In this post I am going to intersperse my responses to excerpts from the many extremely helpful and insightful comments to last weeks post. The comments and my responses are in the order in which they were received.

Judy Drew Fairchild said:
 Ok… I think I like this idea… mostly. I love the division into raves, criticism, etc, but it would be more helpful if it were distilled into just the part of the feedback that fit into that category– I ended up feeling a tad voyeuristic about reading the whole question and answer session about a particular client. I wonder if (after each feedback question) you ask the critic to do the work labeling their feedback. Also, I would much rather read bullet points of constructive criticism (and I like that you respond to each) than page through all the comments of a particular person- I don’t need to know everything about someone’s anniversary weekend.
If I were filling out this form (I raved for pages, if  I recall correctly).

MK:  Judy these are very good points.  The feedback would be easier to understand if it was edited.  The question that concerns me, however, is that if we start to edit where do we stop.  I can’t see how we can credibly claim that the feedback is uncensored even if we edit with the best of intentions.  Your thoughts?

Judy Drew Fairchild said:
 I might also feel uncomfortable with my last name being published… just a first name and location should add enough credibility– and, if I had just raved about you, I would link to that feedback on facebook myself… providing you with that discrete attention to privacy, yet the credibility of a real person.

MK: Another good point. I think we may be able to let each individual decide to a certain extend how much of who they are they want to reveal, as long as it is obvious that they are not  gaming the system by pretending to be someone they are not.

Judy Drew Fairchild said:
 I lOVE the facebook connection; we are just working on how to do that (and encouraging people to post their own vacation videos and photos, which are really just free marketing for us!) Facebook also provides you with an interesting benefit– now you have a connection with everyone who came, and not just the trip planner.

MK: I thought you would like that. Let’s keep sharing how it goes.

Judy Drew Fairchild said:
 If you really post from EVERYONE, what do you do about the professional complainers? We, too, have few discontented people, but occasionally we get one who is way out of line.

MK: My take is that you respond telling them that you think they are out of line.

Judy Drew Fairchild said:
 There are a few crackpots in this world, despite all my efforts to weed them out before they get to our island. I would hate for their bitter grumbles to dissuade the next guest. I guess, if they don’t have last names, it would be easier to refute some of their claims.

MK: I trust that our potential guests are sophisticated enough to spot the crackpots.  Even more dangerous than crackpots are the experienced social media blackmailers who are skilled at crafting false complaints to pressure you into refunds.  We have had both kinds in the past.

We have posted every bit of feedback we have received for guest who have been with us since January 1.  So far no crackpots or blackmailers.  Inevitably we’ll have one sooner or later.  I am interested to see how it plays out.

Judy Drew Fairchild said:
 In addition to those categories, you might have an “advice for the next guest” category– I would read that one first!

MK: Ramy will kill me if I add another category.  We’ll think about putting it in the second interation.

Chase Buckner said: 
I think it’s a brilliant idea to categorize feedback. For a potential guest to view a complaint and then see that CRE responded in a timely manner and really addressed the complainer’s concerns is huge. I’ve read many reports that consumers almost always sympathize with a company that screws up but addresses the complaints directly.

MK: We have made such life-long friends from the occasions when we have screwed up and made it right, that in mischievous moments I have suggested that we screw up on purpose and then perform miracles making it right.  Fortunately, I have adult supervision.

Chase Buckner said My big concern is always authenticity – meaning I am huge proponent of having Facebook log-in so that people may NOT create their own user name when it comes to comments/feedback. The ability to create anonymous user names opens the door to inauthentic comments as a commenter like “CostaRicaJoe” doesn’t have to own up to their comment in any way. He could be anyone. Requiring Facebook connection helps eliminate Judy’s concern about the crackpots.

MK: Chase, you are preaching to the choir.  Anonymity is one of my least favorite things about the web.  Trip Advisor is so into anonymity that they do not allow you to have a username with separate first and last names.  To be as un-anonymous as possible I had to make my username MichaelKaye.

Now that we are on this, I never liked the term “username.”  Aren’t  users bad people who manipulate other people to their own ends? Let’s come up with a really creative substitute for “username.”  For example, how about “name?”

Gary Estis said: 
 I see the categorization of comments as a good approach. However, I want to know something about the process of placing comments in a category. Who does it for the company? What guidelines do they use to select the category? This helps me determine the validity of the process to the company. In other words, is it just eyewash or really a valuable tool for feedback for company improvement and client awareness?

