Seeds of Their Own Destruction

Lots of folks are talking about the news out of Cornell that researchers have created a program to filter out fake reviews at online sites.

It's an interesting program, no doubt.

And it is, as the researchers describe it themselves, a good first round filter. It focuses on specific language used.

Here's my human filter that works for me. And it ought to not be that difficult for a second round filter to, well, filter out.

I look at the relationships between the reviewers.

Sure, that's easier for me, since I often know the relationships. If I know that the inn owner has a brother in Alaska named Fred, for example, and Fred from Anchorage posts a review, well, yes that's pretty obvious. Especially if it was for the same time period when Fred was visiting.

But the relationships I'm talking about go beyond that. It's the relationships between the reviewers themselves. Say there's an apparently solid review from a reviewer with, oh say, 25 reviews under their belt.

Must be a solid reviewer, right? No flags there, right.

Not so fast.

Say that reviewer has posted reviews of 6 bed and breakfasts. All within a thousand miles of home.

Fairly normal, right?

Say each of those 6 bed and breakfasts has received reviews from each of the other reviewers of the first bed and breakfast. Fairly easy to see that each of the reviewers, despite their geographic differences and seeming body of solid reviews, have a clear relationship with each other.

One's from Indiana, one's from West Virginia, one's from Virginia, one's from DC. You get the picture.

What do they have in common? They're all B&B owners. They belong to the same forum. They exchange free visits with each other - and follow up each visit with a glowing review that looks terribly terribly solid.

And that's just one ruse that's sadly quite common.

Here's another I see often. In today's economic climate, more and more small inns are being bought by investors who are buying up not one but three or four small inns. Several partners involved. Each partner then writes up a glowing review of each of the small inns they now own. Suddenly their inns move from bottom of the review list to top of the list, almost overnight.

But the reviews look solid, right? They're not one hit wonders, for sure.

And if you didn't know that the inn in, say Pacific Grove, was owned by the same set of investors as the inns in, say Elk, well, who would know the difference? Certainly not the unsuspecting guests who think they've just read some unbiased guest reviews. They haven't.

A program that looked at those sorts of relationships - that become surprisingly easy to spot once you're looking for them - would filter out a huge volume of fake reviews.

Why would a review site not want to do that? I can only guess that the number of fake reviews that would be discovered would expose the unreliability of the site itself.

Only a guess. But basically when I'm looking at online reviews without my own filter, that's all I have to go on anyway. A guess as to whether they're real or not.

And that, my dear friends, is why, as is so often the case, I agree with Arthur Frommer on the future of online review sites.

Unless, of course, they clean up their acts and responsibly remove the treasure trove of obviously fake reviews on their sites.

As for innkeepers who post fake reviews, well, regular readers know what I think of folks who stoop to fraud to attract guests. Those aren't innkeepers, those are...well, I'll let you fill in the blanks on that one. Suffice to say, the description I'd use would not be a nice one.

And suffice to say that the number of guests I would refer to an inn that posts fake reviews is a very consistent number. Zero.

Green Shoots

Cornell just released a new study of guest's sustainability preferences and found that there are few differences between leisure travelers and business travelers.

Of the study participants, the single attribute most preferred was green certification. Also good to know: they like dispensers and linen reuse programs, two of the most cost-saving methods of going green.

What don't they like? They don't want to pay more for green.

And why should they? A well-planned go-green program can result in significant cost-savings for any inn. It seems guests just want what we all want - for those savings to be passed on.

All in all, an interesting study. Go on over and take a look.

Meanwhile, if you're targeting business travelers with discounts or special amenities, it might be time to take a look at a whole new way of attracting them: with sustainability as a benefit that clinches the deal.

All About Doing Deals

And all about Europe.

That's what the upcoming conference for European hotel investors says about itself.

Everyone will be focused on the great deals out there (see Ireland) and the opportunities left in the wake of Europe's economic crisis.

Ought to make for some interesting discussions, especially by the time September rolls around.

What do I think? I think for investors with cash, there's no doubt that there are great deals out there.

I also think that Europe is in no way actually headed towards a viable way out of its economic crisis. The worst is still ahead. The Greek austerity bandaid won't stick. Greece will default, it's really just a question of how much pain they inflict upon themselves before coming to that painful conclusion.

And once they do, the question will be who is next. Sadly there will be a number of possibilities at that point. One by one, the dominos will fall.

And whatever the fat cats might want to say about that now, it won't end well. For anyone still believing the euro will hold up well once the dominos start to fall, I think we could find a tranch of AAA-rated subprime mortgages on the Brooklyn Bridge that are currently available for your investment portfolio.

What makes me so sure? The same thing that made me so sure back in 2004 that the real estate market in America was starting to bubble out of control and would eventually burst. There was simply no other possible outcome to be expected by any rational person actually looking at the facts on the ground.

All that said, put all the real facts facing Europe right now in one basket and this ought to make for one very interesting conference indeed.

What's a European to do? Well, I have personally found a few Hail Marys have been particularly beneficial at times like this. Beyond that, well, I think I'll take a pass.

It's A Crazy World

Timothy O'Neil-Dunne over at Tnooz asks if the coupon craze is benign or evil and points out some inconsistencies in a recent study that's being touted as proof that it's all worthwhile.

