Even the birds on the tree know that same old story about the importance of excellent customer service and user experience in the hospitality industry. With the advancement of modern and innovative technology, today guests have very high expectations when it comes to hospitality.
Even though customer service has been fundamentally the same over the years, nowadays, it has become more customer-centered than ever.
So, with the help of IT, the hospitality industry is working around the clock to make their customers fully satisfied and provide them with everything and anything they require.
In fact, 97% of modern guests say that customer service plays the most important role in people choosing their brand.
That's why there has been a significant shift in the way every hospitality business is making their efforts to engage with customers, as well as the channels of communication they use to provide the highest quality services their guests need and want.
That means that every hospitality business needs to embrace every method that will help it guarantee an impeccable service.
The Ever-growing Expectations
The trends in the hospitality industry regarding customers and their expectations have changed quite a bit, as modern guests expect a lot from a hotel.
While they expect to be in control of their stay up to a certain point, they expect an exhilarating and unique experience that matches the standards they set in their own lives.
Moreover, people want the same flexibility over all channels they prefer, over the phone, on mobile, in person or online.
It's important for them to move between channels without any hassle. Fortunately, the hospitality industry has IT and other smart technology solutions to make it easier for both the hoteliers and the guests.
With all this in mind, here are a couple of ways IT can improve customer services and guest experience for the hospitality industry today. From check in to in-room features, we'll go through how IT helps the hospitality industry make it easier for guests to state their demands and hospitality businesses to answer them.
Personalization Marketing
By definition, "personalization marketing is a strategy based on the delivery of promotional content to users on a more individual basis.
By using digital automation to provide the most exquisite customer service and guest experience, hospitality businesses get a chance to collect valuable data that allows them to improve their services even further.
On the other hand, the guests receive improved service, which further increases their satisfaction and the chances of them responding positively. Personalization marketing improves the guest experience in several different ways:
- Guests prefer personalized marketing emails and are more likely to read them.
- The hospitality sector can use retargeted adverts to keep in touch with the guests and give them intelligent suggestions and recommendations, making the entire booking process much easier.
Smart Rooms
The development of smart rooms is among the latest emerging trends within the hotel industry. A combination of voice recognition technology and artificial intelligence is powering these rooms. Guests can enjoy all the comforts voice control provides which results in a significantly improved customer experience.
That way, the guests can gain control over multiple devices within their room, giving voice commands to their utmost convenience. They can order room services, turn the TV on or off, control the lights and so on.
Chatbots & Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence means giving the ability to a computer system or a machine to perform an almost human-like, seemingly intelligent function. This brings a wide variety of benefits to the hospital industry.
For example, introducing services such as chatbots to hotels means giving hotels the ability to provide their guests with all the necessary services 24/7.
Therefore, the most common example of AI in the hospitality industry is a chatbot. They improve customer experience by swiftly answering all requests and providing responses to questions at any time of day.
On top of all that, chatbots supported by AI can also gather and analyze data from guest surveys and reviews to improve the guest experience.
Chatbots can make hotel bookings, flights, give useful recommendations and suggestions, and so much more. They can deliver basic customer service, but they can also take care of more complex tasks like flight and hotel bookings.
Chatbot building platforms such as SnatchBot.me have an excellent chatbot solution for the hospitality industry.
Their SnatchBot Booking Travel Template supported by artificial intelligence helps guests book a hotel with ease. On the other hand, bots can be used for almost any sphere of business in hospitality.
Bots are best used for gathering information about the preferences and needs of customers and then passing all that data to where it's needed the most.
Robots as hotel assistants
Robots can be used as assistants for hotels as their capability of carrying out a wide variety of tasks such as information provision, room service or giving shopping recommendations, plays a key role in providing an excellent customer experience.
With that in mind, modern guests love these benefits and they rely on them freely. They especially love one thing when it comes to bots: shopping recommendations.
When people check in, they can receive fully-detailed info about the products they like, as well as shops that sell those products near their hotel. This significantly influences their willingness to leave a positive review of a hotel, solely based on this convenience.
So, it's more than clear that IT plays an extremely important role in the modern hospitality industry, as it allows so many hospitality businesses to upgrade their customer service and provide the most exquisite guest experience.
In a world where guests value their personal satisfaction over anything else, this is the only way to remain competitive and relevant within your business niche.
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