EyeforTravel Blog
Drive Data Excellence: Leverage data to get up close and personal with your customer at Smart Travel Data Summit Miami 2018!
With more searches, on multiple platforms, while passengers are on the move gives travel brands endless amounts of data that they can use to their advantage to improve the customer journey.
EyeforTravel has put together a summit - Smart Travel Data Summit in lovely Miami (27-28 Feb) which is an intimate networking and discussion based event that unites leading players from the travel market- from the hotels, airlines, online marketing, data integrators, software developers, revenue managers, tech innovators and more to examine the steps needed to develop and deploy a strong business model, to create market traction and engage the connected traveler in a data heavy world.
If you work in travel and focus on data analytics, revenue management, marketing or product development, this is the event for you to attend to walk away with actionable insights.
This event brings you something unique:
They have topics from Wyndham and Expedia covering personalization, AirBnb talking about the next steps in machine learning, to McKinsey, Southwest Airlines and Delta Airlines talking about new frontiers in revenue management for airlines, Winding Tree talking about Blockchain as the next Major Disruptor and a lot more on GDPR and customer experience!They don’t just stop there, with 100+ people data experts that will attend to discuss the need for chatbots, data strategies, marketing analytics and artificial intelligence best practice, customer behavior, machine learning and more to make sure you have all the takeaways you need in just 2 days. Click here to see how you can join as well: http://events.eyefortravel.com/smart-travel-data-summit-north-america/Come to this event to:
- Create new data products: That allow travel suppliers to create a personalized experience so good that it doesn’t just sell direct, it drives lifelong loyalty
- Negotiate partnerships that give you customer insight: Know at the right time, with the right message what product your customers want. Fueled by API technologies, data and insight is flowing between travel companies. This takes your customer insight to a whole new profitable level and crucially these profits stay within the industry
- Exploit new platforms: Conversational commerce backed by AI allows direct sales, better service and cuts costs. Whether via web, brand app or through messenger apps (900 million FB messenger users compares favorably with 100 million Uber users) the industry is uniting chat, service and commerce.
- Drive data enabled personalization: Personalization of product, message, payment and the very relationship you have with your customer is being revolutionized through analytics, data partnerships and machine learning. The result is higher conversion rates, customer loyalty and profitability
With just 23 passes to go, now’s your chance – click here to join the travel data elite!
Register this now to grab a final few passes, via the secure link: http://events.eyefortravel.com/smart-travel-data-summit-north-america/register.php For the complete conference program and speaker line-up, visit: http://events.eyefortravel.com/smart-travel-data-summit-north-america/conference-agenda.php or contact the travel team at shreya@eyefortravel.comEyeforTravel is a community where the world's top online travel brands – from hotels to airlines, online travel agents, cruise, car hire firms and more – come to meet to drive forward growth and innovation in the industry. We aim to provide you with industry focused news, events, reports, updates and information. EyeforTravel Limited is a registered company. The Company Registration number is 06286442. It is also registered in England & Wales. Registered office is 7-9 Fashion Street, London E1 6PX, United Kingdom.Shreya Ganapathy EyeForTravel+ 44 20 7375 7150 shreya@eyefortravel.com
Heathrow Airport, Melia Hotels and Dutch Railways: Discuss How to Leverage Technology & Data to Create Seamless Customer Experience
Today’s customers can book a hotel, a surf lesson and flights on their phones, laptops, tablets and even over voice command! Travel brands really need to focus on the channel preferences for each customer to ensure sales and services are tailored to keep customers coming back! EyeforTravel have brought together key experts to discuss what to do next in this live interactive webinar – sign up to listen in on 21st Feb 3pm GMT. So, what's the game changer? EyeforTravel think technology and data, with smartphones at the helm. So, today's travel brands are leveraging AI, Mobile Integration, NFC, geolocation, beacons and more in an all-out pursuit of customer happiness and seamless travel. With tech savvy passengers’ eager to use new digital services to transform their journeys, they can offer a new ecosystem of connected personalized services wins.To share industry insights, EyeforTravel have partnered with TIBCO to create a live webinar series that covers the technology and data that is transforming travel operations. You can sign up to listen in or request the recording here. Speakers for the webinar include:
- Hans Tönissen Program Architect "Comfort IT" at NS (Dutch Railways)
- Rodney Dortalina, Technology Evangelist, TIBCO
- Susanna Mander, VP Marketing & Brand Development, Melia Hotels International
- Stephen Glenfield, Head of Digital, Heathrow Airport
- Adapt to the connected traveller to improve user experience and build on engagement with world class tech
- Develop the right mobile strategies and partnerships with personalized content, incentives and real-time data to create that frictionless travel experience
- Evaluate trends: See who’s using your services and what information they’re accessing from different IoT devices
Amazon dominates travel brands’ ongoing experiments with voice technology
Travel brands have only just started putting in voice-first services and currently Amazon has a clear first-mover advantage thanks to its Alexa and Echo products says EyeforTravel’s new free report.
Amazon made a canny move in becoming the first major company to roll out and heavily market smart speakers. This first-mover advantage has made Alexa the go-to for the travel industry’s initial attempts to deploy voice technology finds EyeforTravel’s new Can Voice Change the Way We Travel? Report, which is free to download now.
It’s easy to see why travel brands are largely teaming up with Amazon as it has by far and away the most popular smart speaker in terms of sales currently. Amazon has at least 70% of the market share currently according to estimates and substantially beating out Google Home in terms of web search interest in 2016 and 2017. Even more importantly its Alexa personal assistant, as they have made it part of their strategy to focus on the supporting ecosystem and bring in external developers. This has allowed Alexa to grow the number of ‘skills’, or programmed tasks and apps on the system, exponentially across 2017 from around 7,000 to more than 25,000 by the end of the year.
Hotels are putting their own offerings among these skills, as are metasearch companies, airports, online travel agencies, and airlines. This covers a multitude of brands, including KAYAK, United Airlines, Marriott, IHG, Best Western, Skyscanner, Edwardian Hotels, Heathrow Airport, and Kimpton. Hotels are probably the most prominent users of Amazon Alexa and Echo speakers currently as there is an obvious use case for in-room speakers that act as concierges.
For IHG, they have begun testing their own virtual concierge through Alexa. However, they found that the human element was still critical, using their call centre to train, “Central Reservation Offices (CROs) have been trying to manage a downward cycle in that not many people are calling them anymore, but they know a ton about the way people actually talk, their cadence and what they ask for,” said Bill Keen, IHG’s VP of mobile solutions & digital guest experience at EyeforTravel North America 2017. “Through voice listening tools they actually powered our initial Alexa implementation in the hotel rooms, where we actually had a repository of things that guests normally ask when they call the call centre desk and we could actually build it into.”
However, current adoption trends doesn’t mean Amazon will have its own way for the foreseeable future. Multiple players are eyeing the opportunities that voice afford, including Baidu, Samsung, Microsoft, Apple and Alphabet/Google. “I’m a huge Alexa fan, but I think Google is going to have a big advantage as they have a lot of the context,” said Paul English, CEO of Lola Tech. “When you do a simple query to Google Home, it can piece together all of that.” This data advantage appears already to be having an effect as independent research has found that Google Assistant is more accurate in coming up with spoken answers than any competitors. Similarly, Chinese rivals have made huge progress and claim that their systems are now more effective at transcribing than native Mandarin speakers.
It therefore remains to be seen whether Amazon can keep its lead but right now it is the biggest player in terms of dedicated voice applications being built by the travel industry.
For more on the topic of voice and its impact on the travel industry, click here to download the complete report for free. You can also download our free report on in-room technology, including smart speakers here.
Amazon made a canny move in becoming the first major company to roll out and heavily market smart speakers. This first-mover advantage has made Alexa the go-to for the travel industry’s initial attempts to deploy voice technology finds EyeforTravel’s new Can Voice Change the Way We Travel? Report, which is free to download now.
It’s easy to see why travel brands are largely teaming up with Amazon as it has by far and away the most popular smart speaker in terms of sales currently. Amazon has at least 70% of the market share currently according to estimates and substantially beating out Google Home in terms of web search interest in 2016 and 2017. Even more importantly its Alexa personal assistant, as they have made it part of their strategy to focus on the supporting ecosystem and bring in external developers. This has allowed Alexa to grow the number of ‘skills’, or programmed tasks and apps on the system, exponentially across 2017 from around 7,000 to more than 25,000 by the end of the year.
Hotels are putting their own offerings among these skills, as are metasearch companies, airports, online travel agencies, and airlines. This covers a multitude of brands, including KAYAK, United Airlines, Marriott, IHG, Best Western, Skyscanner, Edwardian Hotels, Heathrow Airport, and Kimpton. Hotels are probably the most prominent users of Amazon Alexa and Echo speakers currently as there is an obvious use case for in-room speakers that act as concierges.
For IHG, they have begun testing their own virtual concierge through Alexa. However, they found that the human element was still critical, using their call centre to train, “Central Reservation Offices (CROs) have been trying to manage a downward cycle in that not many people are calling them anymore, but they know a ton about the way people actually talk, their cadence and what they ask for,” said Bill Keen, IHG’s VP of mobile solutions & digital guest experience at EyeforTravel North America 2017. “Through voice listening tools they actually powered our initial Alexa implementation in the hotel rooms, where we actually had a repository of things that guests normally ask when they call the call centre desk and we could actually build it into.”
However, current adoption trends doesn’t mean Amazon will have its own way for the foreseeable future. Multiple players are eyeing the opportunities that voice afford, including Baidu, Samsung, Microsoft, Apple and Alphabet/Google. “I’m a huge Alexa fan, but I think Google is going to have a big advantage as they have a lot of the context,” said Paul English, CEO of Lola Tech. “When you do a simple query to Google Home, it can piece together all of that.” This data advantage appears already to be having an effect as independent research has found that Google Assistant is more accurate in coming up with spoken answers than any competitors. Similarly, Chinese rivals have made huge progress and claim that their systems are now more effective at transcribing than native Mandarin speakers.
