By golly YES IT IS!

It’s massively important for some and all of the following reasons:

IT SHOWS YOU CARE

• About your guests / customers / clients. That you’re interested in what they have to say. Both the good bits and the bad.
• About your business. Enough to invite the people who spend their money in your business to contribute their perspectives and their experiences of whatever it is you’re offering.

IT GIVES YOU A HUGE ADVANTAGE

• Over your competitors who aren’t engaging and listening to what their guests / customers / clients have to say. The more relevant you are regarding what your guests / customers / clients are wanting, the better your business is always going to be.

IT SETS YOU UP FOR THE FUTURE

• Future guests / customers / clients gain confidence that they’re about to engage with a business who cares and is interested.
• Future guests / customers / clients develop a sense of who you are, or who the business is, before they engage with you for the first time. How you respond to good and not so good reviews says plenty.

THE IMPORTANCE OF REVIEWS DURING A TRIP TO A CITY I DIDN’T KNOW

This past weekend I visited a city I didn’t know. All I had was transport and Google Maps to get around, and decide where 20 plus people were going to eat for lunch and dinner. For the 3 Full days we were there we required 6 different dining establishments. They needed to be above average.

Here’s how I made the decision on where we’d go:

1. Ratings help to sift through the large number of options.
2. A quick glance through the reviews (arranged by most to least recent) help to get an idea of the current state of affairs.
3. Menu items and prices.
4. Photos of the environment and the food.

GETTING UNSTUCK ON SIMILAR SPOTS

The most interesting part was that there were times where we were stuck with a few options for the next meal. Ratings were equal. Reviews were as good. Menu items and prices looked similar, and pics didn’t make a difference.

In the end it all came down to owner / manager response to the reviews. Did they bother to respond? If so, what was their tone, and how did they go about it? In fact, it proved to be really easy making decisions with that last piece.

When all was equal, the response won! Every single time.

The post Is It Important To Respond To Reviews? It Absolutely Is! appeared first on Calidascope.

Guest Reviews!!

I’m not going to explain why guest reviews are so important / critical in a world of always on mobile connectivity. That’s been covered in a gazillion places distributed all over the interwebs. There’s plenty of research out there and you can Google some of it here.

No one else gets reviews like Hospitality does!

I’ve regularly thought about this, and I can’t think of any other industry that get reviews as often and persistently as the Hospitality Industry does. For example, as a Hotel General Manager, you can know about a broken shower in one of your rooms before your Housekeeping department has even started their daily routine. As a restaurant manager you can be alerted to a happy or unhappy guest, before they’ve paid the bill. Reviews come thick and fast, and it’s the biggest gift, if you have the correct attitude and approach.

At their most basic, guest reviews are feedback, and feedback is critical if you want to know how well you’re meeting your guest’s / customer’s / client’s needs? Let’s be honest, if you’re not meeting those needs, you’re not going to be in business for much longer. Businesses that survive into the future will be those that are still relevant to their customer’s needs in the future.

We have and have had a lot of clients in the Hospitality Industry, and while they serve different markets, some definitely do better than others. And while it’s not good science to boil it down to just one element, there is definitely a correlation between success and those who take reviews seriously.

And it’s really quite simple….

Read / React / Reply / Repeat

That’s the magic formula that I tell all our clients. When a review comes in….

1. You read it,
2. you react (make the necessary changes, if any),
3. you reply to the guest, thanking them, and letting them know how you reacted (by replying, you’re letting that guest, and the next guest know that you’re invested enough to take their feedback seriously),
4. and you repeat, for every single piece of feedback you receive.

The majority of our clients agree, and as a business we spend much of my time replying to reviews, and in conversations with clients on how they’re reacting to reviews? When they fail to react properly, reviews in the future continue to highlight the issue, until it’s been handled properly. However when a repeating issue isn’t dealt with, they sometimes enter a downward spiral that has a negative end result.

Whether it’s a particular staff person, a team, paint that’s peeling in a bathroom, a pothole in the driveway, etc, when these are repeatedly highlighted and not dealt with, it spells eventual trouble. The last thing you want are reviews reinforcing that you’re not interested in fixing the things your guests are asking you to fix. As I said earlier, if you’re not relevant to what your guests want and need, you will soon have no business.

I’ve watched business after business, who take reviews seriously, slowly and consistently climb up whatever list they’re measuring themselves on. Whether it’s TripAdvisor, Booking.com, Lekkerslaap, Travel Ground, Google or Facebook. The formula is simple and it works for every single platform. Read / React / Reply / Repeat.

Sadly, I’ve watched other clients do the opposite because they didn’t think guest reviews were important.

#takeahorsetowater

The post Guest Reviews Are How You Get Ahead In Hospitality appeared first on Calidascope.

