New research published by Barclays Bank Ireland today shows that three quarters (74%) of hospitality and leisure businesses in Ireland expect their sales or revenues to increase over the next 18 months with the vast majority (78%) seeing online customer feedback as a key driver to improving turnover in the next 18 months.
The Barclays Feedback Economy report, which specifically analyses the transformative effect that online customer feedback is having on the hospitality and leisure sector in Ireland, reveals that online feedback has helped 76% of businesses surveyed attract new customers and an equal 76% to retain existing customers.
The report shows that more than half (54%) believe that online customer feedback has led to an increase in customer numbers over the past 18 months.
Almost half (48%) of businesses have been able to measure the value of customer feedback to the business and 88% anticipate their businesses making changes to facilitate better feedback management.
For some (42%), the biggest negative effect as a result of customer feedback is that the weak points in their businesses have been exposed with 82% of businesses believing that customer feedback represents the extremes of supremely pleased or displeased customers.
Furthermore, almost three quarters (72%) agree that published online customer feedback attracts more customers to their business than it puts off.
The report also highlights that 200 new contributions are posted on TripAdvisor every minute keeping information up-to-date and helping businesses make informed decisions on issues such as pricing, operations and strategy. Likewise review website Yelp now features more than 102 million customer reviews and recommendations while OpenTable attracts 450,000 reviews every month.
Commenting on the findings, Helen Kelly, Head of Client Coverage, Barclays Bank Ireland said, "It’s really encouraging to see that the majority of businesses across Ireland say that online customer feedback has been beneficial to their businesses. The use of feedback by customers is not only a growing trend, but a potentially incredibly valuable source of information for the business community."
She added, "With 92% of businesses across Ireland anticipating that not only will feedback become more important in its own right, but that it will also become more important to manage that feedback, businesses would do well to consider their options and capability now."
Source: www.businessworld.ie
