notes from a small hotel about how rooms actually get filled

Reach for the tranquilizers another bad review has appeared

 

I would rather swallow a frog than reply to an online review.

I read them.

I reread them.

I leave them open while doing three other jobs - but I still don't answer.

I am angry. It has to subside before I am in the right place to reply.

 

While your dealing with todays check outs and countless other jobs, potential guests are reading your reviews before booking.
Out of curiosity, I looked up the statistics and around 73% of British travellers prefer to see written reviews when choosing somewhere to stay, and over half won't book if they are poor.

Replying isn't really about the reviewer - it's about reassuring those who will read it later. It's for the next guest, the invisable one. And if you can't be arsed to respond, it makes your place look like the worst in the area.

After a while, I started reading how other hotels replied - just to see the best ones. And I decided to keep them on a file because it was easier to copy a sentance that already sounded human than to try coming up with something different on each occasion. Besides it saved time.

That folder grew. I didn't plan it. It just became something I reached for on the days when words were in short supply.

The aim is simple, you don't need to pop a frog in your gob to turn every review answered into an opportunity. Better than letting the silence do the talking.

Go to the 'help yourself' page where there are some replies that I saved, exactly as they were written and where you can funnily enough help yoursef when you are stuck.