Here are the tentative categorization criteria that we are using. Let me know what you think.

Raves: Praise expressed with strong positive emotions.  Look for words like, “Superb, Fantastic, Best Trip of my Life.”  Also expressions of strong positive feeling towards trip planners, guides, hotel personnel, drivers etc.
Praise:  Positive feedback that does not contain strong emotion.
Constructive Criticism: Negative feedback that either implicitly or explicitly points the way to how to improve.
Complaint:  Negative feedback that does not point the way to how to improve. “The food was mediocre,” is a complaint.  “The food was too salty,” is constructive criticism.
Bitter compliant:  Negative feedback that does not point the way to how to improve and is expressed with strong emotion. “I was insulted that you served me that slop.” Is a bitter complaint.

If the feedback falls between two categories, put it in the less positive category.

Gary Estis said: 
 The best part is the ability to see the answers made to the guests comments, especially their complaints. This is where you make money with the feedback process. It forces you to actually reply and take meaningful corrective actions and it lets future customers see how much you care. A “cover-up” of problems would only occur when a complaint is not answered, so it makes employees stay alert. It makes management think “outside the box”, look at problems from a different angle, and to recognize new problems as ust that – a new problem and challenge.

MK: Gary, I’m glad you mentioned that.  One of the benefits of having an application that organizes and categorizes feedback and responses is that is gives us a more efficient way than email to share these situations internally.

Gary Estis said: 
 A company incentive program for important “fixes” may also help in this process.

MK:  We have one company wide incentive program for everything. It’s called profit sharing.  The problem that I have found with individual incentives for extraordinary performance is that we can’t be sure to notice all the different individuals extraordinary performances. So it ends up being incentives for the extraordinary performance that we notice.

Gary Estis said:  Please do not let clients categorize their own comments.

MK: Please tell my why you feel this way.  I have not had time to think this through, but I was assuming that we would at least try giving past guests the criteria and letting them categorize their own feedback.  If guest categorization turned out to be wildly inconsistent we could come-up with Plan B.

Perhaps dueling categorizations, one from the guests and one from us.

Emily Le Moing said:
 PS:  If I were using these comments to help me plan a trip to Costa Rica, I’d want a way to check the comments on the places I was considering visiting. Rather than organizing the comments only by whether they are positive or negative or somewhere in between, would it also be possible to organize them by destination? Otherwise, once you get a lot of comments online, it’s going to be really time-consuming for potential clients to use them for trip planning.

Thanks, Emily.  It will take a while for Ramy and his team to program this, but as you can see from the screenshot below we have already taken your comment to heart:

Please let me have any other suggestions you have for categories of feedback.

Emily Le Moing said:  Also, re. the guest who complained because he wasn’t warned that Arenal volcano hadn’t been very active for the past few months, doesn’t your web site explain to guests that you can’t guarantee they will see Arenal at all (because of potential cloud cover) much less that they will see lava flowing down? We got lucky when we visited Arenal with you several years ago and had a fabulous view of lava flows from our room at the Observatory Lodge, but even if we had not had this experience, we had been prepared by our wonderful trip planner (Priscilla Jimenez), our great guide (Luiz) and your web site that the volcano might not be visible or active while we were there. I really enjoyed reading your volcano expert’s comments on Arenal but I think if you don’t mention in your response to the guest that he had actually be warned he might not see volcano activity,then potential clients might think you might not warn them about other possible glitches they might encounter on their trip. In other words, if you are going to post guests’ comments + your responses in this way, you need to be extra careful about your responses to make sure they give an accurate picture to potential travelers of the kind of service you provide. (The sad thing is, only a company as good as CRE already is would bother to take on the daunting task of posting guests’ comments in this new way. A bad company, one that really should have to post negative comments, never will. I’m sure that the fact that you’re posting negative comments is going to get you new customers. If I’d never traveled with CRE and knew nothing about it and was looking for a travel company, I would certain be drawn to you just because you were willing to post negative comments.)

MK:  How to communicate the situation in Arenal deserves a whole blog post to itself. You’ve gotten me to thinking about it.  I’ll probably dedicate a whole post to it in the near future.

Judy Drew Fairchild said:
In response to your question about the photo albums… there are lots of sites that make that possible, through picasa, blurb, apple, etc… and many of them offer an online preview, which can be shared through facebook, etc. What if you just asked people to post their vacation albums back to you? Or offered high quality download photos of your lodges and relevant nature for them to add to their own albums?

