For instance, in extreme weather conditions like heavy rainfall, traveling takes a back seat. But apart from that, people do travel to hill stations and beaches in the summer and to warm areas in the winter.

And as we know, in the Indian subcontinent, summer lasts longer than winter, so people seek out vacation spots to escape it.

This is why travel is at its peak in the summer, and hoteliers can reap immense benefits during this time.

Now if you are clueless or following the same regular methods to attract guests during the summer, then this blog is your savior. Here I am sharing the most effective ways to market your hotel for this summer season.

Summer: The Most Popular Season Among Travelers

Statistics show that summer 2023 saw an upsurge of 8.7 million travelers based on current booking trends. This is a big green flag for the hospitality industry.

In fact, 42 percent of UK travelers reported that climate change will impact their travel plans for 2024.

But why does summer get this special love from travelers?

From what I have experienced, summer evokes a nostalgic feeling. It brings back childhood memories of summer break and family time. This is why people choose summer for family vacations and trips.

Aside from families, many businesses send their employees on summer vacation to take a break from heat waves and maintain a work-life balance.

Moreover, summer suits every age group, whether it is kids, adults, or boomers.

Hence, hoteliers need effective hotel marketing strategies for this summer so they can secure an upper hand at bookings and revenue. More on such strategies are discussed below. Follow along!

How Can Hotels Make the Most Out of Summer 2024?

Summer is one of the busiest seasons for the hotel industry, but the question is: how can you make your hospitality stand out to drive maximum booking traffic?

To help you do this effectively, I have curated 8 brilliant ways to market your hotel for the summer of 2024. Explore them all in this section.

1. Give a summer touch to your marketing

Marketing is the main pillar for driving guests. So, you must roll out your summer marketing strategies at the perfect time, which is now.

Your website and social media platforms should have a summer-ready makeover.

Images play a crucial role in helping you achieve this. They set up a visually pleasing vibe for your guests and persuade them to make bookings.

Apart from this, your content should also highlight the summer-specific amenities like air-conditioning, swimming pool, complimentary cold drinks, etc.

On top of it all, sprinkle a good color theme that gives a soothing effect to your guests’ eyes in the middle of the hot summer.

2. Add emotional appeal

How can hotels use summer to emotionally appeal to their guests?

— By advertising how a summer vacation at your hotel can enrich their lives with memories and good times.

After all, who doesn’t go for a vacation during the summer break?

Kids especially love that! They get tired of sitting inside the four walls and going nowhere because it’s too hot outside. So, a trip with their family can do wonders for them.

Furthermore, Friendship Day comes in mid-summer, so you can create a buzz around friend groups to finally go to their pending reunions.

In a nutshell, it’s just a matter of adding emotions to your marketing to build instant connections with your guests. Once they see that you offer a perfect stay featuring fun for kids and leisure for adults, they can barely resist making a plan.

3. Provide amazing packages and discounts

As the summer season is almost here, this is the best time to offer good deals on pre-bookings of summer packages.

Letting your guests claim exciting packages on family or group bookings is a smart and sure way to increase your occupancy rate.

You can also offer an early bird discount on great deals and ensure that your guests get an all-inclusive experience. 

So, it’s time to frame your summer holiday packages and promote them on your social media handles and website to engage guests’ activities at the very outset of summer.

You must note here that a good package can sell itself more than any other offer.

4. Beat the heat with a welcome drink

We know that summer is all about finding ways to keep our cool.

And the most basic way to step up against the hot summer is by drinking cold water, homemade beverages, and fresh juices.

Hence, it is plausible to welcome your guests with a glass full of chilled satisfaction.

Here I am recommending just a basic drink, nothing extravagant! You can also consider an indigenous drink to make it more appealing.

This small gesture can fulfill your guests more than you can imagine. We think that only big things matter, but believe me, it’s the small gestures that win your guests’ hearts.

5. Add a cool breeze to your menu

Now let’s move on from the welcome drinks and talk about the rest of them, shall we?

Just kidding

Setting a perfect menu that complements the summer theme is another important task.

First of all, in the summer, people are a bit repellent toward cooked or warm food. And they look out for foods that are light on the stomach. 

This means your menu must have loads of fresh fruits, salads, juices, cocktails, and smoothies. These categories of food must be kept on your menu because people are now more conscious of their health.

Adding to this, cakes, pastries, and ice creams can give your menu a wholehearted summer vibe.

6. Include sports activities

Relating to the family vacations and packages we talked about, adding sports activities and fun games can add more value to your guests’ stay.

These activities are always a good choice for making their vacations active and worthwhile. If you succeed at this, then only word of mouth will be enough to drive your sales for the rest of the season.

Not only families, but friend groups or bleisure travelers may also wish to join in for a fun game session.

You can choose evenings when the sun is at its lowest intensity. Host fun, summer-themed games and activities for your guests, like a lawn twister, a frozen-t-shirt race, a dunk bucket game, and much more.

You can come up with quirky water games according to your property’s space.

7. Shield your guests from the sunny havoc

Just 2 seconds of exposure in the afternoon of a summer day is enough torture, right? This is why saving your guests from this is important.

For doing so, conditioning the air temperature is essential—whether by providing AC rooms or installing centralized ACs.

Aside from that, your hotel can consider providing cab services for guests to save them from the hot sun. You can provide it for free up to a certain radius around your property.

You can also install patio umbrellas to provide a shady boon to your guests. It will add comfort to their swimming session while they relax by the pool.

Note: Keep greenery on your property for natural cooling covert and shade.

8. Offer complimentary services

Who doesn’t love complimentary services?

They are the key to establishing an amazing guest experience. 

Is your hotel ready with summer-themed complementary items?

Well, the one on my mind right now is the summer survival kit that can please your guests.

You can put together a nice kit that includes all of the summer essentials, such as body wash to keep them clean, sunscreen to keep them from getting tanned, face cream to keep their skin look fresh in the midst of the summer sweat, and stuff like that.

How about a complimentary ice cream treat per day on bookings of 5 days or more? Or for all the children that visit your hotel? This will be my personal favorite, as we all know that summer and ice cream are always a big hit together.

Explore the benefits of complimentary services

The post Amazing Hotel Strategies to Attract Guests During Summer 2024 appeared first on eZee Absolute.

To reach such heights in terms of profit or revenue generation one needs to have immense knowledge of the hospitality industry and its marketplace. (As knowledge alone creates all the difference.)

This is why every hotel owner puts a lot into serving its guests but only a few get an impressive revenue collection. 

Most of the time, this happens because of the fragile pricing strategies hoteliers set up without analyzing guests’ behavior and insights into the latest marketing techniques.

In one of our old blogs, we previously discussed various pricing strategies that hotels should be aware of. But in this article, I aim to expand upon that list and delve into some more unique pricing strategies to help you level up your revenue generation game.

So get ready and follow along if you want to attain excellence in the revenue department of your hotel.

Why Is It Important to Set Pricing Strategies?

The sole purpose of any pricing strategy is to optimize your revenue.

Let me be clear that setting prices on your rooms and services doesn’t count as a pricing strategy. It is how you mold and manipulate your prices according to the market scenario and your guests.

Let’s examine this with a scenario:  

All the hotels near your property are struggling through the shoulder season. To stay afloat and drive more bookings, they cut down their prices, whereas you kept them intact. Turns out, they came out well and you experienced a great loss.

Therefore, you cannot just put up the prices and let it be. It is a process that needs constant revision. You must have a great sense of the current market and ongoing trends in price modulation to do so.

 But I’ve got it all covered in the next section Let’s hop in, shall we?

Pricing Strategies to Optimize Your Hotel Revenue

Hotel revenue management is a tricky affair and there’s no single magic formula to optimize it. You require a blend of various strategies to ripe out the maximum benefits.

This is why I am mentioning some unique tactics for you to skyrocket your hotel revenue. 

1. Value-based pricing

The simplest pricing strategy is value-based. It is the cost that your service must get in return.

For example, a smoking room will have more price than a non-smoking room because it has an additional service that tops up its value. Same way, beach-facing rooms will have more value and thus more price.

So, what you are providing to your guests, how much that particular service costs you, or its value range across the market decides this type of pricing.

Value-based pricing is never negotiable. Because it drives you the minimum profit your rooms & services deserve.

2. Package pricing

Nowadays travelers lookout for good packages instead of arranging things separately. So it is important to build your packages and let your guests avail them at the right prices.

By including taxi/cab rides, complimentary meals, a local guide or tour, co-working spaces, a spa, laundry facilities, and much more in a package, you can make comparatively high revenue.

What you do is: keep a room booking, let's say at ₹8,457 for a week (high from its usual value), and a package with all the facilities at ₹9,849. Your guest will perceive that within a minor difference, they’re getting so many things.

Most of the time, they do not require all of these facilities but still tend to get overwhelmed by them and sign up willingly.

Even if they use them all, it is anyway beneficial for you. Because it helps in upselling your services.

