Stephanie Fierman - Marketing Observations Grown Daily

Wednesday September 10th 2008, 6:16 pm
Filed under: stephanie fierman

I don’t feel like I have an extraordinary number of bad hotel experiences… Maybe I just have high expectations?

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about the Westin ad campaign that has pretty much nothing to do with the true expectations of hotel guests. Westin’s “This is how it should feel” just makes me feel nauseous, etc.. Now comes a Sheraton partnership with Microsoft.

Sheraton’s Boston, Chicago, NYC, San Francisco and Seattle hotels are now featuring Microsoft’s Surface technology on 30-inch displays in their lobbies. Guest can use their hands and various gestures to access all kinds of information about the local area including restaurants, shopping and transportation. Multiple guests can use the interface simultaneously.

.

To me, this is a lot of work. If I’m traveling on business I’m not interested, or… that’s what a concierge is for. And if I’m traveling for pleasure and I haven’t already figured out most of what I plan to do, I’m in trouble.

I don’t know. I didn’t have as visceral a reaction to this stunt as I did to Westin’s campaign, because Sheraton isn’t making any weird claims about existence beyond its golden doors and it’s just a little fun thing (that I doubt Sheraton paid much if anything for).

I just (still) wish that hotels would focus on core customer service factors: a good bed, putting me farther away from the ice machine and non-nicked furniture. And clean bathrooms. And good mirrors. And icy A/C. OK, I’ll stop.