Lodging industry as part of Tourism Industry is one of the top 10 industry in US, with about $127B annual sales revenue and $18B pretax profit from Hotels rooms sales alone.
Consider the below figures to understand the dynamics of hotels Industry:
Over 70% rooms has an average rate of $60 or more and over 42% has average rate of $85 or more, the highest room reporting category. Looking at the guests profile, about 40% of guests travel for business reasons with 54% of of them managerial or professional position with an average yearly household income of $116,578.
A typical leisure traveler spends about $105 /night and travel with his/her spouse or family.
Based upon these its safe to assume that a professional business traveler or a leisure family are the two most frequent and most spending guests in upper category hotels.
Yet, these types of hotels are not keeping up with tremendous technical adaptation going around elsewhere. Not sure if they are just too complacent in Laissez-faire or the entire management are vacationing at their timeshares at Tahiti but they seems to have missed an entire decade of technological changes going around everywhere.
If I have to compare my hotels stay from 10 years ago to now, I will be hard pressed to list even a couple of major significant changes.
Below are some facelifts that the hotels can do at a very low cost to make the stay more attractive to the new iPad-Facebook generation:
The current check-in system should be revamped to allow a guest to check-in electronically, choose their own room on whatever floor and whatever view or side they prefer in agreement with their purchases. Airlines are doing it since years, no reason hotels couldn't' do it. The hotels can additionally add things like 3D-views, internet and cellphone signals strength etc. from different floors and alleys to make the selection more meaningful.
And like an electronic boarding pass, an electronic room key could be sent over to guests smart phone. Some Hilton hotels have an RFID door locks already in place, it just needs to be upgraded to work with iphone key.
And please don't' still add the additional requirement to stop by the lobby. Much more complicated and costly financial transactions happens with faceless electronic verification than a simple hotel check-in Not to mention that the most of the hotels are already equipped surveillance system to cover the additional financial or security risk.
Things have changed upside down with the advent of iPhone, iPad, the app store and the content delivery network. Its about time the hotel management realizes that and can prioritize these upgrades accordingly.
By adding a tiny little device like apple TV, or Google TV & integrating its interface with the guest home page, the whole TV and internet world can be personalized, starting from my favorite channels, my favorite apps, last scenes that I watched before I left home, my emails, my Facebook pages, my news sites, my games scores etc. And as soon as the guest checks out, the customization will revert to default settings waiting for new guests to check in.
For five star and up hotels, adding a Vanity Mirror TV in bathroom, again customized with the above programming and control options will be a nice upgrade. Research shows that the bathrooms are getting more and more used like any other regular room in the house and at least 45% of adult male carry & use smartphone in the bathroom.
Bottom line
The bottom line is that the hotel's bottom line isn't
going to get hurt by these seemingly free or at-cost options rather its going to grow. It will save time, add satisfaction and minimize stress to a business
traveler and will make a vacationing family's stay smoother whose little
ones are getting more & more tech savvier.
Consider the below figures to understand the dynamics of hotels Industry:
Over 70% rooms has an average rate of $60 or more and over 42% has average rate of $85 or more, the highest room reporting category. Looking at the guests profile, about 40% of guests travel for business reasons with 54% of of them managerial or professional position with an average yearly household income of $116,578.
A typical leisure traveler spends about $105 /night and travel with his/her spouse or family.
Based upon these its safe to assume that a professional business traveler or a leisure family are the two most frequent and most spending guests in upper category hotels.
Yet, these types of hotels are not keeping up with tremendous technical adaptation going around elsewhere. Not sure if they are just too complacent in Laissez-faire or the entire management are vacationing at their timeshares at Tahiti but they seems to have missed an entire decade of technological changes going around everywhere.
If I have to compare my hotels stay from 10 years ago to now, I will be hard pressed to list even a couple of major significant changes.
Below are some facelifts that the hotels can do at a very low cost to make the stay more attractive to the new iPad-Facebook generation:
1. Start with Guest Web Page
A good number of guests do create a user's account on hotels site to take advantages of the points system and save their favorite settings like types of rooms, choice of floors, airlines miles etc. These are good settings but it badly needs expansions.2. Check In Experience
Imagine checking into your hotels, choosing your room and then getting the electronic key on your iPhone while you print your flight boarding card ? How cool is that ?! Not to mention the ease of mind that you will get a room of your choice where you can connect to the internet freely and wouldn't' have to stand up in queue while checking in.The current check-in system should be revamped to allow a guest to check-in electronically, choose their own room on whatever floor and whatever view or side they prefer in agreement with their purchases. Airlines are doing it since years, no reason hotels couldn't' do it. The hotels can additionally add things like 3D-views, internet and cellphone signals strength etc. from different floors and alleys to make the selection more meaningful.
And like an electronic boarding pass, an electronic room key could be sent over to guests smart phone. Some Hilton hotels have an RFID door locks already in place, it just needs to be upgraded to work with iphone key.
And please don't' still add the additional requirement to stop by the lobby. Much more complicated and costly financial transactions happens with faceless electronic verification than a simple hotel check-in Not to mention that the most of the hotels are already equipped surveillance system to cover the additional financial or security risk.
3. Personalize the stay, all the way
The only thing resembling 'personalization' you can find in hotel stay these days is your choice of pillow, high or low floors or choice between queen or king size beds. These are goods but a lot more can be done to expand the personalization. Few additional areas of personalization are:TV & Video
Aren't you fed up with turning on the hotel TV, watching the same old access menu which never gives you anything useful to watch. Add to that the excessive costs of movies-on-demand based upon some 20 years old pricing study and the navigational pain with the old IPTV remotes with lacks the basics like programming guides, inline info etc. ?Things have changed upside down with the advent of iPhone, iPad, the app store and the content delivery network. Its about time the hotel management realizes that and can prioritize these upgrades accordingly.
By adding a tiny little device like apple TV, or Google TV & integrating its interface with the guest home page, the whole TV and internet world can be personalized, starting from my favorite channels, my favorite apps, last scenes that I watched before I left home, my emails, my Facebook pages, my news sites, my games scores etc. And as soon as the guest checks out, the customization will revert to default settings waiting for new guests to check in.
For five star and up hotels, adding a Vanity Mirror TV in bathroom, again customized with the above programming and control options will be a nice upgrade. Research shows that the bathrooms are getting more and more used like any other regular room in the house and at least 45% of adult male carry & use smartphone in the bathroom.
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