How Mariquel Waingarten – a new hotelier – created the top guest-rated hotel in Buenos Aires

Tailor Made Hotel from outside

A highlight of my trip to Buenos Aires last week was visiting the Tailor Made Hotel, and talking with owner Mariquel Waingarten. In a very short time, she has taken her new property to among the most popular design hotels in Argentina. Here is an excerpt from our conversation:

Can you tell me the story behind how you opened your hotel?

I lived in the neighborhood, and liked this property when I used to walk by. I finally built up the courage to make an offer on the building, and the Tailor Made Hotel opened within a year. The location is very important, as most of the hotels in Buenos Aires are concentrated in Palermo neighborhood. Las Canitas – where we are – is a lovely neighborhood: very residential and local. There a lot of good restaurants and shops, and it’s only a short walk to Palermo.

I like to travel, but there were many things I didn’t like about hotels I stayed at. I like going to expensive hotels, but I hate going there and then being charged for WiFi or paying $10 for a bottle of water. Design hotels can be a little bit pretentious, and it’s easy to feel a little out of place. This is weird, because I’m the guest and I should feel like I’m the queen.

So I wanted to have a nice hotel with good design and a concierge service that is friendly. There is a fine line between being too much and just being helpful and friendly.

Nowadays, when you travel, you always need access to WiFi. The fact that I have five rooms is an advantage, because I can put a computer in each room. For travelers, it’s a relief because they don’t have to bring a laptop or netbook. I’m really inspired by Apple technology and Apple design. All their products are really simple, and you really understand what they’re supposed to do.

So at this hotel we have a culture is based on three things:

1. Personal concierge service
2. Apple technology
3. No extra charges (We don’t charge for WiFi, laundry, phone calls or drinks.)

Apple Computers at Tailor Made Hotel

From the feedback I see on the web, your guests are very happy with the service they get here. How do you consistently provide excellent service?

At the very beginning, when a guest makes a reservation, we invite them to fill out a form online. Before they arrive, we already have some knowledge about their expectations for the trip, and what they are wanting to find here. So for example, they may say that they’re really interested in history or architecture or design or shopping – and then we can take this and prepare activity recommendations for their days here.

All the recommendations are personalized, and come from places me or Loli (the manager) find. We go and talk with the owners of the place and make sure the place has good aesthetics, service, and quality – it needs to have that mix. Guests appreciate knowing the places that I would go to myself.

I like wine, so every afternoon we serve our guests and I really like that moment. I like to see the city through the eyes of the guests who come here.

Which marketing tactics have you used to get the word out?

Our only marketing was personal effort: blogs, social media, and TripAdvisor. We built such a good online reputation that mainstream travel publications such as Condé Nast and Travel + Leisure contacted us to do a story. They were interested in us.

On Facebook, YouTube and Twitter we share things that we like — common interests with our typical guests: design, art, environmental issues, and hospitality.

Which marketing method has worked best for you so far?

TripAdvisor.

Okay, you’re number one in Buenos Aires — how did you do that?

We concentrate on having a good product. Me, Loli, and the staff all love what we do. And second, we always try to never say “no” to our guests… and try to realize what they want before they ask.

It’s just little things.

In the beginning, when we were on TripAdvisor I was scared , because you’re very exposed to good reviews and bad reviews. Fortunately, we’ve been able to get very good reviews, and the bad reviews that we received were actually really helpful. They tell us what to correct, and we like to take care of that. Sometimes people don’t tell you what’s wrong, and then it’s a surprise for us when they write it down on TripAdvisor.

Some people accuse hotels of writing their own reviews, but I think first of all TripAdvisor does a very good job of sorting out fake reviews. We’ve had bad reviews posted from people who never stayed at our hotel, and told TripAdvisor about this, and and they took them down.

Besides, cheating on TripAdvisor is risky, because much of my business relies on their website for referrals. If we ever did anything wrong, they could get mad and take us off, which should be disaster for us.

And then the third thing is that “lies have short legs,” as we say here. So if you lie about your hotel and create false reviews people would come to your hotel and be disappointed, and that is the worst thing that could happen. A customer with failed expectations is impossible to satisfy. It’s bad for me, and it’s awful for them.

Do you encourage your guests to leave reviews in any way?

Yes — not really to leave to reviews — but to share the experience.

How do you do that?

Sometimes guests ask us for something prior to leaving: like checking the time of their flights. Or to send a postcard. So then we send a goodbye e-mail telling them we hope they were well taken care of, and if they had a good experience could they share it.

The email includes links to our web presence: including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr. And then we also include a TripAdvisor link if people want to write a review about us.

What’s next for you?

We’re opening another hotel in Punte del Este next year, but once that opens, that will be it for a while. We’ve only been around for two years, and we’re still young!

Thank you for your time, Mariquel.

You can learn more at the Tailor Made Hotel website.

Related posts:

• Hotelier Interview: Tuncel Toprak of Witt Istanbul Suites
• Interview with an Irish Hotelier that consistently receives rave reviews online
• What the best hotel managers know about responding to guest reviews
• Hotel Website Makeover: Whale Cottage Guest Houses
• Cutting through the noise of guest reviews: a radical proposition

Need More Hotel Marketing Ideas?

Our new Savvy Hoteliers Guide to Hotel Marketing Ideas contains hundreds of tested tactics that work.