It therefore remains to be seen whether Amazon can keep its lead but right now it is the biggest player in terms of dedicated voice applications being built by the travel industry.
For more on the topic of voice and its impact on the travel industry, click here to download the complete report for free. You can also download our free report on in-room technology, including smart speakers here.
Are Amazon, Apple, Google and Microsoft falling behind Chinese voice tech?
China is a crucible for the spread of voice technologies and domestic companies might be leading the world currently in this field says EyeforTravel’s new free report into voice.
Unique dynamics make China a perfect laboratory for developing and deploying voice technologies. This is propelling local players, principally Baidu and iFlytek, to become world leaders finds EyeforTravel’s new Can Voice Change the Way We Travel? report.
China is likely to become the key market for voice technologies and one in which travel brands need to be paying attention due to a number of reasons. Firstly, is the Chinese language, which has thousands of individual characters rather than a conventional alphabet. This makes typing a challenge, particularly on the smaller screen of a smartphone, creating a clear need that voice can solve. Furthermore, Chinese travellers are far more mobile focused than travellers in other markets according to EyeforTravel’s Chinese Travel Consumer report.
Progress in voice technologies means that voice technology is already the most convenient way for Mandarin speakers to operate their smartphones. A joint Baidu, Stanford University and University of Washington study from 2016 found it was three times quicker to say English words than type, and 2.8 times faster with Mandarin, while the rate of mistakes was a fifth lower using English and almost two-thirds lower with Mandarin.
This creates the demand for voice to flourish in the Chinese market, but local players have further advantages of a supportive Chinese government that has made AI a core focus and a more amenable regulatory environment for this field of research. Data that can be collected, analyzed and deployed with far fewer legal data security and privacy restrictions than in the EU or the US. This could be key, as the quantity of data is key in this kind of machine learning, especially as engineers tackle the next challenge of getting AI to understand and respond to speech in a contextual framework.
That data is already being generated by millions of Chinese consumers. Whilst Apple claims Siri has a userbase of around 375 million, likely making it the most used personal assistant outside of China, China’s leading player at the moment iFLYTEK claims more than 700 million end users, which they believe gives them more than 70% of the Chinese voice market. Media reports more widely quote a figure of around 500 million regular users, still a vast figure.
iFLYTEK’s main competitor in China Baidu is hot on their heels, and claims prodigious growth as a result of pouring around USD3 into AI research from 2015 to 2017. In a November 2016 release, they noted that that “the daily requests for speech recognition grew from 5 million in 2013 to 140 million this year, and the number of daily requests for speech synthesis stands today at 200 million.”
Crucially, both companies have also been able to establish an ecosystem of various players who depend on their software, unlike Apple and Siri. This enables them to extend the reach of their rising voice empires and gather more data to further improve accuracy. Both companies claim that thousands of companies have already developed products from their voice technologies.
So, the big tech players in the West have plenty to feel anxious about given the progress of their Chinese counterparts and the scene is only going to get more crowded as Samsung started to push its Bixby voice products in the second half of 2017.
Therefore, if there is one key market that travel brands need to keep an eye on in relation to vice technology developments, it is China. The already deep penetration of advanced technologies, alongside unique market dynamics and a language particularly well suited to voice applications seems likely to make the country the forefront for this new way of engaging with the digital world.
For more on the topic of voice and its impact on the travel industry, click here to download the complete report for free.
Unique dynamics make China a perfect laboratory for developing and deploying voice technologies. This is propelling local players, principally Baidu and iFlytek, to become world leaders finds EyeforTravel’s new Can Voice Change the Way We Travel? report.
China is likely to become the key market for voice technologies and one in which travel brands need to be paying attention due to a number of reasons. Firstly, is the Chinese language, which has thousands of individual characters rather than a conventional alphabet. This makes typing a challenge, particularly on the smaller screen of a smartphone, creating a clear need that voice can solve. Furthermore, Chinese travellers are far more mobile focused than travellers in other markets according to EyeforTravel’s Chinese Travel Consumer report.
Progress in voice technologies means that voice technology is already the most convenient way for Mandarin speakers to operate their smartphones. A joint Baidu, Stanford University and University of Washington study from 2016 found it was three times quicker to say English words than type, and 2.8 times faster with Mandarin, while the rate of mistakes was a fifth lower using English and almost two-thirds lower with Mandarin.
This creates the demand for voice to flourish in the Chinese market, but local players have further advantages of a supportive Chinese government that has made AI a core focus and a more amenable regulatory environment for this field of research. Data that can be collected, analyzed and deployed with far fewer legal data security and privacy restrictions than in the EU or the US. This could be key, as the quantity of data is key in this kind of machine learning, especially as engineers tackle the next challenge of getting AI to understand and respond to speech in a contextual framework.
That data is already being generated by millions of Chinese consumers. Whilst Apple claims Siri has a userbase of around 375 million, likely making it the most used personal assistant outside of China, China’s leading player at the moment iFLYTEK claims more than 700 million end users, which they believe gives them more than 70% of the Chinese voice market. Media reports more widely quote a figure of around 500 million regular users, still a vast figure.
iFLYTEK’s main competitor in China Baidu is hot on their heels, and claims prodigious growth as a result of pouring around USD3 into AI research from 2015 to 2017. In a November 2016 release, they noted that that “the daily requests for speech recognition grew from 5 million in 2013 to 140 million this year, and the number of daily requests for speech synthesis stands today at 200 million.”
Crucially, both companies have also been able to establish an ecosystem of various players who depend on their software, unlike Apple and Siri. This enables them to extend the reach of their rising voice empires and gather more data to further improve accuracy. Both companies claim that thousands of companies have already developed products from their voice technologies.
So, the big tech players in the West have plenty to feel anxious about given the progress of their Chinese counterparts and the scene is only going to get more crowded as Samsung started to push its Bixby voice products in the second half of 2017.
Therefore, if there is one key market that travel brands need to keep an eye on in relation to vice technology developments, it is China. The already deep penetration of advanced technologies, alongside unique market dynamics and a language particularly well suited to voice applications seems likely to make the country the forefront for this new way of engaging with the digital world.
For more on the topic of voice and its impact on the travel industry, click here to download the complete report for free.
Can voice technology change the travel industry?
It’s the biggest topic in tech, with the giants piling in to voice-focused artificial intelligences, meaning travel brands need to sit up and take notice finds a new free report.
EyeforTravel’s new Can Voice Change the Way We Travel? reportadvises travel brands to get ready for the expansion of voice technologies, as although these are at an early adopter stage, they are already important parts of the digital ecosystem and developing at a breakneck pace.
Blockbuster sales of smart speakers over the holiday periods in both 2016 and 2017, alongside a steadily growing number of connected devices per home across major markets in the last half decade, have demonstrated an appetite for voice products. Even more critically than the smart speaker market, personal assistants are being incorporated into ever more platforms, meaning a market of billions of devices already exists.
Estimates of voice’s market share in terms of search are harder to come by than device sales but this too is growing rapidly, nowhere more so than China. Already, the leading players, Baidu and iFlytek, claim that users are making hundreds of millions of daily requests through voice, allowing them to gather vast amounts of data. This base has allowed both companies to put together voice products that can recognise speech at accuracy rates of up to 98%.
This growing accuracy demonstrates the rapid progress in the field and how the technology is on the cusp of being able to transcribe human speech perfectly. However, for travel where the real issue lies according to the report, is not in the technology to comprehend the human voice, but the ability to personalize the experience. Comprehension is one thing but context and cogent answers are quite another, which will require another leap in performance.
“When you do a normal screen based search, a whole screen of information comes up – but on a voice based search there isn’t time for Siri, Echo or Home to read out the whole page,” Sam Turner, sales director of Hotelbeds Group told EyeforTravel. “A much more personalised response is required to give you the most relevant information only, and nothing more, otherwise it simply doesn’t work.”
Paul English, CEO of Lola Tech, believes that “ultimately talking to your phone and saying I want a hotel tomorrow night and I am going to be in Chicago Thursday and then having it know enough about the context and enough about the personalization requirements that it does everything for you” is the future.
Getting to a more personalised service will require a concerted effort on the part of travel brands in terms of data gathering, interpretation and presentation. Therefore, consumers conducting a full cycle of travel research solely through voice remain some way off.
In the meantime, travel brands are finding a variety of uses for voice products to ease the travellers’ journeys. Heathrow airport is experimenting with smart speakers in flight screens and key locations in the airport to help travellers with common questions. For hotels, Marriott, IHG, Best Western and Kimpton are among the pioneers in the sector. Principally these brands are looking at using speakers in guests’ rooms to provide services and ease guest requests. Bill Keen, IHG’s VP of mobile solutions & digital guest experience, reported that they had implemented Alexa into and enthused about its further potential: “Voice is sexy again. I do believe that’s the next interface for us.” For luxury hotel brand Edwardian, they have gone a step further and developed out their self-developed chatbot so now it has been enabled to speak to guests and the leadership team is looking at their own in-room speaker tech.
For more on the topic of voice and its impact on the travel industry, click here to download the complete report for free.
EyeforTravel’s new Can Voice Change the Way We Travel? reportadvises travel brands to get ready for the expansion of voice technologies, as although these are at an early adopter stage, they are already important parts of the digital ecosystem and developing at a breakneck pace.
Blockbuster sales of smart speakers over the holiday periods in both 2016 and 2017, alongside a steadily growing number of connected devices per home across major markets in the last half decade, have demonstrated an appetite for voice products. Even more critically than the smart speaker market, personal assistants are being incorporated into ever more platforms, meaning a market of billions of devices already exists.
Estimates of voice’s market share in terms of search are harder to come by than device sales but this too is growing rapidly, nowhere more so than China. Already, the leading players, Baidu and iFlytek, claim that users are making hundreds of millions of daily requests through voice, allowing them to gather vast amounts of data. This base has allowed both companies to put together voice products that can recognise speech at accuracy rates of up to 98%.
