Travellers' Tales: social media

As the social media floodgates open into the world of corporate travel, Felicity Cousins explores what buyers can gain from traveller review platforms

Travel buyers are going to have to move quickly and work together with suppliers and travel management companies (TMCs) if they are to keep up with the integration of social media in the corporate workspace and, more importantly, keep up with their travellers.

Ever since the introduction of online booking tools several years ago, there has been a shift in the way travel is booked and managed, as employees logged on at home and booked their hotels and flights themselves.

Now, armed with their smartphones and with easy access to user-generated content review sites, such as Tripadvisor, travellers are not only reading other people’s comments on the hotels they are staying in, but they are also looking for a way of communicating their experiences, good and bad, with a wider world.

This merging of social media from leisure time to the work environment is being dubbed the “consumerisation” of business travel. It’s such a growing trend that there was a whole session dedicated to the subject at the ACTEAssociation of Corporate Travel Executives: A non-profit association that represents the global business travel industry. It provides executive-level educational programmes and carries out independent industry research. Its members come from all areas of business travel - from corporate buyers to suppliers. Provides members with a forum for sharing ideas and also offers independent advice. conference in Paris this autumn.

We’re not talking about Facebook here – who cares if employees rant and rave about their terrible work trip to their friends? The traveller does not gain anything from it, except letting off steam, and the buyer will not hear about it, so the problem will not be solved.

No, we are talking about a certain kind of consumer behaviour that has popped up in the corporate workspace: internal review platforms; company intranets; and products such as Yammer and Chatter, which enable employees to build a community and share experiences about the hotels they stay in, tips on cities and, no doubt, grumbles about their travel policy. So are they a help or a hindrance to the travel buyer and their managed policy?

Too much information

Carel Aucamp, global sourcing manager at Agrega, says that if managed correctly these online communities can be useful and that supplier reviews can help buyers – but opening the floor to travellers to comment on managed policy is not encouraged.

“If you have instant reviews it’s really great but how do you ensure it does not become a moaning page?” he says. “Do you need an open blog to get this traveller feedback? In London, for example, we only contract six hotels and two of them are always new, and you can see which one the traveller favours each year, and that has a big impact.”

Where policy is concerned, buyers are interested in three things. First, in streamlining and minimising waste, and in some cases online communities can show a travel manager where leakage is happening and why. Second, travel buyers are concerned with traveller safety and satisfaction, and these channels work with a managed travel policy because buyers can easily respond to a complaint (keeping the traveller happy) and be aware of where their traveller is (keeping them safe). Third, a buyer will be more in control of cost if they can look at where their managed policy can be tightened, as well as using traveller knowledge and reviews for negotiating with suppliers.

Karoline Mayr, director of global travel procurement for US management consultancy Deltek, has been using social media channels within her role since 2009. “Travel managers say they are afraid to open the doors to these channels of communication but, from my perspective, it has been great. We wanted the opportunity to get information from our employees, but also to our employees, quickly.”

Mayr adds: “Employees are encouraged to use the blog to supply feedback as it means we can see what is going on from their perspective. We did have some negative feedback from more than one person about a particular supplier, so we showed the supplier and they posted a response, and then they made some changes, so it was a real win-win situation.”

Agrega’s Aucamp gets feedback from travellers twice a year by sending out forms for them to fill in. “Having feedback is great, but if it is a global policy and one or two people are complaining then we are not going to change it,” he says. “In principle, online forums are moving in the right direction, and one of the benefits of them is they are internal so you don’t have travellers blogging in open space about your company.”

In the past, what the traveller thought of their company policy was often found out much later via a disgruntled email to a travel manager about a bad experience with a particular hotel or airline, or a quick discussion in the corridor. Now feedback can be instant and transparent but it can also be managed.

A problem shared

BCD Travel vice-president of corporate intelligence, product planning and portfolio management Torsten Kriedt says: “Some travel managers are scared to connect with the traveller as they are worried they [the travellers] are bashing the properties in their policy, but there are also those who say: ‘I always wanted to know the details from the travellers,’ so now they finally have a chance to get to know what the travellers think, during the trip, or immediately after.”

In August, HRG launched a facility for reviews on its hotel booking tool HRG Online. Paul Saggar, HRG’s director of technology and product development, explains that the review product has a search facility, so a traveller can search for hotels in a certain city and the results will come up with the top hotel as rated by other travellers in the community. Saggar says: “You are more likely to be influenced by your friends than an independent review – so in this case, who better to trust than another corporate traveller who has the same travelling experience as you?”

These preferences can then be used by the buyer to communicate and negotiate with suppliers, but Saggar is keen to point out this does not have to be negative.

“If you have three preferred properties in one city in the same price bracket, one of them will be ranked top by the travellers,” he says. “So you’re saying to the suppliers: ‘Look, you can get a better return with people coming to stay if you provide a great service.’ So we are still adhering to policy but giving the properties a chance to improve their service.”

