The hotel industry asks a lot of questions, but not necessarily always the right ones. One of them – legitimate – is “how to bring in customers, or even how to retain them? “ But shouldn’t we rather ask ourselves ” how not to scare away customers? “ . Here are 10 recipes that are sure to turn them off in hotels and the hospitality industry.
1) – Dilapidated, poorly maintained hotels
The recipe :easy! Take well-aged, dirty, poorly maintained, smelly hotels with damaged furniture and cadaverous carpets (etc.) and offer them to customers. • Tip:add bedbugs so customers can take a souvenir in their suitcase.
=> 1/4 of French hotels are dilapidated or very old, 1/3 is running out of steam in its offer ( White Paper on Hotel and Tourist Modernization ).
2) – Deplorable service and reception
The recipe :worry-free. A phone that does not answer when you call the hotel, unpleasant and expeditious exchanges with the staff (or the boss), disastrous breakfasts, not enough staff to serve, a smile on absent subscribers, … everything is there there everything so that your customers do not come back. • Tip:never agree with a customer who claims or complains.
=> 72% of hotel customers are regularly or sometimes disappointed with the hotel service.
3) – Minimalist and poor equipment
The recipe :subtle! You just have to furnish your rooms with low-end that breaks and shakes, with uncomfortable beds that squeak, to equip them with a heating that only works … in summer, with a small screen TV that only receives (badly) a few channels, with a faulty WiFi as soon as there are three customers connecting at the same time, with bathrooms lit by an old fluorescent tube and which pour cold water for showers after 7 p.m., etc. . • Tip:don’t make an effort to soundproof the rooms, anyway guests will only stay one night.
=> Noise is the number one reason for complaints from customers in hotels.
4) – Have a repulsive website
The recipe :hard to miss! Few photos and when they exist, place ugly ones (taken by your 6-year-old kid), put false texts (sea view) or “blah” (“a young and dynamic team ready to welcome you in a refined ”,“ a product designed to meet your expectations ”), do not allow online reservations (obviously). And especially not to worry about the aesthetics and the fluidity of the site, nor its referencing (by the way, what is it?). • Tip:a musical background when the Internet user comes to the site will be a plus (the thundering Valkyrie for example, or even Richard Clayderman).
=> 93% of hotel customers are looking for accommodation via the Internet.
5) – Mistreat your E-reputation
The recipe :do not respond to customer comments on the corresponding sites. Or even better: insult them copiously when you don’t like the online review. It’s a good way to show that you have character and that not having any more customers is not a problem. • Tip:copy and paste the same response text for all customers.
=> 1 in 2 hotel customers take into account the online comments of other travelers when choosing accommodation.
6) – Double prices, or even more
The recipe :when demand is strong in your city, in the name of the famous yield management, do not hesitate to double the price of rooms, or even more, like this Parisian chain hotel which goes from 95 € the room to 225 € (thank God, he is not the only one). • Tip:do not hesitate to complain about the increase of a few tens of centimes in the tourist tax, explaining that it scares tourists away and kills hundreds of jobs.
=> 72% of customers find that French hotels are too expensive.
7) – Go after OTAs (online travel agencies)
The recipe :explain to anyone who wants to hear it that OTAs steal customers from hotels, impose their law, evade taxes, are excruciatingly expensive and practice racketeering. Above all, ignore that without these OTAs a large number of hotels would have closed for a long time (only 1 in 5 hoteliers is actively marketing their hotel). Moreover, do not take into account that online travel agencies are ubiquitous on the Internet and that they frankly appeal to customers, by providing them with a wide choice and guarantees.
• Tip:talk about mafia concerning OTAs and above all, refuse to group together with other hoteliers to get OTAs to be cheaper and more docile. Remain isolated no matter what.
=> 80% of customers who search for a hotel by keyword on Google do not go beyond the first page of responses (where the OTAs sites are located) and 20% do not go beyond the second page .
8) – Go after Airbnb and other tourist accommodation
The recipe :accessible to all! Say that Airbnb (and company) is in tax exile and demand that its rental owners have as many regulatory and fiscal constraints as hotels. Require that any stay in an Airbnb rental be a minimum of 7 days, to be sure that tourists will no longer return to France. Do not accept the idea that this offer satisfies travelers who for the most part would not have been to a hotel and refuse to believe that its business model is very mature. • Tip:convey the message that at Airbnb, we do not have the reception as in hotels (reread point N ° 2).
=> 65% of travelers like to opt for different types of accommodation depending on the type of destination and travel (business, leisure, weekend, vacation, etc.). No study shows that Airbnb would have taken clients from hoteliers, their activity figures have been more or less the same for the past 5 years.
9) – Developing corporate and protectionist communication
The recipe :Leave it to the pros: professional organizations. The ingredients are always the same and the knack is well known: seek to ensure that para-competitors (tourist accommodation, tourist residences, guest houses, etc.) have the same hassles as oneself (taxes, regulations, various obligations often stupid and expensive, etc. – instead of obtaining relief for oneself), above all not taking into account consumers / customers and their expectations (27 million in the French hotel industry, of which 1/3 are foreigners) and, the end of the end, make the competition of the one who was the first to denounce the bad guys who harm the hotel industry. • Tip: divide and conquer and never question yourself.
=> 71% of hoteliers do not trust union representatives and 82% consider them to be inefficient.
10) – Victimization:
The recipe :within everyone’s reach. To say that all the misfortunes of the profession inevitably come from others: the tight-fisted and overly demanding customers, the public authorities which lay absurd laws (it is however true), the OTAs and Airbnb which divert the customers, the sites of comments of customers who post fake reviews, staff who can’t be found and who don’t want to work, etc. (the most imaginative will have pointed out other culprits).
• Tip:moan constantly and constantly remind you that it is a crisis, that nothing can be done about it and that the means are lacking to do well.
=> 1,800 hotels have closed over the past 5 years and 1 in 2 hotels is in deficit or in fair balance in its accounts.
Here are 10 situations and cases which are “anti-modernization” of the French hotel industry. Any similarity with real situations or acts would be only the fruit of chance or pure coincidence …
Also read on the TendanceHotellerire.fr website: ” Hoteliers and Hypocrisy, is there only the” H “in common? “