In todays connected and digitised world, a large number of people read online reviews before they visit your Hotel, Restaurant, Bar or Entertainment Establishment, and then make a decision as to whether they’ll visit or not?

HOW IMPORTANT ARE REVIEWS?

We manage 4 hospitality properties in South Africa who hold a number one position on TripAdvisor in their category and area from a ratings perspective. Each one of these clients is very sensitive to their reviews, and take a review under 5 stars very seriously. Holding the number one position is extremely prestigious and we go out of our way to remind current and future guests of their position. It’s a confirmation of the service and experience you can expect to receive during your visit.

We sometimes spend hours pouring over a negative review in an attempt to deconstruct what happened, and to ensure it doesn’t happen again. We then carefully write a response detailing what happened and why the guest can be assured it wont happen again. These are key elements for the contributor and future guests who will come across the review.

A quick search on Google results in more than enough evidence to show the importance of a review and its influence of purchasing behaviour.

As one example, according to Revain:

In the U.S., 68% of online shoppers are more likely to engage with businesses that have positive reviews (BrightLocal 2017), and 93% determine whether a business has a good reputation (or not) based upon the available reviews. In 2016, Fan & Fuel reported that 92% of consumers hesitated to make a purchase if there were no customer reviews, and a full 97% say customer reviews factor into their buying decisions.

Products with reviews are 270% more likely to be bought than a product without, according to Speigel Research Centre (2017). For a higher priced product, this likelihood increases to 380%.

FAKE ONLINE REVIEWS ARE RISKY TO YOUR BUSINESS

With reviews significantly influencing purchasing behaviour, it’s obvious that using fake reviews to enhance your status is a very attractive strategy.

Fake online reviews can include asking friends and family, or even go as far as using services where you can buy fake reviews.

According to an article on Harvard Business Review, as many as 4.5 million sellers sourced fake online reviews in the past year (2020).

These Fake reviews are fraught with problems:

The larger review sites are getting smarter at detecting them. As an example, in 2019 alone, Amazon spent more than R7.5 billion and employed more than 8,000 people to reduce fraud and abuse on its platform, deleting around 40% of these fake reviews. With this kind of investment fake reviews increasingly run the risk of being identified and your business being penalised for posting them.

While there may be a short term gain from fake reviews, you either need to continue to buy them, or grow your family / friend base in order to sustain them. Once they stop appearing on your platforms of choice, the real reviews begin to dominate, potentially leaving future guests confused as to what to expect from your establishment.

REVIEWS ARE YOUR FRIEND

Outside of Hospitality I can’t think of another industry that receives a similar amount of in-the-moment feedback. It’s my personal view that you can almost run your entire hospitality business by taking all your reviews and authentically responding and actioning them. As a Hotel General Manager you can be alerted to a broken shower before your housekeeping team have entered the room. As a Restaurateur you can know that someone had a wonderful meal before they even arrive at home after leaving your establishment.

Reviews allow you to see your business and staff from the most important perspective possible…. the customer. Your processes, procedures, quality, pricing, value, etc, etc.

By responding with care to each review, you illustrate your commitment to quality service and experience. Each review response is read by the contributor and multiple guests into the future. Even if an error was made, you have the opportunity to apologise and show your passion and commitment to your customers and your business.

By looking back each quarter at your collective reviews you can spot trends and themes in what people are writing and get a unique perspective on what’s going on.

Handled well, reviews are not something to be faked or afraid of. To the contrary, they are enablers of your business, as long as you are committed to listening, responding and actioning what the most important person in your business is saying to you. The bonus… they’re doing it for free and on their own time. Now that’s commitment worth matching, at the very least.

Photo by henry perks on Unsplash

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When we first started Calidascope our goal was to do our best to find interesting clients, doing interesting things, who wanted to shake up the status quo and get the attention of their market (not matter the size of their budget). Over the last 6 years we’ve had incredible fun on these projects.

FOR EXAMPLE – THE LEGO MOVIE AND LANSER’S ON MAIN

We designed and delivered Lego Mini-figures to Fresh, Gareth Cliff, Banong Matheba, Lee-Roy Right and Caspar Lee for the launch of the Lego Movie on DVD.

We’ve worked with Lanser’s on Main (in Bryanston). We used TripAdvisor as the bench mark when Lanser’s first opened their doors. If you’ve not been, it’s guaranteed to be an experience you’ll remember. In 18 months Lanser’s on Main has gone from 48th on TripAdvisor, all the way to Number 1. Definitely Bryanston’s favourite Bistro

KWANU – WESTVILLE’s FIRST DEDICATED CLICK AND COLLECT SUPERMARKET

And most recently, we’ve been involved in the launch of Kwanu. A dedicated click and collect online supermarket located in Westville, Durban.

