Shift in behaviours towards loyalty points

In my last post, I was raising the issue of the measures hoteliers take to draw customers and earn their loyalty, with the example of Le Méridien hotels. As explained, the chain created its own “arrival signature”, which provided the guest with a one-of-a-kind experience. The interrogation whether this would lift Le Méridien out of chain sameness was raised in the light of this post. My opinion is that it certainly endows the chain with some uniqueness, and this despite the fact that Le Méridien is an international chain part of an international group. Starwood guests still have the choice between many brands within the group, and Le Méridien now has a defined approach to its guests that may appeal to a more specific segment.

Talking about loyalty to hotel chains, I read a very interesting article from Kris Hudson dated December 16th 2009, which emphasizes a recent phenomena in this field. Whereas loyalty points used to be redeemed for free rooms or stays in hotel chains, lately, guests have been using them to buy gifts and other merchandise. With items as different as mixing bowls, vacuum cleaners, jewellry and Ipods, hotel chains have to face this new realty and their reserve of money intended for paying for free rooms and stays has significantly increased compared to the same period last year.

The dilemma now for hoteliers is that they do not want to see the number of their loyal members decrease, but they also aspire to minimize any loss in profit due to the money going to the product suppliers and not the hotels themselves.

The challenge for hoteliers is first of all to know if this trend is only due to the end of the year celebrations and tighter gift budgets. They also need to secure the number in loyal guests and encourage them to redeem their loyalty points for free rooms and stays in hotels rather than merchandise.

Award winning experience at Le Méridien

As part of their brand re-launch, Le Méridien has created a signature concept revolving around the idea of providing their guests with interactive cultural experiences, explains the author of this article published on the website Hotel Marketing on December 9th 2009. This concept focusing on 4 key points has now been awarded the “Best Innovative Concept in Full Service Hotels” at the Worldwide Hospitality Awards in Paris.

The challenge for Le Méridien was to create a unique and cultural experience for the guests from the first 10 minutes they walked in the hotel lobby. In order to do this, the Starwood-owned hotel chain surrounded itself with LM100™ members, famous and talended like Le Labo perfumers Fabrice and Eddie Roschi for the creation of a distinctive scent, or composer/producer Henri Scars Struck for the sound atmosphere. Other LM100™ members designed rooms’ key cards so that they guests would keep them as a piece of art after departing the hotel.

The whole idea is to offer the guests art and culture at their fingertips, whether by collecting key cards, smelling a particular scent in the lobby or also, by being surrounded by unique soundscape in the elevator.

What I find particularly interesting about this concept is how successfully and timely Le Méridien implemented this new concept. Now is the time when boutique hotels appeal to guests looking for a one-of-a-kind experience and Le Méridien managed to apply such a concept to a hotel chain. Increasingly, we find that art is used and blended with other elements such as fashion brands (Louis Vuitton and the opening of their contemporary art foundation in Paris) and hotel experiences (design hotels in general and “creative hubs” for the Le Méridien).
This sure is one interesting way for the brand to stand out of the crowd and gain customer loyalty.

E Business OTAs and Portals

View more presentations from Gabrielle D.

Hotel reviews, their influence and their limits

Last week, I was raising the question of the internet social media and their impact on hotels popularity. This week's article was written by Daniel Edward Craig in 2005, and similarly addresses the topic of the use of the internet by hotel customers and how it affects these establishments. Although the tone of the article is light, the topic remains an important one. Who has never had a look at hotel review websites in order to make a booking decision? Probably very few of us. Review websites such as Tripadvisor are powerful tools to support hotels' popularity but also to damage their image. D.E. Craig recounts how he found an anonymous and quite insulting review about himself - he is the general manager of a Canadian hotel, on one of those websites. The comment was very personal and gave no useful information to the future travellers, yet the review website refused to erase it. Is it common then to find such unhelpful comments? The answer is yes and the author of the article gives us his own classification of such websites' users. From the "uncle Bob" user to the "forensic examiner" we find out about numerous profiles, which I would qualify as parasite commentors. I actually agree with these profiles because anyone comes across them at some point. The question now is, what can hoteliers do to control these frequently unjustified comments?

Analysis of reverse auction websites

Here is an analysis of reverse auction websites. It describes how they were created and how they work in general. Then an example of a reverse travel auction is shown using Hotwire.
Analysis Of Reverse Auction Websites

Characteristics of an OTA

-Customer reach:
International customers (links to different websites depending on the languages, ex. Opodo)
Cheap deals
senior packages
family packages
couple's packages : honeymoons ...

-Customer communication methods:
international phone numbers
email
keep in touch with customers via reference numbers
frequently asked questions


-Types of product sold:
accommodation
car rental
all inclusive packages
transport : filghts, train,
cruises
last minute deals
sightseeing and tours on-site
insurance
reward programs
personnalised packages

-Special promotions capabilities:
last minute packages
seasonal packages (christmas, ski, easter ...)
special occasions (valentine's day, bank holiday, new year's eve ..)

-Online booking conditions and fees:
personal details at the moment of the booking
credit card details: credit card fees for certain credit cards
special request concerning the family holidays
insurance required for most OTAs
extra options : sightseeing, theatre tickets, car rental, airport transfers
have to agree with terms and conditions
file set-up fees
cancellation policy

-Affiliate programs
YES for most OTAs

-Affiliate program payment structure
possibility to join most OTA's affiliate programs
payment structure: a percentage of the sale (depending on the type of sale: flights, travel insurance ...)
conditions to be an affiliate: be a website that relays advertisment for the OTA and cannot be a hotel part of the OTA's offered packages

-Info for hoteliers
possibility for the hotel to create a partnership with the OTA
video presenting the benefits of being a partner with an OTA (expedia)

Sophia Rospars and I worked on this