1) The document discusses service quality metrics and customer satisfaction scores (SALT scores) used by the Hilton Hotels Corporation and the Hampton Inn & Suites hotel in Burlington, North Carolina specifically. 2) Customer satisfaction is measured using comment cards and the LODGSERV scale to evaluate performance on key service quality dimensions. 3) SALT scores collected via email surveys sent to guests are used to determine the overall performance of the Hampton Inn & Suites property and ensure guests have positive experiences.

1. FALL
2014
Clay de Souza
Hilton Hotels Corporation
FALL 2014
SALT Scores

2. 1
Our property scoareboard at the Hampton Inn & Suites Burlington
1
Hampton Inn & Suites Burlington back of the house

4. 2
Vertical placement shows ordering by Property Loyalty

5. Hilton Worldwide Internal Employee page
Hilton Worldwide Internal Employee page
3
The table displays Loyalty scores and volume of feedback across the top-level topics and broken down by the
sentiment of their comments

6. 4
4
Average Loyalty score for entire selected topic. Topics can be expanded to up to three levels.

7. 5
6
• 7
5
To support weekend and longer leisure business throughout 2014, the Always on Leisure campaign has been
developed to highlight the great rates and packages at hotels within the Hilton Worldwide portfolio. The Always on
Leisure campaign encourages consumers to "Be a Weekender" and is supported by a comprehensive marketing
strategy that includes TV, newspaper, magazine, radio, email, digital display, paid search, OTA, GDS, Public
Relations and social media. "Hampton.tagworldwide.com."Hampton.tagworldwide.com. Web. 10 Dec. 2014.
<http://hampton.tagworldwide.com/index.cfm>.
6
"Hampton.tagworldwide.com."Hampton.tagworldwide.com. Web. 10 Dec. 2014.
<http://hampton.tagworldwide.com/index.cfm>.
7
"Hampton.tagworldwide.com."Hampton.tagworldwide.com. Web. 10 Dec. 2014.
<http://hampton.tagworldwide.com/index.cfm>.

8. •
8
Hampton Inn SALT score sample
8
The chart displays the sentiment distribution for the selected topic over a selected period of time. Hover over a
column to see sentiment volume percentages. The 100 most recent comments mentioning the topic you have
selected, with passages of text highlighted in green (positive sentiment), yellow (neutral sentiment) and red
(negative sentiment)

9. At the Hampton Inn and Suites in Burlington (N.C.), we have 4 divisions/departments:
Front Desk (which I am apart of), Breakfast, Housekeeping, and Maintenance. Each department
is governed a Supervisor who is governed by Pinki Mitchell, our General Manager or Hotelier
(as what they are called in the Hospitality Industry).
Pinki and we (The Hampton Inn & Suites) are franchised by Parks Hospitality Hotels, a
Cary-based hotel management group who owns and operates numerous hotels throughout North
Carolina including several Hilton hotels. Ultimately as a franchised hotel, we must adhere to
Hilton’s standards or else our Hilton license is revoked.
To use Hilton’s brand for our property it costs us $40,000 per month within our $200,000
a month budget (as revealed in a team meeting). We are measured from our Management group
by not only revenue but by customer and guest satisfaction.
We are evaluated from a top down perspective on how guests rate us. Above all,
performance is determined by how ‘happy’ guests are during their respective stay with us here.
As a Front Desk Agent the last several months, how I am looked at is based on if I am displaying
“Hamptonality” towards our guests. “Hamptonality” essentially is us, the hotel staff, showing
our absolute sincerity and friendliness towards the guests no matter how happy or friendly they
are themselves. I can theoretically impress 99 guests in one day but if I am not showing 100%
Hamptonality to the 100th guests, there could be repercussions in the form of our “SALT
Scores”.
Service quality is a significant measure for the success of a hotel. The greater the
observation of service quality, the more probable guests will return to the hotel, spread
advantageous good reviews and upturn brand loyalty. Countless hoteliers discover comment

