Personalization for Hotel Stay Experience

The art of tailor-made strategy for hotel stay experience is just like making a nice meal, how tailor-made strategy can transform a better hotel stay experience under this ever-changing world from culture, business and technology aspects.

Value of tailor-made is always high. From men’s suits, custom couture, shoes, handbags, jewelleries, cars to private vacations. No doubt people have desire on those as they are exclusive, like no other with both tangible and intangible values, the balance between expectations and experiences. The art of tailor-made strategy for hotel stay experience is just like making a nice meal, we need quality ingredients, suitable utensils and the enjoyment of cooking process. Fill into the tailor-made strategy, personalization, customer experience design and ambiance are the quality ingredients; hardware design, software design, social media and technology are the utensils; people – activities and actions by customers and staffs are the enjoyment of cooking process. Before cooking, what to buy to meet customers’ taste preference is also important, therefore, to understand the Asia market in this report is necessary as well.

Personalization + customer experience design + ambiance = memorable experience

Hotels nowadays is not only a place to sleep, but they also provides a journey experience from spatial design, facilities, activities provided, limousine service, F&B to all-round journey management, technology applications, staff’s performance, lifestyle formation and create cultural value. Almost every hotel brands, from independent ones to chain hotels, they all urge to create their point of different through service and positioning. These two are the fundamental part, next is to create something for guests to take away, makes them to come and revisit, which is – a memorable experience.

THE MAKING OF TAILOR-MADE STRATEGY

INGREDIENTS (THE KEY ELEMENTS) including personalization, customer experience design and ambiance.

UTENSILS (THE TOOLS) including hardware design, software design, social media and technology.

It is the era of customer value. From the book Creating Breakthrough Products by Prentice Hall in 2002, it has clearly indicated that the only way to be competitive and maintain customer loyalty is integrating style and technology through features. There are six factors that a personalized guest experience should have, namely journey integration, personalized service and support, customized room options, multichannel self-service, personalized shopping and post-stay support. Journey integration – travelers want to blur the travel limitations that they can book everything at one same platform from flight, limousine, hotel to other activity’s ticket in order to simplify the whole process, save time and have a clearer itinerary. A comprehensive mobile system with their profile for multi-use self-service and check-in/out is also needed to shorten the queuing time. Personalized service and support – guests will feel respectful if they were being recognized. Treat them like VIP say for example prioritized the room service based on guest’s loyalty, provide better F&B service via guest’s arrival time and preferences, have flexible check-out options or twenty-four-hour support lines for feedbacks. For in-room options, be flexible is the key inside the only private “home” space. In-room arrangement can be customized making it multi-function, with technology options no matter what kind of mobile devices are adaptable and works well with the provision intelligent system. Also need to provide multichannel self-services to help the guest have a smooth experience during stay and act as a housekeeper to record and summarize every single detail.

While personalization in one of the key, it needs to go with standardization getting the balance between customer’s satisfaction and hotel’s operation. Here are three strategic suggestions. First is the “me” service – defined and categorized each guest’s specific needs through interact with them, by offering those categorized desires, hotel can easily enhance the guest experience, and comes together on incensement of marketing return. Second is to let the guest be the lead – allow guests to personalized their needs under certain levels of standard products, this can differentiate their experiences from other guests based on their preferences. Since this is made under certain levels of standard products, it can be achieved efficiently, to increase customer’s loyalty and intimacy. Thirdly is to satisfy their personalized needs on every stay – this will enhance the guest experience since the services are provided in line with their expectations.

Customers wants “flexible public spaces and open layouts that provide them with different options to work and socialize”. What it means that hotel spaces need to have flexibility gives customers can either work alone or gather with friends in same place. As said at the very beginning, hotel is not a place to sleep anymore, people will step out from the room to have different activities in public spaces. Since hospitality is an emotional decisions, therefore hotels need to offer a matrix of services to balance the experience from hardware to software, from physical to mental.

Hotels can use above facts of personalization transform into memorable customer experience, to increase their product value from functional to memorable. Experiences connects customers lifestyle and the hotel, in a broader social context, it place individual customers for repeated purchase occasionally – the engagement.

Offering personalization and customer experience design sounds against traditional hospitality service – standardization from business perspective. But these three can works well together in fact, to complimentary each other. To allow certain personal requirement from guests under the systemized workflow, this can satisfy guests’ desire and needs yet hotel staffs can work smoothly and efficiently under the systemized scenarios to maintain the work flow, manpower arrangement and the cost.

Customer experience cannot be designed by hotel operators themselves because experience is intangible. What can be designed are the touch-points to differentiate and influence their experiences directly and indirectly. See below the framework where the touch-points can be in hotel stay experience. This figure briefly shows where touch-points can insert into the hotel experience to influence guests, same path but create different feelings and journeys. From the time they start make the reservation, one the way to hotel, arrival, check-in, get into the guestroom, have a nice meal at the restaurant, explore the social at the public areas, check-out and follow-ups after leaving hotel.

From lots of loyalty engagement articles indicates that customers usually engaged in rational choices, but what makes customers to engage with rational choices? The answer is emotion. Fantasies, enjoyment, feelings are often the elements that drive our emotions during consumption experiences. Say it in another way in hotel services, is the influences from the five senses. Customers they see, smell, hear, taste and touch throughout the hotel stay physical touch points and generate individual’s feelings / experiences. Create the environment as art, from nothing, exploitation to imagination, inspiring the guests when they are into the space from lobby, common areas and guestroom. A photo, a story or an art piece are the most direct way to create ambiance. Brand creators acts as storytellers creating brand image, vision and statements to communicate with guests visually, developing the character. To enhance the environment, music is a good choice building audio experience blending together.

Next is to provide activities and service. Ambiance only happen when there is people with activities. A space is only a space when there is no one. Good food (nice dining experience) and events let guests to have activities, good services by staffs let guests to have connections with the hotel brand. What should put into the menu is a professional task, quality food and beverage, choice of ingredients will lead the guests to have different moods. Apart from eat and sleep, boutique provide varies self-exploration activities for guests from a mini music show, art jamming or others, strengthen the brand experience and to engage with guests. Gentle staffs with smiles and understand your need ahead you know it will also affect the overall ambiance – the mood to the experience.