Hilton Hotels Corporation is a leading global hospitality company, with 10 brands, more than 2,800 hotels, and 490,000 rooms in more than 80 countries.
Background
Customer satisfaction and loyalty, which Hilton historically tracked, became pillars of the Company’s culture in 1997 when Hilton introduced a comprehensive strategic performance management program. Under the new program, designed to eliminate inconsistencies in quality across properties, Hilton tracked customer satisfaction and loyalty (among other metrics) and linked them to employee rewards and recognition.
Even as customer satisfaction tracking took on heightened importance, Hilton encountered road blocks. Response rates dropped, the costs of its mail-based data collection program grew, and the customer satisfaction data that Hilton wanted to use as a lead indicator functioned as a lag indicator. Though the company wanted to take advantage of future opportunities, the four- to six-week delay in getting data following a customer service interaction meant it was actually measuring past performance.
Challenge
By 2000, HHC wanted to move its mail survey online in order to capture the many benefits of internet-enabled surveying. It established the following success criteria for the new program:
- higher response rates
- respondent-friendly surveys that were easier to complete
- cost savings
- much faster turnaround
Hilton’s main selection criteria for the online vendor were the technical and methodological rigor of both the transition plan and the proposed online program. Rigor was key because, with compensation tied to customer satisfaction scores, Hilton team members needed to accept the shift to online surveying and trust the validity of online results.
Solution
Hilton met with key providers of online survey solutions. Unfortunately, many failed to meet Hilton’s technical or methodological standards. The Company chose Medallia to move its paper-based customer survey program to online because of:
- the strength of Medallia’s proposed solution
- the capabilities of the Medallia technology platform
- Medallia’s rigorous testing methodology and transition plan
In the initial phase of the transition, Medallia conducted a parallel test of two random sub-samples of customers, administering a paper mail survey to one group and an online survey to the other. Medallia then compared the results of the two surveys, proving not only the validity of the online results, but also their superiority in meeting (and exceeding) Hilton’s success criteria. For example, the online survey generated a much better response from Hilton’s most valuable customer segments.
Medallia used the test results to calibrate the transition, determining such details as the optimal sampling plan and optimal sample allocation between online and mail surveys.
Results
With Medallia Hilton not only met but exceeded all success criteria for its online program:
- Response rates doubled.
- Average time to complete the online survey dropped to 10 minutes, a significant improvement over the paper version it replaced.
- The online surveys were respondent friendly, with little or no need for scrolling, minimal need for mouse movement, same-page error notification, 100% browser compatibility, optimal survey lengths, and much more.
- Item non-response declined by more than 50% on average, generating much better-quality survey data.
- Costs declined by more than 50%.
- Lag between survey completion and delivery of results dropped from 4–6 weeks to 24–48 hours. With such dramatic time compression, the data became much more relevant, enabling Hilton to detect problems quickly and recover at-risk customers.
- Medallia proved the validty of online surveying, resulting in company-wide confidence in—and acceptance of—the new methodology.
Today, more than six years later, Hilton remains a customer—and advocate—of Medallia. “The reason that we are still with Medallia after six years is that it is really the best company out there,” says Stephen A. Hardenburg, Hilton’s Director of Syndicated Customer Research.
