Momondo on the future and 5 more stories
PREDICTIONS FOR HOTEL TECH
Peter O'Connor together with several hotel tech companies put together some predictions of what is to come for the hotel tech industry. The percentages and numbers associated with the predictions are slightly confusing (it's hard to put numbers on predictions) but the content is interesting. I'd recommend it to anyone in the hotel tech space.
ARE LOYALTY SCHEMES RELEVANT?
Of course when you're the biggest hotel company in the world, Loyalty is important. But is it going to remain relevant? With OTAs taking the lions share of online bookings and online bookings being pretty much the main source for the future, how relevant it is to carry another points card? The one benefit they will have is for automated systems as it can help filter choice. But branded hotels aren't equal in quality by any standard so how relevant are their points systems? Loyalty isn't bought, it's earned. It's doubtful in my opinion that loyalty will be relevant in the next decade. This interesting read on Skift shows it needs some re-thinking.
METASEARCH AND ITS EVOLUTION
Let's face it, metasearch in its current state is somewhat like the web of 10 years ago. A list of plenty of choices some of which aren't event entirely correct (comparing different room types for example). Trivago knows it, Momondo knows it, even Kayak knows it, and going through TripAdvisor's earnings call notes it's pretty clear they know it too. Both Momondo and Trivago believe the future is in personalization. I think that's a great idea, it'll take a lot of data to get there though.
IGNORANCE + ARROGANCE = IRRELEVANCE
Last week Forbes published 11 Trends Shaping the Future of Retail, not all apply to the hotel sector but it is an interesting look into an industry that needs to reinvent itself due to online competition. As the author wrote, Ignorance + Arrogance = Irrelevance, our industry suffers from some of that and while many are working on improving things I think it is a healthy exercise to look elsewhere and see what we can learn.
WHY BOTS ARE HOT
Bots are in the news kind of all the time right now but this is not yet another article on bots and AI. Chris Messina is an ex-Uber, ex-Google product manager who also invented the hashtag. In this interview he explains WHY bots are the natural evolution for computer interfaces and how that will come to be. It's not a fad or a trend, it's just the way things will evolve because technology finally is ready for it. I recommend the read even for non-tech geeks to get a bigger view of what is coming and how to prepare for it.
WOW, THE COMMENTS
I shared this article a few weeks ago about why hotel tech needs more entrepreneurs and intra-preneurs, Tnooz picked it up recently and it seems to have strung a chord with the industry. The comments are most definitely worth a read - and pitch in if you think you can add to it.