It’s no secret that today guests are more demanding than ever and small missteps can quickly lead to disappointment. In this article, we’ll explore examples of bad guest experiences in hotels, what causes them, and how to improve the guest experience in hospitality with practical strategies you can implement right away.
Remember: The times when all that cared was the location and good service are long gone.
Creating an excellent hospitality experience nowadays has to do with personalised and efficient your service can be.
Not all the examples of bad guest experiences have to do with complicated situations or impossible guests. On the contrary, sometimes forgetting about taking care of basic issues leads to a bad experience and in consequence, negative hotel reviews.
The most common scenario is that there is no guest communication strategy for the hotel and this means they are either sending too many messages to guests or not sending anything at all.
Guests receive too many emails inviting them to upgrade their room or add breakfast, when perhaps they don’t even use email. All messages are sent one day after the other, and sometimes multiple messages are sent on the same day.
As you suspect, all of this provides a bad hotel guest experience.
In fact, according to a survey conducted by Deloitte to analyse the guest experience, only 66% of guests reported being satisfied with the way the hotel engaged with them, showing that there is plenty of room for improvement.
Your communications should be planned, timely, consistent and value-led. This means:
- Communicating with them across the entire guest journey.
- Not sending information every day
- Using different channels
Creating a guest communication strategy for your hotel prevents guest frustration caused by irrelevant, delayed or missing information.
If you are thinking about how to do this guest journey optimisation, we have some great tips to help you optimise your hotel guest journey.
This is one of the top examples of bad guest experiences in hotels and has to do with the poor use of segmentation.
- You offer a couples massage to a business traveller.
- Send a message about tickets to a family show to a solo traveller.
- Say “It’s great to have you with us for the first time” to a guest who has stayed in your hotel five times already.
All these situations highlight the importance of personalised recommendations for guests, using your guest data to understand who they are and what their preferences are.
The bottom line is that every message should be relevant to your guests. This not only boosts the guest experience but also helps you to build a relationship with them, which will have an impact on your guest loyalty.
If you think that segmentation is complicated, discover how a hospitality CRM helps you to segment your guests and personalise your communication in less time.
In this video, get a few tips on how to build more meaningful interactions with guests.
Time is of the essence! One of the most annoying parts is starting the vacation period by having to stay in line in the hotel lobby, waiting for someone to make you sign documents or until they bring the key to the room.
Guests want to enjoy their trip from the minute it begins and waiting times and manual processes automatically take away part of the magical experience you promised to your guests.
Think about the processes that can be automated or how you can save time. Perhaps is it about implementing online check-in or about using digital keys instead of physical ones.
What about service requests? If they have to call reception to order something extra, you are already asking too much. Why not give them the opportunity to do it through a guest app?
A few real examples of this:
- Guests need to fill out a massive form to get in contact with the staff
- Guests need to go to reception to ask any questions
- Reservation processes that take more than three steps
- Booking that are impossible to modify
According to Zendesk, 65% of customers want to buy from companies that offer quick and easy online transactions. And this includes hospitality.
Why? Because customer effort is critical to satisfaction. The simpler, easier and clearer your communication and processes are, the happier your customers will be, and the better the experience for them.
To start addressing this issue, you can analyse your processes, from the most important to the less. Think about how to make it simpler, how to eliminate steps, and keep just the necessary items.
Learn more about customer effort and why is being a guest in your hotel so difficult.
Personalised guest communication in hotels is key to create a good guest experience. Your guests are different from each other, so treating them the same only hurts your brand.
According to the survey mentioned before by Deloitte, only 65% of guests said they are satisfied with how well the brand knows and remembers them, their preferences and their needs.
One clear example of how to use personalisation has to do with the channels they use to communicate. Not all of them read their emails, just like not all are interested in receiving a WhatsApp message.
Another example of how personalisation is relevant is when you send instructions on how to reach your hotel by train, for travellers who arrive by train, and by plane for those who are flying to your location.
The more personalised your communications and your services are, the better the experience.
Another common example of bad guest experiences in hotels is when reality doesn’t match what was promised.
Whether it’s overstated amenities or misleading room descriptions, broken expectations can quickly turn excitement into frustration.
Imagine booking a hotel that advertises a fully equipped gym, only to find a few dumbbells and a stationary bike. Or expecting a full-service spa based on the website, but being greeted by just a jacuzzi and a massage chair.
These gaps between promise and reality not only damage the guest experience; they also hurt your reputation and reduce repeat bookings.
You don’t need to exaggerate to create appeal. Instead, be transparent about what your hotel offers. Clear, accurate information helps guests make the right choice for their needs and builds long-term trust.
To avoid these common mistakes and improve satisfaction, focus on:
- Building a solid guest communication strategy
- Using a CRM to deliver personalized guest communication
- Monitoring and learning from examples of bad guest experiences in hotels
Remember, the best strategy is to pay attention to the whole guest journey, and how you can improve at every stage, from an operational and a guest satisfaction point of view.
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