Hotels rather than airlines seem to be the main focus for traveller reviews, as typically there is much less choice on certain airline routes, so buyers are limited to two or three carriers for negotiations, whereas in any one city there are numerous chain and independent hotels to choose from.

Hotel portal HRS has had an online review option in place for a few years, and has logged around three million reviews. Reviews can only be posted by people who have stayed at a particular property (they are emailed for their opinions only after their stay). Corporates using HRS can opt for a closed channel so their employees only see each other’s reviews.

HRS UK managing director Jon West says these platforms are helping to shape and improve managed policies. “Reviews clearly tell the travel manager whether a particular hotel is good, so the comments are not necessarily just for the travellers but also picked up by the travel manager,” he says. “They have a huge advantage in getting feedback they wouldn’t usually have.”

For example, a traveller may be using his per diemper day (within policy) to check into a certain hotel every time they are in a particular city, and then he may share the hotel with colleagues online. Buyers can use this information and consider adding that particular hotel to be within policy. After all, why have that leakage when you could get leverage, and enhance your programme and increase compliance?

West says traveller reviews can be used by buyers as a bargaining tool: “I think if you had a hotel on your programme with a low review rating from your travellers and you go back to the hotel for re-negotiation, you could say: ‘On the basis of these reviews being so low I’m going to pull out for another hotel,’ and so leave it for the hotel to come back to you.”

Agrega’s Aucamp agrees feedback on suppliers can give the buyer the upper hand. “For managed policy we will never ask for feedback because we are not going to change it,” he says. “But with feedback on suppliers, we have more power with the suppliers, and that is the big benefit.”

Community service

It is all very well having feedback and useful data, but of course all of this means extra work for the buyer. Aucamp points out it takes a lot of work to keep online communities alive and functioning. “If a traveller gives a comment then they want to see something happening straight away, and we have not got the resources. We do have a forum where we put up certain topics for discussion, as frequent travellers are more knowledgeable than buyers on travel subjects, but they are also busy people.”

Agrega is working on a cycle, starting in 2012, where each year a different person takes responsibility for the social media platforms and works with them to keep the company and employees up to date.

But not everyone is embracing this widening communication within their companies. HRG’s Saggar explains that the uptake of internal review products is slow within the industry because people are still not sure about the benefits, and they still see the consumer review sites as being quite negative.

“We have many clients who are not interested in the whole review process and don’t think it is what a traveller should be doing. Some travel managers believe they have a programme and travellers should be sticking to the programme,” he says.

“But the whole idea behind reviews is for the travel manager to address the experiences of the traveller. This isn’t about collecting huge amounts of negative feedback to give ‘supplier-beating-up-power’ to buyers – this is about helping manage the policy in a positive way, whereas in the consumer world it is often the opposite.”

Tips and tricks

If you have the time and resources then the positives are certainly there. Being immersed in your travellers’ experiences will show elements of a programme that have not yet been managed, such as ground transportation, and tips and tricks the travellers learn on their trips. It opens up a conversation.

Deltek’s Mayr says: “I would say to anyone who is unsure that it’s very important to communicate with the travelling public and move with the times. And don’t be afraid – when email first showed up there were only some people who could ‘do email’, and when the internet came, some people couldn’t ‘do the internet’. Harness this and make it your own. Wouldn’t you rather be part of the solution and conversation?”

Others agree: Aucamp says having an internal forum on suppliers is fine – “the more transparency the better” – while HRS’s West says: “If you can embrace it you can take advantage of it, and if you choose not to embrace it then you have to be very confident that you have a perfect travel management programme.”

BCD’s Kriedt offers some advice to buyers embracing this new world. “Find out from stakeholders in the organisation which social media platforms are in use – such as Chatter – so you can establish a community. The closer you get to travellers the easier it is to roll out a rating system. Get closer and build a social network and empower travellers. Use applications to enrich their lives.”

He adds: “Start thinking of the traveller as being the consumer. Just because it is a corporate solution it still needs to be user-friendly, and having that expectation for consumers will help improve the communication and the programme.”

What can your managed travel programme gain from online social activity?

• Valuable intelligence Travellers are excellent eyes and ears for maintaining the quality of a travel programme and providing useful advice, such as the best way to transfer from an airport to city centre.

• Authenticity Peer reviews of travel suppliers carry much more conviction than official information from the supplier, or even the travel manager.

• Reinforced sourcing User-generated content is extremely useful for sharing with preferred suppliers, and not only to improve customer relations. It could ultimately be used in negotiations.

• Research pool Travel managers could also use a network to float ideas among travellers. By showing that they have canvassed opinion in advance, networking can win buy-in to policy.

Source: Changing the DNA of travel management (BCD Travel white paper)

This article was first published in ABTN's sister title Buying Business Travel, the award-winning magazine for company travel & meetings buyers and arrangers.

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