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Managing a hotel implies that close attention should be paid to all the touchpoints of the guests. Every detail counts, starting with the initial phone call to the last checkout. That is why most companies now resort to the concept of mystery shopping hotels to get a picture of the actual experience of guests.
A properly implemented mystery shopping programme can assist hotels to enhance service quality, train employees, and improve customer satisfaction. This stepwise guide will enable you to establish a powerful and successful system in case you intend to establish one.
Step 1: Organise the Purpose
Begin by making a choice of what you want to measure in your hotel. Some hotels are concerned with the check-in efficiency, and some others desire to consider the room cleanliness, the conduct of staff, or the quality of food service. With a purpose in mind, you will be able to develop a more effective mystery shopping plan that will provide you with valuable information.
Question: Do you desire increased guest satisfaction? Better online ratings? Better communication of staff? A clear purpose will ensure that your mystery shopping hotels programme is focused, structured and useful.
Step 2: Determine Major Guest Touchpoints
There are a lot of touchpoints between guests who are booking, arriving, dining, staying in the room, and checking out. All phases should be reviewed to know the entire journey of the guests.
Mystery shoppers may note how welcoming and efficient the booking process is, how the front desk receives guests, the state of rooms, the quality of services in the restaurant, and how the staff addresses requests or issues.
It is always best to list these touchpoints so that a shopper can be made aware of what to look out for, effectively giving the hotel detailed, organised and useful feedback.
Step 3: Develop a basic and direct checklist
A quality checklist simplifies the assessment procedure. It must have direct questions and easy-to-answer questions that provide quantifiable results. e.g.: Have the staff been polite? Was the room in good shape and clean? Was the waiter right in serving the order? Were the amenities in proper working condition?
The simplicity of the checklist is important in order to have clear insights. Ensure it matches your brand standards to ensure the outcomes are related to your service objectives and can contribute to overall growth across departments.
Step 4: Selecting the appropriate mystery shoppers
Selection of the right shoppers is very important. You should have those that know hospitality and those that see details and remain absolutely neutral when paying a visit. To be a professional mystery shopper, one should be able to communicate effectively, be discreet and give feedback free from any biases.
They have more experience to provide more valid and reliable results. This reason has led to more hotels favouring an agency that specialises in mystery shopping hotels because most of these agencies have trained shoppers who provide detailed reports and reliable information as compared to untrained people.
Step 5: Train the Mystery Shoppers Well
Even the seasoned mystery shoppers should be trained to begin with. This should be knowledge of your expectations, brand standards, most important evaluation points, and reporting style.
Training will guarantee that they take the same guidelines every time they visit, and this will guarantee you get similar results with time.
Shoppers are prepared to make their observation more useful and focused on your aims. Such consistency makes your mystery shopping programme stronger and allows you to trace improvements month in and month out with more accuracy and confidence.
Step 6: Mystery Shopping Visits
After all the preparations, the shopper undertakes the visit, as would be the case with any other guest. They look at the quality of services without identification that provides a real picture of the guest experience.
In the process, they can test the speed of service, politeness of staff, condition of rooms, quality of food and the way the team reacts to complaints.
Their observations will help them to point out what your hotel has achieved and what is not working well, providing honest information unlike what you might have got during the normal feedback.
Step 7: Raise and Evaluate the Reports
Your mystery shopping programme will centre on the report after the visit. Ensure that the information is simple to understand and compare with previous results. Some of the patterns to look out for include slow check-ins, dirty rooms, poor restaurant service, or employees who lack greeting procedures.
The trend analysis assists in identifying areas where performance is gaining or losing. Using definite trends, you can make some significant steps towards better service quality, satisfaction with the guest and work of a hotel.
Final Thoughts
Designing an efficient hotel mystery shopping programme is a case of planning, knowledge, and consistency. When executed properly, it can assist your hotel to provide improved service, happier customers and enhanced online ratings. It provides you with candid information that might not be delivered by other regular guest commentaries.
In case you need a reliable partner that helps you install or operate a complete mystery shopping system, CTRL Service provides efficient and expert services tailored specifically to the hotel sector. The best mystery shopping support today to improve your guest experience – choose CTRL Service.
