Our CEO, RJ Friedlander, was interviewed for a special edition of Hosteltur on information technology and communication in the travel industry.
In the interview (in Spanish), RJ talks about the impact online reviews can have on a hotel. Up to 85% of travelers, depending on the study, read online reviews before making travel plans. He points out that reviews can be highly influential because they appear at the point of purchase if users are booking their hotel through an Online Travel Agency. However, even people who are not booking their travel arrangements online now read reviews.
RJ notes that while online reviews are publically available, monitoring and managing these reviews can be time consuming. ReviewPro aggregates over 35 million reviews and analyzes them in a way that would be impossible to do manually. RJ advises hotels that while it is important to respond to reviews publically, it is just as important to respond internally, by improving issues that customers are concerned about.
The full interview is available in Hosteltur's online version of the special edition (in Spanish only). We are on page 5!