The pandemic has triggered significant changes in the trends of the travel and hotel industries. The travel and hospitality industry is now searching for ways to bring changes in operations for better functions.
Companies are now focusing on cost optimization and automation of lodging or travel planning processes. Adopting modern technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) or Machine Learning (ML) has helped industries survive and thrive well in the world of digitalization.
Key Driving Factors for Travel & Hotel Industry
People travel more frequently these days after being stuck at home during the pandemic. Traveling has become one of the favorite ways to relax for most professionals. Thus, the service providers are establishing their distinct presence through customized products and services.
At the same time, data analytics has simplified perceiving guest preferences. Monetizing guest data is now possible with the help of AI and ML.
Machine learning is undeniably the best way to learn and act, depending on past experiences.
As the process depends on data from practical experience, it is the best way to fulfill the customers’ demands with minimum investment.
Artificial intelligence helps you to use deep knowledge about customers. Moreover, this will enable the industry agents to suggest online and offline marketing activities based on the current data.
Role of AI in automation
Artificial intelligence or AI refers to intelligent computer programming that helps machines to execute tasks that would otherwise call for the recruitment of human resources. The AI assistants and the chatbots on the website and mobile applications now do most of the customer support work that happened inside the brick-and-mortar office rooms earlier.
The essential decision makers are adopting Artificial intelligence-aided systems in the airline industry or hotel booking sites. So, now people need help to book transportation or accommodation for their travel and also get help planning the journey without any intervention from human workers.
Artificial Intelligence powered systems maintain an extensive repository of travel data and continuously learn from it. Integrating these AI systems with Websites or Apps provides valuable suggestions on prices, discounts, and hotel details based on the previous search query.
For instance, if you try to book a flight ticket from point A to destination point B. The AI system will surprise the user by offering similar suggestions, nearby hotels with accommodative prices, or other hotels within a short radius of the destination point B.
This is the magic of AI. Some algorithms will allow users to set price alerts to save money while traveling. The online suggestions from analyzing search histories, favorites, price ranges, and filters will help build up the business.
The technical aspect includes complex AI/ ML algorithms and data science. Thus, small travel agencies may not initially be able to invest such a considerable sum.
Yet, several companies are working day and night to make AI adoption cheaper, more accessible, and more manageable. Platforms like CellStrat Hub provide ready-to-integrate APIs for every need.
AI can automate the customer journey and every touch point.
AI Aiding in Customer Service
AI virtual assistants can create new realities for traveling. One can speed up check-in at the airport through self-service kiosks or online methods.
Customers like the shortest response time to answer queries, and AI has effectively decreased the average waiting time for a response from 20 to 30 minutes to a few seconds.
Multilingual bots, flight rescheduling apps, and luggage-finding tools are helping the hotel industry further. These tools rely on a massive amount of data processing that is a possibility with only AI and ML.
You may start believing that robots will likely replace airport employees in many areas, especially the check-in process. There are some premium global hotels where all the first-level staff are robots who can speak many languages and help guests with check-in and checkout.
The latest developments include the making of AI-powered robots for customer contact kiosks, which can
· Answer human queries,
· Offer recommendations depending on the gestures and language of the user,
· Plan site seeing,
· Express emotions via changing colored lights,
· Troubleshoot their issues and ease their stay.
These are some of the best examples to show how the user satisfaction level will be 100% after including artificial intelligence systems in the hotel.
Apps for Flight Price Prediction
Long-run travelers will always prefer to catch the flights at the lowest fares at the right time. Airfares depend on many uncontrollable factors like global fuel prices, government policies, demand-supply, international laws, regulations, etc.
If done manually, predicting the prices in advance is not a cup of tea.
There exist AI-powered apps for intelligent price prediction of flights. Their system keeps learning past and present data to predict future availability and prices.
Some travel agencies even allow the users to lock the price of the flights to avoid paying higher fees for waiting a little longer.
Travel Disruption Management
Delays in flights, trains, or buses are everyday affairs. There can be technical glitches, human factors, or natural disasters that can cause a delay in all types of mobility services. Artificial intelligence and predictive analytics will always help the travel industry with intelligent automation.
It is possible to:
· Gather weather forecasts
· Inform about delays in advance with predictive analytics
· Offer alternate solutions for travelers who have a time constraint.
Such a service will always make artificial intelligence systems mandatory in the travel industry.
AI Makes Hotel Booking Easier.
Nowadays, people book hotels directly from travel sites or apps. Besides, the use of artificial intelligence in travel sites draws more customers.
When an app suggests several hotels near the one a user is enquiring about, the user will get many options that the person may not even know. The AI algorithms run through the person’s previous bookings, likability, hotels’ current availability, and other metrics and suggest places accordingly. This ability of AI gives a high conversion ratio to the booking sites.
AI and ML algorithms enable the platform to provide similar suggestions within the same price range to ensure that the users feel that the company is trying to help them with the booking process.
Tourists & Pilgrimage Management
Famous tourists and spiritual destinations around the globe get millions of visitors every year. The administration has to take an interdisciplinary approach to examine international, national, and regional tourism and specific management issues in those destinations.
For example, Kumbh Mela in India witnessed 200 million visitors in 2019. Similarly, Mecca in Saudi Arabia sees more than 4 million visitors annually. Managing & guiding those, making policies and their timely execution is brutal.
Artificial Intelligence bots are now enabling effective tourist management.
· Saudi Arabia utilizes artificial intelligence (AI) in line with Islamic principles. It has positioned AI-powered robots at the Grand Mosque in Mecca, where they will recite verses from the Holy Quran and deliver sermons to Muslims.
· The Uttarakhand (India) Police began employing artificial intelligence (AI) to track COVID-19 regulation offenders in the wake of an alarming rise in COVID-19 infections.
AI CCTV cameras with sensors sent out a warning when they captured a person without a mask. They also gave notifications when high-density crowd areas were at risk for stampedes.
AI also helps in accommodation management at this mammoth scale of tourists.
AI-voice assistants, chatbots, Data analysis, hyper-personalization, etc., are other applications of AI that are in place to support the administration.
