We say, "It's actually not so hard." One of the solutions to the tech problem is for hotels to re-evaluate the way they prioritize and integrate technology. Instead of beginning with a laundry list of possible technologies to implement (i.e., mobile check-in, voice-activated in-room tech, rate optimization and distribution technology, and so forth), start with the guest. Hotels know--or should know--who they are after. The ideal guest. And every ideal guest has a different set of needs and wants. How hotels prioritize hotel technology has everything to do with making a love match between the right technology and the right travelers. And the Guest Journey Game is here to help.How It WorksThere are six basic types of travelers. Among them, Cobi, Gen Z (young, hip, looking for a good time at a great price); The Family (has a lot to consider to keep everyone happy); and Paula & Ricky, The Couple (anniversaries and long weekends, here we come).Unless you're a Moxy, most hotels will find they have two or three different love interests out of the six. Choose the one that has the most synergy; the one your hotel can best cater to or finds to be the most profitable. (You can always do more than one Guest Journey, anyhow.)Since we're talking love interests, let's talk about Paula & Ricky. The Couple. It's their first anniversary, but they're still paying off the wedding. They're looking for a reasonably priced staycation but want the experience to be stellar so reviews matter. Hotels that play the game will walk through the experience through Paula & Ricky's eyes, identifying things like whether or not rates are optimized automatically with the most up-to-date rates on all the sites they would visit; if opportunities to add roses or champagne to the reservation have been presented; if the check-in process is clunky or smooth; and how easy it is to book activities once they're on-site. After all the choices have been made, the game, created and sponsored by apaleo, will send you a note about how well you did at reaching your target traveler along with a report about what Paula & Ricky really want in their stay.The Guest Journey Game Report offers confirmation of how well you're doing, a detailed look at the traveler profile and what they want in their stay, the core technology set-up that can deliver it, and the add-ons they need to drive the perfect guest journey. For instance, they're in the early 30s and cost-conscious. They DO want personal touches and a cozy hotel, and they DON'T want to wait in line or be bothered with screaming children. Hotels will learn how they book, how long their average stay is, and more. A section called "How to Run a Hotel They Love" details everything from revenue management tools to upselling needs to point of sale technologies that properties need to close the deal and keep Paula & Ricky coming back for more. Details on "The Additional Wow Factors" encourage hotels to think beyond the basics about things like ancillary activities, experiences, smart rooms, and more.Cobi, the youngest and tech-savviest of the bunch, wants more from the tech experience than Paula & Ricky. He's going to want flexible technology, judge the hotel on the seamlessness of the digital experience, and is more inclined to use the in-room tablets and chat features, like a digital concierge.Hotels may find they've got it in the bag with one traveler type but are missing key technologies with another valuable traveler. At the root of reaching all six travelers, however, is a solid cloud-based PMS with open APIs that allow technologies to be added with ease. The parts that most concern hotels--the architecture and the integrations--are solved for when the core system is competent for what a hotel needs in the 21st century.When asked what guest-facing technologies hotels will focus on in the coming year, two out of three hoteliers asked by HotelNewsNow said voice-enabled technology. The third focused on automation via mobile apps. And these may well be where these particular properties need to focus with their ideal guests. However, it only makes sense to look toward the guest first--follow their lead. For some, voice-enabled technology just doesn't matter. For others, like Cobi, it's everything. Knowing that hotels simply can't enable every tech solution, it makes sense to go after a foundation that will offer flexibility and build on exactly what will make your guests happy, and make your property more profitable.