This growing accuracy demonstrates the rapid progress in the field and how the technology is on the cusp of being able to transcribe human speech perfectly. However, for travel where the real issue lies according to the report, is not in the technology to comprehend the human voice, but the ability to personalize the experience. Comprehension is one thing but context and cogent answers are quite another, which will require another leap in performance.
“When you do a normal screen based search, a whole screen of information comes up – but on a voice based search there isn’t time for Siri, Echo or Home to read out the whole page,” Sam Turner, sales director of Hotelbeds Group told EyeforTravel. “A much more personalised response is required to give you the most relevant information only, and nothing more, otherwise it simply doesn’t work.”
Paul English, CEO of Lola Tech, believes that “ultimately talking to your phone and saying I want a hotel tomorrow night and I am going to be in Chicago Thursday and then having it know enough about the context and enough about the personalization requirements that it does everything for you” is the future.
Getting to a more personalised service will require a concerted effort on the part of travel brands in terms of data gathering, interpretation and presentation. Therefore, consumers conducting a full cycle of travel research solely through voice remain some way off.
In the meantime, travel brands are finding a variety of uses for voice products to ease the travellers’ journeys. Heathrow airport is experimenting with smart speakers in flight screens and key locations in the airport to help travellers with common questions. For hotels, Marriott, IHG, Best Western and Kimpton are among the pioneers in the sector. Principally these brands are looking at using speakers in guests’ rooms to provide services and ease guest requests. Bill Keen, IHG’s VP of mobile solutions & digital guest experience, reported that they had implemented Alexa into and enthused about its further potential: “Voice is sexy again. I do believe that’s the next interface for us.” For luxury hotel brand Edwardian, they have gone a step further and developed out their self-developed chatbot so now it has been enabled to speak to guests and the leadership team is looking at their own in-room speaker tech.
For more on the topic of voice and its impact on the travel industry, click here to download the complete report for free.
Hilton, Marriott, Expedia, Facebook, Choice Hotels, Accor Hotels, Cathay Pacific, and more to share digital strategies at EyeforTravel Summit
Over 30% of the conference agenda will be industry case studies, at the upcoming EyeforTravel San Francisco 2018 Summit – the West Coast’s largest digital travel summit, where over 300+ senior travel executives will come together for two days, on April 9 & 10th. The overarching theme for 2018 sees a huge focus on emerging technologies in travel – with one of the key aims being to ascertain the practical tech strategy from the hype and to truly dissect the opportunities of these technologies for digital marketing campaigns.This year sees the most number of case studies to be presented with brands such as Hilton, Marriott, Expedia, Facebook, Choice Hotels, Accor Hotels, Cathay Pacific, and more giving insights into their strategies and the secrets to getting relevant insights on customers to create successful engagement.To shed light on how emerging technologies are shaping travel, Renu Kannu the North America Lead for EyeforTravel said “We really are at such an exciting point in travel – the industry has seen some huge shifts over the years, but the potential of travel technologies such as voice, AI, machine learning and blockchain is immense. This could be a game changer for travel brands in 2018 and beyond, and the time to act is now”. CASE STUDIES INCLUDE:- Brand Building in the Digital Age (Amy Martin Ziegenfuss, VP – Marketing, Hilton)- AI Breaking New Ground & Fuelling Customer Engagement and Experience (Jay Fluegel, Head of Product – Customer Care, Expedia)- The Power of Mobile to Drive Interaction (Brooks Martin, Senior Director – Mobile & Digital Guest Experience, Marriott)- Supercharging your Engagement Strategy (Will Farnan, Client Partner – Travel Suppliers, Facebook)- Incorporating Virtual Content and Mobile Video (Robecta Ma, VP – Marketing, Cathay Pacific Airways)- A Holistic Approach to Emerging Technologies and your Digital Strategy (Bill Ramsey, Senior Director – Mobile & Emerging Channels, Choice Hotels)And this is just the start. Other companies confirmed to speak include: Priceline, IHG, OneFineStay, Hotel Tonight, Winding Tree, Jet Blue Ventures, Japan Airlines, Booking.com, Air Canada and much more!Click here and learn more about the speakers and what they will coverContact the team directly at – renu@eyefortravel.comEyeforTravel is a community where the world's top online travel brands – from hotels to airlines, online travel agents, cruise, car hire firms and more – come to meet to drive forward growth and innovation in the industry. We aim to provide you with industry focused news, events, reports, updates and information. EyeforTravel Limited is a registered company. The Company Registration number is 06286442. It is also registered in England & Wales. Registered office is 7-9 Fashion Street, London E1 6PX, United Kingdom.Renu KannuEyeForTravel | Project and Research Director+ 44 20 7375 7197 |renu@eyefortravel.com
The technologies transforming the guest’s experience
Apps, chatbots, RFID, in-room devices, and the internet of things – a host of technologies are opening up and improving the guest’s experience finds The Future ofthe In-Stay Experience report, which is free to download now.
Hotels often feel held hostage by TripAdvisor reviews, but property apps, digital concierges and more are helping hotels reach the guest and react far better to their needs says EyeforTravel’s new report.
Hotels can now monitor and track guests around their properties using installed apps that can access the guest’s location or Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tied to keycards. They can then log every guest request through AI-driven concierges operating through chatbots or smart speakers that mean the guest doesn’t need to ring down to front desk. The growing Internet of Things (IoT), which can be controlled from a single device in the guest’s room or their app, can allow the hotel to know what temperature the guest likes their room to be set at, what entertainment they watch, and when items need to be replaced.
Armed with this technology, hotels can personalise down to an individual level for guests they know and use aggregate data to predict what they should recommend to new guests. Services are even springing up that amalgamate data from many different hotels to learn from similar properties to identify patterns in guest behaviour and make recommendations for add-ons to the guest’s stay.
This will give the hotel of the future a key edge in increasing customer satisfaction and also driving increased revenues from ancillaries or pushing entirely new revenue streams.
The new ability to react in a smarter and faster way to a guest will also help to push up those all-important review scores, as the best time to receive guest feedback is while the guest is still on property. Hotel platforms and apps make it easier for guests to instantly message any issues to the property. Being able to fix an issue before it escalates into a complaint is vital in today’s world of online review sites and digital endorsements.
Following up with a bottle of champagne delivered to the room or a free dinner, can make a guest less likely to vent on TripAdvisor, or even better, turn the complaint into a compliment with a post about the fantastic service provided by the hotel. This has a demonstrable effect on the bottom line, with increased review scored tied to better performing hotels with higher revenues according to more than one study.
However, with this power hotels will also need to learn where the fine balance lies between helping their guests and becoming overbearing. “Learning what a customer orders, be it craft beer or double-shot espresso, is a benefit. Offering specials that walk that line are okay, but to cross it needs to get consent from the client,” says Jeffrey Parker, Vice President of Hospitality Systems, Red Lion Hotels Corporation. “If Joe Smith tells us he wants Jack Daniels and a double-cheese burger in his room with every stay, we need to act on that. If he always orders a cheese burger, we should suggest that,”
The hotels that master guest communications and services through this growing proliferation of smart technologies in a way that is appropriate for their clientele will be the ones that come to thrive in the increasingly competitive accommodation market.
To download The Future of In-Stay Technology report for free, click here.
Hotels often feel held hostage by TripAdvisor reviews, but property apps, digital concierges and more are helping hotels reach the guest and react far better to their needs says EyeforTravel’s new report.
Hotels can now monitor and track guests around their properties using installed apps that can access the guest’s location or Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tied to keycards. They can then log every guest request through AI-driven concierges operating through chatbots or smart speakers that mean the guest doesn’t need to ring down to front desk. The growing Internet of Things (IoT), which can be controlled from a single device in the guest’s room or their app, can allow the hotel to know what temperature the guest likes their room to be set at, what entertainment they watch, and when items need to be replaced.
Armed with this technology, hotels can personalise down to an individual level for guests they know and use aggregate data to predict what they should recommend to new guests. Services are even springing up that amalgamate data from many different hotels to learn from similar properties to identify patterns in guest behaviour and make recommendations for add-ons to the guest’s stay.
This will give the hotel of the future a key edge in increasing customer satisfaction and also driving increased revenues from ancillaries or pushing entirely new revenue streams.
The new ability to react in a smarter and faster way to a guest will also help to push up those all-important review scores, as the best time to receive guest feedback is while the guest is still on property. Hotel platforms and apps make it easier for guests to instantly message any issues to the property. Being able to fix an issue before it escalates into a complaint is vital in today’s world of online review sites and digital endorsements.
Following up with a bottle of champagne delivered to the room or a free dinner, can make a guest less likely to vent on TripAdvisor, or even better, turn the complaint into a compliment with a post about the fantastic service provided by the hotel. This has a demonstrable effect on the bottom line, with increased review scored tied to better performing hotels with higher revenues according to more than one study.
However, with this power hotels will also need to learn where the fine balance lies between helping their guests and becoming overbearing. “Learning what a customer orders, be it craft beer or double-shot espresso, is a benefit. Offering specials that walk that line are okay, but to cross it needs to get consent from the client,” says Jeffrey Parker, Vice President of Hospitality Systems, Red Lion Hotels Corporation. “If Joe Smith tells us he wants Jack Daniels and a double-cheese burger in his room with every stay, we need to act on that. If he always orders a cheese burger, we should suggest that,”
The hotels that master guest communications and services through this growing proliferation of smart technologies in a way that is appropriate for their clientele will be the ones that come to thrive in the increasingly competitive accommodation market.
To download The Future of In-Stay Technology report for free, click here.
WEBINAR: THE ROLE OF DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES TO ENHANCE THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
We already know there is a plethora of technologies and tools out there for travel brands to more effectively engage with customers – including the proliferation of mobile across the online travel industry.