3. Captive product pricing

Captive product pricing is to set a combined price for two or more services that are co-dependent.

For example, an ordinary room costs ₹5,000, and using the swimming pool has an additional charge of ₹800 which makes the total ₹5,800. However, if you choose a poolside room that costs ₹5,600 then there are no additional charges for using the pool.

This is how you can increase the sales of your poolside rooms. So every person who wishes to swim will ultimately buy your poolside room that costs high.

This pricing helps you increase the sales of your best rooms by adding a complementary thing to them.

4. Market-penetration pricing

When you introduce a new service or upgrade your hospitality, it is important to make it popular and known among your guests. This is the only way to make it win its place in the market.

To give this new service optimum exposure, you need a market-penetration pricing strategy according to which, you must keep it partially free at the start and increase the price with time.

If you have opened an in-house restaurant at your hotel, you can keep the first meal free for all your guests. This will market your restaurant effectively and its sales will increase fast.

5. Psychological pricing

A psychological pricing strategy is important for attracting your guests. It makes your price look good and affordable.

This price plays with your guests' psychology and convinces them that it is reasonable. The basic example is putting ₹999 for the swimming pool charges instead of ₹1000. This difference of one number somehow creates a lot of differences in the human brain.

Besides this, promoting offers and discounts is also a psychological game that excites your guests. They give in quickly if you showcase that a ₹9,899 package is available at only ₹7,599 if they book within a day. Note: This is how you make sales in your shoulder season.

Learn more about aligning your marketing strategies with your guest’s psychological responses below.

Psychological Principles for Better Hotel Marketing

6. Promotional Pricing

This is the average and the comparatively lowest price you use to promote your hotel. It helps attract your guests to your website. With this, they explore other things you offer and increase your chances of getting bookings.

So if the lowest room or package that is available at your hotel is ₹1,899 and the highest package is ₹10,899 then your promotional price must be the former one that is lowest.

It will amaze your guests that your packages are starting at such affordable prices and thus, they will visit your website. This will drive more traffic to your website and will increase your bookings and revenue altogether.

 Promotional pieces are mostly the one that highlights the least starting prices of your rooms.

Dynamic Pricing to Ace Your Strategic Game

All the strategies I discussed above are proven for optimizing your revenue.

But what is the real foundation for them?

Dynamic pricing!

The marketplace is ever-changing. What is selling out this week might not get any attention in the upcoming weeks. Therefore, you need to change every instant. (I am not exaggerating)

Recently when I was planning to book a homestay through an OTA platform, I was amazed at how quickly the price was fluctuating.

When I visited this XYZ property many times, its price went up within hours because they tracked that I am interested in it and will book eventually. After that, I started exploring other properties for a couple of days. Guess what! The rate of that XYZ property dropped again.

A dynamic pricing strategy analyzes every aspect of the marketplace and sets an ideal price for your services. It keeps fidgeting rooms’ prices across all your online profiles. This fluctuation in price ensures maximum profit at any given time.

But making all these calculations and analyzing the prices manually is NOT easy. You need a perfect revenue management system to do so. You can check out eZee Mint which streamlines the process of setting intelligent pricing strategies at the right time to optimize your revenue.

 

The post Secrets to Boost Your Hotel’s Revenue: Pricing Strategies You Need to Know appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Hotels often experience something similar to this when their prospect guests visit their website but do not make any bookings. This aspect of hospitality businesses is measured as the “look-to-book ratio”.

Let’s understand this in more detail.

In today’s digital world, users always scrutinize every service and product they are likely to purchase. That is what travelers do while booking their accommodations. They surf through the internet, various hotel websites, and OTA platforms to find a perfect stay at an affordable price.

I bet you don’t want your hotel to be just a part of their surfing process. Rather you’d like the guests to stop by your website and find it a perfect fit to book.

However, earning an instant booking from your website visitors is not easy. You have to set up proper strategies to hold your guests’ attention and to even out your hotel’s look-to-book ratio effectively.

But worry not. In this blog, I am going to discuss it all step-by-step.

What Is the Look-To-Book Ratio?

As the name suggests, the look-to-book ratio (also known as the L2B ratio) is a comparison between the number of people who visited your website vs the number of people who made a booking.

This ratio is one of the key performance indicators for your hotel and its website. It gives a reality check of your website’s quality and tells you if it is effective enough to make good sales.

What is an ideal look-to-book ratio?

After understanding the look-to-book ratio, as a hotelier, you might want to achieve the best value of it. So, let’s address the real question now – “what is the value of an ideal look-to-book ratio for hotels”?

You might think it is 1:1 but it can happen only in hypothetical situations. It is clearly an unrealistic case where every person that visits your website ends up booking a stay.

To be honest there is not any particular value that hotels should run after. Instead, through constant efforts, they must try to improve their ratio day by day.

So, let's say your look-to-book ratio is 30:1. Meaning, out of 30 people visiting your website, only 1 is booking. Now your next goal can be 25:1 or 20:1. You can even aim to achieve 10:1 in the long term (though it is not a cakewalk).

Yes, it seems easy to write and read these values, but achieving them is a whole different game altogether. However, it is not impossible. And this is why I am here to guide you through perfect strategies to help you reach your goals.

How to Improve Your Hotel’s Look-To-Book Ratio?

To improve your hotel’s look-to-book ratio, the sole strategy is to make your online presence more appealing.

When your guests reach your website they should feel connected. If the website visitors can relate to your website, its content, and your property then you are halfway through.

In this section, I am discussing all the strategies you must note and follow to improve your L2B Ratio.

1. Make your website visible

If you want people to book your hotel, the primary step is to reach them. For that, your website should stand out from the pile of the internet ecosystem.

To do so, you must work on the content of your website. Research on the current customer behavior, how they search on the internet and other platforms, and what they are actually looking for.

In technical terms, note down the SEO keywords (search engine optimization) and include them in your website content.

By using effective SEO for hotels you will get acknowledgment in the search engine to become visible to the world. With time, you will start driving more customer visits to your website.

2. Track your target audience

Let’s just face the truth, you can’t please every visitor. What you can do is attract a particular niche. According to your hotel and its facilities, you must figure out what is an ideal guest persona for your hotel.

Once you track down your audience, you can use effective techniques to pull them in. You should know how to impress them on their first visit to your website.

As we know, hitchhikers and solo travelers will look out for a fun and carefree experience. Whereas families will look out for a whole package and comfortable stays.

So, to hold the attention of your ideal guest, your website should give them the particular vibe they desire. If they do not get excited about their stay just by looking at your website, then they will barely book you.

3. Keep your audience engaged

People do not always visit the hotel’s website to make a booking. Sometimes they just make future plans and casually lookout for travel and vacation spots. (To get that adrenaline boost:D)

In these cases, it is important to make an ever-lasting impression on your audience. They should have a strong image of your hotel so that whenever they plan to book, they will remember you.

To establish such an impact, you must connect with your audience personally besides the basic advertisements. For this, it is important to have your presence on social media sites. 
Recently, hotels are also using WhatsApp business tools to connect well with their guests.

Due to WhatsApp’s popularity among all segments of society, it helps in better reach. With its catalog tool, hotels are able to share their offerings with a single click. It helps build a strong pre-booking connection with guests, eventually resulting in an increased number of bookings.

Explore more benefits of WhatsApp Business 

4. Build an authentic and appealing website

One thing that users lookout in your hotel website is accurate information. While creating it, ensure you are not keeping the details vague and hidden. Always give out the full and right information to your visitors.

This unveils transparency and adds authenticity to your hotel’s image.

However, it does not come solely through the content, the design and color scheme of your website are also inclusive. These can seem to be the less important factors but the visuals do impact a lot on the conscious as well as the subconscious minds of your guests.

So, for bringing a genuine aura to your website, along with its content, you must build it with eye-pleasing and exciting visuals. 

An effective website builder software can help you do so. You can check out eZee Panorama, which helped many properties build their dream websites and improve their L2B ratio.

5. Keep the booking process smooth

Once you build an appealing website, ensure that it also functions smoothly. If there are a lot of hurdles while booking and getting its confirmation, then your website will instantly lose its charm.

The first thing you must look out for is an effective booking engine. It should be highly receptive and instant in terms of functioning. So that, your guest gets a wide range of platforms to connect with your hotel easily. Moreover, it should notify you immediately to track your bookings and assist your potential guests.

You can check out eZee’s Booking Engine which handles all these affairs ideally.

Besides this, the process of booking should be kept short and simple. Do not make your booking box a registration form for some entrance exam. Your guests may feel it is too extensive and may leave without booking.

6. Put up amazing offers

One of the prominent ways to improve your hotel’s look-to-book ratio is by offering great deals.

Your guests surf the internet just to find the best deals. So, if your website has reasonable prices and great offers for them then they will definitely book you.

This is why putting up different offers in festivals and seasons become important. Giving special offers on repeat bookings, discounts on group bookings, and great deals on packages – are some excellent ways to persuade your audience for booking.

