How AI, VR and IoT Is Changing the In-Room Guest Experience
The heart of any business model is selling a product the market demands in exchange for money. Often when a customer gains possession of the product, their needs or desires are then met. However, within the hospitality industry the product sold is untouchable, subjective and ephemeral. Hospitality is selling an experience to satisfy guest needs.
For the hospitality industry, one unavoidable and important factor is to increase brand relevancy, loyalty, and advocacy. How can you achieve it: by human touch, technology or a combination of the two? Never before has technology played such an important role in redefining the customer experience.
The best technology makes your guest feel at home – whether that be placing an in-room tablet next to the bed or offering a voice-activated solution. Additionally, removing the language barrier may be the biggest win in terms of guest comfort. No matter where guests are in the world, they will always feel at home with the ability to automatically change languages in seconds regardless of the in-room technology used.
From mobile check-ins to app integrations, like GrubHub food delivery, guests are beginning to attend to their needs in new ways. This article from Trilyo will examine the role of AI, VR and IoT in hotels and how this technology is changing the in-room experience.
Artificial Intelligence: An AI-enabled virtual assistant is a boon to the hotel industry. The assistant never sleeps and keeps your business active and online 24/7 which offers guests a cost-efficient yet powerful and convenient support system. Marriott’s AI-powered bots are trained by using historical conversations and can perform some of the same tasks as a live support center rep such as correcting an invoice, answering basic questions about room availability and more.
AI can also solve a hotel’s check-in/out issues. With the introduction of AI-powered assistants (like Amazon Alexa or Google Home), the guests can check-in/out on the go. This reduces the long queues that usually occur during peak seasons, leading to higher guest satisfaction.
With AI-enabled assistants, guests can receive a regular stream of helpful updates related to their stay. An assistant, rather than the front desk clerk, can notify a guest when his or her room becomes available, or conversely remind guests of the property’s check-out policy.
Internet of Things: In order to enhance the guest experience, hotels are bringing the internet of things directly into the hotel room. IoT can help hoteliers in providing proactive maintenance and location-based interactions to improve the customer experience. Thanks to IoT, a hotel can easily check on existing sensor-data to find hazardous or risky trends and can notify suitable maintenance personnel before the issue escalates. Also, IoT can send custom-tailored recommendations to the guests based on their previously indicated interests, for example news of a nearby beach, a cafe or a tourist spot.
Virtual Reality: VR is a very popular infotainment service that will entirely redefine the customer experience. It can provide crucial information to an in-room device without the guest needing to leave the room. For example, a VR info-desk attached to an AI-concierge service could be a useful guide to events and locations. A VR video-booth could provide an interesting tour of the hotel, resort, and amenities, as well as the nearby attractions such as museums, beaches, shops, and and restaurants. Marriott Hotels has already introduced VR in their hotels, they call it ‘VRoom Service’.