I met up for a drink last night with a cousin of mine who was over from Dublin on business. During the course of the evening, as we caught up on what we’d both been doing for the past 5 years, I asked here where she was staying. She replied that she was booked into a hotel in Bloomsbury. When I asked what the hotel was like her only response was “I wish I’d checked TripAdvisor before, rather than after, I booked it”.

You see, when she did check TripAdvisor to find what past guests at this particular hotel had thought, she wasn’t overly impressed. Comments included:

Worst shower in hotel history

Dreadful / Appaling - book elsewhere

Awful in every way

and my personal favourite,

Don’t stay here - even if for free

Obviously if she had seen these comments whilst researching hotels it is highly unlikely that she would ever have booked the hotel at all.

As if it’s not bad enough that anyone with an internet connection can decide whether or not they should make a booking with a hotel, now you don’t even need to be online to find out what visitors to TripAdvisor think. Last week saw the site naming the dirtiest hotels in the UK, based on its users reviews, and the story was soon picked up by offline media; the story even made it as far as Australia which is obviously the starting point for huge numbers of visitors to the UK. I’m guessing that the only people who’ve been ringing the Nanford Guest House in Oxford recent have been journalists looking for comments.

Image: Mr Mystery on Flickr

As if the travel industry wasn’t taking enough of a beating on the ground, a recent announcement by US airline JetBlue could herald a similar situation in the air. As Jane from SEOmoz explains, the launch of wi-fi on planes could soon lead to annoyed passengers expressing their frustrations mid-flight, rather than waiting till they’ve landed, when they’re probably less likely to bother complaining.

Say you’re on a long-haul flight of the Hawaii to New York variety. The cabin crew are rude and the food is vaguely reminiscent of curdled vomit…. Right now, you’ll fume for the eight hours and get off the plane…Buckled into your seat, imagine the damage you could do, given a live online outlet!

Whilst some would argue that in a world where many budget airlines seem to take pride in the fact that they don’t care about customer service, I’d argue exactly the opposite. I’ve sworn never to fly with a certain budget airline ever again, as I feel that no saving can be enough to be treated like cattle (not to mention the ethical issues that paying £1 for a seat on a plane raises). For me, customer service is very important and I’m willing to pay a premium to get it, which is why I fly BA whenever I can & I’d guess that there are plenty of other people like me out there.

All of this simply highlights the increasing importance of managing reputations online, whether you’re a hotel, an airline or any brand that relies on its customers (which is, pretty much, every business in existence). If you’d like to talk to use about how you could manage your brand’s reputation online, please give us a call.

Header image: aubergene on Flickr

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