7. Provide instant assistance

“Never keep your guests waiting!” This goes for pre-booking as well. The moment you put your guests on hold, you lose them, especially in the pre-booking phase.

Nowadays, people are reckless in terms of doing activities or taking decisions. Gone are the days when they used to have patience.

So, if they have any queries, you better guide them instantly, or else they will move on to your competitors in no time. It is important to be available for your guests whenever they contact you otherwise you lose a booking. This will eventually reflect on your L2B ratio.

8. Shield well from negative reviews

Reviews have become an important source for website visitors to check your hotel’s authenticity. Hence, it is necessary to manage them wisely.

If your prospective guest checks your website and reads a bad review then they become skeptical. It reduces your chances of earning a booking.

Therefore, keeping your website clean and sober in terms of reviews is a must. But it can get a little challenging too.

For making it easy, your hotel can use a reputation management system to deal with the reviews on your website. eZee also provides you with Free Review Response Templates so that you can respond to positive or negative reviews in an ideal and safe way.

9. Handle cancellations like a pro

One thing that can’t be overlooked here is when your guests confirm a booking with you and then cancel it.

Cancellations are the silliest way to lose your bookings. They snatch away your hopes for a better L2B ratio. However, it can be handled well.

If your booking terms are feasible and flexible to suit your guest’s requirements then there are fewer chances of cancellations.

Still, if it happens, you can earn it back by keeping the rescheduling window open for your guests. Or by asking about their genuine issues and trying to amend them.

The post Master the Aspect of the Look-To-Book Ratio for Your Hotel appeared first on eZee Absolute.

And these migrations, whether they are interstate or international, can cost a fortune. For the start, you require a suitable and affordable place for a long or permanent stay. 

And for such cases, aparthotels suffice all the needs.

Aparthotel (the ship name for apartment and hotel) provides such guests a comprehensive package that includes all the services required for stays of months or years, say kitchen, laundry, etc.

The best part is that the cost of staying at aparthotels can be often 25-30% lesser than staying at hotels. 

Because of these factors, aparthotels are making an important place in the hospitality industry and their scope is going to increase in the coming times.

To take the real benefit of this scenario, installing technology is a must for aparthotels.

Why Do Aparthotels Need Modern Technology?

The prime reason to invest in technology for your aparthotel is that guests love it.

Technology ensures that your guests have a seamless experience throughout their stay. Right from the moment they discover your apartment and make a booking with you, to the moment they check out, technology furnishes everything.  

As stated above, most of the people who opt for aparthotels are away from families, living alone or in groups. So one thing they appreciate and need the most is technology to make their daily chores and tasks easy and efficient. 

Apart from this, today’s generation works around the atmosphere of digital devices and technology so it is necessary to make the apartment appealing and relevant to them.

Hence, if you are an apartment owner or want to start a profitable aparthotel then you shouldn’t miss out on smart apartment technology. To help you, we have a list below with the latest ones.

7 Must-Have Technologies for Your Aparthotel

To make an apartment convenient and modern, there are some essential technologies. Read this section to know what they are, how they function, and how they help you please your guests.

1. Voice-controlled furnishing

Controlling things in your apartment through voice assistance overwhelms your guests. These things include electronic devices, television systems, furniture, and much more.

Voice-command recliners, to name one, can add up to your guests’ comfort and ease.

Also, you can substitute the manual use of switchboards with the magic of Siri!

This way your guests can just say, “Hey Siri! Switch on the lights” or “Hey Siri, adjust the temperature to 63” and it will be done.

In the winter season especially, this is the technology your guests would long for. Rather than leaving the warm blanket, they would turn the lights off with only dialogue. Nothing could feel more wholesome than this!

2. Smart keys and locks

To modernize your apartment altogether, you must install smart doors.

There are various smart door systems available in the market. But, the one that can be managed through voice control can be a plus. Or you can have a smart lock system installed on your door.

Whatever the case is, try to keep a virtual / E-key for your apartment. It will reduce the cases of forgetting or losing one. With this, guests can easily receive the key on their mobile devices and access the door.

A smart door can also be connected to the electric supply of the entire room. This way, when your guests leave the apartment, it would cut off the power inside, saving on electricity.

Operating a smart door gives the utmost feeling of security. It also makes the management part easy and handy for your guest.

3. Integrated management system

If you are operating a full-fledged aparthotel business, then managing it manually will not be a good idea.

According to your requirements, you must explore and install the right technology solutions to simplify operations and stand out in the industry.

Your aparthotel can use a booking engine to get bookings from your website, a channel manager to drive booking through online portals, and a review management system to handle your online identity card.

These technologies will help you cut on the tedious work and provide the best experience to your guest. It will also enhance your occupancy rate. 

You can explore the full suite of hospitality technology we provide here.

4. Connected office furniture

Most people staying at aparthotels are working. They would be more than grateful for your apartment if you provide them with office furniture.

A dedicated space in their apartment to sit and get their work done. Besides chairs and tables, you can level up with connected electronic devices, for example, laptops, and headphones. 

It would leave a different level of an impression on your guests.

You can also add other accessories and general stationery to give a perfect zest to their working space.

5. AI-powered air conditioning

Furnishing your apartment from its very root is important.

Nowadays, air conditioners are available in every accommodation. So if you want to make your aparthotel stand out then make a shift to AI-powered air conditioners.

How does that work?

These air conditioners automatically adjust the temperature or fan speed, complementing the room temperature. So your guest does not have to fetch a remote every hour to do so. When the temperature is pleasant, the air conditioner switches off automatically, saving electricity.

This type of technology gives a pleasant stay to your guest and add up to their experience.

6. Voice assistance for room services

On your entire dashboard of smart functioning, the important one for aparthotels is voice assistance for room services.

Unlike hotels, aparthotels need a whole different level of expertise in the room service department. Your guests are there to stay for a long period and consequently need many more services.

So for every small thing, you do not want to make them call you. Instead, install smart voice-controlled service settings that let your guest ask for whatever they need. 

The AI-generated voice will answer about the status of that service to your guest. Meanwhile, it will also notify your staff of the guest’s request.  

You can also have a smart screen displaying various services you provide: laundry, sanitation, room supplies, and more. They can just tap on what they need to notify the specific department or person responsible. 

This can save your guest from getting hesitant of calling multiple times and avail of the best of your services.

7. Self-service technologies

No doubt, you must provide everything your guests ask, but they would also require a certain sense of privacy. 

To make them perform their personal affairs easily, you can lookout for endless technology for aparthotels. This can include, automatic laundry or steam iron machines, coffee makers, and other appliances for the kitchen.

Besides this, general things also count. Like clearing off their bills through online payment gateways without your personal intervention.

These amenities help your guest have a personal space. At the same time, it makes management easy and convenient.

How Can You Align These Technologies With Your Budget?

All these technologies mentioned above will come costly if you are still at the early stage of building a successful aparthotel. But there’s always a way out.

You can start with one thing at a time. Even minor changes and advancements are going to boost your image and revenue ultimately.

One more specific way is to furnish a few apartments first with all the necessary technology. Set their prices high accordingly. And when you get an upper hand at revenue through this, you can progress likewise with the other apartments.

Also, there are cost-effective ways available in the market for most of the things mentioned above. You can explore and go ahead with them.

The post How Technology Enhances Guest Experience in Aparthotels appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Two reception counters, handling four queues of guests. Only two people at the frontdesk handling this crowd. People are waiting in the seating area beside the frontdesk. A hotel staff member is assisting them with their check-ins on a digital pad. And you are standing there, hoping you could just get a room without going through all this.

Now imagine, if this hotel had a self-check-in kiosk. You could use it to enter your booking details, verify your ID, and make the payment, and there — “this is your keycard”, and you are simply done with the check-in. Looks like a dream?

Well, let’s make that true!

The hospitality industry is now stepping up and installing hotel self-service kiosks in order to provide hassle-free check-ins and other services to its guests.

In this blog, I am going to talk exactly about how this is enhancing guest satisfaction and what benefits it has for your property.

What Is a Hotel Self-Service Kiosk?

A hotel self-service kiosk is a digital device that enables guests to fill in the required information and get access to their rooms and other services. It eliminates the need for the front desk as it handles bookings, check-ins/outs, provides room keys, processes payments, and such likes.

The hotel kiosk system comes with various integrations. The most important one is its integration with your property management system through which it works in sync with your overall hotel data.

Along with the instant reservation for walk-in guests, it successfully serves guests who have pre-booked through the hotel or any OTA website.

While kiosks handle all the major front desk functions, your staff gets a chance to enhance the guests’ experience by interacting and providing them with quick services.

Should You Install Kiosks in Your Hotel?

The prime aspect on which the hotel industry is established is – “hospitality”. The key function of a hotel self-service kiosk is to give a boost to this hospitality.

