These digital services are not yet universal as many hoteliers still struggle with implementation, but providing these digital capabilities on users smartphones have become table stakes in order to remain competitive.
Smartphone technology enables additional opportunities for the hospitality industry based on the global trend of remote working and the key role of mobile in our daily lives.
My career and consulting practice has been devoted to identifying emerging tech trends and understanding how these trends impact travel industry business practices. I wrote my first piece on the impending mobile revolution back in the early 2000s, when we were all still enamored by our flip phones. Smartphones that emerged in 2008 signaled a shift from a telephone, to a handheld computing device as Apple and Samsung continue to add features and functions that enhance our lives.
What often happens with emerging tech as it becomes mainstream, is a complacency where standard approaches become the norm (no pun intended) and future potential of the tech is often ignored. This is where we are today with smartphones. The digitizing of hotel services is still an essential priority for hoteliers, but the bigger opportunity is in understanding how the smartphone has become the center of the evolving digital revolution.
The most important message here is that for the Millennial and GenZ generations, smartphones are not just a touch point but the center of their lives. This combined with a move to a nomadic workforce should translate into clear set of priorities for hoteliers in 2022, including:
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Ensuring the highest level of WiFi connectivity. We are no longer in the era where offering free Wi-Fi is a differentiator. Covid has permanently changed the work habits of a generation. Companies are closing their offices allowing their employees to work anywhere. Hotels who invest in the fastest Wi-Fi and who recognize the hotel room has morphed into the remote office will be able seize this opportunity.
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Constant updates on Covid status in your community – As we've all learned the much anticipated "end of the pandemic" is unrealistic expectation. As the virus continues to evolve we will move from concerns over dying of Covid (at least for vaccinated travelers) to surviving a breakthrough case. Hoteliers need to be the resource for local Covid information within your community proactively notifying travelers of changes in virus variants and exposure risk. If the guest is exposed to Covid, a set of services should be offered during isolation including access to telemedicine, all offered digitally via the guest's smartphone.
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Smartphones are a 24 hour a day communication tool – With continued active engagement with social media, smartphones allow guests to broadcast negative experiences faster than hotel management can respond. Hoteliers need create a direct digital dialogue with their guests to ensure any issues are resolved quickly before they become a tweet.
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Remote working also means isolation. Many who embrace this nomadic lifestyle want to experience the local culture of a given destination while working remotely but may feel isolated from colleagues. Given that we will be dealing with pandemics for some time, setting a virtual space for hotel guests to meet may be replace the hotel bar as a place to connect with other travelers.
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Virtual access to business services – For decades business-oriented hotels have offered business centers, but more may be needed in a truly nomadic working environment. Hoteliers should use their smartphone communication (web, app, chat) to proactively identify needed services that may be not available at the hotel. For example, a nomadic traveler may need admin support or local assistance in refilling a prescription. These local services should be aggregated by the hotelier and communicated through digital channels.
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Digital payments for all services – The current generation of travelers has embraced sending funds via services such as Venmo while many express a desire to pay in cryptocurrency. Hoteliers need to make all service available through multiple forms of payment including the emergence of cryptocurrency as a payment mechanism by the smartphone where many crypto currencies are often stored.
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Leisure travelers are also digital natives – For years hoteliers have looked to automate their concierge services and embrace local destination restaurants, tours, and activities. Now is the time to digitize this content by working with a third party or creating the hotel's digital presence. If possible, booking of restaurant and activities should be facilitated by the hotel through the customer's digital device.
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High Touch without Touch – Luxury properties have long promoted their white glove services as a differentiator. With staff shortages and pandemic concerns still a factor for 2022, redefining what high touch means in a digital touchless environment can be challenging. The true value of high touch is not the actual interpersonal contact with the hotel staff, but the sense that hotel cares about the customer throughout the day. For the leisure traveler, this means anticipating what services are available in the destination and what may be needed by the guest throughout the day. For the business traveler anticipating the need to take a break, exercise or grab a meal is a way to engage the busy nomadic worker.
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Mobile as a Remote Control – Progressive hotels are moving to have all controls in the room controlled by the guest's smartphone. Dedicated devices for control of heating, lighting, blinds, and curtains are moving from manual or dedicated devices to voice activated commands from the smartphone. For those hoteliers who invest in this technology, a remote-control room becomes a differentiator.
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Create a Mobile Game – It was not that long ago the world was focused on Pokemon Go, essentially a digital AR scavenger hunt. Hoteliers should explore how virtual gaming can be used to reinforce your brand and provide a different avenue of entertainment for the guest. This is a generation that has already embraced the metaverse via games such as Minecraft and as we all move to a truly virtual world, gaming is an entry point for many.
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Offer In-Room exercise wellness options - This could include offering rooms with Peloton bikes or providing connections to yoga or meditation services. Many hoteliers have embraced the wellness trend, but more virtual wellness tools are available digitally and should be offed as a guest service.
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Create a Photo Contest – Today's smartphones have multiple cameras that rival some features only previously available in expensive cameras. Why not create a contest for the best photos taken by guests within your city and provide guest rewards for the winners? This is a guest community building effort that will have side benefits as guest become engaged in a digital contest.
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Connect into Livestream events – Every guest needs downtime to enjoy their favorite artist, music or lecturer. With the continued pandemic, many of the in-person events have gone digital. Hoteliers need to tap into existing livestream platforms and offer these virtual concerts or lectures to the guest.
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Enable the smartphone as the entry device to hotel services – This may seem obvious as plastic room keys give way to digital and access to the Gym Spa is enable by the guest's smartphone.
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Explore NFTs – Non-Fungible Tokens represent everything from digital art to sports memorabilia. Creating a virtual hotel that can exits only in digital form but creates a clear brand in the virtual world. Budgets permitted; hoteliers may want to consider creating space in emerging virtual worlds such as Decentraland.
These suggestions range from the obvious to bleeding edge emerging tech. Some of the advice may seem impractical as we all struggle to survive the ups and downs of the pandemic. The reality is that technology will continue to advance and more of the world will become part of the digital reality.
The metaverse symbolized by the changing of Facebook's name to Meta is much more than remote networking or virtual reality shift. It is a realization that physical borders are no longer a barrier for communication, entertainment, or collaboration. No matter where the traveler is in the world, the ability for the guest to participate in the virtual world of work and play space is unlimited.
Hotels need to build on the idea of the hotel as a destination, to define the hotel as an immersive digital experience. For that to become reality, hoteliers need to move beyond operational efficiency and recognize the role smartphones as the center of our digital lives.
By Norm Rose President, Travel Tech Consulting, Inc.
