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Hotels Are Missing Vital Marketing Messages

Aspire Executive Lounges, Swissport's global airport hospitality brand, has joined the British Institute of Hospitality, the world’s leading and award-winning membership body for hospitality professionals. Aspire Executive Lounges becomes the first business partner from the airport lounge hospitality sector to join the Institute of Hospitality. Aspire Executive Lounges, the fast-growing Swiss brand in the airport hospitality business, has joined the British Institute of Hospitality (IoH), the world’s leading membership body for professionals working and studying in the hospitality leisure and tourism industry. Aspire Executive Lounges is the first business from the airport lounge sector to become a member of IoH. The collaboration will foster an exchange of expertise and insights: IoH will benefit from Aspire's expertise in airport hospitality, while Aspire, by sharing its wealth of experience with IoH members, can extend its professional network to the hotel and catering sectors and hospitality management schools. “Our vision for Aspire Executive Lounges is clear and simple: We want to deliver a guest experience that is similar to what our guests are used to from their preferred hotels, meeting the needs and exceeding the expectations of today’s travelers,” says David Collyer, Global Vice President of Executive Lounges at Swissport International AG. “We strive to deliver an unparalleled experience and set a benchmark that transcends our industry, redefining excellence across the hospitality sector. The Institute of Hospitality is a great network to exchange insights and experiences, and to learn from others in the hospitality sector, which will help us bring our vision to life.” Robert Richardson, CEO of the Institute of Hospitality: “Our aspiration at the Institute of Hospitality has been to develop and grow our membership, the number of countries we operate in, and the number of hospitality sectors represented within our organization. With that in mind, it is a natural partnership for us to welcome Aspire into our family, and to learn from their teams, who serve travelers with passion and dedication. As two organizations with similar values, we look forward to collaborating in promoting high levels of excellence within our profession.” With over 30 years of experience, Aspire Executive Lounges is Europe’s largest brand in the airport lounges sector. In 2023, Swissport welcomed more than five million customers worldwide at over 69 lounges in 20 countries. The airport hospitality brand recently opened new lounges at Toronto City Airport in Canada, and Helsinki-Vantaa Airport in Finland. Aspire Executive Lounges recently created a new lounge concept in partnership with the airline alliance oneworld. The first oneworld branded lounge was launched at Incheon Airport in Seoul, Korea, in December 2023. Aspire Executive Lounges is owned by Swissport International AG, the global leader in aviation services, serving airlines at 286 airports in 44 countries across 6 continents
Written by Amy

Hotels are losing customers because they aren’t using the most effective marketing messages for their ratings, reveals new research from King’s Business School.

The researchers have created a model that exposes the truth about hotel performance using text from online customer reviews on websites such as TripAdvisor.

Using a big data set of more than a quarter of a million online reviews for more than 25,000 hotels in 16 countries, a total of 19 controllable factors were found to be vital for hotels to manage in their interactions with visitors. These included checking in and out, communication, homeliness, room experience and accommodating pets.

The research further identified the most important dimensions according to the star rating of hotels, with homeliness and events management being important for five-star hotels, while room experience and communication were basic requirements at one-star level.

“However, not all factors are considered by hotels and hotel comparison websites, like homeliness and natural beauty which the research revealed to be important for top-rated hotels and older consumers,” says Professor Stuart Barnes, “and so key marketing messages are being missed that would target the ideal customers. Hotels need to position themselves carefully.”

Clear differences were also found according to demographic segments. For example, men are more sensitive to price than women, while female hotel customers place greater significance on the standard of the bathroom.

The results, recently published in the journal Tourism Management, have clear implications for how hotels effectively market their offerings to different customers.

The application of advanced, mathematical machine learning techniques has provided an important development in marketing as Barnes, in collaboration with Hohai University, used them to develop a new model, which was compared with traditional numerical ratings. The approach provides a potential solution for many businesses seeking to understand the voice of their customers

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