According to this, without a kiosk, your full suite of technology solutions is not really complete. To acquire its best efficiency, installing a kiosk is a must! 

(But I am not going to push my opinion over you.)

I just want to give you a clear perspective on why kiosks are a need in this constantly growing hotel industry. For this, I will make hoteliers understand how a kiosk works and streamlines their operations effectively.

Therefore, in the next section, I am sharing all the benefits of a hotel self-check-in kiosk.

10 Benefits of Hotel Self-Service Kiosks

Hotel Self Check-In Kiosks are not just limited to guest satisfaction, it goes beyond that. Your hotel staff also get to enjoy various benefits.

So let’s just hop in and see what all wonders a hotel self-check-in machine can do:

1. Eliminate the front desk fuss

A front desk is the trickiest place in any hotel. With all the guests having unique demands and expectations, it gets difficult to perform front desk operations fluently. But with the kiosks by your side, you can turn this around.

When most of your guests will use kiosks for check-ins and check-outs, you will only have a handful of guests at the front desk who genuinely needs human assistance. And for those, your front desk staff can deliver the best of their services.

In addition, you might not require as many staff members as before (saving on that).

2. Say goodbye to queues

Availing of self-check-in and check-out services through kiosks takes not more than a few minutes. Guests just need to enter their detail, select their room, pay for it and they are out with their keycard. 

Unlike the front desk, they do not have to engage themselves in a dialogue process. This means Kiosks save you from long waiting queues.

Being a hotelier, you may agree that keeping your guest waiting is a setback. Even if you have a dedicated concierge, a guest would want to check-in at the earliest.

So if your hotel is stuck in managing the waiting lines, then the kiosk is your way out.

3. Acquire a modernized look

Nowadays guests are always on the lookout for a well-developed hotel where they can get a luxurious vibe. Along with the infrastructure, furnishing, and services, modern technology and automated operations give hotels an affluent look.

A kiosk gives a modern outlook to hospitality businesses with its functions, user-friendly interface, and digitalized technology.

Your guests use this device at check-in and check-out, so they are likely to get a long-lasting impression from its usage. It will add weight to your hotel’s image.

4. Cut down on human error

The major benefit of installing technology is that it nullifies the chances of error. It is true that we humans can misinterpret things more often than a machine. 

For instance, a human can sometimes make mistakes while processing cash payments but a kiosk will be accurate in its calculations. We may mix up things while multi-tasking but a kiosk will maintain transparency at its best.

Hence, keeping in view, that these small human errors can become a considerable reason for your guest to question your hospitality, why not use a kiosk to eliminate them all at once?

5. Upsell your resources effectively

I think it is a clear psychology that most people get skeptical and deny the additional resources when sold in offline mode. However in online mode (say while doing online shopping), with the visuals on the screen, people end up buying more things. This is why upselling your services at the front desk results in a low success rate.

At the front desk, guests do not get enough time to make a decision because (a) they are mostly in hurry and (b) they think it is a tactic to add more value to their bills.

However, with the kiosks, guests get personal space, time, and a well-showcased catalog to choose from and add the resources easily with just one tap. Moreover, the charges are added automatically so their psyche doesn’t question them on spending more.

6. Focus on meaningful guest interaction

No doubt, hotel operations take a lot of time for the hotel staff. Not only check-ins, check-outs, or guest services but handling and processing all the data on the system takes significant time. Among all this, do your staff get enough time to interact with the guests?

If not, then a hotel kiosk can make that happen. It saves the time of your guest as well as your staff to help them get along on the interaction part.

Now you know that installing a kiosk doesn’t mean cutting off human interaction. On the contrary, your staff gets to welcome your guests nicely. They can offer them great services and assistance in the meantime.

7. Add weight to personalization

The hotel kiosk system helps your guests to choose what’s best for them. At the front desk when you ask about their personal choices for the various services you have in the bucket, it gets a little too much to process at once.

Choosing a suitable set of things becomes easy when it is listed properly, you can go through the options and choose them with a tap.

For example, choosing the type of room you want: smoking/non-smoking, double bed/two separate beds, deciding whether you want complimentary lunch/dinner, what payment gateway you want to use to clear bills, and much more.

You can categorize everything in the kiosk so your guests can select them at their convenience. Along with adding value, it also automates the process of personalization.

8. Satisfy the introverts too

Being an introvert is a lot of pressure. You want things but can’t ask for them and when you finally ask, the opportunity is long gone.

(No, I am not talking about myself.)

There are times when introverts even struggle to ask important questions like, “Where is my balance worth 1000 bucks?” (Just kidding)

But this can’t be denied that there are a lot of introverted people nowadays and they simply hesitate to make decisions on the spot (say, at the front desk).

For them, a kiosk is a big-time life savior as it gives them space to choose the suitable set of services for themselves.

9. Save everyone’s time

As a hotelier, you would agree that your guest loves to save time. Not only them, but even your staff wants exactly that.

Everyone wants to accomplish a lot of things in a day. And if only checking in takes a lot of their time then it is not impressive at all.

Therefore, installing kiosks to speed up your operations is a fair decision as it saves a lot of time for both parties.

10. Keep technology by your side

As I mentioned in my previous blogs, millennials choose hotels having modern solutions, facilities, and technology. It is not just millennials but anyone traveling nowadays looks up to that.

People are getting tech-savvy and to attract them, hoteliers need to skill up at the technological parameters. Kiosks can definitely help them achieve that.

And this must be noted that once modern technologies are by your side, you also start fetching international recognition.

FAQs

The post Hotel Self-Service Kiosk: Why Is It a Must-Have? appeared first on eZee Absolute.

But among these, there is only one winner.

Traveling it is, of course!

Just kidding. (Not really!)

Well, I didn’t know that traveling was winning in such a dramatic way till I recently talked with two of my colleagues, Shreeya and Harshajit.

They were exploring these beautiful accommodations on the internet and told me how they wanted to visit all these places to experience amazing stays there.

Now, I am an amateur when it comes to traveling (thanks to my parents), so I stayed quiet.

But I noticed one thing that was the highlight of their conversation – “Hostels are better than other accommodations! They provide real, raw, and a comfortable experience with the added magic of crazy fun.”

And I decided to dig into this remark a bit more. 

So here in this blog, along with discussing how hostels are providing exhilarating experiences to guests, we will widely look into the future of hostels and what new they are bringing in.

Why Are Hostels Popular Among Travelers?

Hostels are ideal accommodations for solo travelers, backpackers, hitchhikers, and young tourists. Of all the people staying in hostels, 72% are solo travelers. Now this proves that the experience of a hostel is genuinely something else. It must have been homelike, comfy, and adventurous to build a strong niche among solo travelers.

With all the hostellers living together, sharing rooms, sleeping on bunks, socializing on rooftops, and participating in fun activities, people find hostels the most welcoming accommodation.

All these things help hostels leave an ever-lasting impression on travelers.

It should also be noted that the new hostel chains and their creative ideas have added magic to this industry. From choosing the perfect locations to building amiable infrastructures, they have successfully managed to create a wholesome experience for travelers.

Also, hostels may have young people as their mainstream niche but other age groups are also keen in exploring them. Because when people are traveling they love to fetch the experience of youthfulness. And hostels seem to be an ideal place to get it from.

On top of all, the affordability of hostels just adds up to the delights of travelers.

Hostels and Their Future Potential

Hostels are no longer limited to just bunker beds and community halls. That’s long gone!

Then, what is the future of hostels? What does it look like? Will they be successful?

Well, the new hostel chains like a&o Hostels, Zostels, Backpackers, Nomads World, Mad Monkey, GoSTOPS, Madpackers, and many more have already proved their unparalleled capability in the travel industry and there’s a lot more in their bucket. The future of hostels is going to madden their fanbase for sure.

Also, there is no doubt that with the tremendous rise of the traveling buzz, the new and creative strategies of the hostel industry are going to be a big hit.

To back this up, let’s have a quick look at how hostels are adding value to their property and welcoming a prosperous future ahead.

Hostels and Their Add-ons

Though many hostel chains are surging ahead with new trends and setting the benchmark for the industry, there are still those which need to improve their pace. For helping them out, I am listing the ideas modern hostels can opt to add more flavors to their traveler’s experiences. Here it goes:   

1. Budget hotels

With time, hostels have upgraded themselves. Most hostels now offer private rooms and the rest are eventually following the trend to broaden their guest spectrum. This way hostels are also functioning as budget hotels.

Let’s understand this with a scenario:

A few years ago, Samay had traveled to Kasol for his college trip and stayed at Serene Hostel which had a beautiful river-facing view. Now, Samay is taking his family there and wants to experience the same scenic beauty. But staying in a dorm with his family doesn’t appeal to him. 

Although when he searched on this hostel’s website, he found that this hostel is now offering private rooms as well. So, he could still go to this amazing location without worrying about his family’s privacy.

And in my opinion, most of the hostels are situated in exotic places and hence seem to attract a wide range of travelers. Therefore, filling in as budget hotels is coming naturally in the hostel market. And in this way, they are optimizing their reservations.