EyeforTravel is hosting an exclusive webinar (Tuesday Feb 6th- 5pm GMT) titled ‘The role of digital technologies to enhance the customer experience’ bringing together the following experts:
· Bill Ramsey, Senior Director – Mobile & Emerging Channels, Choice Hotels· Alison Anesta, Area Director of Performance Improvement, Dorchester CollectionThe webinar will explore:
- The various digital tools available in the travel industry to enhance the customer experience, better engage, and drive loyalty
- The intersection and blending between technology and the physical – and balancing both as part of your strategy
- Driving interconnected mobile engagement throughout the travel journey
We hope to have have you involved as part of the conversation in two weeks!
Renu Kannu renu@eyefortravel.com
EyeforTravel have an attendee list for the data travel elite that they think you need to see!
EyeforTravel have just released their attendee list for the Smart Travel Data Summit 2018 (Miami Feb 27-28). Don’t miss your chance to join this one of its kind data networking and business focused event for the travel industry.
In a recent Forbes study titled, Data Driven and Digitally Savvy: The Rise of the New Marketing Organization, there were some key findings: The travel industry is a clear leader in achieving competitive advantage through data-driven marketing. Sixty-seven percent of travel executives say they have done so in customer engagement/loyalty, 56% in new customers and 59% in customer satisfaction.
With more travelers turning to the internet and mobile to get ideas, inspiration, and options for their trips. There’s more data on each customer from their searches, saved preferences and previous travels. This event covers data analytics, revenue management, marketing analytics and artificial intelligence and personlizartion. Data is where it’s all at – see how you can leverage data to get up close and personal with your customer.
EyeforTravel are excited about this shift towards smart data and have positioned their EyeForTravel Smart Travel Data Summit Miami (Feb 27-28) to focus on just that, and are even offering a sneak peak of their attendee list early.
The event will have 120+ travel data decision makers to help brands identify the data, technology, partners and strategies that you need to grow revenues in the mobile-first world!
To shed light on who will be at the event, Tim Gunstone the Managing Director for EyeforTravel said " “We’re excited to be welcoming back executives from Southwest Airlines, Wyndham, AirBnb, Booking.com, Hilton Hotels, the Travel Corporation, Allegiant, Priceline, Winding Tree and a lot more”
He went onto to say, “We don’t usually release our delegate list this early but we want to shout about this event, we have over 80 people in, and thought we should share it, to give others the chance to book in early and manage their meetings too!”
Need a bit more convincing?
Learn more about who is attending the Smart Travel Data 2018 in event in sunny Miami here: http://events.eyefortravel.com/smart-travel-data-summit-north-america/
If you are a hotel – cruise or airline – contact the team for discounts
Contact the team directly at – shreya@eyefortravel.com
In a recent Forbes study titled, Data Driven and Digitally Savvy: The Rise of the New Marketing Organization, there were some key findings: The travel industry is a clear leader in achieving competitive advantage through data-driven marketing. Sixty-seven percent of travel executives say they have done so in customer engagement/loyalty, 56% in new customers and 59% in customer satisfaction.
With more travelers turning to the internet and mobile to get ideas, inspiration, and options for their trips. There’s more data on each customer from their searches, saved preferences and previous travels. This event covers data analytics, revenue management, marketing analytics and artificial intelligence and personlizartion. Data is where it’s all at – see how you can leverage data to get up close and personal with your customer.
EyeforTravel are excited about this shift towards smart data and have positioned their EyeForTravel Smart Travel Data Summit Miami (Feb 27-28) to focus on just that, and are even offering a sneak peak of their attendee list early.
The event will have 120+ travel data decision makers to help brands identify the data, technology, partners and strategies that you need to grow revenues in the mobile-first world!
To shed light on who will be at the event, Tim Gunstone the Managing Director for EyeforTravel said " “We’re excited to be welcoming back executives from Southwest Airlines, Wyndham, AirBnb, Booking.com, Hilton Hotels, the Travel Corporation, Allegiant, Priceline, Winding Tree and a lot more”
He went onto to say, “We don’t usually release our delegate list this early but we want to shout about this event, we have over 80 people in, and thought we should share it, to give others the chance to book in early and manage their meetings too!”
Need a bit more convincing?
- Look who you could meet and learn from: Airbnb, Amazon, Air Canada, Hilton, Delta Airlines, Mozio, HQ Revenue, Southwest Airlines, Priceline, McKinsey, Amperity, Lufthansa and more
- Test your data strategy with insights from across the travel market to discuss everything from personalization, artificial intelligence, revenue analytics, blockchain, GDPR, data talent acquisition, data integration, marketing analytics to enhance the customer experience and so much more!
- Get your data and commercial teams talking to see your analytics insights take off. Reach those new levels of personalization and discuss the best attribution models on market today!
Learn more about who is attending the Smart Travel Data 2018 in event in sunny Miami here: http://events.eyefortravel.com/smart-travel-data-summit-north-america/
If you are a hotel – cruise or airline – contact the team for discounts
Contact the team directly at – shreya@eyefortravel.com
The hotel that talks back is the future
Hotels are only just beginning to deploy chatbots and smart speakers but these early experiments herald the beginning of a major shift in guest communications finds The Future of the In-Stay Experience report, which is free to download now.
The hotel of the future might become an interlinked artificial intelligence that can speak back to the guest through speakers and chatbots to suggest activities to the guest, answer their queries and solve their complaints says the report. Using AI-powered voice and chat capabilities to do these tasks provides more convenient channels for guest interactions that can not only improve satisfaction with their stay but also drive revenues.
Both chatbots and voice systems working through smart speakers can be integrated into a whole system, recording all requests and integrated into a Property Management System (PMS). Largely these early investigations into interactive AI are as smart concierges for hotels, with both big and independent chains deploying the tech.
“We created a conversation concierge so that people can get all of their informational experience through channels they are more used to operating. It delivers specific responses very quickly. It positions the hotel as a trusted advisor,” says Charles Cadbury, Co-Founder of Dazzle Technology, a start-up that implements and operates smart speakers for the hospitality industry.
“Hotels are able to listen to what the guests want and get real time data of who is asking for what and when. Then they can make real time adjustments to their product or services to cater to those requests.”
The other benefit of offering these services out to guests through voice or chat interfaces is that hotels staff are alleviated of a lot of mundane tasks and can really focus on delivering a high quality of service to guests.
Jeffrey Parker, Vice President of Hospitality Systems, Red Lion Hotels Corporation, says that, according to experts, between 50-75% of guest questions can be responded to by a Bot. “This can relieve questions to the desk staff and other departments. The appropriate way to do it is to also link to your service app infrastructure and have a warm hand-off to a real person.”
“Conversation allows you to ask very specific answers in a type of communication you are most comfortable with,” says Cadbury. “And because it’s not a live conversation, you’re not tying up staff on the phone.”
However, Parker has a warning: “Don’t ever let your app pretend to be a real person. Be transparent with your guests.” (For more on chatbots click here for our free report).
The human element is also still highly relevant in creating the background that can make these interactive AIs possible. Humans are necessary to create a culture of recording and measuring guest interactions and building up the background data. IHG used their customer service call centres to help build up their Alexa offering, for example.
“The best way to build a picture of the guest is to leverage the hotel’s greatest assets, their people, to capture every seemingly relevant detail humans need to build personal relationships,” says Armand Rabinowitz, Senior Director of Strategy and Workgroups at Hospitality Technology Next Generation (HTNG).
Similar to putting a data strategy in place, hotels need to think about the individual guest when implementing voice and chat functions. Hotels can’t just charge in and introduce voice to every room and client, privacy issues are at play too. “We need to take clues from the guest and offer services based on what profile we think they are, but not to the extent we ruin that relationship,” says Parker. Hotels need to offer guests the choice and respect their decision if they ask for connected devices to be removed. Chains such as Marriott and IHG are working closely with Amazon to develop solutions that provide the guests with a seamless experience while also protecting their privacy. Data collection and privacy issues will only be highlighted as the EU’s GDPR regulation comes into force warns the report.
To download The Future of In-Stay Technology report for free, click here.
We have also covered voice technology and its implications for travel in a dedicated new report on the topic, which is free to download now here, as well as chatbots, which can be downloaded here.
The hotel of the future might become an interlinked artificial intelligence that can speak back to the guest through speakers and chatbots to suggest activities to the guest, answer their queries and solve their complaints says the report. Using AI-powered voice and chat capabilities to do these tasks provides more convenient channels for guest interactions that can not only improve satisfaction with their stay but also drive revenues.
Both chatbots and voice systems working through smart speakers can be integrated into a whole system, recording all requests and integrated into a Property Management System (PMS). Largely these early investigations into interactive AI are as smart concierges for hotels, with both big and independent chains deploying the tech.
“We created a conversation concierge so that people can get all of their informational experience through channels they are more used to operating. It delivers specific responses very quickly. It positions the hotel as a trusted advisor,” says Charles Cadbury, Co-Founder of Dazzle Technology, a start-up that implements and operates smart speakers for the hospitality industry.
“Hotels are able to listen to what the guests want and get real time data of who is asking for what and when. Then they can make real time adjustments to their product or services to cater to those requests.”
The other benefit of offering these services out to guests through voice or chat interfaces is that hotels staff are alleviated of a lot of mundane tasks and can really focus on delivering a high quality of service to guests.
Jeffrey Parker, Vice President of Hospitality Systems, Red Lion Hotels Corporation, says that, according to experts, between 50-75% of guest questions can be responded to by a Bot. “This can relieve questions to the desk staff and other departments. The appropriate way to do it is to also link to your service app infrastructure and have a warm hand-off to a real person.”
“Conversation allows you to ask very specific answers in a type of communication you are most comfortable with,” says Cadbury. “And because it’s not a live conversation, you’re not tying up staff on the phone.”
However, Parker has a warning: “Don’t ever let your app pretend to be a real person. Be transparent with your guests.” (For more on chatbots click here for our free report).
The human element is also still highly relevant in creating the background that can make these interactive AIs possible. Humans are necessary to create a culture of recording and measuring guest interactions and building up the background data. IHG used their customer service call centres to help build up their Alexa offering, for example.
