What do you think of the new Palace Label ?

The French government decided to create a new label to distinguish palaces among other 5* hotels. To receive this label they must have some criteria, called “excellence criteria”, that are likely to attract international high level guests. Candidates are submitted to this list of objective criteria, that will enable them to receive this label for 5 years.

Criteria

France decided to go from 4* luxe to 5* rating, in order to standardize with the rest of the world. It was supposed to attract more international guests, by making the lecture easier : Some foreign people could have not understood the 4* luxury denomination, when looking for a 5* one. This new label will be a purely French standard; will it be understood by foreigners? To them a Palace is a very subjective thing : French palaces where awarded this name because everyone acknowledged the quality they offer was simply “WOW”. It is really worth to create a new purely French award? Isn’t it a step back?

All the criteria are about the quality of facilities and the diversity of the services proposed, but very few are about the quality of service.
I believe that most of the mandatory criteria are obvious for a 5* hotel and more, many criteria are not mandatory:
- The conciergerie service is optional,
- You have to answer the phone before the 5th ring, while most hotel require before the 3rd ring,
- Most of the food and beverage services are not mandatory; can you imagine a Palace without a Gourmet restaurant, one of the French specialties?
- The possibility to book a room 24/24h is not mandatory, while nowadays with the internet, it would be simply crazy not to be able to do so

.

Unfortunately, those which could really distinguish a Palace from another 5* hotel are only “ à la carte”, that is to say that they are only optional, such as
- Being trained to welcome disabled guests, and have a wheelchair at their disposal
- People speaking 3 languages, among them English
This kind of criteria could show that you are ready to welcome any kind of guest, wherever they come from.

Regarding Sustainable development, 3 criteria are mandatory, but to me it seem really not enough : the hotel is supposed to increase awareness of its employees about saving water, energy and produce less waste. But it does not mean that the hotel has to implement real actions to be responsible toward the environment. Hospitality is a very polluting industry, and being a palace should also include that you are responsible for your planet.

I believe that the “criteria of excellence” are not the ones listed for this label. The facilities criteria are already listed in the 5* hotel rating, why listing them again, and not going further in the service requirement? If every 5* hotel can have this label, what is the point of creating it ?

To me the name Palace is a very romantic word of recognition that is awarded by guests, because they experience a WOW service. I don’t think a ministry is really a good judge to design which hotel must be a palace, because all the criteria are purely French, and the word Palace is an international recognition, the criteria are coming from everywhere in the world and are satisfied, so let’s let the guests judge of who can be a palace of not.

Final exam

Open publication - Free publishing - More report

Still not convinced about social media ?

Five Wishes for Hotels and Social Media in 2011

Five Wishes for Hotels and Social Media in 2011

1. Put your on-staff experts to work.
2. More social media only offers.
3. Someone to really take a big foursquare/Facebook Places leap
4. Cross promotion.
5. Fewer minutias

The way social media are used have evolved a lot, and very quickly. Having a Facebook page or a Twitter account is not enough for organizations today. Their aim is to use it efficiently, to engage customers!
Being part of the Social Media is no longer an option. You MUST be part of it! The reason is that it is part of our life style. Some would say that it’s not a serious place to be, but they’re wrong. They cannot be blamed because things evolved so quickly! But it’s time to recover your delay!

Think of how buzz regularly make people famous? Why not using it to your hotel’s advantage!
To do so, you have not only to be very active, but in a good way. Posting one-way comments is useless now:
- Be active in the social media. Experts think posts must be done at least twice or 3 times a week.
- Posts must influence people to comment, react, like, re-tweet… Create conversations on your pages! Involve people in these conversations; it will make them even more loyal.
- Answer your followers! Show them you’re close to them, and that you like conversing with them!
- Talk about your future events, talk about the expertise you have in your hotel (like your chef or concierge or florist ‘s interviews, recipes… !). People are curious, and want to learn new things when coming to your page.
- People also like being rewarded for the time they spend on your pages. Propose the special offers; offer them a glass of wine for newt visits, discounts …thanks to printable coupons, or special codes. This will give them a reason to continue follow you on the social medias!

Social influence

Measuring Social Influence

View more presentations from migou83.