2. Thrilling themes

Going to a party is fun but going to a Halloween party is what excites people!

Simply put, themes add extra flare everywhere. And this is what hostels are harnessing successfully.

Let’s look at a real scenario where you and your gang of cousins are bored of visiting the same old places of Poona. And one of your cousins suggests a staycation at a haunted place (I am this cousin!). Then you come across ‘The Hidden Hour’ – A horror-themed hostel that gives you a safe but horror experience altogether.

But this isn’t it!

While I was researching, I found the quirkiest themes that hostels are offering. There’s a lookup-themed Prison hostel in Goa! In Udaipur “Hostelcrawl” is giving a real-time Hogwarts experience to all the Potterheads. Fascinating enough?

These amusing and funky themes are what make hostels stand out and spice up the user experience.

3. Innovative infra

One of the prime aspects of hostels is to facilitate the dorms with flexible infrastructure. The way hostels furnish a small room with all basic requirements and still manage to craft a spacious look fascinates travelers a lot.

My colleague Harshajit mentioned that the interiors and exteriors in modern hostels are so creatively designed that they are enough to grab anyone’s interest. And travelers do look out willingly to design their personal rooms at home like the ones in hostels.

This is true! I mean check out the hostels on the internet, they are literally a treat to your eyes. You will get stunned by the vibrant colors, makeshift furniture,  eccentric decor, and eye-catchy graffiti.

Apart from these, hostels are now taking extra care of the hostellers by prioritizing their work commitments. 

For instance, Moustache cowork hostels in Goa provide everything a digital nomad requires. Besides 24/7 wifi, they have dedicated coworking spaces, laptops, stationery, and other types of equipment to support the hostellers with the new workation trends.

4. Savor experience

According to a source, 40% of backpackers travel just to experience new cultures. 

One of the ways hostels can lure these backpackers is by giving a local touch to their services, maybe by arranging a free tour for them of the localities and the culture around – including clothing, historic places, food, dance, music, etc. 

Hence, the secret sauce to hostels’ successful future will always be, the experience.

Though they are still handling it very well with the evening rooftop sessions, singing and dancing beside the bonfire experience and funny socializing games, etc., there is more.

Let’s start to dig it with Zostels’ amazing “Meet your fellow travelers” policy. 

So, Zostels purposely shuffle the travelers visiting together and allot them dorms with strangers to spice up their socializing experience.

Likewise, Gostops has designed a whole new section named “goEXPERIENCES” for this purpose which offers planned and guided trips and treks to the hostellers thus adding a package of outdoor experiences to their indoor ones.

5. Technology

In this digitally driven world, we can’t go ahead without discussing a solid take on technology. The way it is molding every business, no wonder hostels must leverage it for performing at their best.

Also, over 70% of the hostellers are millennials and I have already discussed in one of my previous blogs that millennials are tech-savvy. Therefore, to keep a strong hold on this audience, you need to shake hands with technology.

In fact, a few things that you can never overlook to secure a prosperous future are: Listing your hostel on effective OTAs, moving forward with mobile technology, and most importantly opting for an ideal Hostel Management Software.

All these technological advancements are a must if you want to conquer the future challenges of the hostel industry.

The post The Hostel Industry Is Up for Huge Success! [Here’s Why and How] appeared first on eZee Absolute.

And there’s no hiding that Online Travel Agents (OTAs) are a major source for optimizing their online booking flow.

It is observed that OTAs control approximately 2/3rd of all online bookings.

Then it must be the best friend of hoteliers, right? Indeed! 

But with so many OTAs available, how do you know where to list your hotel? Which OTAs are the best? 

Well, every OTA is best in its own way; however, there are a few that might do a better job and deliver better results. 

So for all the hoteliers reading this blog, here I am sharing some of the best OTA platforms to increase your hotel bookings by manifolds.

Top 9 OTAs to Drive Maximum Bookings

I am listing below the prime OTAs in the hotel industry that can promote your hotel on a larger scale to drive maximum bookings.

Here goes the list:

1. Booking.com

Booking.com is recognized as the global leading OTA platform where more than 1.5 million rooms are booked on a daily basis.

It connects a wide spectrum of accommodations; from apartments, vacation homes, and family-run B&Bs to 5-star luxury resorts, tree houses, and even igloos.

Its website and mobile apps are available in 43 languages which helps accommodation providers to generate a worldwide network and enhance exposure.

But the real treat for hoteliers is that the listing process doesn’t charge you anything. You only get charged if a booking is successfully completed.

In addition, this platform showcases the booking info in a very clear way so that the users get transparency on every detail and policy. This helps establish a strong sense of trust among its users.

2. Agoda

With a strong emphasis on providing customers with cheap or discounted accommodation, Agoda is getting popular among travellers.

It can help your property business to stand out whether it is a hotel, hostel, or any resort. It is preferred for group bookings and packages because it offers flight + hotel bookings at low costs. Therefore, it is an ideal platform to attract international travellers.

Agoda is owned by Booking Holdings (which also owns Booking.com) and it charges between 15 to 20% on successful bookings.

3. Airbnb

Airbnb is a classic choice for small and local properties to boost their booking flow.

And if you look precisely at the contemporary picture, you will see that this platform is gaining popularity among big hotels too.

The reason that guests get attracted to the properties listed on it is – they are personalized, homely, and have a local connection. So if you have a well-furnished property, then Airbnb is the ideal place to land.

Airbnb might drive a few bookings compared to other mainstream OTAs but it ensures longer stays.

Also, it does not charge you money directly—it takes a cut out of every booking which is the lowest among other OTAs, typically 3% of the booking amount.

4. Hotelbeds

With more than 71,000 tour operators, travel agents, and airlines, and 50 million room nights sold annually, hotelbeds is one of the renowned names in the accommodation distribution space.

By listing your hotel on hotelbeds you get all the solutions and tools you need to maximize your room occupancy rates. Additionally, it also offers a wide range of marketing solutions and products that gets your property much-needed attention. Meaning, your hotel gets seen in the right place at the right time.

Over the years, hotelbeds has worked dedicatedly to build strong relationships at both ends of the travel chain to offer products, services, and solutions that help all its client and partners grow.

It can rightly be said that it is one of those platforms that can contribute significantly to maximizing your hotel occupancy and revenue. 

5. Cleartrip

Founded in 2006 as a hotel and air aggregator, Cleartrip is another popular OTA that accommodation providers shouldn’t overlook.

Being one of India’s fastest-growing online travel portals and with hundreds of partners from the travel and hospitality industry, the OTA provides access to a bouquet of offerings and enables people to take that much-needed vacation at attractive prices.

Upon its acquisition by Flipkart, the platform even participated in the Flipkart Big Billion Day event, which was like a travel shopping spree on the Cleartrip website and app as well.

If your hotel is in India and looking for a bundle of services to just boost occupancy but also increase revenue, then Cleartrip should be one of your go-to OTA.  

6. MakeMyTrip (GoMMT)

Established in 2000, MakeMyTrip is a household name in the Indian OTA space and over the years the company has strengthened its offerings extensively. 

It has more than 2.5 million daily users searching for hotels and homestays, making it the preferred OTA for accommodation providers. 

One of the events that made MMT one of the most preferred partners was its merger with Ibibo Group in 2017, making it GoMMT.

Today, GoMMT is a leading travel group in the country, providing a one-stop shop for all accommodation providers.

Whether you own a hotel, villa, resort, lodge, guest house, serviced apartments, hostel, homestay, cottage, or a BnB, you can list your property for free with MakeMyTrip & Goibibo and leverage its best-in-class offerings to maximize online bookings and bottom line.

If your property isn’t listed on GoMMT, there’s no doubt that you’re lagging. So, without further ado, get your accommodation listed on this sought-after platform. 

7. Expedia 

Expedia lures maximum travellers to its platform through the “Best Price Guarantee”!

Yes, it pulls out the cheapest deals for the consumers and hence they love it. And this is why the booking traffic is always massive on Expedia.

Adding to this, it provides everything in one place. Travellers can book their flights, hotels, or packages for their entire trip in one go at an affordable price.

With commission fees between 20% and 25% on bookings, it gives great exposure to increase your hotel presence.

Furthermore, as a fun fact, Expedia is one such entity that owns more than 200 travel booking sites, and over 150 mobile apps and websites worldwide. So, you must understand how this company is still a reigning leader. 

While it’s not practical to list all of them, here are some of the popular ones:

• Hotels.com
• Travelocity
• Orbitz

8. Trip.com

With Trip.com rewards (coupon codes and discounts), travellers get a chance to save on their bookings. This is why it has 400 million users worldwide. 

If an OTA has such a massive following then isn’t it the best match for your hotel? It is!

This OTA lets the customers buy their whole trip at one stop. Whether it is booking a hotel, flight tickets, car rentals, or holiday deals.

