Hospitality leader creates propriety score to measure online first impressions for hotels

Travel Media Group has launched a propriety reputation score to help hotel managers better understand property performance. The only of its kind, the 1st Impression Score™ is designed to focus on the most important factors in traveler booking decisions: those that contribute to a traveler’s first impression of a hotel online.

Most reputation scores out there focus on one thing only: the lifetime review score of a hotel on TripAdvisor or another website. While the lifetime score is valuable, it’s only one component of the hotel’s reputation. To create a reputation metric that provides actionable insight for hoteliers, it must incorporate the components that matter to the traveler most at the time of booking.

“One challenge with using a lifetime review score to judge a hotel’s performance, is that it changes slowly over the course of months,” said Jason Lee, vice president of product development at Travel Media Group. “We designed a score to show a hotel how they’re doing right now, and their score will update daily to reflect their performance.”

The 1st Impression Score™ includes other essential, timely components travelers use to judge a property, such as:

• The average score of their most recent reviews
• How often reviews are posted by travelers
• How many reviews receive responses from the hotel

These factors are especially helpful to travelers when comparing multiple hotels with similar lifetime scores or price points. At the point of the travelers’ journey when they’re evaluating hotel reputation, it’s relevant content such as new reviews and hotel responses that contribute to guest expectations. It’s during this closer evaluation of hotels that a booking decision is made.

“Travelers are more discerning than ever during their booking journey,” said Dana Singer, vice president and GM of Travel Media Group. “Following COVID-19, the most recent guest reviews and how hotels are responding to them will directly impact the lodging choices travelers make.”

The 1st Impression Score™ is available exclusively in the TMG OneView® dashboard for management groups, ownership groups, and individual properties. Hoteliers can view 1st Impression Score™ performance for individual properties, large portfolios, and for local market competitors. Travel Media Group also works directly with brands to develop brand reputation scores specifically to evaluate their hotels.

“The 1st Impression Score has evolved the way our management group partners can assess portfolio performance,” said Erica Jo Rago, sales director for Travel Media Group. “The score makes it easy to identify areas of opportunity for each property and implement an action plan to improve booking conversions.”

For hotel managers who need actionable reputation performance metrics, the 1st Impression Score™ is ideal. Learn more about the new 1st Impression Score™ from Travel Media Group.