Understanding What Guests Really Want

With the number of online reviews from OTAs, TripAdvisor, and social media, it can be hard to pinpoint what exactly guests want. One guest might not enjoy the breakfast, while another gripes about the decor. On the flip side, it‰’s important to know what it is your hotel is doing right. With so many reviews with suggestions, complaints, and praise coming in, how do you know what really matters?

Harnessing Sentiment Analysis

By using review sentiment analysis, you can dive deeper than just in the star rating of a review. Sentiment analysis breaks hotel reviews into specific categories that are ranked as having a positive or negative sentiment.

In the example below, we’ve highlighted the positive and negative aspects that are mentioned in one online review. You can see how a review is often not all positive or all negative, but a mix.

By analyzing reviews in terms of the sentiment for different categories, you’ll be able to identify overall trends to be addressed at your hotel. In this example, the review was negative in terms of Cleanliness but positive for Service and Breakfast.

If you see a trend across reviews where Cleanliness is often rated negatively, then you can focus on that as a place to improve at your hotel. However, if you look at your overall Cleanliness sentiment for all your reviews and see that this was a random outlier, then you might identify other places that are more important to focus on right now, like the decor.

By addressing the issues at your hotel that cause the most negative sentiment, then you’ll be able to positively affect the perceived value of your hotel. As a result, you’ll also positively influence your hotel’s reputation in the long run by improving the elements that are most often mentioned in a negative light.

Make a Playbook from Online Reviews

In this webinar, we share ways to digest your online reviews in a way that helps you see the bigger picture of your property. By using review sentiment analysis, you can find out what issues are making the biggest impact on how guests enjoy your property and on how they review it.