The commission rates are also flexible depending on various factors like your property size, location, duration of stay, and so on.

9. eDreams

In quarter one of the fiscal year 2023, e-Dreams reported 4.4 million bookings, which is the highest ever in a quarter and 50% up on bookings compared to pre-pandemic.

This rapid increase in bookings has a hidden fact that it offers up to 40% discount on its vacation packages (flight + hotel).

Here is a little more: If you list your property on E-dreams ODIGEO you can leverage the opportunity of getting exposure through 3 more international brands along with eDreams - Opodo, GoVoyages, and Travellink.

This can help you reach 18.5 million travellers in 46 countries. So think it over!

OTA Listing and Your Channel Manager Go Hand in Hand

Firstly, listing your hotel on OTA platforms can work only if you have a suitable channel manager at your property because that is the source to connect your hotel with any OTA.

With a channel manager, you update your inventory and rates on various channels or OTAs you are listed on. It automates the process of adjusting rates and room availability.

Now, to connect with any OTA platforms including the top ones mentioned above, you need to make sure that your channel manager offers the required integration to do so.

You can check out eZee Centrix, our channel manager, which offers integration with 130+ OTAs, GDS, and vacation portals. 

In addition to this, if you prefer any local OTA platform whose integration isn’t available then you can contact us and get it integrated with our channel manager depending on its feasibility.

The post Top 9 OTAs for Hotels to Boost Bookings appeared first on eZee Absolute.

And guess what?

Through all my travel experience, lately, what I have drawn is that hotels aren’t really focusing on catering to millennials.

Last year, when I was in Vientiane, Laos, my hotel didn’t have a stable internet connection. And working with the laggy internet was frustrating.

I didn’t take much time to check out from that hotel.

This isn’t just me. I am sure hundreds and thousands of other millennials would agree with me.

So, hey hoteliers, if you’re reading this, I am here to discuss ‘how you can turn your hotel millennial-centric’.

Trust me, we millennials have quirks and expect our hotel experience to be a little different than others.

If you have been struggling to cater to us, then you’re in luck as I am going to list some of the prominent tips to offer millennials a great experience.

What Do Millennial Hotel Guests Want?

In most common situations, millennials follow a busy and cluttered schedule in their regular life where they do not get to spend quality time with family, friends, or themselves.

The reason they go on a vacation is not just the craze to explore the world but to spend some days without work stress, doing fun activities, and relaxing.

Fun fact: According to a survey result, 83 percent of millennials somewhat or strongly agreed with the statement “I’m all about taking a nap on the beach, spa treatments, and all-day relaxation”

This means comfort is the basic key to targeting millennial guests as they long for a vacation that comes with every service and minimum effort.

Explore more about the travel trends of millennials

Ways to Attract Millennials to Your Hotel

To cater to them, the hospitality industry needs to keep a checklist of what millennials are looking for in hotels while traveling.

For making it convenient, I am sharing with you all the contemporary ways to attract millennials to your hotel. These are easy to be followed at any hotel and can make a massive difference in driving booking from this group of travelers.

1. An amiable ambiance

People today are sensitive to how they are treated at any place. Especially on vacation, they need everything to be positive, and the people around them to be welcoming.

So your hotel, its staff, and overall ambiance should set up a friendly tone. Giving a kickstart with unnecessary professional attitudes can make your millennial friend feel aloof and uncomfortable.

Therefore, it is important to train your hotel staff in a way that your guests feel light and cheerful while interacting with them.

Moreover, the basic tone of your hotel should feel comforting; this includes the building, its colors, and the vibe of the whole space.

Millennials might not spot the particular thing which is wrong but they will just not feel excited if things are in any way dull or lousy.

2. Value for money

Millennials earn, save, and spend their money with care. These people are much more experienced in handling finance and judging services by value.

Therefore, it is a compulsion to give justice to what they pay.

They can live with less adventure but not with fewer facilities. So if they have booked your hotel, then they must have inquired or seen reviews to make sure that your property offers all the necessary amenities at a reasonable price. And it becomes your job to ensure they get it all; be it travel conveyance, good food, comfortable rooms, or quick service.

3. Mobile tech-first

Nobody likes to carry around various documents, papers, or even money nowadays, especially when they are going on a vacay. And millennials are the generation of people that have seen the revolution in mobile technology from the very start.

They are up to date with technology and prefer things to get done with a few clicks. Hence your hotel must become tech-first to give a green signal to millennials. 

Let’s see how.

Millennials travel with planning, the priority being where they will stay. To finalize this, they will always surf the internet. 

Now, if you have not made a website or listed your hotel on Google My Business (GMB) and OTA platforms, they can never reach you.

If they need to call the frontdesk for every small thing rather than just getting access to everything digitally, that will also be a buzzkill.

If they can’t make cashless payments, that will be a killjoy.

It means technology is a major factor through which hotels can keep up with millennials.

4. Transparent hotel policies

Transparency is the key to your hotel’s success. If you are not honest about your policies from the very start then you can lose your millennial audience in no time.

Because these are the people who get agitated the most in such situations where hotels do not mention their policies clearly or only mention when something goes wrong. This is a big disappointment!

Let’s look at this with an example:

Samay has to travel with his pet. He surfed through many booking platforms using a specific keyword – “pet-friendly hotel” and got one property claiming they welcome pets wholeheartedly. So, he made the pre-paid booking. 

However, at the time of check-in, he was told to pay additional charges for his pet. 

See, the reason for his dismay was not that he had to pay extra charges for the pet. But the hotel has showcased only half information about its policy. They have displayed their pet-friendly services but not the charges they cost.

So, even after providing an additional service, hotels can lose their integrity if their policies are not clearly mentioned and taken care of.

5. Indigenous frills

Millennials are always longing to mingle with activities, food, clothing, and even the slang language of the place they are visiting. They desire to enjoy a 360-degree tour of the place and its cultural roots. (Xanax)

To put a fair impression on them, turn your hotel into a flavor of the place they are visiting; in terms of infrastructure, services, food, and overall hospitality. 

For instance, you can welcome them with a snack your place is famous for. In addition, have proximity to the local beauty such as markets, popular monuments, and restaurants having indigenous cuisines.

Millennials love to breathe in the new air because this is why they are visiting the new place – to explore its unique features.

6. Spaces to socialize

There is one thing that most millennials are good at, and that is ‘building real-life networks’.

Even if they are traveling alone, they will find a companion just like themselves and hit it off. Therefore it is only considerate to provide them such spaces where they can socialize and meet new people.

To fulfill this you can set up an in-house restaurant or a small gym area. You can also host some interesting activities or events, where they can socialize and play something together.

Apart from this, utilizing the roof is important for such spaces because a roof can attract a lot of people without much effort. Be it a rooftop bar, a clean pool, or a gaming area.

7. Coworking space

As I mentioned at the start, with changing times and technology, millennials nowadays prefer to work remotely in the comfort of their homes. And while doing this, they can easily plan and go on workations; for they have the leverage of working and vacationing together.

The only terms required here are a good network and workspace. If your hotel provides them with these two things then millennials are all yours.

Though it is comfortable for them to work from their room, they want to go out too. They don’t want to feel like they are at home.

Here comes the need of building a dedicated coworking space in your hotel and set up a required ambiance for working people, and bleisure travelers, who have to take client meetings, to help them crack their deals.

8. Blend of aesthetic and modern

Millennials have become modern in this digital era, yet they seek aesthetic beauty while on a vacation. 

To complement this requirement, your hotel, along with modern tools and technologies, should have an aesthetic beauty attached to it.

Though your hotel building can play a big role in setting up the aesthetic score, there has to be beauty otherwise; the furniture, lighting, artsy decor, and most importantly greenery - trees, and flowers.

These small things can help set a bright mood as most millennials travel from cities to vacation spots and are always up for a green breeze.

9. Personalization

In the hospitality industry, the power of personalization can never be neglected and the same is true with millennials.

When you offer even the tiniest personalized service, they feel like they are in charge of choosing things on their vacation and they like this idea.

Attract them in with this power of control.

You can maybe ask them their food preferences when they book your hotel and give them a welcome meal, help them get trusted conveyance for traveling around, and if they make a special request, do consider it.

10. An extra dose of comfort

Millennials are working all the time whether it is to earn or to run domestic chores therefore, it is reasonable to long for more comfort.

To cater to this, you can provide them with a few services to bring them a feeling of relaxation; a spa service, hot water bath, massage services, an outdoor pool, or whatever best suits your hotel.

Also if you are offering complimentary meals then set the time limits a bit open. I have seen hotels keeping the breakfast only till 7 AM and after that, you need to buy it. This can break the comfort zone of your guests who aren’t morning people and wake up at 9 or 10 AM – which is most of the millennials on trips or vacations.

Also, keep these services free or at discounts, or you can maybe give them a coupon when they book you. It will enhance your image for your millennial guest.

