Hotel Technology That is Transforming The Hospitality Industry

by Mycloud Hospitality Software Development

It would be an understatement to say that the year 2020 was difficult for the hotel industry. It was a period of tremendous change that didn't stop with the end of the year. The pandemic's aftereffects will most certainly last for years. Even in 2022, the hospitality industry has not recovered to pre-covid revenue levels, and hotels are experiencing a severe labor shortage as a result of the lockdown, which forced them to lay off a large number of employees. Over the last year, hoteliers attempted but failed, to address the acute labor shortage by tempting recruits with sign-up incentives, better salaries, or even cash payments to candidates simply for showing up for an interview. Today, there are 1.73 million unfilled employment in the hotel industry alone in the United States, out of almost 11 million available positions across the economy.

While COVID-19 did the world no favors, the pandemic's effects were not all negative. Technology like hotel software put in place to assist in battling the spread of the virus, as well as developments in hotel tech that allow hoteliers to operate more efficiently and cost-effectively, will benefit the hotel business.

Below are the technology applications and solutions that can have a great impact on hospitality in 2022 and beyond.

Contactless Guest Experience

One of the few methods to mitigate the negative effects of current labor shortages and boost hotel income this year is to implement contactless guest experience technologies. Contrary to popular belief, contactless guest experience includes everything from mobile check-in to mobile keys or self-check-in kiosks, guest communications via messaging, a housekeeping-on-demand program, the voice assistant in the room with grievance management applications to handle customer service requests by stay-in guests, and virtual concierge, services, and more. According to recent studies, more than 70% of hotels are contemplating or are already utilizing contactless payment and digital messaging services, and over 60% are considering/are currently using smartphone-activated room keys. Consumers agree, citing contactless payments (35%), digital room keys (26%), and digital messaging services (20%) as the top three enhancements that would make them feel more at ease staying in a hotel.

A scalable hotel software

When it comes to technological applications for the hospitality business, hotel software cannot be overlooked. It has always been the foundation of a successful hotel business. Hotel software consists of several modules and functionalities that automate your hotel's operations. Hotel software handles everything from reservations to the front desk housekeeping to invoicing, and more. This isn't the only advantage you have. Cloud hotel software offers hotels more than just scalability, availability, and security. It offers 24/7 access to the hotel system at any time, anywhere, and from any device. Even from your smartphone. You can check in/check out guests, pull out in-depth reports, and so much more right from your phone too. If you're still hesitant, it's time to alter your mind and choose hospitality software.

Chatbots:

Using a chatbot, hotels can quickly engage visitors, answer their questions, and assist them in booking a reservation, as well as upsell and cross offer more services 24 hours a day, which is hard for humans to do. Over 60% of chatbot contacts occur outside of business hours and on weekends when the hotel is significantly understaffed. Chatbots act as your property's virtual customer service department, providing information to users via text, graphics, video, audio, and so on. The use of chatbots as a brand communication medium has surged by 92% during 2019, according to Drift's 2020 State of Conversational Marketing study. In 2020, 24.9% of purchasers used chatbots to engage with businesses, up from 13% the previous year.

A Scalable Customer Relationships Management Platform (CRM)

CRMs are no longer a luxury and are used in almost all industries. Even in hospitality, it links other components of your hotel's IT stack and fills in the gaps with automation that relieves your employees' workload. The right CRM should be scalable, meaning it can scale up or down to meet your demands as your business expands. However, automation and scalability are only one of the many advantages of a robust CRM. It may be used to deliver tailored offers to entice customers to return, upsell hotel amenities to current guests, gather feedback, and more. It can also be used to perform marketing efforts that send people to your website directly. As a result, a CRM may assist you in increasing bookings while also reducing costs.

Hotel Mobile App

Another intriguing development in hotel technology is the growth of hotel-management mobile applications. You can manage practically any task from your smartphone with a cloud-based property management system, including scheduling housekeeping, taking reservations, and much more. This has several advantages for small hotel businesses. For starters, it guarantees that traffic and people on the hotel property are kept to a minimum. There is less chance of virus transmission with fewer individuals, and your visitors will feel more assured and at ease. Secondly, with fewer workers on staff, you'll be able to better control payroll expenditures, which leads to higher profits. Hotel apps also offer more freedom for administrators and managers in terms of where and how they operate. For example, the manager no longer has to be in the back office to arrange the following week. Managers, decision-makers, and other staff may now work when, where, and even how they choose.

Using Robots to Free up hotel staff

Hotel robots are among the most successful kinds of hospitality technology, and their existence will assist to guarantee that guests are satisfied. A robot, in general, is any equipment or system that is designed to perform a specified set of activities with exceptional efficiency and precision. In the hotel sector, robots are primarily used to improve and expedite the complete guest experience. During the year 2020-2024, the market for service robots in the healthcare and hospitality industries is expected to increase by 942 million USD. This pattern can be attributed to several factors. In terms of cost, hospitality technology is getting more affordable to deploy. This means that even tiny establishments like boutique hotels may benefit from the benefits. However, we must remember that the needs of the guests are changing. Customers have grown to anticipate second-to-none levels of service during their stay because of wireless connectivity and the virtually ubiquitous presence of cellphones. To some extent, this necessitates the use of technology. Because hotel robots may provide such a competitive edge, it's no surprise that management is opting to use them.

The list of technological innovations that can make a difference is endless. From pre-arrival customer engagements through on-property guest services and post-stay customer retention, today's technologies may drastically cut personnel requirements and labor expenses.

In our opinion, the hotel sector can only reduce staffing demands and unsustainable labor costs by accelerating investments in technology, such as cloud, mobile, AI, robots, IoT, and other next-generation technology applications and advancements.