The Bigger Promise of Voice in Hospitality Could Be With Vacation Rentals
There's been plenty of anticipation — and coverage — of the possibility of using voice technology in hotels, but when it comes to vacation rentals, the theoretical power of voice has the potential to be truly transformative for an area of hospitality without staff to provide certain services.
"The promise of voice in vacation rentals is amazing, in theory," said Alex Nigg, co-founder and CEO of Properly, a cleaning management platform for private accommodations. "It's amazing because if you look at how vacation rentals position themselves against hotels, it's more about the product: more space, kitchens, interesting neighborhoods. But you miss the service overlay of the hotel, and a voice system can replace a lot of that. That promise is compelling because it brings vacation rental product up to par of what a hotel offers."
Not only that, but as more consumers purchase and use voice assistants for their homes, their familiarity with the product has grown. Research released earlier this year by Voicebot.ai estimates that approximately 20 percent of the U.S. population, or 47.3 million U.S. adults, has access to a smart speaker.