“The best way to build a picture of the guest is to leverage the hotel’s greatest assets, their people, to capture every seemingly relevant detail humans need to build personal relationships,” says Armand Rabinowitz, Senior Director of Strategy and Workgroups at Hospitality Technology Next Generation (HTNG).
Similar to putting a data strategy in place, hotels need to think about the individual guest when implementing voice and chat functions. Hotels can’t just charge in and introduce voice to every room and client, privacy issues are at play too. “We need to take clues from the guest and offer services based on what profile we think they are, but not to the extent we ruin that relationship,” says Parker. Hotels need to offer guests the choice and respect their decision if they ask for connected devices to be removed. Chains such as Marriott and IHG are working closely with Amazon to develop solutions that provide the guests with a seamless experience while also protecting their privacy. Data collection and privacy issues will only be highlighted as the EU’s GDPR regulation comes into force warns the report.
To download The Future of In-Stay Technology report for free, click here.
We have also covered voice technology and its implications for travel in a dedicated new report on the topic, which is free to download now here, as well as chatbots, which can be downloaded here.
Could hotels’ secret weapon be in-stay technology?
As hotels fight for guests’ loyalty, could the technology they use during the guests’ stay be the superweapon to turn the tide in their favour?
Hotels are fighting hard for customers and currently a lot of that effort goes into getting their marketing in front of guests’ eyeballs and winning the booking. However, the one period hotels have the guest completely to themselves is during the stay itself. Here, technology, both at the customers fingertips and behind the scenes, is now capable of making a real difference and winning over the customer’s loyalty says EyeforTravel’s new free report, The Future of In-Stay Technology.
Principally this technology is about putting the hotels services’ at the guest’s fingertips. These range from apps that can allow the guest to immediately receive answers to their questions any time of the day or night and book any on-site or arrange of external experiences. Tablets that can control an entire room’s features, such as lights, temperature, curtains, the TV and more. Smartphones that come with the room so that the guest can be connected to services whenever they need. These technologies are putting the hotel’s capabilities back in front of the guest whilst making their stay a more convenient and comfortable experience.
Furthermore, these technologies not only help hotels serve guests better and improve their ratings, they present enormous upsell opportunities that can help restore those all-important margins. If a hotel has managed to get a device with its app into the hands of a consumer, then they can use this to send them push notifications about key services. Chatbots and smart speakers can take user requests and once a hotel has gathered enough data, use this to make recommendations based on similar requests and customer profiles. Smarter in-room devices can put the hotel back into position as the local expert again and allow them to monetise local experiences, tours and activities.
Critically these technologies are also all gathering data around every guest interaction and many are capable of categorising and using this data in an automated manner. “Whilst I often hear complaints in the hospitality industry that the big online players have a data advantage that they can’t compete with – and to some extent that is true – this is finally a chance for hotels to turn the tables,” says Alex Hadwick, Head of Research for EyeforTravel. “Detailed guest preferences are a valuable thing and not only are you elevating the customer experience, your reinforcing that your hotel is delivering the service, not the intermediary. Smart tech in the hotel is a better way of gathering, storing and utilising key information that an OTA doesn’t have.”
Data gathered can not only be used as mentioned above for providing guests with services but also behind the scenes to improve staff performance. Connected technologies provide alerts on guest requests, enabling service to be immediate. They also provide transparency between the guest and property, and with back of house operations. Departments know what is being worked on, when and when it is complete and from a single source, heling to eliminate confusion. From a property-wide perspective, Internet of Things (IoT) devices can help with scheduling the regular maintenance of and other engineering works through notification of flaws, or simply let the hotel know when the guest is outside of their room through door entry monitoring, making service seamless and more efficient.
According to Pablo Rodríguez, Marketing Manager at Stay, smarter communications between guest and hotel, such as through a chatbot, “Eliminates mundane tasks, allowing the staff members to focus on valuable actions that cannot be automated.”
“These days everyone is so familiar with messaging as a means to communicate. Hotels are finding it easier to deal with five customers directly in their rooms via chat channels, instead of having five customers standing behind a reception counter,” explains Hammad Hussain, Managing Director of UK and Ireland, Tink Labs.
All of these innovations are adding up to a smarter, more responsive hotel that can take the fight back to the online environment and re-establish the relationship between guest and their stay.
To download The Future of In-Stay Technology report for free, click here.
Hotels are fighting hard for customers and currently a lot of that effort goes into getting their marketing in front of guests’ eyeballs and winning the booking. However, the one period hotels have the guest completely to themselves is during the stay itself. Here, technology, both at the customers fingertips and behind the scenes, is now capable of making a real difference and winning over the customer’s loyalty says EyeforTravel’s new free report, The Future of In-Stay Technology.
Principally this technology is about putting the hotels services’ at the guest’s fingertips. These range from apps that can allow the guest to immediately receive answers to their questions any time of the day or night and book any on-site or arrange of external experiences. Tablets that can control an entire room’s features, such as lights, temperature, curtains, the TV and more. Smartphones that come with the room so that the guest can be connected to services whenever they need. These technologies are putting the hotel’s capabilities back in front of the guest whilst making their stay a more convenient and comfortable experience.
Furthermore, these technologies not only help hotels serve guests better and improve their ratings, they present enormous upsell opportunities that can help restore those all-important margins. If a hotel has managed to get a device with its app into the hands of a consumer, then they can use this to send them push notifications about key services. Chatbots and smart speakers can take user requests and once a hotel has gathered enough data, use this to make recommendations based on similar requests and customer profiles. Smarter in-room devices can put the hotel back into position as the local expert again and allow them to monetise local experiences, tours and activities.
Critically these technologies are also all gathering data around every guest interaction and many are capable of categorising and using this data in an automated manner. “Whilst I often hear complaints in the hospitality industry that the big online players have a data advantage that they can’t compete with – and to some extent that is true – this is finally a chance for hotels to turn the tables,” says Alex Hadwick, Head of Research for EyeforTravel. “Detailed guest preferences are a valuable thing and not only are you elevating the customer experience, your reinforcing that your hotel is delivering the service, not the intermediary. Smart tech in the hotel is a better way of gathering, storing and utilising key information that an OTA doesn’t have.”
Data gathered can not only be used as mentioned above for providing guests with services but also behind the scenes to improve staff performance. Connected technologies provide alerts on guest requests, enabling service to be immediate. They also provide transparency between the guest and property, and with back of house operations. Departments know what is being worked on, when and when it is complete and from a single source, heling to eliminate confusion. From a property-wide perspective, Internet of Things (IoT) devices can help with scheduling the regular maintenance of and other engineering works through notification of flaws, or simply let the hotel know when the guest is outside of their room through door entry monitoring, making service seamless and more efficient.
According to Pablo Rodríguez, Marketing Manager at Stay, smarter communications between guest and hotel, such as through a chatbot, “Eliminates mundane tasks, allowing the staff members to focus on valuable actions that cannot be automated.”
“These days everyone is so familiar with messaging as a means to communicate. Hotels are finding it easier to deal with five customers directly in their rooms via chat channels, instead of having five customers standing behind a reception counter,” explains Hammad Hussain, Managing Director of UK and Ireland, Tink Labs.
All of these innovations are adding up to a smarter, more responsive hotel that can take the fight back to the online environment and re-establish the relationship between guest and their stay.
To download The Future of In-Stay Technology report for free, click here.
Does loyalty matter any more in travel?
Loyalty is a hot topic in travel but are travel brands trying to win a losing battle as consumers shift from brand to brand and is their anything they can do to promote loyalty?
It’s expensive business to find a customer and win their booking in travel as multi-channel marketing and technology costs rise. Therefore, travel brands are taking loyalty extremely seriously as a key way of improving profitability, but are they succeeding and at what cost?
EyeforTravel is trying to find out with a new survey and we need your help to get to the bottom of the state of loyalty in travel in 2018.
So, if you are consumer-facing travel brand, click here to answer the survey, which is just 8 short questions, so it will take less than two minutes to answer.
As a way of saying thanks, we will send you the results before anyone else, so you can benchmark your performance. We will also send you free copies of the reports on completion, and you can get access to all of the video presentations and slides from our recent Vegas and Amsterdam Summits just by leaving your email at the end of the survey.
We are also investigating mobile marketing and messaging, which you can help us with by clicking here to answer our mobile survey.
It’s expensive business to find a customer and win their booking in travel as multi-channel marketing and technology costs rise. Therefore, travel brands are taking loyalty extremely seriously as a key way of improving profitability, but are they succeeding and at what cost?
EyeforTravel is trying to find out with a new survey and we need your help to get to the bottom of the state of loyalty in travel in 2018.
So, if you are consumer-facing travel brand, click here to answer the survey, which is just 8 short questions, so it will take less than two minutes to answer.
As a way of saying thanks, we will send you the results before anyone else, so you can benchmark your performance. We will also send you free copies of the reports on completion, and you can get access to all of the video presentations and slides from our recent Vegas and Amsterdam Summits just by leaving your email at the end of the survey.
We are also investigating mobile marketing and messaging, which you can help us with by clicking here to answer our mobile survey.
What mobile strategies are succeeding?
As travellers’ eyeballs are increasingly captured by smartphones, what should travel brands do to get in front of them and where should they be putting their dollars?
Apps, mobile advertising, messaging, location tracking, mobile sites, QR codes – the proliferation of mobile technology can seem bewildering. So, in order to find out what strategies are succeeding and how brands should be reaching travellers we are conducting a major mobile survey.
Click here to answer the survey, which is just 12 questions long, so it will take less than two minutes to answer.
Topics we want to answer include app adoption, mobile messaging services, lead times, mobile marketing method, investment areas, and more.
As a way of saying thanks for answering, we will send you the results before anyone else, so you can benchmark your performance. We will also send you free copies of the reports on completion, and you can get access to all of the video presentations and slides from our recent Vegas and Amsterdam Summits just by leaving your email at the end of the survey.
We are also investigating the topic of loyalty, which you can help us with by clicking here for our state of loyalty in travel survey.