10. cards to be an imperative feature of evaluating guest satisfaction and use them to compute the
gulf between the service quality they have faith in they that is providing and guest/ customer
perceptions of service quality. 9
Hotels that can charm, uphold, fulfil and keep customers are more in the cards to last.10
According to industry experts, providers best positioned to harness future growth will be the
ones that are able to elevate the guest experience and meet escalating customer service and
quality expectations.11
Customer/Guest perception of value is persuasive in defining guests’ satisfaction level
and chances of them revisiting the same hotel12 13
For a property to continue to be good and be
moneymaking, it must create robust customer/guest relationships via customer/guest advocacy,
loyalty, and repeat usage.14 15
Customers/Guests who are happy are additionally expected to
9
Keith, Nancy K., and Christina S. Simmers. 2013. "MEASURING HOTEL SERVICE QUALITY
PERCEPTIONS: THE DISPARITY BETWEEN COMMENT CARDS AND LODGSERV." Academy Of
Marketing Studies Journal 17, no. 2: 119-131. Business Source Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed December 10,
2014).
10
Choi, T.Y. and Chu, R. (2001), Determination of hotel guests’ satisfaction and repeat patronage in the Hong Kong
hotel industry, International Journal of Hospitality Management, 20, 277-297
11
Litchford, T. (2007, October 10), Microsoft’s foodservice innovation outlook, retrieved December 10, 2014, from
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2007/oct07/10-10foodservice.mspx.
12
Choi, T.Y. and Chu, R. (2001), Determination of hotel guests’ satisfaction and repeat patronage in the Hong Kong
hotel industry, International Journal of Hospitality Management, 20, 277-297
13
. Sim, J., Mak, B. and Jones, D. (2006), A model of customer satisfaction and retention for hotels, Journal of
Quality Assurance in Hospitality and Tourism, 7(3), 1-23.
14
J.D. Power and Associates, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. (2011, July 20), retrieved December 10, 2014,
from http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/jd-power-and-associates-reports-hotel-guest-satisfaction-withcosts-
and-fees-improves-from-2010-despite-a-decline-in-overall-satisfaction-125873078.html
15
J.D. Power and Associates, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. (2011, July 21), retrieved December 10, 2014,
from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qln-toS-5E

11. form loyalty, repeat purchases and favorable word-of mouth.1617
In the hotel industry, service
quality is often calculated to decide customer insights of the guest experience. Service quality is
an originator of consumer satisfaction that, at the end of the day, impressions purchase
objectives.18
Consumer satisfaction moreover upsurges investor value.19
Consequently, the
innkeeper who is capable to deliver healthier service and value has the economical lead.20
Satisfactory to provide better service and value, it turns into gradually significant for
hotels to monitor customer perceptions of service quality. Many hotel managers select comment
cards as a process to figure out guest satisfaction. In the “friendliness” industry, most service
quality measurement centers on the gulf between customer expectation and apparent experience.
We, the Hampton Inn & Suites of Burlington, fall under industry-specific service quality
scales……
Even though hotel proprietors have numerous service quality instruments accessible to
them, LODGSERV, a service industry index measurement model for the hospitality industry can
be alleged as a wide-ranging, ready-to-use analysis.21
Though, many hoteliers use comment
16
Anderson, E.W., Fornell, C. and Mazvancheryl, S.K. (2004), Customer satisfaction and shareholder value, Journal
of Marketing, 68(October), 172-185.
17
Matzler, K., Renzl, B. and Rothenberger, S. (2006), Measuring the relative importance of service dimensions in
the formation of price satisfaction and service satisfaction: a case study in the hotel industry, Scandinavian Journal
of Hospitality and Tourism, 6(3), 179-196.
18
Cronin, J.J. Jr. and Taylor, S.A. (1992), Measuring service quality: a reexamination and extension, Journal of
Marketing, 56(July), 55-67.
19
Anderson, E.W., Fornell, C. and Mazvancheryl, S.K. (2004), Customer satisfaction and shareholder value, Journal
of Marketing, 68(October), 172-185.
20
Stevens, P., Knutson, B. and Patton, M. (1995), DINESERV: a tool for measuring service quality in restaurants,
Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly, 36(2), 56-60.
21
Keith, Nancy K., and Christina S. Simmers. 2013. "MEASURING HOTEL SERVICE QUALITY
PERCEPTIONS: THE DISPARITY BETWEEN COMMENT CARDS AND LODGSERV." Academy Of
Marketing Studies Journal 17, no. 2: 119-131. Business Source Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed December 10,

