NEWTON, MASSACHUSETTS In an effort to better respond to the concerns of hoteliers TripAdvisor is launching a new customer support unit.
John Dila has been named to the newly created position of director of customer care. Dila will lead TripAdvisor’s new customer care operations, shape TripAdvisor’s support strategy and service culture and build a global team of customer service agents.
In an interview with the TripAdvisor for Business blog, Dila says his initial priority will be to better serve the hotelier community, with a primary goal to deliver a streamlined management response system to make it quicker and easier for hoteliers to post management responses.
“We are in the early days of better serving owners,” he says. “The key is to listen, and my team will attend events this year where owners meet and speak freely, and we’ll ask, ‘How are we doing?’ and ‘Would you recommend this experience to others?’ If the answer is no, we have to find out why and design a better experience. That kind of listening and acting engagement will be a major focus this year.”
Dila joins TripAdvisor from InnoCentive Inc., an open innovation crowd-sourcing startup, where he led the community and product business unit. Prior to that, Dila spent six years at eBay, developing and running the customer experience teams and customer support strategy.
“We’re delighted to have John on board,” says Stephen Kaufer, cofounder and CEO of TripAdvisor. “He’s a crucial addition to TripAdvisor, and we look forward to John building this new team and improving the experience of both property owners and travelers. We are committed to improving service standards and this hire underscores our desire to act more efficiently on user and owner feedback.”