Customer Service & How Your Brand Suffers

Tissue issue nearly flushes this hotel’s reputation.

I’ve been thinking a lot about branding lately. Specifically, how that a brand matches up with its reputation.

Your Brand

Brand image is important as this allows companies to sell its products and oftentimes command a premium for superior service. I must admit, I’m more of a Chevrolet man who enjoys his Cadillac touches. Buick might do, but if I can have the best and do so without paying full price, then why not?

My current branding thoughts most likely has everything to do with where my family chooses to stay when we’re on the road. For several years we were Choice Hotel members (Comfort Suites, Quality Inn and Sleep Inn to name a few), then briefly switched to Wyndham (Days Inn, Microtel, etc.) before deciding we absolutely liked the accommodations available at Marriott properties. I had already been staying at Marriott properties before we made the switch, having been put up in these fine hotels by clients when I’ve flown or have driven into town.

A quick trip up north this past week meant that we would split our journey into two days going up and two days coming back, with stays at Marriott properties in Winchester, Va., each time. On the way up, it was a Fairfield Inn property. On the way back, it was to be a TownePlace, a newly built hotel at that.

The Fairfield Inn is on the “budget” side for Marriott as is TownePlace, but the Fairfield offered several nice touches including breakfast, fresh fruit, coffee throughout the day and an inside pool. The TownePlace offered much of the same although the pool was outside. This latter hotel also had a hard to find entrance — the hotel looks like an apartment complex and there was no entrance door with a defining and welcoming canopy. Still, we found our way in, made payment and went to our room.

TownePlace’s are wonderful for families especially if you want to avoid eating out. Breakfast is served, but each room features a kitchenette equipped with a full size refrigerator, a stove, a microwave, a sink and a dishwasher. Plates, cups and utensils are also available, allowing travelers to make themselves at home. Restaurant food is fine, but these can wreck your diet — make it yourself and eat better and save some money.

Marriott Amenities

Important to everyone wherever we stay is the bathroom as well as the beds. Marriott properties typically have some of the most comfortable mattresses and pillows anywhere — your sleep comfort isn’t an issue. Bathrooms are large with plenty of towels for our family of four.

What was lacking and what soon proved to be a problem was the toilet tissue. The lone roll available was down to about one-third of its original size with no additional rolls in storage. Thinking nothing of it, we soon hit our mattresses and fell asleep.

Tissue Issue

The next morning, realizing that the “issue of tissue” would soon become a problem, I made my way down to the front desk and spoke with the representative, asking for a roll. Her response stunned me — “We’re out of toilet paper and we don’t expect any more in until later in the day.”

That wasn’t the answer I wanted to hear and, being that I have an expressive face, I dropped my jaw in disbelief and was rendered speechless, but just for a moment. Realizing that we were about to hit the road again and in need of r-e-l-i-e-f, I asked for the next best thing, a box of facial tissues, which the rep was able to supply.

Once back in the room I explained the problem to my wife who was just as surprised and disappointed as I was. We managed with what we had, packed our bags, got in our car and headed home.

Hotel Feedback

The next day I received a note from the manager of the TownePlace asking us about our stay.  In reply I offered the following:

I must admit that I was disappointed with my most recent stay. Yesterday morning, when I asked at the front desk for a roll of toilet paper, the rep told me that the hotel was out of paper and that they hoped to get some in later in the day. Honestly, I was stunned by her answer — but, I managed to regain my composure by asking for a box of facial tissue to help us out. When we checked in to our room, the one roll in the bathroom was mostly depleted.

With Martin’s (a supermarket) just across the way from the hotel, surely someone could have picked up a few rolls.

The room was fine although I couldn’t get the bathtub to drain. I shower fairly quickly, but the water was still above my ankles.

I’ve left Choice Hotels and Wyndham because of substandard service, but will continue to use Marriott. Still, I’m surprised by the toilet paper problem and was a bit embarrassed. My wife wasn’t happy either.