Apps, mobile advertising, messaging, location tracking, mobile sites, QR codes – the proliferation of mobile technology can seem bewildering. So, in order to find out what strategies are succeeding and how brands should be reaching travellers we are conducting a major mobile survey.
Click here to answer the survey, which is just 12 questions long, so it will take less than two minutes to answer.
Topics we want to answer include app adoption, mobile messaging services, lead times, mobile marketing method, investment areas, and more.
As a way of saying thanks for answering, we will send you the results before anyone else, so you can benchmark your performance. We will also send you free copies of the reports on completion, and you can get access to all of the video presentations and slides from our recent Vegas and Amsterdam Summits just by leaving your email at the end of the survey.
We are also investigating the topic of loyalty, which you can help us with by clicking here for our state of loyalty in travel survey.
Priceline’s Meituan investment is a big deal
Priceline has long been one of the smartest players when it comes to mergers and acquisitions and it looks to have made another key move with its recent investment into Meituan-Dianping finds EyeforTravel’s new report into the company.
Priceline just strengthened its Chinese market position by investing into Meituan-Dianping, one of the fastest growing players in the Chinese digital space, showing its ambition in international expansion and giving it a new edge says the report into the online giant. In October 2017 Meituan-Dianping announced the investment as part of Series C funding into the start-up, which brings together group buying, booking and reviews.
It is a rapidly rising power in Chinese online travel thought to be behind only Ctrip and Qunar. Reportedly, Meituan-Dianping recorded more than 18 million room night bookings in July 2017 alone and claims to have meteoric growth rates that are quickly making it one of the world’s top start-ups by reported valuation. In the latest round of investment the company was able to raise USD4 billion, giving it an estimated value of around USD30 billion – a valuation that would put it among the biggest of the emerging tech companies and perhaps even bigger than Airbnb.
Although Priceline has a comparatively small stake in the company, with its investment reportedly valued at USD450 million, it also announced that it was to create a distribution partnership between the company’s travel division and Priceline’s main Asian arm, Agoda. This is potentially more crucial than the investment itself and likely what Priceline was mainly looking to get at in the funding round.
“Now, Priceline has a fantastic presence in Asia-Pacific through Agoda, its partnership with Ctrip, and now this additional investment,” says Alex Hadwick, Head of Research at EyeforTravel. “It is therefore sitting on a well-fortified position within the market space and is also hoping to grow its Booking.com presence in the country with a local team. What’s more it has been able to achieve this without having to put in the huge sums other international tech giants have made into market. Famously Uber invested billions before conceding to local competition, so Priceline are able to minimise risk through their network of investments while growing market penetration.”
With a predicted Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of more than 8% between 2017 and 2020 and even a faster growing domestic market, the attraction is obvious for Priceline and getting involved with local players at this stage could be crucial as EyeforTravel’s research suggests that more than seven out of ten digital travel bookings in China are made with Online Travel Agencies (OTAs).
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
Priceline just strengthened its Chinese market position by investing into Meituan-Dianping, one of the fastest growing players in the Chinese digital space, showing its ambition in international expansion and giving it a new edge says the report into the online giant. In October 2017 Meituan-Dianping announced the investment as part of Series C funding into the start-up, which brings together group buying, booking and reviews.
It is a rapidly rising power in Chinese online travel thought to be behind only Ctrip and Qunar. Reportedly, Meituan-Dianping recorded more than 18 million room night bookings in July 2017 alone and claims to have meteoric growth rates that are quickly making it one of the world’s top start-ups by reported valuation. In the latest round of investment the company was able to raise USD4 billion, giving it an estimated value of around USD30 billion – a valuation that would put it among the biggest of the emerging tech companies and perhaps even bigger than Airbnb.
Although Priceline has a comparatively small stake in the company, with its investment reportedly valued at USD450 million, it also announced that it was to create a distribution partnership between the company’s travel division and Priceline’s main Asian arm, Agoda. This is potentially more crucial than the investment itself and likely what Priceline was mainly looking to get at in the funding round.
“Now, Priceline has a fantastic presence in Asia-Pacific through Agoda, its partnership with Ctrip, and now this additional investment,” says Alex Hadwick, Head of Research at EyeforTravel. “It is therefore sitting on a well-fortified position within the market space and is also hoping to grow its Booking.com presence in the country with a local team. What’s more it has been able to achieve this without having to put in the huge sums other international tech giants have made into market. Famously Uber invested billions before conceding to local competition, so Priceline are able to minimise risk through their network of investments while growing market penetration.”
With a predicted Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of more than 8% between 2017 and 2020 and even a faster growing domestic market, the attraction is obvious for Priceline and getting involved with local players at this stage could be crucial as EyeforTravel’s research suggests that more than seven out of ten digital travel bookings in China are made with Online Travel Agencies (OTAs).
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
Can Expedia transition to the travel industry’s tech partner?
A transition appears to be underway as Expedia increases the number of technology solutions it offers and builds partnerships out across the industry but will this strategy succeed asks EyeforTravel’s new report into the online giant?
A subtle change appears to have happened in the online travel environment. Emboldened by changes to regulatory frameworks, new technologies and growing revenues, travel suppliers are fighting to claw back market share. In response, Expedia appears to be pushing a new strategy to ensure future growth by growing its partnerships and services to support the industry according to a new report into the company.
Expedia sees opportunities in facilitating services in the travel industry and mobilizing its technical expertise to enhance its position at the center of travel distribution through partnerships and offering a full spectrum of travel products that are personalized for consumers, whether they are buying a hotel room, rail ticket or a whole package.
Most notably this can be seen in the roll out of new products and options for partners across 2016 and 2017. They have worked to give access to inventory and have invested in white-label technology, including for hotel loyalty, and also on advertising products. These have included:· Private Label Packages: Expedia worked with Marriott to create Marriott Vacations where the hotel chain uses a dynamic packaging platform powered by Expedia so their customers can book flights with accommodation, and earn Marriott Rewards when they book. Expedia has since built this out into a white-label option and has signed on Barceló and Omni Hotels & Resorts to the dynamic packaging system. · Partner Loyalty Enrollment: Red Lion Hotels initially kicked off this development as the first to have its own loyalty scheme actively promoted by Expedia in search results. Expedia claimed that there were three hotel chains signed up in August 2017 to the product, which allows users to enlist bookers directly to their loyalty programs from Expedia sites and in December 2017 announced that G6 Hospitality had signed up to the scheme. · MICE Booking Technology: Expedia began testing their new MICE platform in mid-2017 and are hoping for a major roll-out in the near future. The system is a front-end booking tool and a back-end management and analytics platform. · Rev+: This is a B2B service for revenue managers of hotels, free to those already part of its distribution network, that runs of Expedia data and appears to be an attempt to provide a rival to BookingSuite. · TravelAds Direct: Seemingly a reaction to book direct efforts, especially as Expedia’s official release stated that it offers “easier price comparison for consumers, and more potential brand touch points, bookings, and loyalty for hotels,” TravelAds Direct is CPC advertising that refers to hotel brand sites. · Accelerator: Finalized in Q4 2015, this product allows hotels to bid against each other, transforming the search results into a marketplace where hotels pay commissions for the top listings, increasing their chance to be booked by a traveler. This could be part of their strategy to compensate for lowering ADRs, as well as gain a share of online advertising revenues and sweat the assets of their platforms.
The number of products and interest in pushing these out to major partners suggests a larger strategic focus on the area and a divergence from the approach of its biggest competitor, Priceline. Expedia has long thought of itself as a full-service travel agency, providing products that cover the entire travel spectrum. However, this advantage has narrowed as a growing universe of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and cloud platforms allows smaller players to access far more inventory than they previously would be able to. Whereas setting up agreements to sell car rentals, flights, or tour activities would have been technically and legally arduous to set up for a smaller travel company, they can now work through third parties and a single agreement can open up a global supply network.
“Embedding in a network of partnerships across the industry and supplying partners will help to insulate Expedia from disruption across the market and supplement their traditional OTA business,” says Alex Hadwick, Head of Research at EyeforTravel. “How successful they will be in this endeavour remains to be seen, as suppliers may prefer to take the fight to OTAs and keep them at an arm’s length in the battle for customer bookings and loyalty. However, a number of big names, including Marriott, Thomas Cook and Norwegian have signed on to various partnerships in the last 12 months, which will offer encouragement.”
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
A subtle change appears to have happened in the online travel environment. Emboldened by changes to regulatory frameworks, new technologies and growing revenues, travel suppliers are fighting to claw back market share. In response, Expedia appears to be pushing a new strategy to ensure future growth by growing its partnerships and services to support the industry according to a new report into the company.
Expedia sees opportunities in facilitating services in the travel industry and mobilizing its technical expertise to enhance its position at the center of travel distribution through partnerships and offering a full spectrum of travel products that are personalized for consumers, whether they are buying a hotel room, rail ticket or a whole package.
Most notably this can be seen in the roll out of new products and options for partners across 2016 and 2017. They have worked to give access to inventory and have invested in white-label technology, including for hotel loyalty, and also on advertising products. These have included:· Private Label Packages: Expedia worked with Marriott to create Marriott Vacations where the hotel chain uses a dynamic packaging platform powered by Expedia so their customers can book flights with accommodation, and earn Marriott Rewards when they book. Expedia has since built this out into a white-label option and has signed on Barceló and Omni Hotels & Resorts to the dynamic packaging system. · Partner Loyalty Enrollment: Red Lion Hotels initially kicked off this development as the first to have its own loyalty scheme actively promoted by Expedia in search results. Expedia claimed that there were three hotel chains signed up in August 2017 to the product, which allows users to enlist bookers directly to their loyalty programs from Expedia sites and in December 2017 announced that G6 Hospitality had signed up to the scheme. · MICE Booking Technology: Expedia began testing their new MICE platform in mid-2017 and are hoping for a major roll-out in the near future. The system is a front-end booking tool and a back-end management and analytics platform. · Rev+: This is a B2B service for revenue managers of hotels, free to those already part of its distribution network, that runs of Expedia data and appears to be an attempt to provide a rival to BookingSuite. · TravelAds Direct: Seemingly a reaction to book direct efforts, especially as Expedia’s official release stated that it offers “easier price comparison for consumers, and more potential brand touch points, bookings, and loyalty for hotels,” TravelAds Direct is CPC advertising that refers to hotel brand sites. · Accelerator: Finalized in Q4 2015, this product allows hotels to bid against each other, transforming the search results into a marketplace where hotels pay commissions for the top listings, increasing their chance to be booked by a traveler. This could be part of their strategy to compensate for lowering ADRs, as well as gain a share of online advertising revenues and sweat the assets of their platforms.