Sleeping  like a king

 

Chambord

  After Versaille and Fontainebleau Castles, Chambord, François Premier’s Castle, is going engage a renovation by next year.

Part of it consists in renovating an outbuilding of the domain, la Maison des Refractaires, and another forest house, to open a high standard hotel de charme. Both of them are expected to offer 20 rooms to the visitors willing to enjoy the King life.

Fontainebleau

Internationally famous, the city wants to keep improving its image and fame. 730 000 people visit the castle each year, and 2million enjoy the park. It’s been years since people have claimed for an opportunity to stay in a hotel de charme within the royal property.

 

Cultural hospitality is more and more developed, Fontainebleau and Versaille  took the first step, and Chambord followed them.

Versaille

In Versaille, the Hotel du Grand Controle, which welcomed ministers for finance at the time of Louis XVI, will be transformed into a23 rooms luxury hotel. Fontainebleau just make a call for tender for one of its buildings.

 

This idea triggered off many reactions, some citizens being afraid that the state abandoned their heritage.

To me, it is an innovative idea to renovate buildings that are lagged behind, due to the lack of budget to renovate and exploit them. Not for any easy these building must be lost. As far as the buildings are renovated according to the rules of the listed buildings, without damaging the spirit of the place, transform them into luxury hotels de charme perpetuates the tradition of these Castles. They were built to welcome the splendor of the courts, why not continuing the tradition? I definitly believe that France enjoys many jewels, unfortunatly unexploited, that the government cannot afford renovating. If welcoming people who came to visit wonderful historical sites can save them, let's do it !

 

Hospitality keeps pushing the limits, proposing more and more innovating alternatives to classic hotels. France and especially these 3 Castles offer pioneer ideas. In the end of 2013, Versaille, Fontainebleau and Chambord will provide their visitors with the opportunity to experience the King’s life….

The future of travel loyalty programs

The future of travel loyalty programs

Loylogic published a study regarding loyalty programs. It resulted that nowadays, there is a shift in customer’s satisfaction:

• ·         58% of the travelers prefer earning points on the web: being connected any time, any where is a habit today, and being available on the web is a crucial issue for companies.
• ·         43% indicated that travel was their preferred non-core reward category (Merchandise (26%) and experiences (10%)). This figure demonstrates that consumers want a wide range of options when comes the time to convert their points into rewards.
• ·         75% of travelers are satisfied they can use their points or miles on what they want and when they want

• ·         22% would like more redemption options
• ·         3% indicate they can never use their points or miles on appealing rewards.

Loyalty programs are structured marketing efforts that reward, and therefore encourage, loyal buying behavior - behavior which is potentially of benefit to the firm.

Their aim is to influence the behavior of consumers in order to make them repeat purchase. More, an efficient loyalty programs is able to change normal repeat-purchase patterns into ‘Excess loyalty’ for brands in the program.

Concretely, loyalty programs are used through free cards / paying cards, adapted to your spending potential. The more you spend, the more you can earn points that you can later converts into rewards.

Loyalty programs are experiencing an increasing popularity around the world. Nearly 75 percent of shoppers in the U.S. now belong to at least one loyalty program.

With almost 2 billion loyalty program memberships in the U.S. and more worldwide, the “one-size-fits- all” loyalty program will no longer suffice. It is vital to practice individual marketing level.

The study revealed that 22% would like more redemption options, that is to say nearly 1 out of 4 people. The more personalized, the more attractive are the programs. What is the point of collecting points, or miles, if there is nothing interesting for you in the ends?

Rewards must be targeted and personalized. According to Loylogic, key features of futures travel loyalty programs are:

• o   Higher miles value at unchanged costs
• o   More rewards including non-air travel
• o   Personalized reward experience
• o   Worldwide reward delivery
• o   One electronic interface

Regarding Hospitality pursue a very different business model compared to frequent flyer programs. Leading hotel chains offer attractive reward solutions to their worldwide member bases. The key challenges and opportunities the industry is facing vary among regions but include:

• o   Deliver packaged travel for points
• o   Setting up and managing global reward solutions
• o   New accounting standard

With the increasing number of cunsumers being members of a loyalty programs, hotels and travel companies will have to compete in order to elaborate the more attractive, personalized, and efficient programs!