The post How to Turn Your Hotel Millennial-Centric? [10 Effective Ways] appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Though she is always traveling and staying in hotels for her photography projects, this time she got disappointed by the hotel she booked.

Why? You ask.

It’s because she thinks ordering food on a call, going to the front desk to get a wifi password, and asking for room service from management staff, are all intimidating tasks.

She better have a lousy experience than go and ask for the things she needs from the hospitality staff.

She expected this hotel to have a mobile application in which she could get access to all the services. Since she is too shy to talk in person but very active when it comes to contactless interactions.

In this blog, I would like to amplify the solution to such situations where your guests want to leverage all your services but do not want to ask for them. They are more comfortable exploring everything themselves.

And to provide such an experience to the guests it is important to introduce mobile technology in the hospitality industry.

Let us see why and how.

Mobile Technology: A boon for Hospitality Industry

In a simple sense, anything which is a boon for the hospitality Industry must simplify your operations as a hotelier and enhance the convenience & experience of your guests.

And mobile technology does the exact same thing!

Let’s look at this with an example.

Assume that you have a guest in room no. 302 who calls at the front desk for placing an order from your hotel’s kitchen.

The receiver at the front desk cannot argue with the guest to call the kitchen directly for placing the order, right? He will take the order and pass it to the kitchen himself.

Imagine, in a rush of handling other tasks at the front desk, he forgets to make the call to the kitchen or tells the wrong room no. or wrong order?

Your guest won’t get much impressed by your hospitality.

Let’s look at this very example again; except now with the touch of mobile technology.

Yes, in this case, your hotel has a mobile PMS application.

During check-in, you can get your guests to install your hotel’s mobile application and guide them on how to avail services.  

Now, this guest in room no. 302 doesn’t need to call. He will place the order on the hotel’s app. Your kitchen staff will get notified about this order automatically through mobile PMS.

The order directly goes to where it should (including the frontdesk PMS), your guest gets enough time to explore what you have and what he wants, and you get aware of your tasks the moment they get assigned.

Looks like a win-win situation for everyone.

Numbers that speak for themselves

Apart from the above scenario, some solid statistical pieces of evidence clearly show the importance & the positive effects of mobile technology in the hotel industry.

According to a source:

• Hotel mobile applications help approximately 70% of travelers in making booking decisions.
• Nearly 70% of last-minute bookings are done using a mobile device.
• Around 74% of the travelers say that they would prefer using a hotel application for booking and other details.
• 88% of the hotel guests wish to have a mobile application that can deliver them a personalized experience.

Considering the weightage of these numbers, I don’t think I need anything else now to prove my point.

How Mobile Technology Helps Streamline Hotel Operations

Whether you accept it or not, your hotel also needs mobile technology. And if you are still deprived of it by choice, I would like to convince you in this section by sharing what you are missing out on:

1. Digital integration

Through the mobile application of your hotel PMS  you can track the booking flow at any hour of the day no matter if you are at the front desk or not. Not just that, you can even make the bookings from your mobile if something comes up.

Something like what?

For instance, you receive a message from your hotel owner to book a room for one of his friends. But what if you are not on shift and this room needs to remain available at any cost?

You can either run to the hotel and do it yourself or call your colleagues who are on the shift. 

But, if you have a mobile PMS application, you can make this booking from the convinience of your smartphone, from anywhere.

In these cases, the digital integration of your mobile application with the Hotel PMS will help save your extra efforts for making this booking. It will also save you from delaying the booking or making any blunders.

2. Remote access

Probably one of the most basic and significant benefits of having mobile technology in the hospitality industry is the ability to access it remotely.

Now imagine you are not at the premise of your hotel but want to get the status of how are things going on there.

Let’s say, you need to have a look at the booking flow for the next week in your hotel or any other report regarding your hotel’s growth.
For this, you need not bother your staff to update you every minute. Rather you can just keep the mobile application to track everything down sitting miles away from your hotel.

Not to mention, you can also assign tasks to your team members through the portal without any hassle.

Mobile applications help staff in managing operations through any corner of your hotel. This means they need not physically coordinate with each other to pass on a particular task and its details. They would simply know what needs to be done via constant updates in the mobile app.

3. Contactless hospitality

One thing that the Pandemic left for you is the responsibility to ensure contactless hospitality at your hotel. And it is not easy to maintain such a thing without necessary technical support.

Everything that you serve your guests needs to involve the lowest level of physical proximity.

To provide this kind of hospitality you need to invest in those devices that guarantee minimum contact with your guests and their belongings.

For instance, rather than using the conventional method of serving guests with a menu booklet, you can go for the “Scan and Order” trend. Wherein they will use their mobile devices to scan and view the menu on their device, directly from where they can order and pay bills easily.

This way you will successfully maintain a contactless service while providing your guests a sense of privacy.

4. Easy check-in and check-out

From check-in to check-out at the front desk, everything needs to be framed in such a way that your guests get a sense of freedom out of their whole stay. 

Let’s start with the frontdesk check-in.

There, you can invest in mobile devices to make the process of check-in easy, quick, and contactless by using OCR Scanner.

OCR Scanner serves the purpose of scanning the IDs of your guests and automates the process of filling their credentials in your portal. 
Not to mention, it saves your time to fill the details manually on every required paper and your guests get quick check-in too.

While checking out too, you can give your guests the liberty to check out through their mobile application directly.

This one thing can put a big impression on your guests. How?

Okay, so your guest Samay has to catch a flight on time for which he needs to check out immediately but your front desk is occupied. Samay can’t risk missing out on his flight, right?
Now, if he has the option of checking out on your hotel’s mobile application, he will do it himself.

In addition, he can make necessary payments through the same for his stay at your hotel. And you will get notified about this checkout by your Hotel PMS directly.

5. Guests’ requests

Through mobile applications, it becomes easy for hotel staff to fulfill guests’ requirements without a miss.

How?

While using traditional methods of listening and writing your guests’ unique demands on a piece of paper, anyone can mess things up now and then, right?

For this purpose, using your Property Management Software on your mobile devices can help significantly to note the requests directed from the specific room no. or restaurant table. You will have everything saved. No chance to mess things up.

Also, synchronization plays a vital role here because changes made by one member on the system send notifications to others too. Meaning, the department which is responsible for fulfilling that specific request receives the task update immediately and gets it fulfilled at the earliest.

6. Staff coordination

Getting updates on all that is happening in your hotel through your mobile device is important to establish coordination among staff members.

For instance, as hotel staff, you came across a guest in a corridor who places an order from your hotel’s kitchen and gave you his room number.
Now instead of physically going to the kitchen or making a call, you can just take his order in your mobile application by the credentials of his room number and directly notify the kitchen about this order.

This way the message will get delivered fast and the order may even get ready when you reach the kitchen.

These things can get you extra stars for performing efficiently with quick services.

The more coordinated and connected your staff will be, the less time it will take to attend to the guests’ requests.

7. Task division

If tasks are dispersed among staff members, then there will always be an ambiguous workspace at your property.

Therefore, there must exist a division of labor among the crew when working for a large entity like a hotel.

Mobile technology is an essential tool to make sure that tasks get divided automatically throughout your management staff.

How? You ask.

Today’s contactless hospitality comes with personalized login access for your staff personnel. If using the system on their mobile device, they can operate all the assigned or pending tasks on a go. It ensures that each person is aware of what’s on the list for them to do next and which task is in priority.

Also, when a system divides the task and tracks their progress then you get a clear view of your staff’s performance.

8. Cashless payments

Cashless Payments have become mainstream in this digital world.

And when we talk of the hotel guests, that statement gets more evident.

What is the mode of payment used by your guests when they book you online?

In the case of offline bookings too, how many guests prefer mobile payments?

I think you have got the idea of what I’m trying to quote here.

This is just to remind you that mobile payments are not the kind of a trend that comes and goes.

It will stay for long and you should equip your technology to tune in with various payment gateways your guests are using nowadays. Because it eases your problem to deal with money and its calculation through traditional methods.

How can eZee help you?

With all its will and expertise in the hospitality technology industry, eZee has one job, that is, to simplify your job.

With our cloud-based PMS (Property Management System) and its futuristic approach, we are determined to make your hotel operations effortless and secure.

Our technology solutions have easy-to-use mobile applications with a user-friendly interface. You can operate and track your performance on a tablet and mobile phone from remote locations.

Besides, we offer fully integrated solutions that help you handle your hotel operations with a desired and personalized approach.

The post 8 Ways in Which Mobile Technology Streamlines Your Hotel Operations appeared first on eZee Absolute.

Hoteliers need to communicate with their guests at several stages – pre/post-booking, during their stay, and post-departure. Though handling these communications perfectly wouldn’t always bring you in a limelight but improper or dull communications can take a massive toll on your guests’ experience.

With this blog, I will give you a check on how you are lacking in terms of ideal guest communication and all the strategies you require to master it.

Why is Guest Communication Important?

