Campground review / campground owner response

I have wondered about this myself. Over the years of traveling I have found that many campgrounds and RV parks aren't even aware of this site and/or forum. Just recently I called one of the RV parks we like to stay at when traveling to ask why their rates have skyrocketed to where several recent reviewers have stated their own shock to the rate increase and saying they won't be coming back. The person talked with wasn't aware of CGRs and actually went online while I waited on the phone to check out a few recent reviews about their rate increase. I have to wonder out of the thousands of RV parks listed just how many others don't know about CGRs??? This particular RV park didn't seem to care one bit after reading those recent reviews and made some lamebrain excuse as to why rates were increased so much. So without further commentary I told them we would not be coming back again until they lowered their rates to a more reasonable increase over the past rate. Didn't seem to bother them so I hung up and will find another park to stay at in this area as there are several. Good question Ron, hope to see a few responses to your post from both owners and reviewers..............

Regards, Terry..............(aka BankShot)

 

I kind of wondered why some campground owners don’t reply to reviews of their parks myself. Maybe it’s because they don’t know they can or couldn’t be bothered. It would be nice if they did. Like Paythebill says it’s a valuable resource that the owner could use to see what campers think of their park be it good or not.

 

I think it is due to both of these reasons, although I know our management has made quite a few efforts to inform park owners about replying to reviews and other functions available to them. When we have traveled, I have personally mentioned to owners about the services we offer and have been greeted with everything from interest (tell me more) to indifference (I'll think about it) to impudence (don't bother me with that stuff). So it's still true that you can lead a horse to water, but . . . .

 

I've run into the same thing. Although, I would say it was more the later response. I've even tried to explain (then gave up because it wasn't worth the effort if they didn't care) how CGR's is better than Yelp or Trip Advisor because we have a site team who do their best to vet & monitor reviews to be sure they are legitimate & from actual guests of the campgrounds. I'm sure owners/managers have a lot to handle running their campgrounds & maybe having to keep tabs on yet another review site is not worth their time.

 

It is fighting a losing battle to reply to reviews. If you only reply to good reviews with a "thank you", people will think you don't have an answer to a bad review. Replying to a bad review almost always requires you either call the reviewer a liar or you have to start telling the other side of the story that puts the reviewer in a bad light. It just becomes a tit for tat. Not worth it.

 

I'm not sure exactly what all has been done to let owners know about the features available to them, but I do know that before owners can reply to reviews, they need to "claim" their park (register as the owner), which is free. After they do this they are informed when they receive a new review. I also know that when owners contact us about listing their park, they are given the information about claiming their park and what all that offers them, but again, we can't make them register.

This seems to be a bit related to the forum thread about why do many people never thank forum members for their advice. Even if all the owner says is "Thank you for staying with us," that is professional and just plain polite. Thank you's and hearing that you are appreciated can go a long way in generating return business.

 

When I was traveling full time I used this site all the time, and let the rv parks know that I found them through this site. Many had no idea that it was out there. I found that strange that a campground would not know how many folks found them.

 

I too have found that many parks are not aware of this site. One asked if I would put in a review for them, but then handed me a paper with instructions on how to put in a review on another site. When I asked about Campgroundreviews, it was like a deer in the headlights.

 

And exactly how many people who leave a good review would then decide they will never return to that park because the park ownership didn't leave a "Thank you" message? Or, is your position that people are going to think, "We really wanted to go the East Coast this year, but that nice park out west left us a thank you note after our review so we should go there instead?"
I find it hard to believe that answering reviews would generate even enough additional revenue to justify the time that would need to be spent to find and respond to all the review sites. There are at least a dozen sites where people leave reviews on RV parks. This site, Google, Yahoo, Good Sam, RVParky, Trip Advisor, Yelp, Facebook are but a few. Years of experience has taught me to just run a great park and don't worry about reviews. The reviews will take care of themselves.

 

All I'm saying is that it does not hurt to be polite and thank others for things they do. So thank you for your input. We appreciate your support.

 

We've had much the same reaction from quite a few. There have been some that genuinely seemed interested.

IMHO the most disappointing reaction I had was at a CG where the owner's comment was along the lines of "Oh, we respond to reviews; we have a company that does that for us!" What incredible customer concern that exudes! We care so much about our customers' concerns that we outsource our responses to them. Tells you a lot.

 

I would rather parks not respond either positively or negatively. Especially the negatives as I'm sure they could just turn into pi$$ing contests. I really only care what other campers think of the park and that's all I want to read about. I would hope that park owners read their reviews in order to modify their operations to meet customer demands though.

Darrell

 

Does the ownership of Campgroundreviews.com personally thank the poster of each and every review? I don't post reviews, but I bet your system generates an automatic "Thank you" when a review is posted. Isn't that the same as outsourcing your responses?
There are many experts (what makes someone a social media expert, I don't know, but apparently they exist) who say that responding to reviews, especially negative reviews, is not advisable. A common recommendation is for a business to either be fully entrenched in social media or not involved at all. Choosing to engage only sporadically is considered to be the worst course of action. We stay out (or should I say "above") the fray.

 

Yes, our thank you's for reviews are automated and I'm sorry you do not see this as a sincere effort to thank someone for sending in a review regardless of how the message is sent out. Again thank you for your comments.

 

Not saying it is not sincere, but you posted that hiring a professional company to respond to social media posts was not a sincere effort at customer service. My view is hiring and paying someone to properly handle those posts is a much more sincere effort than just having a few lines of code that generate a generic "thank you".
Would you view a park that had an employee charged with handling social media reviews in the same light as the park that outsourced that responsibility? If not, why is paying an employee any different that paying an outside company? Does having an employee, rather than an outside service, somehow make every task better? Do employees mow the grass better than a lawn care service? Do they wash the bed linens and towels better than a laundry service?
The social media consulting companies I have seen proposals from claim they actually read every review and respond to that content. If there is an issue they feel should be addressed beyond a simple response they forward that information to the park. What they don't do is send nonsensical, automated, generic responses no matter what is contained in the review. Which I bet is what I would receive if I sent a review full of racial epithets. I would get a "thank you" even though you would subsequently not post the review and probably ban me from the site.

 

The automated "Thank you" here is simply an acknowledgement of the submission, not a comment on the content of the submission. The notice you receive later of either the acceptance or rejection of the review is more content related.