MK: All good ideas that we are going to have to work on.

Cheryl Shnider said:
 Lastly, is there any way (perhaps through facebook) to allow the potential guests to contact the guest providing feedback for clarification or more details about their experience? This is one of the features on TripAdvisor that I use extensively. Not only does it help me to get the information I want, but it also provides me with a degree of validation that the review is authentic. (I once contacted a woman who, in her review of a hotel mentioned that she was there with a multigenerational group. She was able to give me all kinds of information about the area (not just the hotel) that helped me to determine that this area would be fun for the entire group traveling with us.) Trying to message someone by name only on facebook is difficult. You might ask the reviewers if they are willing to be contacted?
Good luck with this Michael – its such a wonderful idea. How will you market the app itself to consumers??
 Cheryl

MK: Cheryl,  Most of your suggestions have already been covered, but this last one is a great idea that had not occurred to us.  Clearly we are going to have to work on a way for past guests to communicate privately with each other and prospective guests to communicate with past guests who are open to being contacted.

Chris Parrott said:  
(For the benefit of other commentors, I’m a UK tour operator.) 
Morning Michael,
My intention was not to read any of the other comments, so I wouldn’t be influenced, and any overlap would be outweighed by the benefit of my views being untarnished. But I got drawn into it, and did read them.
My question (you may have told me already) is will read-only access to this feedback be available to anyone?

MK: Yes

Chris Parrott said: By the way, to start with, I didn’t twig that the 5-category filter works on the home page, but not when you get to the comments “Browse Feedback” page.

MK:  I don’t understand your comment.  Could you translate it into American?

Chris Parrott said: 2. Negative comments – it’s common sense that prospective clients are seduced by seeing comments which are not relentlessly positive. It helps them choose.
3. Constructive response – common sense again that readers are impressed by non-defensive and honest responses. I particularly like Gordon’s response as to why you charge hotel bookings up-front. No embarrassment at letting us see the commercial nuts and bolts.
4. Respondent’s full names. I can see this’d be useful to prospective clients, but I think it would have the effect of dissuading people from commenting in the first place. I suppose I’m still suspicious about the idea of unlimited social networking. I’ve signed up to Facebook, but I’m embarrassed by the idea of some stranger wanting to be my friend.

MK: I feel the same way, but I’m trying to overcome it.

Chris Parrott said: Similarity of the questions asked. I agree, some appear to overlap. But I’ve been writing and analysing questionnnaires for 30 years, and I’m still looking for the holy grail of questions which elicit clear, succinct and constructive answers. Sometimes, the same question asked differently comes up with “bingo”.
6. “What almost decided you not to travel”. A really great question, gets to the heart of how to convert more bookings. Alright, the grammar’s iffy, but the meaning’s clear. Nice to see Cheryl keeping up standards though – there was me thinking that it’s only on this side of the Atlantic that “decide” is an intransitive verb. 
7. Advice for next guest. This could get out of hand. Guest of Costa Rica Expeditions? Guest at specified accommodation? Maybe limit it to three bullet points of max. 20 words each.
Overall, excellent concept Michael. Presentation: easy to follow, but frustration at having to wade through so much “how wonderful you are”.

MK: Funny, that was one of my favorite parts.

Can you track how many people filtered first (or only) by complaint and bitter complaint? 
By the way,

MK:  Not yet, but there should be no problem being able to do it, and as much as I hate to admit it,  it’s a good idea.

Chris Parrott said: I can see that not filtering by accommodation may well be a conscious decision to avoid becoming a Trip Advisor for all Costa Rica hotels.

MK: I certainly would not want to be Trip Advisor for all Costa Rica hotels, but a more useful than Trip Advisor for selected Costa Rica hotels is not such a bad idea.

Chris Parrott said: I’ll continue to graze the site – but I could easily spend a whole day at it…
CP

MK: Please spend the whole day at it. I don’t mind.

Again, thanks for taking the time to write very thoughtful comment.

Everybody gets coffee, except:

• Chase Buckner because he does not drink coffee and he owes me a visit.
• Chris Parrott because he used “twig” as a verb, which given the phallic implications of the noun is probably not appropriate for a family blog.

Please add any new thoughts to the comments section of this post.  They’ll be more coffee to on the way.