Technology

I believe there will be a large shift over a long period of time. However there's a visual aspect of information that doesn't exist in a query type conversational level. Visual and sound create the emotional reaction. So generative on an "answer my question" level I think yes, but not on an inpirational level.

I agree that we're witnessing the rise of a new, AI-driven interface to the internet, which will expand but not entirely replace today's web interface. GAI chatbots are the first step, worrying Google about the future of its profitable search engine.

In a word, no. Conversational interfaces have their place, but they would add friction to airline, hotel, and restaurant searches. Amazon some years back tried to promote and monetise voice search via its Alexa devices, but no one was interested.

Any hotel group which values the direct channel (brand.com) already knows that data science has been at the core of digital marketing in hospitality for many years. It's fundamental to customer segmentation, targeting and results measurement.

The data fragmentation in hospitality is a huge challenge the industry faces today. Guest and operational data lives in multiple "data islands" that do not talk to each other: PMS, CRS, WBE, CRM, ORM, CMS, DMS, Social Media and BI.

Data science is an area of expertise that needs specialists, similar to other areas like design and creativity. Typically, most companies have outsourced these non-core functions; in the case of creativity, to ad agencies, for example.

Behaviors of guests & sorting of all offerings (room, packages, meals, drinks, activities) based on previous behaviors. Much of this if done on a per person can be done using general purpose AI along with a just in time promp injection model.

The best data that a PMS stores is its guest history - travel purchase, rooms stayed in, ancillary purchases, number of occupants, special requests and so on. While we can discover some patterns to help grow the business, a machine can sift through this multitude far more efficiently to find patterns and do so in an unbiased manner.

PMS data is only one source of first-party data, and it's actually quite limited because it focuses only on past guests. A richer set of data is built when combining PMS with CRM data and direct website behavior data. Once powered by that dataset, some key practical applications are: Benchmarking: create automated competitive sets for each hotel and find opportunities for improvement.