The hotel industry had a stellar end of 2023 and a huge chunk of that was driven by return visitors. At the same time it is no secret that deep guest personalisation correlates strongly with Return Visitor Rates.

Let's dive into how hotels can increase their returning visitor rate by passing additional guest preference data into their CRM and PMS systems - specifically by collecting more feedback before guests have checked out.

Like anywhere in life, a little appreciation goes a long way

According to a survey by eMarketing Associates, 68% of guests will fail to return if they feel unappreciated.

Therefore, nurturing relationships with your guests is a critical part of growing and maintaining a successful hotel business. Repeat guests are like an investment for hotels that give you a return better than attracting new guests - so deep personalisation makes commercial sense.

Whilst it's true that much of a guest's hotel choice relies on their location choice, it's also true that there is a considerable enough percentage of a hotel's guest base which is from returning guests which makes retention a worthy investment.

What are the benefits of real-time feedback for RVR?

Real-time hotel guest feedback software can help hotels identify important trends, instances around service issues, common items for property improvement prioritisation, and more.

Tech solutions like Biteluxe (that's us) can enable hotels to measure in real-time how their guests feel about key experiences around the hotel and integrate it into other hotel systems in a detail that allows deeper personalisation in other systems.

And we do it in a very straightforward way via WhatsApp.

There are manual ways, such as in-person staff feedback, but there's lots of psychological barriers to the volume and accuracy of this (we'll explore this at some point) and if all else fails, there's the mighty pencil and paper.

Although, that is an extremely manual process and wouldn't get you the kind of depth of insights which is commercially valuable.

In addition to collecting real-time feedback, hotels can also pass more guest preference data into their CRM and PMS systems (the low hanging fruit). This can help hotels tailor their marketing messaging to make it attract more new guests or insert guest preferences into guest communications post-checkout

Just picture this...

A hotel guest called Jim loved the curry he ate in the hotel restaurant on his first night - literally a highlight of his hotel stay. With some good timing, Jim is specifically reminded by the hotel of how much he enjoyed his chicken tikka, instantly transporting him back to that moment. Powerful stuff!

Additionally, automated messaging platforms can benefit from being passed info from unhappy guests. If a guest is unhappy with a specific experience within the hotel, service recovery can begin instantly by sending an automated message to the guest.

Of course, technology-first methods all has to be done in a consensual way that adheres to data protection laws, such as GDPR. Generally, that's not a huge challenge.

Deeper personalisation = growing revenue

It's not unusual for brands that create personalized experiences by integrating data and advanced technologies to achieve revenue increases of between 6% and 10%. Personalisation can also create upselling and cross-selling opportunities by enabling hotels to offer guests customized packages and services that align with their preferences.

The summary

In brief, hotels can increase their returning visitor rate by passing more guest preference data into their CRM and PMS systems, by collecting real-time feedback. Ideally, you can leverage technology to capture real-time feedback which are specific to micro-experiences. Although, having some real-time feedback is better than none - so even having strategically placed pencil and paper is better than nothing at all!

Personalisation brings undeniable commercial benefit - what kind of technology are you going to use to help you get there?