Kwanu is doing some interesting things in the world of online grocery shopping:

Located in Westville, as a Click and Collect service, they’re not focussing on national. In the words of Neville Dunn (ex MD of Masscash), “We’re not trying to solve for the National Market. We’re focussing on one community at a time. We think grocery online in South Africa will be most successful when it has a local focus and integration.”

They’re not a ‘buying business’, using local retailers. Says Andrew Mardon (ex National Buyer for Masscash), “Kwanu is focussed on delivering ‘everyday best prices’. We’ve built relationships with key suppliers, ensuring we can offer our customers the best possible prices everyday.”

By offering a click and collect service along with a focussed range, they’re solving the two biggest issues with shopping online for groceries… never substituting products for out of stock and South Africa’s unique challenges with delivery.

Kwanu’s results and customer feedback speak volumes.

Fast and friendly service! The quickest grocery run I have ever done. – Kerri Wolfaardt

WOW !!! Kwanu is just the most incredible way to shop and has the most user friendly website – they have thought of everything to make shopping easier and then to top it all they definitely have the best pricing in town!! Last night I had a total life transforming moment – sitting at my computer in my PJ’S – normally you see everyone you have ever known when you shoot into the shops in your old tracksuit !!! – Abigail de Robillard

Just had my first Kwanu experience. Will Def be back. Friendly guys and so easy. Thanks. – Leigh Bolam

At Kwanu Promotional pricing is great!! But what you have to look at is the pricing of the products that are not on promotion as they still make up a significant part of your shopping basket! Here is where Kwanu wins. Would love for Kwanu to be put up against Checkers, Spar, PnP, on a basket of products across the range. My guess is that Kwanu is significantly cheaper! – Grant Surmon

More than just Grocery Shopping

Kwanu is onto something. Grocery shopping is largely made up of the same basket of items, week in and week out. There isn’t any reason to have to walk the aisles of a store to do 90% of your shopping. Repeat purchases should be fast, easy and convenient. That’s what Kwanu is doing, and they’re doing it really well. We’re proud to be part of the adventure.

LOOKING TO DISRUPT YOUR MARKET?

If your business is looking to disrupt your market, Calidascope has an experienced team to help you execute your idea into the world. Contact Catri Dixon to set up some time to talk.

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Why you can’t afford to ignore Online Customer Reviews!

A quick internet search around the importance of customer reviews returns a plethora of research indicating how important reviews have become in business today. Of course a large amount of the research is done in countries with a high online penetration, where increasingly people are shopping online. But even if you knock the stats down to a number you think best represents the South African Market, you’d be hard-pressed to deny the general trend.

Take a look through these stats from Invesp, and compare them to your own purchasing / review behaviour:

• 90% of customers read online reviews before visiting a business
• For nearly 9 in 10 consumers, an online review is as important as a personal recommendation
• Customers are likely to spend 31% more on a business with ‘excellent’ reviews
• 72% say that positive reviews make them trust a local business more
• 92% of users will use a local business if it has at least a 4-star rating
• 72% of consumers will take action only after reading a positive review
• Reliability (27%), expertise (21%) and professionalism (18%) are the most important reputation traits for a local business
• 86% of people will hesitate to purchase from a business that has negative online reviews

In light of data like that, I’m often bewildered at why so many businesses pay little to no attention to their customer reviews, and worse, do it so badly?

When It Works

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that Online Customer Reviews are only important for online stores. It doesn’t matter if you’re a family hotel in the Drakensberg, a restaurant in a busy Jozi Suburb, or an online supermarket in Durban, in our experience at Calidascope, customer reviews work well when they’re moved to the centre of your business.

Here are a few of the Signposts we’ve developed over time:

Make sure you have competent and experienced people engaging with customers

Experience matters when you’re dealing with people. Empathy is critical. Emotional tone is key. Being able to ‘really see’ what’s being said, and what your customer is looking for in the exchange is important in order to craft the best response. Keep in mind, rave reviews are really easy to respond to. It’s the critical reviews that will test your metal. I’ve had clients, who from time to time, would far rather tell a client or customer to never come back. That’s never a great response.

Respond Quickly

When a customer takes the time to write a review, there’s a lot of effort that goes into it, for many people. There’s risk attached when putting yourself out publicly. The very least you can do is to get back to them as quickly as possible. Sometimes it takes us a day or two to gather all the information, to ensure our response is accurate and we have as many of the facts as possible.

Create a direct line between the Responder and Senior Management

We won’t take on a client if we don’t have access to a senior person in the business. Sometimes action needs to take place to rectify a situation, and if we can’t ensure the necessary steps are taken, then our responses are impotent, and the customer ends up losing. In fact, if it’s something that’s going to impact future customers, then all customers are losing, and the entire exercise becomes a farce.

When necessary, pick up the phone

Just because the review came in via an online channel, there are times when the response requires a phone call, or even a face to face meeting. In our experience the more extreme a review, the more likely that a phone call is the best response.