12. cards to provoke customer opinion vis-à-vis service quality, the customer comment card is a
basis of client comment at the time of the service experience and, hence, a beneficial instrument
for weighing service excellence(or lack thereof). Info garnered from comment cards can be
taken into account for service recovery and bearing of quality improvement.22
Comparable to
LODGSERV, customer comment cards signify a performance-based measure of the opinion of
service results and consequences. The question is whether the requests asked on hotel comment
cards are in sync with the LODGSERV scale in assessing service quality. Not everyone is
agreement that comment cards are all that. I believe that comment cards are not used to their full
potential. I am of the mindset that cards are used to satisfy customers and/ or to punish
employees. Poor card availability and problematic return methods contribute to ineffective
evaluation and that all of these reviews are disproportionately skewed. Hospitality academics
Wisner and Corney (1997) specify that the typical comment cards do not assess all five, service
quality dimensions established in the SERVQUAL (a quality management framework)
instrument. If comment cards were more consistent with the components taken by LODGSERV,
they would prove to be more “intellectually and managerially valuable.”23
The system we use at the Hampton Inn & Suites as well as all throughout Hilton are
SALT scores which is used to evaluate guests’ hotel stays and their overall experiences with the
staff and amenities. These surveys are used to determine the overall performance health of the
hotel. Guests are given emails to fill out these surveys randomly and that information is housed
in a software cloud system known as Medallia, which is accessible to all hotel staff, management
2014).
22
Sampson, S.E. (1996), Ramifications of monitoring service quality through passively solicited customer feedback,
Decision Sciences, 27(4), 601-622.
23
Wisner, J.D. and Corney, W.J. (1997), An empirical study of customer comment card quality and design
characteristics, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 9(3), 110-115.

13. and ownership. All Hilton hotels properties as well as the Choice Hotel brands use this model to
determine all factors of the guest experience, which is arm-in arm with revenue. The guest
experience has a slightly tad upper hand over revenue making because at the end of the day we
want our clientele to feel the “Hamptonality”.

14. References
Anderson, E.W., Fornell, C. and Mazvancheryl, S.K. (2004), Customer satisfaction and
shareholder value, Journal of Marketing, 68(October), 172-185.
Choi, T.Y. and Chu, R. (2001), Determination of hotel guests’ satisfaction and repeat
patronage in the Hong Kong hotel industry, International Journal of Hospitality Management, 20,
277-297.
Cronin, J.J. Jr. and Taylor, S.A. (1992), Measuring service quality: a reexamination and
extension, Journal of Marketing, 56(July), 55-67.
"Hampton.tagworldwide.com."Hampton.tagworldwide.com. Web. 10 Dec. 2014.
<http://hampton.tagworldwide.com/index.cfm>.
J.D. Power and Associates, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. (2011, July 20), retrieved
December 10, 2014, from http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/jd-power-and-associates-
reports-hotel-guest-satisfaction-withcosts-and-fees-improves-from-2010-despite-a-decline-in-
overall-satisfaction-125873078.html
J.D. Power and Associates, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. (2011, July 21), retrieved
December 10, 2014, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qln-toS-5E
Keith, Nancy K., and Christina S. Simmers. 2013. "MEASURING HOTEL SERVICE
QUALITY PERCEPTIONS: THE DISPARITY BETWEEN COMMENT CARDS AND
LODGSERV." Academy Of Marketing Studies Journal 17, no. 2: 119-131. Business Source
Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed December 10, 2014).

15. Litchford, T. (2007, October 10), Microsoft’s foodservice innovation outlook, retrieved
December 10, 2014, from http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2007/oct07/10-
10foodservice.mspx.
Matzler, K., Renzl, B. and Rothenberger, S. (2006), Measuring the relative importance of
service dimensions in the formation of price satisfaction and service satisfaction: a case study in
the hotel industry, Scandinavian Journal of Hospitality and Tourism, 6(3), 179-196.
Sampson, S.E. (1996), Ramifications of monitoring service quality through passively
solicited customer feedback, Decision Sciences, 27(4), 601-622.
Sim, J., Mak, B. and Jones, D. (2006), A model of customer satisfaction and retention for
hotels, Journal of Quality Assurance in Hospitality and Tourism, 7(3), 1-23.
Stevens, P., Knutson, B. and Patton, M. (1995), DINESERV: a tool for measuring service
quality in restaurants, Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly, 36(2), 56-60.
Wisner, J.D. and Corney, W.J. (1997), an empirical study of customer comment card
quality and design characteristics, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality
Management, 9(3), 110-115.