Hopefully, this isn’t an ongoing reflection of your new hotel, otherwise this could prove to be a problem later on. BTW, on the way up north (the previous Friday night), we stayed at the Fairfield Inn in Winchester and loved it.

GM Response

A few hours later I received a direct reply from the hotel’s general manager who apologized and offered an explanation. A delivery truck with said supplies did not show up as expected the night before. The rep was the only person on duty that morning, but the GM wasn’t aware of or informed of the problem until she arrived at the hotel later that morning.

For my inconvenience I received an additional 5,000 Marriott points, credited to my account immediately. I appreciated the gesture and can imagine that the GM has already taken steps to get her staff to notify her of problems before they escalate.

That’s something I’m all to familiar with, having once worked as a store manager for Wendy’s, the restaurant chain. Whenever a problem arose while I was at work and was something my other managers couldn’t resolve on their own, I was contacted and immediately brought in a box of lettuce, a ream of cups or other item that was in short supply. This was in the day before cell phones too — I had to keep on top of things even when I was at home. No wonder I lasted just three years in the industry….

Customer Satisfaction

So, back to branding: you are only as good as your most recent customer feedback and a small, but significant problem can leave a bad taste in your mouth. The Marriott “tissue issue” was a surprise to me, but it hardly compares to problems I’ve had with uncomfortable beds, awful breakfasts and dirty rooms experienced elsewhere.

Still, it is often the little things that can ding your brand, leaving a bad taste in the mouth of your customers who might flee to the competition.

Photo: SXU

Google PageRank Update & Other Distractions

In case you missed it, Google exported PageRank to its toolbar within the past week. I don’t have an exact date to share, but it should show up on your toolbar. Perhaps you were busy playing with Google + or maybe you simply don’t care — in any case, as much as Google tries to take the wind out of its PageRank sails, the Internet routinely lights up with discussions about this dysfunctional website ranking system.

I’m one of those who pretends he doesn’t care about PageRank, but in reality I do. Back in 2005, when I launched by “The Article Writer” website, it quickly zoomed to PR6. I never could figure out why it jumped so high, but eventually it fell back, dropping to PR2 or PR3 before returning to PR4 more than a year ago, the number where it remains today.

Up, Down or Unchanged

I manage several websites and immediately visited those sites including ones owned by clients. Beginning with this website, I noticed a drop from PR4 to PR3, but I believe that ranking to be largely deserved — I neglected the site from mid-February to late June, going with guest posts only when I posted at all. Personally, I would have spanked the site harder and knocked it down another notch.

My main automotive website at autotrends.org is now ranked PR4, which is up one notch while wordjourney.com is also up a spot and is now ranked at PR3, where it was more than a year ago. Most other sites stayed the same, although I must inform a customer that one of his sites, which was ranked PR4 last year and then fell to PR2, is now ranked at PR0. I’m not certain why, but I think there is an ad issue that could be causing a problem. Hmmm….

Search Engine Optimization

Regardless of whether PageRank were to officially be killed off or not, there are some things you can do to optimize your website. For my two sites which increased in rank, I will tell you that I worked hard to write articles that people have linked to, including detailed book reviews, product reviews and news items. I didn’t take those steps to help improve PageRank, rather to increase each site’s visibility and strength online. I write with my readers in mind, which is the best way to get acknowledged for what you do. SEO is grand, but readers won’t bother with your site if what you write is poorly written, boring or both.

Another method I took advantage of is to send updates to Facebook and Twitter for my busiest websites. I just started doing that for this website, so I fully expect that I’ll be at PR9 real soon. Just kidding.

Funny, I should have known that something was up when I started to get a rash of link exchange requests for my “Auto Trends Magazine” website earlier this week. As before, I’m not into link exchanges, preferring to call out worthy content naturally as part of links within an article or at the end of each article in a “Resources” or “References” section.