The number of products and interest in pushing these out to major partners suggests a larger strategic focus on the area and a divergence from the approach of its biggest competitor, Priceline. Expedia has long thought of itself as a full-service travel agency, providing products that cover the entire travel spectrum. However, this advantage has narrowed as a growing universe of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and cloud platforms allows smaller players to access far more inventory than they previously would be able to. Whereas setting up agreements to sell car rentals, flights, or tour activities would have been technically and legally arduous to set up for a smaller travel company, they can now work through third parties and a single agreement can open up a global supply network.
“Embedding in a network of partnerships across the industry and supplying partners will help to insulate Expedia from disruption across the market and supplement their traditional OTA business,” says Alex Hadwick, Head of Research at EyeforTravel. “How successful they will be in this endeavour remains to be seen, as suppliers may prefer to take the fight to OTAs and keep them at an arm’s length in the battle for customer bookings and loyalty. However, a number of big names, including Marriott, Thomas Cook and Norwegian have signed on to various partnerships in the last 12 months, which will offer encouragement.”
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
Priceline and Expedia continue to grow but at what cost?
They are still growing strongly, but Priceline and Expedia are increasingly reliant on marketing spend to drive expansion and this could leave them with vulnerabilities, finds EyeforTravel’s new reports into the two companies.
Both Priceline and Expedia continued to post some impressive growth numbers in their Q3 results, with double digit rises in gross bookings but these increases appear to come at an ever-increasing cost and concern is rising among investors. EyeforTravel’s new reports into both Expediaand Pricelinefinds that investors are right to be concerned as this is a potential weakness for both companies that empowers potential rivals in the form of the main digital advertising giants Facebook and Google.
Both companies saw soaring costs in 2016 continue into 2017 and appear to be trapped in a competitive spiral, focusing on matching increases in the other’s marketing spend for fear of falling behind. In 2016, Priceline increased its brand advertising spend by 8% and performance advertising by 27%, whilst Expedia saw selling and marketing costs rise by 29%. Through the first three quarters of 2017, marketing spend by Priceline has grown by 22%. In percentage terms this matches a 22% increase in the broader ‘selling and marketing’ element of Expedia’s costs across the same time frame. For the latter, selling and marketing costs now make up more than 55% of the company’s overall costs, whilst Priceline's combined selling and advertising costs make up 70% of overall costs.
There can be little doubt that the majority of this spend is heading over to Google, with Priceline appearing to be the more reliant on the search giant currently. Around three quarters of search engine traffic to Booking.com is generated via paid advertising, as compared to around half for Expedia. This also comes despite Expedia paying less in advertising than Priceline but is nonetheless a concern for both companies as Google continues to relentlessly but quietly ramp up its travel products.
Not only are the two facing pressure from each other and the online travel agency market, but increasing pressure from their suppliers as well, as they try to recapture market share through book direct campaigns. Most of the major chains have initiated these alongside a broader consideration of what loyalty means in the industry. Combine this with a more combative regulatory environment in Europe, with wide price parity agreements being eroded, and what they will get is more competing forces for keywords and users’ attention across a wider number of search terms.
This has caused ripples on Wall Streets, with analysts focusing in on the growing costs and their effect on the bottom line as profit expectations are missed. After Q3 2017 earnings call for both companies, stocks plummeted, falling nearly 16% for Expedia the day following the call on 27thOctober and 13% for Priceline on 7th November. For Priceline this mimicked a similar stock drop following the Q2 earnings call, highlighting investor concerns.
Investor concern is unlikely to dissipate as these two are reaching such gigantic proportions that their growth is likely to slow naturally anyway and there doesn’t seem to be a way out of the marketing spend increases on the near horizon, with search engine marketing critical to their business models. Indeed, currently their ability to outbid almost any other player when required and their vast data regarding search term effectiveness currently makes this arena a competitive advantage for both players.
Nonetheless, the question remains, at what cost? It will be critical to continue to monitor marketing spend for both over the coming years to see what the limits of sustainability and effectiveness are. As the competition intensifies across the digital travel space and tech giants eye travel
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
Both Priceline and Expedia continued to post some impressive growth numbers in their Q3 results, with double digit rises in gross bookings but these increases appear to come at an ever-increasing cost and concern is rising among investors. EyeforTravel’s new reports into both Expediaand Pricelinefinds that investors are right to be concerned as this is a potential weakness for both companies that empowers potential rivals in the form of the main digital advertising giants Facebook and Google.
Both companies saw soaring costs in 2016 continue into 2017 and appear to be trapped in a competitive spiral, focusing on matching increases in the other’s marketing spend for fear of falling behind. In 2016, Priceline increased its brand advertising spend by 8% and performance advertising by 27%, whilst Expedia saw selling and marketing costs rise by 29%. Through the first three quarters of 2017, marketing spend by Priceline has grown by 22%. In percentage terms this matches a 22% increase in the broader ‘selling and marketing’ element of Expedia’s costs across the same time frame. For the latter, selling and marketing costs now make up more than 55% of the company’s overall costs, whilst Priceline's combined selling and advertising costs make up 70% of overall costs.
There can be little doubt that the majority of this spend is heading over to Google, with Priceline appearing to be the more reliant on the search giant currently. Around three quarters of search engine traffic to Booking.com is generated via paid advertising, as compared to around half for Expedia. This also comes despite Expedia paying less in advertising than Priceline but is nonetheless a concern for both companies as Google continues to relentlessly but quietly ramp up its travel products.
Not only are the two facing pressure from each other and the online travel agency market, but increasing pressure from their suppliers as well, as they try to recapture market share through book direct campaigns. Most of the major chains have initiated these alongside a broader consideration of what loyalty means in the industry. Combine this with a more combative regulatory environment in Europe, with wide price parity agreements being eroded, and what they will get is more competing forces for keywords and users’ attention across a wider number of search terms.
This has caused ripples on Wall Streets, with analysts focusing in on the growing costs and their effect on the bottom line as profit expectations are missed. After Q3 2017 earnings call for both companies, stocks plummeted, falling nearly 16% for Expedia the day following the call on 27thOctober and 13% for Priceline on 7th November. For Priceline this mimicked a similar stock drop following the Q2 earnings call, highlighting investor concerns.
Investor concern is unlikely to dissipate as these two are reaching such gigantic proportions that their growth is likely to slow naturally anyway and there doesn’t seem to be a way out of the marketing spend increases on the near horizon, with search engine marketing critical to their business models. Indeed, currently their ability to outbid almost any other player when required and their vast data regarding search term effectiveness currently makes this arena a competitive advantage for both players.
Nonetheless, the question remains, at what cost? It will be critical to continue to monitor marketing spend for both over the coming years to see what the limits of sustainability and effectiveness are. As the competition intensifies across the digital travel space and tech giants eye travel
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
China is Expedia’s Achilles heel
Expedia wants to expand outside the North America but making inroads into the world’s most influential travel market will be a tough ask in the face of increasingly fierce competition finds EyeforTravel’s new report into Expedia.
With a projected compound annual growth rate in outbound journeys of 8% to 2020 and an even faster growing domestic market, Expedia needs to get a slice of the Chinese market but since its sale of eLong, the competition has only got stronger and it may be too late to make inroads according to EyeforTravel’s new report into the company.
Expedia faces not only a series of rapidly growing brands that are beginning to establish themselves but an increasingly interconnected web of investments between these players that threatens to lock them out of the market. The key player is Ctrip, which is now reaching a point of near-dominance in the market. Other key brands in the market include Qunar, eLong, Tujia, Alitrip, and Meituan-Dianping, making it a competitive market place, but already several of these brands are falling under key rivals. Ctrip is the biggest player in the field, snapping up Expedia’s former brand in China, eLong, alongside Qunar, and it also has a subtantial investment into Tujia.
Expedia’s great rival Priceline is also deeply embedded into the market. It has investments and distribution partnerships with both Ctrip and Meituan-Dianping, tapping into two already key players, with explosive growth rates. In the case of Ctrip, Priceline’s investment gives them up to 15% of the shares in the company and also an observer on Ctrip’s board, allowing them a degree of influence in the company, one that is unlikely to be friendly to Expedia.
Although Expedia’s weakness in the market is noticeable, it’s not just Expedia that has struggled in the Chinese market. Other tech giants, such as Uber and even Google, failed to truly make inroads despite putting in big investments, emphasizing the complexity and unique dynamics of the market. It appears that for now Expedia is choosing to focus on other Asian markets, recently announcing that it is investing into regional OTA player Traveloka. Traveloka focuses on Southeast Asia and Expedia reported in 2017 that the area is its fastest growing regional market.
Nonetheless, the situation leaves Expedia largely bereft of options to open up the Chinese market currently and potentially facing a very large bill if they do want to establish themselves, both in marketing and platform terms. However, one potential route in the long term might be through its investment into SilverRail. Rail travel is already critical in China, making up the largest segment of the digital travel market in the country and is set to grow substantially in the coming years. A foothold in rail therefore could be a key competitive advantage, especially as Priceline is so heavily focused on accommodation and not as diversified in terms of revenue streams as Expedia. However, it remains a longshot in the context of an increasingly powerful number of localized and interconnected players.
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
With a projected compound annual growth rate in outbound journeys of 8% to 2020 and an even faster growing domestic market, Expedia needs to get a slice of the Chinese market but since its sale of eLong, the competition has only got stronger and it may be too late to make inroads according to EyeforTravel’s new report into the company.
