Cleanliness crucial to hotel reviews

Data illustrates that 61 per cent of customers read online reviews before making e-commerce purchasing decisions, which in practice means it’s likely the very first impression a prospective guest has of a hotel is the opinion of a previous guest. 

Results from trivago’s Quality Test, a mystery guest programme in which real guests receive a cash incentive for filling in a questionnaire regarding their stay, shows that 78 per cent of guests expect an ‘above average’ level of cleanliness and that if they rate a hotel as clean, they are more likely to give the hotel a high rating overall. 

So while it is commonly understood that good online ratings boost the number of stays, the combined data clearly outlines that cleanliness is a crucial factor in securing positive recommendations and reviews. In fact, P&G Professional’s research shows that an increase of 1 star rating in cleanliness is likely to increase the overall rating by up to 1 star.