Are you getting the maximum from your repeat guests?

So far we have analyzed several hotel marketing tips and ideas that are especially relevant in the Sri Lankan context. In this post we are proposing a few tips to develop your own Sri Lankan hotel loyalty programme that would definitely help your hotel build a more loyal guest base.

How many of you are aware that your guests could be the best promoters of your hotel. It is a bitter truth that customer loyalty in the travel industry is vanishing. According to Deloitte research just 14% of air travel customers are loyal to the airlines that they usually travel with and only 8% of the hospitality customers stay loyal to the hotel brands. You might have noticed that the repeat purchase rate increases when you run promotions and deals. However those in the hospitality sector are still finding it difficult to build a strong loyalty among guests.

In the context of Sri Lanka, though there is no strong data evidence on the loyalty statistics, still most of the hotels do not think of the benefits of value driven, emotionally connected loyalty programmes. Most of these hotel marketing programmes in Sri Lanka just focus on some sort of random promotions which are strongly supported by real loyalty programmes. So how can a hotel increase loyalty by creating an emotional connection with the guests rather just trying to roll out promotions and deals?

Let’s start from the beginning itself. Read the entire article here

How to use Tripadvisor for Hotels in Sri Lanka?

As per Olery research 81% of travelers check online hotel reviews before making a travel decision. What is your contribution online to grab their attention?

A common factor that is noticeable among Sri Lankan hotels, especially among the small and medium scale hotels is that a little or no attention is given to their online presence and reviews about their hotels in the internet. It is always important for hotels to control their online presence and they should pay attention to what guests are saying about their brands. However, most of the Sri Lankan hotels forget the importance of online reviews. For instance there are mixes of negative and positive comments about heaps of Sri Lankan hotels that are not officially attended to by the respective hotels. One factor for them to neglect these reviews, especially the negative ones is that they think they are getting enough bookings through their travel agents and are quite satisfied with their current occupancy rate with the least amount of effort that they put into marketing the hotels. Though the bookings are received through the travel agencies, the decision makers are the travelers and tourists who have started to depend on online reviews about hotels and places.

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