Expedia faces not only a series of rapidly growing brands that are beginning to establish themselves but an increasingly interconnected web of investments between these players that threatens to lock them out of the market. The key player is Ctrip, which is now reaching a point of near-dominance in the market. Other key brands in the market include Qunar, eLong, Tujia, Alitrip, and Meituan-Dianping, making it a competitive market place, but already several of these brands are falling under key rivals. Ctrip is the biggest player in the field, snapping up Expedia’s former brand in China, eLong, alongside Qunar, and it also has a subtantial investment into Tujia.
Expedia’s great rival Priceline is also deeply embedded into the market. It has investments and distribution partnerships with both Ctrip and Meituan-Dianping, tapping into two already key players, with explosive growth rates. In the case of Ctrip, Priceline’s investment gives them up to 15% of the shares in the company and also an observer on Ctrip’s board, allowing them a degree of influence in the company, one that is unlikely to be friendly to Expedia.
Although Expedia’s weakness in the market is noticeable, it’s not just Expedia that has struggled in the Chinese market. Other tech giants, such as Uber and even Google, failed to truly make inroads despite putting in big investments, emphasizing the complexity and unique dynamics of the market. It appears that for now Expedia is choosing to focus on other Asian markets, recently announcing that it is investing into regional OTA player Traveloka. Traveloka focuses on Southeast Asia and Expedia reported in 2017 that the area is its fastest growing regional market.
Nonetheless, the situation leaves Expedia largely bereft of options to open up the Chinese market currently and potentially facing a very large bill if they do want to establish themselves, both in marketing and platform terms. However, one potential route in the long term might be through its investment into SilverRail. Rail travel is already critical in China, making up the largest segment of the digital travel market in the country and is set to grow substantially in the coming years. A foothold in rail therefore could be a key competitive advantage, especially as Priceline is so heavily focused on accommodation and not as diversified in terms of revenue streams as Expedia. However, it remains a longshot in the context of an increasingly powerful number of localized and interconnected players.
To preview and buy EyeforTravel’s Expedia report, click here, or here for the Priceline report. These are part of the Future of the Online Giants series, which will cover Expedia, Priceline, TripAdvisor, Ctrip and Google. Keep a look out through EyeforTravel On Demand for the rest of these reports.
Are hotels focusing enough on the stay?
The following is the introduction from EyeforTravel's new the Future of the In-Stay Experience report.
Hospitality businesses live and die by their reputations but are accommodation brands really focusing enough on the one moment where they have the guest’s complete and undivided attention: The stay itself? It is these crucial moments when they interact to request a service, such as check-in, a spa treatment or for local recommendations, that will last longest in the guest’s memory.
Now, there are new possibilities to improve the guest experience as technologies open up and fall in cost. The future of the stay will be one where the guest can use their own device to interact directly with the hotel’s staff or even the hotel itself through AI-powered interfaces. Customers will be able to call on far more services, and staff will be more connected and effective.
Hospitality companies’ key objectives currently are to drive loyalty and improve the customer experience in the hope that this will drive down acquisition costs by creating repeat guests. Although the pre-stay digital area is important and has received a lot of focus recently, it is the quality of the experience when they are in the property itself that will truly generate long-term loyalty and strong review performances.
From a marketing perspective, it’s the one time that they have the guests’ complete attention. Potentially it represents a key competitive advantage for accommodation suppliers, as they compete against themselves and against the online travel agents (OTAs) to grab and maintain the guest’s attention.
This paper will demonstrate the solutions that allow hotels to facilitate better guest-focused services and communications.
We talk to the leading tech firms in the field, break down the changes happening already and what hospitality brands should be looking to implement to secure their guests’ loyalty in the years to come.
Click here to download the full report for free.
Hospitality businesses live and die by their reputations but are accommodation brands really focusing enough on the one moment where they have the guest’s complete and undivided attention: The stay itself? It is these crucial moments when they interact to request a service, such as check-in, a spa treatment or for local recommendations, that will last longest in the guest’s memory.
Now, there are new possibilities to improve the guest experience as technologies open up and fall in cost. The future of the stay will be one where the guest can use their own device to interact directly with the hotel’s staff or even the hotel itself through AI-powered interfaces. Customers will be able to call on far more services, and staff will be more connected and effective.
Hospitality companies’ key objectives currently are to drive loyalty and improve the customer experience in the hope that this will drive down acquisition costs by creating repeat guests. Although the pre-stay digital area is important and has received a lot of focus recently, it is the quality of the experience when they are in the property itself that will truly generate long-term loyalty and strong review performances.
From a marketing perspective, it’s the one time that they have the guests’ complete attention. Potentially it represents a key competitive advantage for accommodation suppliers, as they compete against themselves and against the online travel agents (OTAs) to grab and maintain the guest’s attention.
This paper will demonstrate the solutions that allow hotels to facilitate better guest-focused services and communications.
We talk to the leading tech firms in the field, break down the changes happening already and what hospitality brands should be looking to implement to secure their guests’ loyalty in the years to come.
Click here to download the full report for free.
New Free Report: The Future of the In-Stay Experience
EyeforTravel's new report is out now and completely free for you to download. It covers the growing sphere of in-stay technology focused on improving the guest's experience and hotels' relationships with those guests.
Hospitality businesses live and die by their reputations but are accommodation brands really focusing enough on the one moment where they have the guest’s complete and undivided attention: The stay itself? Now a wave of innovation and consumer technology is giving hotels new opportunities in this space and opening up ways to build relationships. Download the free report nowto see how you can take advantage of this exciting and expanding area
From the moment a hotel takes a guest’s booking they have an unrivalled marketing opportunity. The guest is theirs to build a relationship with and a growing wealth of technological solutions are springing up to handle this before, during, and after the stay. Through smarter properties and systems, hotels can build up complex guest profiles that can be used to improve almost every aspect of property performance and therefore the guest’s experience. What’s more these technologies are becoming cheaper and more accessible through mobile apps and cloud computing.
The future of the stay will be one where the guest can use their own device to interact directly with the hotel’s staff or even the hotel itself through AI-powered interfaces. Customers will be able to call on far more services, and staff will be more connected and effective.
Download this completely free report now and find out what the emerging technologies are, who is providing them, and how they can help to transform your business and your relationship with the guest.
This report explores:
This content is brought to you by EyeforTravel San Francisco 2018. Join 300+ senior travel experts talking about mobile, social media, data & partnerships, and the travel start-up scene.
Hospitality businesses live and die by their reputations but are accommodation brands really focusing enough on the one moment where they have the guest’s complete and undivided attention: The stay itself? Now a wave of innovation and consumer technology is giving hotels new opportunities in this space and opening up ways to build relationships. Download the free report nowto see how you can take advantage of this exciting and expanding area
From the moment a hotel takes a guest’s booking they have an unrivalled marketing opportunity. The guest is theirs to build a relationship with and a growing wealth of technological solutions are springing up to handle this before, during, and after the stay. Through smarter properties and systems, hotels can build up complex guest profiles that can be used to improve almost every aspect of property performance and therefore the guest’s experience. What’s more these technologies are becoming cheaper and more accessible through mobile apps and cloud computing.
The future of the stay will be one where the guest can use their own device to interact directly with the hotel’s staff or even the hotel itself through AI-powered interfaces. Customers will be able to call on far more services, and staff will be more connected and effective.
Download this completely free report now and find out what the emerging technologies are, who is providing them, and how they can help to transform your business and your relationship with the guest.
This report explores:
- The tech and tools available to create better guest stay.
- What tech companies are working in the field and what solutions they can provide.
- How to work with changing consumer technologies and behaviors.
- How to improve pre-stay messaging.
- How property management systems are developing and what this means for hotels.
- What the future of the guest stay will look like.
- The real-world results of implementing technological solutions.
- How staff can improve their performance through new technologies.
- How hotels can gather and utilize the new wave of data coming from emerging technologies.
This content is brought to you by EyeforTravel San Francisco 2018. Join 300+ senior travel experts talking about mobile, social media, data & partnerships, and the travel start-up scene.
New EyeforTravel Free Report: EyeforTravel North America Summit 2017 Round-up
We have a new report out now, which you can download for free, covering all the goings on at our largest US conference, the North America Summit 2017.
At the event it was all about using the leading edge of technology to address the age-old issue of improving the customer experience. See what technologies top brands are getting involved in and the tactics they are using with this report from the heart of the Summit.
EyeforTravel’s North America Summit took place in the wake of tragic events in Las Vegas but the travel industry came back with a roar to take on the big issues: Loyalty, technological disruption, changing distribution possibilities, customer experience, and partnerships. Download this completely free report now to see what key industry figures are saying about these topics and how they believe the industry will adapt.
The report features advice and learning from brands including IHG, Caesars, Lola Tech, Allegiant Air, Marriott, Google, and Priceline.
Get all the key discussions in one easy-to-digest report so you can keep on top of the ever-evolving world of travel and tourism by joining EyeforTravel On Demand's free service, or if you are a member of EyeforTravel On Demand Premium you can view all the videos from the Summit here.
At the event it was all about using the leading edge of technology to address the age-old issue of improving the customer experience. See what technologies top brands are getting involved in and the tactics they are using with this report from the heart of the Summit.
EyeforTravel’s North America Summit took place in the wake of tragic events in Las Vegas but the travel industry came back with a roar to take on the big issues: Loyalty, technological disruption, changing distribution possibilities, customer experience, and partnerships. Download this completely free report now to see what key industry figures are saying about these topics and how they believe the industry will adapt.
The report features advice and learning from brands including IHG, Caesars, Lola Tech, Allegiant Air, Marriott, Google, and Priceline.
Get all the key discussions in one easy-to-digest report so you can keep on top of the ever-evolving world of travel and tourism by joining EyeforTravel On Demand's free service, or if you are a member of EyeforTravel On Demand Premium you can view all the videos from the Summit here.