iPerceptions - Customer Satisfaction Measurement

Mclean Va. (Dec. 6, 2006) – An impressive 44% of business travelers visiting
hotel brand websites are "bookers" and actually make or change a reservation,
according to a new joint study from HSMAI and iPerceptions that measured business
travelers in the mid-scale hotel segment.

Furthermore, 4 in 10 of website visitors are first timers, and only 22.1% mid-scale
business travelers abandon their plan to make an online transaction versus 31%
in leisure travelers.

Those are just a few highlights from the first-ever edition of a unique, quarterly
web metrics report of experience and satisfaction benchmarks, "The Voice of the
Hotel Customer," which focused specifically on the business traveler in the mid-scale
hotel sector.

The research addresses issues of website satisfaction, such as ease of use, convenience,
depth of information, relevant content, if the website encourages return and responsiveness
to customer needs.

"What’s so groundbreaking about the study is that the results can be used to
develop viable benchmarking within the hotel industry, and to illustrate trends
and insights into the attitudes of hotel website visitors regarding their online
experiences," states Robert A. Gilbert, CHME, CHA, president and CEO of HSMAI.
"These reports are a starting point for the industry as they form a baseline against
which a company can compare itself after it implements changes."

"This first quarterly report represents a significant advancement in measuring
and benchmarking the impact of customer word of mouth and feedback in the hospitality
sector," said Daniel Taras, Vice President, Business Development at iPerceptions.
"Capturing the voice of your customer is critically important for companies that
want to build their businesses in the always-on and always-connected online environment",
said Mr. Taras.

"Web marketers at individual companies can benchmark their own customer’s experience
to the overall mid-scale sector within the report to determine where the weaknesses
and strengths are in their website," adds Cindy Estis Green, managing partner
of The Estis Group and author of the report. "As the scores are filtered by meaningful
customer segments, web marketers can easily make changes directed to specific
market segments and then go back to see if they were able to move the needle on
the scores."

The first HSMAI/iPerceptions Quarterly Report was released Dec. 6, 2006 at HSMAI’s
7th Travel Internet Strategy Conference today in Sunny Isles, FL.

Highlights of the report findings will be published in the HSMAI Marketing Review
magazine and the HSMAI Foundations’s eConnect member information portal. One of
the study’s more important revelations is that it shows where there is the most
difference between a booking that happens and one that does not. "The biggest
difference by those who complete their booking, and those who do not, revolves
around whether they feel the website enables them to find what they are looking
for and secondarily, whether they can find a full enough range of the information
they seek," according to the report.

This analysis centered on the business traveler sub-set of the moderate hotel
brands database. The database included lookers (those who went to the website
to get hotel information, research/compare rates or other) and bookers (those
who went to the website to book/change a reservation).

The summary states: "There is no doubt that a higher level of engagement yields
higher satisfaction levels with a website. The most frequent website users who
come to book/change a reservation scored websites consistently higher than others
and suggests that higher satisfaction produces greater usage." The lookers tended
to evaluate the attributes in similar rank order as the bookers, however, the
overall scores for lookers’ evaluations were lower, according to the report. Bookers
were much more engaged and rated the sites higher, except those first time bookers,
who, like first time lookers had many issues that implied they would not be using
the website in the future, didn’t think they were saving money with it and were
not likely to use it for general trip planning.

The iPerceptions research is based on data from 29 major hotel brands; 17 of
which fall into this report’s realm of mid-scale hotels. Other critical data generated
from the survey:

• 56% of mid-scale business travelers have membership in rewards programs versus
  52% industry-wide among business travelers;
• Four in ten (41%) mid-scale business travelers are first timers to a hotel website
  versus 44 percent industry-wide; and only 25 percent are frequent users versus
  35% frequent users industry-wide;
• When analyzing the difference between bookers who "abandoned" their plans and
  successful bookers, the biggest differences were in the way a website’s design
  was rated in terms of whether it enabled them to find what they are looking for
  and if the information covered the range they needed;
• Site visitors who changed/booked a reservation rated the mid-scale hotel websites
  highest of any other customer group, scoring a rating 7.17 (out of 10) versus
  the overall business traveler group which was 6.95. Frequent site visitors (6+
  visits in last six months) rated the websites overall at a high 7.75.
• When comparing individuals’ attributes against the overall mid-scale business
  traveler benchmarks, there are significant differences between website usage levels.
  First timers are considerably more likely than more frequent users to say that
  mid-scale hotel websites are not the place they would likely start their trip
  planning or that mid-scale websites encourage them to return. They are much less
  likely than frequent users to think that the website can enable them to find what
  they are looking for.
• The more committed and engaged in using the site, the more likely a business
  traveler said the site was their primary trip planner and that it saved money
  in hotel rates;
• While first timers in every category gave all aspects of the website the lowest
  ratings, their best scores were for navigation and content related attributes.

About iPerceptions

iPerceptions is one of North-America’s leading web-focused attitudinal analytics
providers. Its webValidator Continuous Listening solution and its Proprietary
Satisfaction Index (iPSI), turn thousands of data points into easy-to-understand
strategic and tactical decision support for website marketers. iPerceptions’ clients
include such well known brands as InterContinental Hotels, General Motors, Dell
Computers, Hyundai, CompUSA, LG Electronics, Toshiba, Choice Hotels International,
BMW and Hilton Hotels. iPerceptions has offices in New York, Toronto and Montreal.

About HSMAI

HSMAI is an organization of sales and marketing professionals representing all
segments of the hospitality industry. With a strong focus on education, HSMAI
has become the industry champion in identifying and communicating trends in the
hospitality industry, and bringing together customers and members at several annual
events, including HSMAI’s Affordable Meetings®. Founded in 1927, HSMAI is an individual
membership organization comprising more than 7,000 members worldwide, with 36
chapters in the Americas Region. For more information on HSMAI, contact the Hospitality
Sales & Marketing Association International, 8201 Greensboro Drive, Suite
300, McLean, VA 22102, phone (703) 610-9024; fax (703) 610-9005, or visit the
web site at www.hsmai.org.