The hotel industry faces a significant shift in 2025 with technology and evolving consumer behavior. As guests seek personalized and immersive stays, hoteliers need to adapt. The top 10 emerging trends, including AI-driven guest communication and focus on recent reviews, will reshape reputation management in hotels.
Efficiency is King Save Time for Your Guests
The hospitality industry is shifting towards efficiency, allowing for more guest interactions. Using AI for managing guest reviews streamlines repetitive tasks without compromising service quality. The right tools can enhance both efficiency and guest communication quality.
Tip: Utilize technology to expedite repetitive tasks. Select a system that boosts both efficiency and communication quality.
AI Replies
The trend of AI replies began in 2023, but by 2025, AI drafts are expected to completely replace templates, making guest communication more personal and engaging. Instead of relying on stale, one-size-fits-all responses, AI technology will generate personalized replies that reflect the unique concerns and compliments of each guest.
Tip: If you’re still using templates, it’s time to embrace AI replies. These tools can help you craft more personal and effective responses to guest reviews.
AI Personality
By 2025, AI tools are anticipated to transform from simple ChatGPT plugins to AI agents reflecting your brand voice. These AI assistants will understand your hotel’s uniqueness, allowing them to respond accurately and personally to specific cases. This shift to AI Personality boosts the authenticity of responses and guest satisfaction.
Tip: Choose a reputation management system with AI adaptable to your brand voice to ensure efficient, personalized responses that align with your branding.
Automation
Think about the time your hotel spends weekly responding to simple 5-star Google reviews. By 2025, reputation management software will automate responses to such reviews, saving considerable time. Automation allows you to focus more on personalizing responses to detailed reviews.
Tip: Analyze your weekly review volume to decide which reviews can be automated, semi-automated, or need manual attention. This strategic approach can greatly boost your efficiency.
More Weight on Review Recency
Past reviews on platforms like Google and Booking.com are losing relevance. Review platforms are now prioritizing recent reviews that reflect current guest satisfaction. For instance, Booking.com updated its score system in 2025, favoring newer reviews.
Tip: Stay informed about changes to review score systems on platforms like Booking.com. This will help you strategize your approach to reputation management.
AI Review Summaries
Word clouds and simple sentiment analysis are becoming outdated. The future lies in AI-based solutions that accurately capture guest feedback without the need for complex data analysis. New AI solutions offer accessible formats like Pro and Con lists or written summaries, replacing individual reviews.
Tip: Utilize AI-powered review summaries for precise insights into guest sentiment to understand your strengths and improve guest satisfaction.
Focus on Most Important Channels
In 2025, the OTA landscape will consolidate with major players like Booking.com in the lead. Hence, an outstanding online reputation on one or two key platforms will be more beneficial than listings on multiple smaller platforms.
Tip: Concentrate your online reputation efforts on the most influential platforms to drive more business and improve brand visibility.
Surveys Will Continue to Lose Importance
AI summaries make it easier to glean insights from guest reviews, reducing the need for lengthy surveys. Furthermore, long surveys may discourage guests from leaving public reviews, which are crucial for attracting direct bookings.
Tip: Encourage guests to leave public feedback instead of relying on extensive surveys. These reviews can act as valuable improvement pointers, trust signals for prospective guests, and boost your hotel’s online reputation.
Opportunity to Drive Direct Bookings
Reviews significantly impact hotel rankings and visibility. A strong online reputation on platforms like Google increases your hotel’s visibility. Combined with attractive pricing and a user-friendly, mobile-optimized website, it can drive direct bookings.
Tip: Understand your guest booking journey. Assess the ease of finding your hotel and the simplicity of booking. The simpler, the more likely guests will book.
AI Search Will Not Disrupt Booking Journey (2025)
Even with upcoming AI search engines like Perplexity and ChatGPT Search, AI still relies on trust signals, namely reviews. Guests will continue to rely on reviews for comparison during booking. Regardless of how booking patterns evolve, reviews will stay critical to hotel success.
Tip: Maintain a focus on your review strategy in your digital plan. Despite advancing tech, guest reviews will remain pivotal in influencing perceptions and decisions.
Embracing these trends and strategies will help hoteliers stay competitive. Using AI, prioritizing review management, and focusing on the guest experience can maintain a strong online reputation and increase direct bookings. In the digital age, reputation is key, and staying abreast of these reputation management trends is vital for success in hospitality.
About MARA Solutions
Effortless AI Online Reputation Management.
MARA helps you optimize your reviews to boost visibility and direct bookings with:
The most personal AI for review responses that adapts to your language
Review Inbox with collected reviews from all your review sources. Replying becomes as easy as hitting “Generate reply” > “Send” > “Done”.
Truly personalized and actionable analytics, as individual as each hotel
Response automation (e.g. automatic responses to 5-star reviews without text from Google)
Tobias Roelen-BlasbergCo-FounderMARA Solutions GmbH
