During the current ReviewPro webinar, Summer 2021: What to Expect and How to Prepare, we asked Hannes Friebel, Manager of Quality and Training at TUI Blue, about how his business is navigating the recovery. Heres a condensed variation of our interview.
Tell us about TUI BLUE and your function with the company.
TUI BLUE is a fairly young leisure hotel brand within TUI Hotels and Resorts, the main company within the TUI Group. I began in 2015, the year TUI BLUE was developed, and I look after all quality and training subjects. After six years, we now operate about 100 hotels worldwide. Prior to COVID-19, we invited over one million guests each year. Most of our hotels lie in sun and beach destinations.
We can proudly state that TUI BLUE is now the best-in-class hotel brand within TUI Hotels and Resorts, as in 2015 we achieved a Global Review Index of 92% and a Net Promoter Score of roughly 60%.
After collecting a great deal of guest feedback over the past year, we recognized that health and wellness topics have actually ended up being more and more important for our visitors. Therefore we have actually changed our interactions to shape our guests expectations, guarantee they understand what they will experience on website, and boost their sense of security.
All in all, we believe we will be rather hectic as soon as travel is possible by source market and host destination. To provide you an example, we opened a brand-new TUI BLUE hotel on the popular German holiday island of Sylt two weeks ago, and we already have an average occupancy for the summer season of nearly 85 percent.
How are you guaranteeing your properties are prepared to accommodate changes in visitor needs and expectations?
At TUI BLUE, we follow an aligned contact strategy throughout the guest journey. We require to compare the various stages in this visitor journey.
1) Pre-stay Phase: InformationCommunication is type in the details stage, particularly before arrival. Throughout the pre-stay duration, we concentrate on our own channels like the TUI and TUI BLUE websites. We also highlight health and wellness topics in the pre-stay email sent 7 days prior to arrival. Visitors can sign in online and make secondary reservations in advance.We also have our dedicated BLUE app, which visitors can download before arrival or throughout their stay and receive comprehensive info about safety measures at the hotel and regional constraints. Furthermore, we have actually upgraded our hotel profiles on different platforms like Booking.com to highlight health and safety subjects and ensure our guests are knowledgeable.
2) In-house Phase: EvaluationOnce our guests have entered our hotel, the in-house stage begins and assessment ends up being increasingly more crucial. During the stay, we provide a brief internal study with just 5 concerns through our BLUE app. Here we get a great deal of important information, specifically concerning operations on site.
3) Post-stay Phase: Evaluation & & AnalysisAfter departure, we send out a post-stay e-mail connected to a survey. And, as we all know, online reviews happen all the time, so during the assessment stage we acquire a mass of guest feedback. And now it becomes more crucial to focus on the analysis stage where we have carried out a special tool to have a mutual exchange about visitor feedback with our general supervisors in the hotels.
Inform us more about how you are helping your properties get ready for healing.
Our so-called “quality calls” take place on a month-to-month basis between the general supervisor and me, and also with other participants like department heads and functional professionals. The most appropriate subject is guest feedback.
The biggest part of the call is about ReviewPro. Here I talk with the general manager about the reviews, management actions and studies we have received like the immediate feedback study and the post-stay survey.
And I frequently take the chance to inform the general supervisor and department heads about specific topics related to guest feedback. All in all, these calls assist guarantee that our hotels are knowledgeable about guest feedback, are ready for the coming months, and understand what will be essential for our guests.
How do you prepare to uphold your requirements and preserve high guest complete satisfaction levels during recovery?
At TUI BLUE, for our handled hotels, I am really happy to state that we have not made any general or international cost cutting. Of course, when hotels were closed, we made modifications where possible to minimize working hours, holiday time and overtime.
However, we all understand that once travel returns to a typical level again, its important to constantly have the correct amount of personnel to provide the defined quality. As part of that, we have actually always focused on devoted training and site sees to support the regional management team. Given that COVID-19, we have moved from an onsite technique to a virtual approach, and now we concentrate on e-learnings such as brand-new principles, distinct selling proposals, standard operating treatments, and health and wellness subjects.
Visitors can examine in online and make secondary bookings in advance.We likewise have our dedicated BLUE app, which visitors can download before arrival or throughout their stay and get detailed details about safety steps at the hotel and local constraints. We have actually upgraded our hotel profiles on different platforms like Booking.com to highlight health and safety topics and ensure our visitors are well-informed.
2) In-house Phase: EvaluationOnce our visitors have entered our hotel, the in-house stage begins and evaluation becomes more and more essential. And now it becomes more crucial to focus on the analysis phase where we have executed a special tool to have a shared exchange about visitor feedback with our basic supervisors in the hotels.
All in all, these calls assist make sure that our hotels are knowledgeable about guest feedback, are all set for the coming months, and know what will be crucial for our visitors.
We understand that website check outs are important, so my operations coworkers go to the hotels and offer assistance to the regional management team. To keep our high visitor satisfaction levels, we follow an integrated method in which every department head gets access to all appropriate systems.
Here, ReviewPro plays a very crucial role. Supplying access to our hotel colleagues to utilize ReviewPro tools separately is necessary. That is why I typically retrain personnel on how to utilize them throughout day-to-day operations. This integrated method and our highly effective processes are fundamental to maintaining our high guest fulfillment and maintaining our standards.
Could you share tips for hoteliers who want to ensure beneficial guest fulfillment ratings during recovery?
Talk about guest feedback and focus on the mutual accomplishment of suitable steps. Its essential to share favorable feedback with your group. And here my personal pointer is to use the note function in ReviewPro to send out individual push alerts to choose users with reference to favorable online evaluations
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As a leisure brand name, TUI Blue is well placed for recovery. How is demand shaping up?
I think we all understand that people are eager to take a trip. But at the end of the day, we require to distinguish amongst the differing limitations in our source markets. It is essential to figure out if individuals can travel abroad and if the hotel location is on the blacklist or not. We also have regional constraints to comply with, as well as entry limitations like quarantine, which has a strong influence on guest demand.
Due to the fact that the company is well connected to source markets and locations worldwide, Im really delighted to work with TUI Hotels and Resorts. As an effect, we receive an everyday upgrade of local restrictions. And in 2015, the business established a particular health and safety measure list on top of the local limitations every hotel needs to abide by. We in the operations department look after implementation.
