SPECIAL REPORT
its promises . “ The operational side was our biggest concern , so flawless execution was our tagline ,” Corbin says .
Operationalization also means using multiple languages to make sure tens of thousands of front-line employees are trained to understand some changes to common protocols .
Corbin adds there is one other key aspect of training he calls , “ ride the existing rails wherever you can .” He means staff can revert to protocols they understand and still make sense instead of “ ripping things out by the roots and starting out with something completely new and foreign .”
TRACKING ACTIVITY While “ riding the existing rail ” is a good fallback plan , along with allowing staff to go off script when appropriate to personalize stays , technology plays a growing role to track guest activity and create more opportunities to personalize and monetize visits , including beacon technology and geo-fencing .
Hilton ’ s Fun Finder application uses beacons at select hotels to understand guest preferences , location and events , and via sending personalized messaging based on where the guest is on the property , according to Jonathon Wardman , vice president of CRM at Hilton . “ The potential is huge , not just for tracking guests ’ locations but , for example , to help guests track the location of their room service order ,” he says .
Using Wi-Fi , GPS and beacon technology , Fun Finder uses customer data to provide recommendations based on arrival and departure information , preferences collected in a pre-arrival survey , the current time and guest location .
According to a Hilton representative , there have been positive and negative results along the way with Fun Finder .
74 % of people
ACCORDING TO GOOGLE have a
TRAVEL
APP
on their phone ,
WHICH IS A REMARKABLY HIGH PROPORTION
compared to other categories
Message timing and delivery have been optimized based on guest responses , and navigation has been tweaked for accuracy . Of course , awareness is critical to success of the app , and Hilton says it has more than tripled the number of downloads since launching it in early September .
Marriott is geo-fencing its portfolio , according to Vice President of Loyalty Thom Kozik . “ The greatest thing about it is we ’ re not only able to monitor any social media chatter about us when customers or members or guests use our hashtag , but because of geo-fencing , we ’ re able to see any chatter around anything going on in our properties ,” he says . For instance , if there ’ s talk of a traffic jam around a Marriott hotel , the hotel team can re-engage with members through social media and guests on property to offer alternative routes .
Kozik says Marriott is expanding beacon programming , which started with standard , local offers a couple of years ago as a proof of concept . Now , because of this data set and the ability to see member history and behavior , Marriott can have a dialogue with guests in the app based on preferences shown in the past . “ If guests never respond to any one of those offers , we tune that down , de-emphasize that approach and prioritize another message that may be more relevant ,” Kozik says . “ That level of personalization of the messages , by the number of beacons , by the number of hotels , is literally a breakthrough .”
Measuring the ROI on beacon-delivered offers remains elusive , according to Kozik , who says Marriott monitors conversions to a certain degree on activation by rewards members , but because of all the point of sale systems across the portfolio , it ’ s challenging to develop an entirely accurate picture of revenue uplift across the board . “ We ’ ve got a good control set and we ’ re able to use that to justify the further investment , but we ’ re never going to have the 100 % picture ,” he says .
DIRECT MESSAGING While once considered more obtrusive , many hotel guests look at direct messaging through any number of platforms as a value-add . Data suggests that first contact resolution opportunities play a huge role in guest stay satisfaction , and often can lead to a satisfaction score higher than that of a guest who had no issues during a stay .
Marriott ’ s Corbin says about
26 hotelsmag . com March 2017