One of the key elements of hospitality is how hoteliers connect with guests, showing a personal touch in their service, but because of the current need for social distancing, hoteliers have been forced to find new ways to establish that connection.

Using social media, texting and messaging apps to communicate with guests was already a growing practice among hoteliers. The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated it.

Prior to the pandemic, Provenance Hotels had a team responsible for engaging with followers on social media through comments, liking and sharing, said Ralph Aruzza, chief marketing officer at Provenance, via email. The company also supplemented its own announcements with user-generated content because it adds a unique, first-person perspective to their channels.

The strategy focused on messaging and sharing information through pre-arrival emails to manage guests’ stays, he said, while some hotels also tested texting with guests. Since the pandemic started, Provenance expanded its text communication program across the entire hotel collection and launched its virtual concierge.

“Guests can communicate with our staff members on a 24-hour basis to confirm preferences and receive additional assistance — from ordering more towels to recommendations on restaurant take-out spots,” Aruzza said. “With the health and safety measures in place nationwide, it's been a convenient way to interact more directly with our guests in a holistic way.”

Though each hotel handled it differently, before the pandemic, hotel staff had been successful in communicating with guests through Facebook Messenger, Instagram direct messages and guest comments on social media posts, said Molly Marshall, e-commerce manager at Marshall Hotels & Resorts. Some property teams texted with guests as well.

The transition to increasing digital engagement has been natural, especially since people are spending so much time on social media while they stay home, she said.

“Since the guests really want to know what's going on right then and there as everything is constantly changing, social media is the fastest way to be updated about this,” she said. “Some hotels have found that they've seen a lot more comments on the posts from guests saying that they missed the property, they miss traveling and they really want to get back.”

The social media posts now are more informative, such as posts about how they’re cleaning the hotel, and less focused on the property itself, such as beach hotels posting photos of the ocean, Marshall said. The guests are appreciative because it lets them know what’s changing and how hotels are responding to the pandemic.

Many of Hospitality Ventures Management Group’s hotels are branded properties, allowing each one to connect with guests through the messaging capabilities of the brands’ loyalty program apps, said Matt Woodruff, executive vice president of guest excellence and chief brand partner officer. For independent properties or those branded properties without messaging in their apps, they use alternative messaging programs.

The messaging and online communications help project a feeling of trust and safety about the hotels’ COVID-19 response plans, he said.

Feeling safer “when they come and stay in the hotel will allow that person to say, ‘You know what, I think we will travel again during this time,’ so I think that that's a direct correlation,” he said.

The pandemic has made it easier to lose touch with people, Woodruff said. To counter that, the staff at the company’s Embassy Suites by Hilton Detroit Troy Auburn Hills property in Troy, Michigan, has picked up its presence on Facebook and Instagram. Instead of making its postings feel like a sales pitch, the posts have been highlighting real life in the hotel.

“They’re celebrating our associates in the hotel and putting it out there, kind of as a real day in the life of the hotel’s perspective,” he said.

Travel and hospitality are high-touch industries, so the challenge hoteliers face is shifting staff members’ mindset during training, Aruzza said.

“The focus will now be on understanding the nuances of guest requests in a virtual setting while continuing to emote the same level of energy, personality and warmth into their interactions,” he said.

This approach has created more opportunities for guest interaction to provide feedback on their stay experience before they leave, allowing them to engage in real time, he said. It also allows for a higher degree of capture for loyalty opportunities for future stays because the benefits are more tangible after having just experienced the hotel.

Staff working at hotels with smaller teams struggled transitioning into constantly checking their social media accounts, Marshall said. It was a new experience for them and there was a lot of uncertainty, both with the pandemic itself and how well digital engagement would perform.

The teams became more comfortable with taking on these roles as they continued to connect with guests, she said. They’re becoming more used to responding quickly to guests’ questions and requests, which will be helpful in the long run.

Marshall believes guest satisfaction has improved because of the digital engagement. People have told hotel staff that they feel better about staying at their hotel because of what they’ve seen on its social media accounts. Digital engagement has also led to bookings.

“Guests have gone on Facebook, seen the comments and messaged asking about certain rooms and then staff have seen that transition into bookings,” she said.

What Marshall has done with digital engagement, especially during the pandemic, has proved how important it is, she said. Moving forward, staff will continue to engage with guests through social media and messaging to keep them up to date with the latest events and changes at their properties.

This is a good development for the hotel teams because they’ll get more used to working with guests this way and get into the habit of using the hotels’ social media accounts because they have a good return on it, she said.

“This will definitely get them into the swing of wanting to use social more often,” she said.

Messaging through social media and texting, even with guests on property, was once considered to be an unfriendly and unprofessional approach to hospitality, Marshall said. Now, those channels of communication might be a guest’s preferred and most appreciated approach because they receive responses much faster.

Digital engagement with guests was evolving before the pandemic because younger travelers were more accustomed to the technology, which is why HVMG had been getting on board with it, Woodruff said. Many people preferred to communicate with hotel staff through texting because of the convenience it offered.

The pandemic has increased the adoption of digital engagement, making people more aware of how easy it is to communicate this way, he said. The ongoing challenge will be to continue digital engagement while still applying hospitality to it.

“That's going to be one of the most important differentiators for our industry going forward, is the ability to still project hospitality in the age of technology,” he said.