Last December I worked with a hotel leadership team in Dayton, OH. One of the discussions lead to identifying the obstacles that stood in the way of creating promoters of its hotel.

Consumer research firm Bain and Company defines promoters as those customers who are the least price-sensitive, have the highest repurchase rates, and are responsible for between 80 and 90 percent of positive word-of-mouth.

One of the executives, Ryan, mentioned that the frequency of problems experienced by hotel guests was an obstacle. In examining this further, it became clear that a contributing factor was the condition of the hotel’s guest rooms due to needed renovations that had been postponed due to the economy.

And they’re not alone. I’ve spoken with numerous hoteliers who are in the same position. They must now get by with a product that, in a more robust economy, likely would have been renovated by now. Because the product is worn, it contributes to the increase in reported problems experienced by hotel guests.

So what’s a hotel to do? Here’s an idea that I received from Horst Schulze, Founding President and Former COO, The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co., LLC. Mr. Schulze calls it the C.A.R.E. (Clean And Repair Everything) program:

Before the C.A.R.E. program, Ritz-Carlton hotels would take an entire floor of a hotel out of service once a year in order to deep-clean guest rooms. By doing so, its guest rooms would not deteriorate as quickly. At 75 percent occupancy, a typical Ritz-Carlton hotel room would last for five years.

Under the C.A.R.E. program, four rooms were taken out of service and deep cleaned every day. This meant the room was like new every three months. In a typical Ritz-Carlton hotel, a ten year-old room was newer and cleaner looking than a two year-old room in other hotels.

What effect did the C.A.R.E. program have on the frequency of problems experienced by its guests? The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co., LLC is a two-time recipient of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. During the last year Ritz-Carlton received the award, there was only one reported defect per 10,000 room nights sold!

What has your experience been? What are you doing to anticipate and reduce the problems experienced by your own customers?

Personal importance is often misunderstood at the frontline service provider level in the hospitality industry. I’ve had participants in customer service classes who challenge the notion that anyone should be treated any differently than anyone else. Some see acknowledging one’s personal importance or “Elite” status as favoritism. Others see it as an affront to their own social status, as though they are of a subservient class.

My response to these participants is that by personal importance, we are not suggesting a social hierarchy whereby customers are treated as more important people. Personal importance implies the acknowledgment of their importance as customers and the value they bring to the business through personal spending, loyalty, referrals, etc.

The best illustration of personal importance that I’ve come across lately comes from the book, The New Gold Standard by Joseph A. Michelli:

A guest of The Ritz-Carlton wrote a letter to the company president, Simon Cooper. In the letter the guest recalled:

“One of your employees and I got on an elevator in your building. I pushed the sixth-floor button and he pushed none. Instead of getting off with me on the sixth floor, your employee simply said, ‘Have a nice day.’ Upon exiting the elevator, I asked, ‘Where are you going? Aren’t you getting off here?’ Your employee replied, ‘No, I’m going back down to the fifth floor.”

The guest goes on to write, “I couldn’t believe it—how do you find people who are so invested in placing the needs of their guest above their own?”

The opposite of placing the needs of customers above your own is to place your needs above theirs. This happens all the time when companies cite “policy” as the rationale for not meeting the needs of their customers. Other times, customers may perceive that they’re being treated indifferently—like they don’t matter—and feel as though their business is being taken for granted.

One survey revealed that 68 percent of customers quit doing business with a company because of perceived indifference towards them as customers. That’s shameful!

So, ask yourself these questions: What might my staff and I be doing that may be, perhaps unwittingly, communicating indifference towards the customers we serve? And, what actions can we take immediately to acknowledge the personal importance of our customers?