Leandro Carvalho Lima, Technical Manager for the Tourism Observatory at the State Secretariat of Economic Development of Mato Grosso, talks to us about developing a tailored KPI index, winning awards, and the importance of partnerships – both with other destinations and TrustYou.
[This is an abridged version of the interview; you can find the full-length version here.]
Can you tell us more about your background and the work done by the Secretariat?
I started my work in public service back in 2014, primarily focusing on tourism development. Currently, I coordinate tourism within Mato Grosso’s Economic Development Secretariat, where we use data-driven strategies to inform public policies. In 2020, we created the Tourism Observatory for Mato Grosso, which has become the main tool we use to monitor and improve tourism in the state. It has been crucial for collecting and analyzing data to help shape tourism-related decisions.
Why did you choose TrustYou?
Before we discovered TrustYou, we were manually tracking online reviews from platforms like Booking.com and TripAdvisor, which became time-consuming as we were monitoring over 120 establishments. When I came across TrustYou, I saw an opportunity to make this process much more efficient. The platform provides comprehensive data and key performance indicators (KPIs) that really helped us get a clearer view of customer satisfaction, something that was difficult when we were doing it manually. TrustYou was the perfect solution to scale up our efforts in online reputation management.
How do you use TrustYou’s data? What are the main KPIs you track and why?
We track specific KPIs such as response rates and the number of reviews per establishment, which give us a clear understanding of how engaged businesses are with their customers. In places like the Pantanal region, where jaguar observation is a major tourist draw, we use the feedback to continuously improve services.
Additionally, we developed our own tailored KPI, which we call the IDTUR Index. This index, built from the data collected through TrustYou, helps us track overall destination performance and customer satisfaction across the state.
What operational or management issues has TrustYou helped you solve?
TrustYou has helped us automate and extend our online reputation monitoring, something we struggled to do manually. The platform allows us to gather a much wider range of feedback, enabling us to identify where services are falling short and where they are excelling. More importantly, it has helped local tourism businesses better understand the importance of engaging with customer feedback. Through this, we’ve been able to push for service improvements and foster a culture of customer responsiveness among operators.
What are your primary objectives when using TrustYou?
Our main goal is to ensure businesses engage with their customer feedback and take actions to improve their services. We want to see high interaction rates and constant improvement. TrustYou has been vital in helping us monitor these interactions and push businesses toward improving their online reputation. For example, in the Pantanal, we’ve seen marked improvements in customer satisfaction since businesses started using TrustYou’s data more effectively.
Congratulations on the awards and recognition your team has received! Can you explain how TrustYou has contributed to implementing these new projects and share any future plans?
Thank you! Yes, our work was recognized through several awards, including the National Tourism Award, where we finished second. TrustYou played a significant role in this, as it provided the tools that enabled us to digitize our processes and better engage with customer feedback. We’re now expanding our use of digital tools and looking into new projects that will further develop the tourism sector in Mato Grosso. We’re also involved in a government innovation program, so we see a lot of potential to build on our current successes.
This recognition has given us more visibility and has strengthened the Observatory’s role in promoting tourism development in the state. TrustYou’s platform has been instrumental in shaping our strategy, and its impact is being recognized on a national level.
What exceeded your expectations since you started working with TrustYou?
What surprised us the most was how much TrustYou helped us organize and structure our data strategy. We’ve not only improved our internal processes but also forged international partnerships through the platform. We’re now sharing insights with tourism observatories in places like Croatia, which has been invaluable for benchmarking our progress against other destinations.
Any other comments you’d like to share with us?
I want to emphasize the importance of partnerships in this journey. TrustYou has been a key partner in helping us realize our goals for sustainable tourism development in Mato Grosso. Together, we’ve been able to grow the tourism sector in a way that benefits both our local economy and the people who visit our beautiful state.
