New Maestro 'GEM' Drives Repeat Business, Captures Comments Online

Automated Response Analysis Boosts Guest Loyalty

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. October 14, 2008

MARKHAM, Canada, May 24, 2006. NORTHWIND, a leading provider of enterprise hotel management software and reservation software for hospitality, announced the introduction of Maestro Guest Experience Management (GEM) today. GEM increases guest loyalty by delivering unique knowledge and insights to help operators better understand and deliver what guests' value most. Guest responses are captured online by GEM and then professionally analyzed to measure each visitors' perceptions and experiences. GEM's analysis provides operators with reliable information on the amenities and activities that keep guests returning. GEM was developed specifically for the hospitality industry in partnership with Navicom Inc., a leader in Perceptual Business Intelligence.

NORTHWIND's President of US Operations, Warren Dehan, said, "NORTHWIND worked closely with hotel and resort clients to learn what tools they needed to better communicate with guests to increase loyalty, create more effective marketing strategies, and improve service. We developed Maestro GEM so operators can have a dialogue with their guests - online - about their hotel experience." Dehan noted GEM's value is its ability to impact the bottom line with customized property inquiries that gather accurate, statistically significant information about guest perception. GEM supplements other Maestro customer relationship management tools.

Chris Shroff, president of Seaside Rentals Management Company, said, "The Maestro GEM system helps my properties communicate with guests more effectively. Now, because of GEM's online efficiency, guests are more apt to tell us about additional services and amenities they would like to see at our resorts and timeshare properties. They also give feedback on our service so we can make improvements and keep them coming back." Seaside Rentals Management Company operates condominium resorts in the Myrtle Beach area, including Grande Shores, Avista Resort, and Seaside, which opens in summer 2006.

Maestro GEM is integrated with Maestro Enterprise Front Office to link responses to each guest's record. At the end of a guest's stay, Maestro GEM automatically emails a 'thank you' note with a link that offers a chance to win a valuable prize for participating in a property survey. Guests are taken to a site with customized multiple-choice questions. Included in the questions are inquiries about future marketing initiatives and amenities. GEM also gives guests the option to trigger a 'red flag' that immediately notifies the property to contact the guest. What makes GEM different from other standardized online comment cards is its statistical analysis of guest responses. NORTHWIND utilizes the strength of Navicom statisticians to provide professional analysis of GEM guest responses.

What do your guests value?

Maestro GEM is more than "a comment card on steroids;" it provides operators with professional statistical analysis that tells them what guests value. GEM lets operators clearly see their property and activities through their guests' eyes so they can take steps to build loyalty by delivering what visitors want from their stay. No other guest satisfaction tool offers the combination of automated guest information gathering and professional tabulation and analysis.

GEM is available as an integrated part of NORTHWIND'S Maestro Property Management Suite of technology solutions for the hospitality industry.

Maestro Property Management Suite

To create the most productive working environment, the Maestro Property Management Suite combines a full-function Front Office System in use by hotels from 3,500 to 25 rooms with a family of robust modules that includes Maestro GDS+ -- an online, real-time reservation engine with integrated Yield Management to maximize ADR for virtually all e-Reservation channels; Maestro Owner Management - fully integrated ownership accounting functionality for asset performance reporting; and Maestro Sales & Catering, which manages group-convention sales and function rooms, whether at one property or a portfolio of hotels

Maestro Enterprise also includes the ResEze Web Booking Engine that enables independent and multi-property hotels to take advantage of the growing online revenue opportunity by providing tools for guests, groups and T/As to book their own reservations from an operator's website; Maestro Yield - a revenue manager that makes sophisticated strategies easy for multiple booking channels at one or more properties; Maestro Analytics - a complete business intelligence software suite that lets end-users interactively analyze critical business information; and Maestro CRM and GEM (Guest Experience Management), which give managers the performance information to make the best marketing decisions for booking new business.

Further, Maestro's Retail POS module integrates all retail sales outlets on one system; and Maestro Spa & Activities Management enables resorts, hotels and clubs to schedule facilities and activities with real-time integration to all other modules. Additionally, Maestro CRS supports a two-way interface to corporate sales offices; and Maestro Multi-Property maintains any number of properties on a single server with a single database, or each property can rely on its own server and have data exchanged with the central corporate offices. All Maestro systems feature three-level password security, credit card masking and property-configurable Data Encryption to assist in the prevention of identity theft and comply with pending identity theft protection legislation.

NORTHWIND will be exhibiting at HITEC 2006 in Minneapolis, MN, June 19-22.

Please visit booth 433 to receive a complete Maestro demonstration.