Guest Communication is like a background score of your hospitality establishment. You might ignore it when it’s there, but when it is absent, you can easily sense the difference.

To set the emphasis right, here are some of the points that clearly show the importance of guest communication in the hospitality industry: 

1. Earning guest loyalty 

Have you ever wondered why few hotels are small-sized, but guests still choose them over other fancy ones?

Chances are that those hotels have cracked the code of establishing strong communication with their guests.

They have understood how to communicate with their guests, assist them with the issues to create a big impression and earn their priceless loyalty. 

2. Fulfill  your guests’ requirements

Ideal guest communication helps in getting proper feedback from your guests. And from genuine feedback, you get to know what are the issues they are facing.

When you set up effective personal communication with your guests, you become aware of the loopholes your hospitality system has.

Consequently, you equip yourself in advance with the ways to fulfill your guests’ requirements in the future.

3. Win repeat bookings

Good communication helps in building trust between any two parties. And once you win the trust of your guests it becomes easy for them to choose you among your competitors in the industry.

In this way, you can increase the flow of repeat bookings to your hotel by many folds.

Challenges in Establishing Ideal Guest Communication

In this digital era, most of the communications you establish with your guests are automated and online. 

The biggest challenge while doing so is getting feedback. Though you get to reach the masses, the masses don’t reach you back. In a way, you end up having one-way communication.

You never know if you are being received the way you intend. You can just wonder if what you are putting out to your guests is making an actual difference or not.

Besides that, there are some strategic challenges too which make the simple task of establishing communication with guests in hotels a lot more extensive.

Here are some of them:

1. Increasing digital indulgence

When you interact with the masses digitally it can create ambiguity and often end up confusing your guest. In addition to this, there are tons of companies providing different services to customers. Mostly all of them do digital marketing.

Subsequently, if you wake up to 50 notifications, it naturally will feel convenient to erase them all without even looking at what they are about.

Therefore, digital transaction of anything is easy and affordable but they cannot assure the required engagement.

2. Multi-channel communication system

Using many channels can widen the spectrum to strike conversations with your guest but at the same time, it can also bother them.

Imagine receiving the same messages on 10 different platforms! 

Sounds irritating right?

Anyone would question this desperate nature and ignore such things.

3. Slow responses and ineffective services

A slow response to your guests’ queries and ineffective services when your guests need them is a mood killer.

Sometimes, till you get in touch with them or resolve their issues, it turns out that they have not waited for your response and have moved on.

Hence, you lose a guest’s reliability.

4. Unbothered or busy frontdesk

If you are a hotelier then it could get challenging for you to welcome every guest with the same enthusiasm when your frontdesk is busy.

Well, this can be a turndown for your guests because frontdesk communication sets the whole ambiance for them. 

That’s why the waiting period in the lobby is the first place where hospitality should be made evident. If you fail to win your guests there, then only luck can save your image.

To overcome all these challenges, you need to work inside the framework of a few strategies I am discussing below.

Strategies to Boost Guest Communication in Hotels

Your first step should be analyzing where you lack at setting up ideal communication with your guests.

Once you are aware of your shortcomings, you will avoid investing your labor and financial resources in them.

Now, it is of utmost importance that we strategize how we communicate with guests and renew the outdated and extensive methods to do so.

Here are a few tips to help you with that:

1. Keep a regular touch

To get constant visits, there has to be a constant connection between your business and its potential or existing guests.

If you don’t do so your guests might forget to acknowledge you because it’s human nature to keep searching for better things endlessly.

Hence, it is quite a task to make someone settle for one thing, isn’t it?

But it is possible to achieve it if you maintain regular contact. It makes your guests feel comfortable, wanted, and welcomed. 

So, never overlook the power of connecting with your guests via digital technology to frequently let them know about what have you upgraded, how your services have improved, what’s new and profitable for them, etc.

2. Ensure a good front desk impression

If you are bad at digital communication, it is still acceptable. But if you can’t allure people while conversing with them face to face, it can be disastrous for your hotel’s reputation. Especially when you are assigned to the job at the front desk. 

Because then, you are the gateway between a guest and the hotel. It is your job to be in close proximity with your guests, handle their issues, listen to their requirements, and ensure that they are in comfort and are not feeling anxious to come to you for anything.

Though you can do everything in your power, you can’t help the situation where your frontdesk gets busy and crowded.

To combat this problem, hotels should have concierge staff to assist the guests with various additional services, in and around the hotel, that they would need. This can save your guests from waiting in queues at the frontdesk just to ask for pieces of information. 

For instance, your guest Samay wants to book a cab. But unfortunately,  the frontdesk is caught up. 
Would it be correct to keep your guest waiting? What if Samay has something urgent coming up? 

This is where a concierge staff enters the screen and plays their crucial part.

Samay can simply reach out to the concierge and get himself a cab booked. Not to mention, the concierge can also help him out with other queries. 

3. Introduce Chatbot on your website

While you are progressing with digital communication, hotels must have a website where people can visit and make direct bookings.

However, in these cases, guests can get confused with the information given on the website and would want instant assistance.

An innovative way to provide this is by introducing Chatbots on your website. The chatbot is a space that uses artificial intelligence for giving efficient replies to the queries of your potential guests.

The more instant and useful your replies to the queries are, the more your guests would be satisfied and look forward to booking you up.

In this way, chatbots can help you fill the communication gap at the stage of pre-booking.

4. Communicate using meaningful offerings

It is common nowadays to make your guests win exciting gifts, vouchers, discounts, and complimentary things so that you could win their loyalty in return.

And most of the time, you strike the conversation while offering any of these to your guests so that they get delighted.

Moreover, meaningful offerings can make you popular in a short period.

How?

Well, if you offer something really exciting then your chances to win new customers increase. It is simply because word-of-mouth advertising plays a tremendous role in these cases.

So, for those hoteliers who ask, “How to improve Guest Communication in their hotel?”, one of the simplest ways is to put offers on your services. 

But do not put your revenue at stake for doing so. Use an appropriate Revenue Management System to put dynamic pricing on your services to optimize your revenue while giving offers.

5. Be proactive

Well, when your guests have an issue and till you solve that, there exists an awkward moment. It can impact the fluency of their stay and unknowingly creates a distance.

But imagine, if there’s no space for any issue because you have provided them with a full manual to help themselves out. Now, they would efficiently look after it without having to go with an awkward situation.

Equipping your guests with the necessary information and tools in advance so that they are left with less or no queries is what a proactive hotel does.

6. Keep a separate database for Multi-Channels

Yes, you should provide clear information to your guests but that doesn’t mean you will provide it to them ten times in a row, right?

It seems funny and irritating at the same time!

But you are probably doing that.

Do you use multi-channels to get connected with a wide spectrum of your guests but end up connecting with the same one just on different platforms?

It has to stop already because it might be bothering your guests to receive the same text as an SMS, via e-mail, WhatsApp, sites of integrated OTA’s and the list is never-ending.

To curb this, you must filter your database at regular intervals so that your messages can hit the audience one time and make an impact.

Notifying the guests continuously can motivate them to shut their doors on you.

7. Personalized and authentic interactions

I’m sure you are familiar with that feeling when someone recognizes you, even though you meet them once in a while.

That is what personalization feels like.

For instance, you have a booking in a hotel and at FrontDesk, the receptionist remembers you and what special things you have asked for the last time.

Oh, she remembers that!

What an eidetic memory!

This kind of effect can buy you LOYAL GUESTS.

Not just that, you can also play the personalization game by your actions. 

Let me tell you how. 

Samay comes to your hotel for a week and you can see on your PMS records that tomorrow is his birthday. Now you can surprise him by sending a cake or providing free meals or offering a discount…

He will never forget this gesture and will tell this particular incident to his friends and family for sure. 

These personalized gestures will help you build a unique image of your hotel in front of your guests. 

Furthermore, you should also ensure authenticity while communicating with your guests.

If you give them the accurate and right amount of information with clear instructions only then they can work around it with ease. But, if you get them confused with a hefty amount of information at once, they will simply lose interest in your services.

8. Be available and responsive

Make sure that you are not burdened with tasks all the time. To give a hospitable ambiance to your guests, ‘being available’ is necessary.

Keeping them in wait can make them skeptical about your services and willingness to fulfill their requirements.

If they hardly get any responses, then they will lose interest very quickly.

Therefore, hotel technology solutions are a Must-Have for modern accommodation properties. So that the staff won’t compromise on the hospitality of their guests in order to handle extensive operations.

9. Ensure guest satisfaction

Though as a hotelier you and your staff are always providing guests with a wonderful experience while they stay, it can become unpredictable sometimes if guests have liked it or not.

You must amplify their experience and make them overwhelmed with your services and offerings so that they get open about how they feel about your hospitality.

This can only happen if you somehow manage to maintain a friendly touch with them.

And that’s the skill you should possess to know their final feedback in advance.

The post Guest Communication in Hotels: 9 Ways to Boost It appeared first on eZee Absolute.