction. I wish you success in your work and happiness in your family!

2. Bad reviews that deviate from the facts

After receiving a bad review that is suspected to be inconsistent with the facts, the hotel must first conduct an internal investigation from people to things to find out what happened. When there is definite evidence that the main responsibility is not in the hotel, you can respond politely with facts directly, and the content should ensure that other guests can distinguish right from wrong at a glance.

The following hotel reply cases are for your reference:

▼ The guest intentionally distorted the bad review reply of the facts.

▼ The guest explained that the reply to the bad review was deviated from the facts.

▼ Reply confirmed as malicious peer review.

3. Bad reviews of incomprehensible categories

In some guests' comments, the reasons for the bad reviews are vague or few words, such as "Hehehehehehehehehe" or "I think this store is very general". For such guests, the hotel can contact each other through Ctrip IM to find out the detailed reasons for the bad reviews. For this kind of bad review, you can use relatively clever language to let other guests see the hotel's service attitude.

In addition, some guests mistakenly think that one star is good, so the hotel can emphasize one more sentence when reminding guests to comment: "Full praise is five stars ~"

Improper ways to deal with bad reviews

In most hotels, we attach great importance to comments, and we also remind everyone to avoid some unreasonable ways to deal with bad reviews.

1. Harass guests to delete bad reviews.

In order to avoid bad reviews going online, some hotels will try to contact their guests in various ways and ask them to delete or modify the comments, which is likely to cause guests' resentment or complaints to escalate. Ctrip guests can continue to comment after writing the first comment. Once the hotel is not handled well, one bad review may become two (main review+follow-up review).

2. Reveal the private information of the guests

Most hotels will register their guests' historical files after they check in. When a guest gives a bad review, some hotels may associate the bad review with the guest information, and even expose the guest's name and other information in the hotel reply. This is revealing the private information of the guests, and the hotel must put an end to it.

3. Scold or give the guest the same reply.

As a hotel, it is difficult for us to ask our guests to have empathy and think from the perspective of the merchants. Therefore, some guests will have bad reviews to discredit our hotel image, which is really unacceptable. This has also led to the fact that sometimes some hotels feel wronged and will directly confront the guests in their replies. Some hotels are Buddhist and always use the same template to reply to the bad reviews of guests. Neither of these practices is desirable. Having said so much about how to reply to bad reviews, in fact, replying can only slightly alleviate the negative impact of bad reviews, but it can't fundamentally solve the problem.

What the hotel should pay more attention to is how to strengthen the communication with the guests in the store, relieve the dissatisfaction of the guests in time, improve the service level at multiple nodes in contact with the guests, and stifle the bad reviews in the cradle. This is the long-term solution.