Starwood Hotels & Resorts is testing a new rewards program that goes beyond the traditional focus on loyalty, targeting travelers based on their earning potential and ability to influence others to travel.
Although few details are being released, the program targets both Starwood guests and those who belong to competitors' loyalty programs, according to Mark Vondrasek, Starwood's senior vice president for distribution, loyalty and partnership marketing.
The "customer experience management program," he said, was launched as a pilot last year to look at ways to go beyond the traditional frequent-guest model.
The initiative, which he said is operated "separately but complementary" to the Starwood Preferred Guest program, "is designed to create compelling and individually tailored experiences for a select group of guests."
For competitive reasons, Vondrasek said the company has the initiative "under the radar," even internally.
"What we can reveal to you is that several thousand consumers were invited to participate in the pilot," he said. "The selection criteria are proprietary, but we looked at factors beyond just frequency, which as you know is the key measure in traditional hotel loyalty programs.
"For instance, we evaluated factors including guests’ profitability, their lifetime growth potential and their ability to influence travel by others. We even targeted some travelers who were loyal not to Starwood, but to our competitors. "
One key to the program, Vondrasek said, is giving members a single point of contact, called a Starwood Ambassador.
"The ambassador’s role is to make our guests' lives easier, particularly — but not solely — as it relates to their travel experiences. By cultivating these one-on-one relationships, our ambassadors' goal is to understand what really matters most to each individual guest and work to make every stay better for them," he said.
"While the complexity and global scope of this initiative requires we leverage innovative technology, it is this individual, personal service (a bit of a throwback these days), often demonstrated in the simplest ways, that our guests tell us really makes the difference. Our expectation is that in addition to taking care of a select group of guests in a breakthrough way, what we learn through CEM [customer experience management] will ultimately impact the service we provide to our SPG members and indeed all of our guests in the future."
Since the pilot's launch, Starwood said it has seen meaningful results, including substantial share shift and increase in stays, guest satisfaction and revenue. As a result, the company said it has expanded the program for 2010.
"For instance, because of our large and growing footprint in China and the growth of a vital base of frequent travelers there, we have included a large segment of domestic Chinese travelers in this program," Vondrasek said.
