I received a voice mail on November 12th from a good friend of mine, Shawn. He had just checked in to the Edmonton Marriott at River Cree Resort in Alberta, Canada. Here’s a portion of the message transcript:
[begin message] I walked in the front door of the Edmonton Marriott and the desk clerk, named Rizwan, looked at me and said, “Welcome back sir. It’s good to see you.”
I said to him, “You know, a little thing like that is just amazing to me given the hundreds—or even thousands—of people you see at this hotel.”
I haven’t been here in around 2 months but it just makes it so nice and it’s funny because next week I come back here and I haven’t booked my hotel and that just solidified it. I said to him, “I’ll be staying with you again next week.”
That one little thing—just the gesture of remembering my face—was genuinely impressive to me. This was a great case where, guess what, they just got my business for another trip—in reality, for several trips in the future. And they’re not even the cheapest by the way. It would be significantly cheaper at some other hotels. It’s just that important. [end message]
This is great illustration of how the front line guest contact employee—in this case, Rizwan—can make a huge difference in the experience of the guest as well as the profitability of the hotel.
