Guest Satisfaction Barometer and Benchmarking: experiences from Austria

• Autores: Kurt Matzler, Harald Pechlaner
• Localización: Benchmarks in Hospitality and Tourism: Copublicado simultáneamente en Journal of Quality Assurance in Hospitality & Tourism, vol. 2; 3/4 (2001) / Sungsoo Pyo (ed. lit.), 2001, ISBN 0-7890-1915-9, págs. 25-47
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • An increasing number of companies use customer satisfaction data for improvement programs, strategic decision making, and compensation schemes. Typically, single companies carry out satisfaction measurement for their own purposes. As a consequence, results are not comparable with other companies. Thus, valuable information on competition is not available and benchmarking is not possible. Moreover, in order to use satisfaction data for decision-making, it should be measured continuously and systematically. In practice, however, many firms do not have the required resources or competencies to carry out these research activities on their own. As a result, there is a lack of reliable data. The implementation of a customer satisfaction barometer seems to be a promising approach. It facilitates competitive benchmarking and delivers valuable information for quality improvement.

    The authors of this paper report their experiences with a guest satisfaction barometer in Austria that was established in 2000. Its objective was (1) to measure guest satisfaction in a systematic and continuous way; (2) to provide participating hotels with information on overall satisfaction, attribute satisfaction, price satisfaction, complaining behavior, loyalty, word-of-mouth, etc.; (3) to identify strengths and weaknesses, as well as improving opportunities; and (4) to provide participating hotels with data for competitive benchmarking. Thirty-seven hotels participated in the pilot phase and data from more than 3,500 guests were collected. In order to illustrate the ideas of the guest satisfaction barometer and the benefits for the participating hotels, the authors first describe the basic ideas and guiding principles of the barometer and report some empirical findings to demonstrate how benchmarks can be used to improve quality and satisfaction.

    The paper closes with a summary of the experiences and some recommendations for future applications. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address:

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