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Love the Gold Floor, But Your People Suck.
After a 9 day stay in Las Vegas I learned how crap, robot-like service is the ultimate of business liabilities, regardless of poshness. As you know, most people vacation to Vegas to escape; to escape from co-workers, incompetent employees, dirty houses, traffic and your typical menagerie of life’s dramas. People love Vegas as it offers an exit from real life, into fantasy – a life of living like a King.
My stay in Vegas started last Sunday at the Rio Hotel compliments of my girlfriend’s company which was participating in a convention. I agreed to meet her there and had no input into the hotel choice … I really didn’t care … after all, it was FREE.
I never stayed at the Rio and normally wouldn’t consider this hotel in my arsenal of potential stays. The hotel was somewhat old and dated; the bed was stiff and the accommodations worn. Nonetheless, I found the staff very nice — dealers were friendly and the casino staff was accommodating to our minor requests. I enjoyed my stay.
After 3 days at the Rio, our hotel stay in Vegas transferred over to the Venetian Hotel — a hotel which my Amex Black card arranged for me. When you book thru Amex Black, a series of “perks” come included with the room. (Free meals, room upgrades, internet access, spa’s etc.)
For those of you who haven’t been in the Venetian, it is a relatively new hotel with very opulent architecture – the casino is graced with ornate columns and corbels, lavish chandeliers, and other affluent appointments that would make anyone feel like royalty.
Our stay at the Venetian was for 6 days.
Unfortunately, after 6 days, I will assert that I will never return.
Our nightmare started on day one and continued every single day — marred by poor human experiences every step of the way: Unresponsive housekeeping, unacceptable hold times to hotel services, failure to deliver promises, mechanized staff, overcharging, and overall, a failure to provide an escape.
The business lesson is this: No amount of great intangibles, such as great technology (snazzy websites) or great architecture (lavishly appointed hotels) can over compensate for poor customer service. Despite the Venetian’s billion dollar appearance, their customer service frankly sucked. Conversely, at the Rio Hotel, customer service was excellent which translated into a great experience, despite the hotel’s dated building.
FASTLANE SIDEBAR:
Fanatical customer service can compensate for short-comings, but fanatical intangibles cannot compensate for poor customer service, or poor human interactionFASTLANE ACCELERANT:
The foundation for growing a business exponentially is found in fanatical customer service.For anyone building a business, your customer service on a human level will translate into how your customer perceives your business. If your customer service sucks, no amount of “intangibles” will overcome that deficit and your customer will not be happy. The floor of the Venetian could have been made of SOLID GOLD, it would not have made a difference. Nothing overcomes poor human experiences.
Some other examples of this:
- A friend owns an Inn. He could have the best inn in the world located on the best beach front in California: If he treats his customers like crap or doesn’t fulfill customer requests, they won’t return.
- You could have the best designed website in the world; if your fulfillment process or issue resolution is hampered by poor customer service interaction (or none at all in the case of many websites) you will not get repeat users.
- You could own a restaurant with a $20 million dollar dining room; gold plates, silverware, fancy props — if the wait staff and the entrees suck, you won’t return.
You can’t overcome for poor human interaction with spectacular intangibles. However, this relationship equation is not associative — you can overcome mediocre intangibles with spectacular customer service as exemplified by my Rio stay.
With my stay at the Venetian, I paid for an escape and instead I got life: Broken TV’s, unclean rooms, incompetent employees and empty promises.
Sorry Venetian, I don’t care how many billions you spent to build your lavish casino — your customer service sucks and I won’t be returning under any circumstances.
For others willing to play roulette with your hotel stay, I wish you luck.
Peace,
MJ DeMarco
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When I was in my 20's, they laughed and said I was nuts. "MJ! You're dreaming!" Then, I got the last laugh. I retired in my 30's and now live a dream. Those same people now whore their life away for a paycheck only to reclaim their salvation on the weekend. With a correctly executed Fastlane plan, everyday of your life can be your weekend.