You’re always responding to two people

Keep in mind that you’re always writing a response to two people. The customer who wrote it, and future customers who will stumble across it and read it. Each reply is an opportunity to describe a fuller context, or educate, or promote, or illustrate, etc. While you and the first customer understand the situation, your future customer may not. Take the time to make sure both audiences have the full picture.

Say Sorry! Even when you’re not wrong

When you’re in the wrong, apologise. Don’t make excuses, don’t try and rationalise or explain things away. Simply apologise. Apologies are magical things. They can dissipate the anger of a client instantly and turn them into fans. They allow you to move beyond the problem and focus on the solution, or the next visit, or shop, etc. Sometimes you may even need to apologise when you had nothing to do with it. I’ve apologised on a number of occasions to guests staying at a Hotel because it rained all weekend. I’ve apologised to customers who had to sit in peak hour traffic on their way to a restaurant 🙂

Customer at the Centre

Placing your customer at the centre of your business is critical. It’s why you have a business in the first place. Lose touch with your customer and you’ll ultimately lose your business. In today’s digital world, customers have an incredible range of options to speak directly to you. To tell you what they love, and what they hate. To suggest fixes and tweaks to make your product or service better. It’s unprecedented in human history to have so much access to feedback from your customer. When you do it well, and you respond effectively to your customer and make the necessary changes and tweaks to your business, there’s a far greater chance that you’ll move ahead in your market and your industry.

I know this because I’ve seen it over and over again.

Need Help with your Customer Review Process?

Calidascope has years of experience working with small and medium sized businesses in a range of industries to assist them with their customer feedback. From building strategies, to training teams, to executing with our own experienced team. If you’d like to chat further, please drop us a line.

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Well done Lanser’s on Main, a new Bistro Restaurant in Bryanston. In just 3 months, they’ve taken their TripAdvisor ranking from 43rd down to 7th, for the Bryanston area. They’re located in a quiet centre on Main Road, one block up from the Dimension Data Campus. If you own a business in the hospitality industry then you know this is an achievement worthy of congratulations.

After Chris Bethell took the non-existent restaurant, The Shed, to London’s number one restaurant on TripAdvisor, the review platform has been on high alert and become a lot more difficult to navigate. Lanser, the hands on owner of Lanser’s on Main, will tell you that in the early days some of his guest’s TripAdvisor reviews just didn’t make it onto his page. We couldn’t find a reason why not, and eventually wrote it off to TripAdvisor being more cautious?

There’s no doubt that moving up TripAdvisor’s rankings requires hard work. Both digital and physical. While Chris Bethell was able to game the system, the rest of the world do it be sheer hard work. There’s no easy digital solution to a good TripAdvisor review. Of course digital plays a critical role in terms of following up on guests, and replying to reviews, but movement happens when you provide your guests with a great product and service, and they in return, show their appreciation through a great review.

No Average Review

At Calidascope we’re not convinced there are many average reviews. For anyone to write a review, they need to be moved to do so. Reviews take time, and there’s no payment given for a review. For someone to sit down, look up a venue, and find the correct place to write takes time and effort. Unless they’re one of those rare people who review a lot, they’re probably writing about their experience because it was great or it was crap. Those two emotions are enough to move people. The emotions in between, probably not.

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Of course we know what’s happened so far. The internet got loud and vast and busy. And the little guy was crowded out sufficiently for him to give up any attempt at starting (or continuing) that business. Of course I’m simplifying the situation, and there’s more complexity, but for the purpose of this post, I’m ok with the simplification.

One of the large problems with peer to peer online shopping is trust. You’re not sure who you’re buying from, and you don’t know if they’re going to rip you off? (There are a bucket load of horror stories floating around online)  This is enough to put most people off even trying to attempt to buy something from the guy in the next suburb.

Which is why it’s so very clever that in parts of the US there are Online Exchange Zones popping up. Atlas Obscura carries the specifics of what’s going on, but in a nutshell:

In the North Carolina town of Apex, which set aside a parking spot outside its police station as a point of exchange, these safe spaces are generally established in highly visible spots that are monitored by cameras so that no funny business can go unrecorded. In the case of the Denton safe area, it is located across the street from a farmer’s market pavilion, and marked off by a sign post.

It’s an old school (analogue) solution for a modern day (digital) problem. So simple, so obvious, so brilliant.

It’s been sad for me that as I’ve shared this story locally, people’s first response has been, “We couldn’t put them outside our Police Stations”. Their second response has been that it’s a cool idea.

And so the dream of peer to peer commerce is still alive. It’s not anywhere close to where the dream would have it be, but where there’s a will there’s a way, and Online Exchange Safe Zones are a great step in the right direction. I look forward to the first one to be set up in South Africa.

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