I went to the Lobby, and...

A few days back I wrote about an interesting initiative from Starwoods Hotels that was lauching a blog: TheLobby.com, (to read in full my previous note: click here).

I really valued the initiative, but was suggesting that the ability to comment on the blog will be a great way to engage readers and potential customers. To my satisfaction, within two days, I got a comment from Marc at ElectricArtists (Marc and his team maintain the blog) was informing me that the ability to comment was now available and more things were to come:

My feedback: well done guys! I will track progress with interest.

Ironically, yesterday,  I landed in Paris airport and had 2 hours to kill before taking a train to Brussels. Guess what, I wanted to check emails. The only place available to do this near the TGV train station is the Sheraton Paris airport hotel. So I walked in the Sheraton Lobby, and was very happy to do so, given my recent positive experience with Thelobby.com!

I asked reception if they had a wifi connection available, they said yes of course, and offered to buy a 30 Euros pass for 24 hours.

I asked if they had in other shorter periods available...Guess what, they said no. And even said that they did feedback this issue many times to management but so far no cards of shorter credits were available...

I am sure of course that I am not the only customer to experience this problem, I ended up buying the 30 euros card, (and a coffee charged 5.5 euros!), but guys, this is really "bad profit" to refer to Fred Reichheld's recent book the Ultimate Question. I even sat in the lobby for an hour or so, it was not really convenient as there were no available plugs for my laptop. Thanks God, the Concierge helped me out to find a better spot.

The lessons :

• The Customer Experience is built across all touch points, so make sure that your ability to deliver a consistent experience is the same online and offline.
• Listen online but offline as well.
• Beyond Listening to Customers like myself (maybe?), Listen more often to you employees and leverage their feedback, they deal with us, customers, everyday, for sure they have things to say to make our experience better, no?
• Listen of course, but please try to take into account what we suggest to offer a better experience.

Again, I still value TheLobby.com initiative but I am probably not as positive towards the hotel as I was before my yesterday experience. Surprised?

I simply hope that my humble customer voice will help other customers and... StarWoods business as well in the long run.

Technorati Tags: Customer Listening, StarWoods, TheLobby.com, Listening, Hotel Blog, Market Research, WOM, Fred Reichheld, Net Promoter, Ultimate Question, Voice of The Customer, Customer Experience,Customer Satisfaction,

Comments

[John]

Actually, The Lobby doesn't allow comments. You can submit a comment that will be reviewed by their "editorial" team.

I went back a few months in their posts and didn't see 1 comment for any posts....