What do I think?

I think discounting has its place. Some inns really need the cash, others are outright desperate for the cash. Some new inns just want to get their name out there.

And there's one thing you can't argue about with the coupon craze. It does get your inn's name out there - and that has value on its own.

For inns hoping to attract loyal guests who will be willing to pay full price in the future, well, it's a bit more hit and miss. Eroding ADR is never a useful instrument for a healthy inn, in my humble opinion.

The coupon craze will be with us for the near future as savvy guests looks for every possible way to stretch limited dollars.

Whether or not that's a good thing for the inns hosting those guests remains to be seen. Every innkeeper considering giving rooms away, should know just what they're getting in return.

And what they're losing.

A Guided Hike Through Illyria

The 10th season for Theatre in the Woods begins today in Woodside with Twelfth Night. Advance tickets are highly recommended.

Plan for a nice little hike before arriving at the magical spot where the words of Shakespeare will ring through the trees. Besides those comfy hiking shoes, don't forget your picnic.

Can't get to Woodside in the next hour? No worries. The season continues until September 4th with performances every Saturday and Sunday.

Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité

Vive la France.

Some might question the wisdom of the tradition we share with France of celebrating our revolutions and equating those revolutions with democracy.

Some might even question just what that whole head-rolling thing really accomplished for the French soul.

There's no question, though, that we looked to the roots of the Enlightenment Movement in France in crafting our own democracy.

Today, both France and the United States not only celebrate our revolutionary past, we celebrate in largely the same way.

Fireworks.

I have fond memories of picnicking by the nearby lake in France as the fireworks broke overhead, listening to the oohs and ahhs of my neighbors. Oohs and ahhs, by the way, sound pretty much the same whether they're with a French accent or not. We are more alike than we are different.

Of course, there is one little difference. In France, no celebration is complete without wine. After all, one can't forget the fraternité part.

Vive la France! And Happy Birthday to us all.

Bribery Blacklists and Warnings

Oy.

TripAdvisor is back in the news in the UK as it issues stern warnings to hotels that bribing guests to write positive reviews will result in blacklisting.

Yawn and double yawn.

And here's the thing. I am so old I can remember the days when, as a guest, I actually believed that the reviews I read on TripAdvisor were actually written by actual guests.

What do I think now? I think offering guests any incentive to write a positive review is wrong.

I also think it's sadly common. What else is common? Many inns skip the actual guest reviews altogether and just post their own fake reviews. Or get their friends to do it for them. And vice versa. Lather, rinse, repeat.

And no, I'm fairly certain that this is happening at many more than the 30 hotels TA says it's blacklisted.

Thirty? Seriously?

As for the inn in question and its "Certificate of Excellence" recently awarded by TripAdvisor? Who knew that if you started handing out fake awards as an incentive to inn owners to buy advertising on your site that they might throw those fake awards right back in your face?

Hmmmm.

Relationship Evolution

With so many innkeepers jumping on the let's-throw-ADR-into-the-trash bandwagon, it becomes more and more important that they at least know what they're giving up in the process.

Many don't really think basic hotel accounting principals could possibly apply to them. They're different, after all.

Many don't care. They need cash, any cash. Half-price, schmaff-price. Can we say desperate?

At any rate, for whatever reason, many of those same innkeepers are jumping aboard the daily deals bandwagon.

Among the options out there, Groupon sales among small inns are becoming more and more commonplace.

Sliding room rates aside, issues of privacy also arise whenever online partnerships are formed.

And guess what? If you thought your guests could sign up for Groupon deals and not give up their privacy, well, you'd have been wrong.

The big guys, it seems, are entitled to change their minds. Once they have all the data they wanted in the first place, that is.


H/T Dennis Schaal at Tnooz

Words Escape Me

It is, quite literally, every innkeeper's worst nightmare. Especially B&B innkeepers.

A fire that not only engulfs the entire building, it kills. The fire this past week in New Ulm, Minnesota took the lives of the innkeeper, her children, and three of her guests.

No one knows just yet how it started. We keep hearing that the building wasn't inspected and the main building - the one that burned - was not licensed for guests.

In fact, those are the primary facts that will continue to drive this story, no matter what we eventually learn about just what happened. Not licensed for guests. Not inspected.

There are bed and breakfasts of every variety in America that run the gamut between casual and elegant. But say B&B and most folks will instantly envision a grand victorian building filled with antiques. And love. A place just like the Bohemian Bed and Breakfast.

Of course, it's no secret that those grand old homes can also be fire traps. Hence the myriad of house rules in so many inns against candles and such. The electric fireplaces rather than the real thing. The steps innkeepers take every single day that are often so annoying to guests but are invariably taken to prevent the disaster feared the most.

There will be plenty of time to assess blame. Innkeepers and building inspectors everywhere will pause and review standards, to develop better and safer conditions, to ensure compliance with both zoning and safety requirements.

As all that happens, it is my great hope that the deep and abiding love that Bobbi McCrea felt for her inn and her life in New Ulm won't be lost in the rush for answers.

Sometimes there are no real answers, only questions. And regret.

Moving Up

Slowly but surely.