The shift from desktop to mobile and tablet devices continued its steady pace in 2018. More than 58% of web visitors and more than 51% of page views were generated from mobile devices last year, compared to 38% of web visitors and 40% of page views only three years ago. In 2018, nearly 28% of bookings and 25% of room nights came from mobile devices, compared to 21% of bookings and 17% of room nights in 2015 (HEBS Digital client portfolio data).It's clear that we're already living in a mobile-first world. Mobile devices dominate the travel planning journey: up to half of all desktop bookings worldwide are preceded by a click on a mobile device, and 94% of leisure travelers use multiple devices (mobile, tablet, desktop) when planning and booking travel (Criteo).In hospitality, up to 30% of hotel bookings are done via mobile devices, a percentage dependent on whether the property is branded or independent, its location (rural or metro area), complexity of hotel product (golf resort vs. major city hotel), availability of a loyalty program, and composition of its customer segments (business vs. leisure, transient vs. group).The hospitality industry, by default, has lower mobile booking share compared to the overall projections for the travel industry due to the complexity of managed corporate travel and SMERF group segment procurement, such as mandated GDS bookings for managed corporate travel and the offline RFP process for group travel.The mobile-first world is here to stay:Across HEBS Digital's hotel client portfolio, consisting of hundreds of hotels and resorts of every size, we saw this shift occur in every data category. The most notable developments in 2018:Nearly 28% of bookings, 25% of room nights, and 24% of revenue came from mobile devices. If we include over-the-phone reservations originating from the hotel mobile website, more than 35% of bookings and 30% of revenue originated from the mobile channel.Nearly 58% of web visitors and 51% of page views were generated from mobile devices.Compared to 2015, mobile devices generated:Less than 21% of bookings, 17% of room nights, and 15% of revenue.Less than 38% of web visitors and 40% of page views.Or, compare to 2012 when mobile devices generated:Less than 9.5% of bookings, 8.6% of room nights, and 9% of revenue.Less than 17% of web visitors and 14% of page views.How Should Hoteliers Approach the Mobile-First World?As we continue to experience this shift to mobile and increased complexity in the travel planning process, hoteliers need to find ways to engage their best potential guests across multiple touch points and across all devices, especially mobile. Today's typical online travel consumer is exposed to more than 38,983 micro-moments in any 60-day timeframe. They also visit an average of 18 websites via multiple devices in eight sessions before making a hotel booking (Google Research). This journey results in some serious competition for the travel consumer's attention and has become increasingly dominated by mobile micro-moments and touch points.Here are the top two action steps for hoteliers to address the shift to mobile-first user behavior:#1. Invest in a responsive, mobile-first website.Hoteliers need to keep the property website, which is the foundation of their digital marketing and distribution strategy, up to the mobile-first standards demanded by today's travel consumer. With nearly 59% of website visitors now viewing on mobile devices, a fully responsive mobile-first website design is a must.If your property website is older than two years, it's due for a redesign. Websites older than two years are often lacking the latest best practices in technology, design, and UX, such as a mobile-first design, content merchandising, Google AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages), schema, and technical SEO considerations. An outdated website leads to lower conversions.The website download speeds across various devices also inevitably affects conversion rates on the hotel website: fast download speeds drastically improve the user experience and increase the user's desire to purchase on the site. According to Google, 53% of visits are abandoned if a mobile site takes longer than three seconds to load. Mobile-first responsive websites with cloud hosting and CDN (Content Delivery Network) provide far better server response times and faster download speeds across geographies.A hotel's website must also be backed by a website technology platform that includes mobile-first functionality specific to the hoteliers' needs, such as:Automated schema markup on the hotel website. Schema markup helps search engines understand the content and intent of websites, especially dynamic content elements such as events and happenings pages, special offers, opening hours, and star ratings. These rich snippets make hotel webpages appear more prominently in SERPs, thus improving visibility of a hotel website's overall SEO performance. One of the important benefits is the Featured Snippets, which Google creates dynamically based on the content of your website and places on top of the search results.Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) pages which download fast on mobile and wearable devices and are featured as news and info "teasers" in the Google AMP teaser section in mobile SERPs. This works to increase hotel visibility and create another entry point to boost mobile visitors and bookings, as well as provide another opportunity to outshine the competition.Advanced merchandising technology platform for promoting special offers and packages, including last-minute deals for mobile users.Content personalization capabilities to target users with unique marketing messages and promotions, based on the device they are currently using (mobile vs. desktop), their demographic information, geo location, and loyalty member affiliation.Promotional banners with live rates providing real-time availability and rate information for both mobile users with shorter booking windows and desktop users with longer booking windows.Advanced content management functionality to create and manage custom page layouts designed to showcase a property in its best light.A highly-secure cloud hosting platform.The property website must incorporate the right balance of beauty and science. An excellent design combined with a state-of-the-art website content management system (CMS), supported by a strong merchandising strategy and engaging visual content and copy, all while providing an optimum user experience from top to bottom on all possible devices. This type of website will result in a boost in conversions and revenues from the direct online channel.#2. Engage the mobile-first travel consumer with multi-channel, multi-device marketing.Keeping travelers engaged and reaching them at various touchpoints throughout their journey requires integrating all marketing channels across all possible screens. Effective multi-channel marketing campaigns utilize the full spectrum of digital marketing (SEO, SEM, display, paid social, and email) to promote one cohesive message across channels and devices. This strategy is the most effective way to increase reach and boost revenues for a need period.Campaign Strategy Recommendations for 2019:Establish the overarching business need you are trying to meet with the campaign: drive weekend stays, increase RFPs for meetings and events, increase ADR, or drive last-minute occupancy needs due to a big group cancellation, for example.Use guest data, campaign insights, website analytics, and customer research to build a customer persona of your target audience.Based on this data, create one cohesive campaign message that will most effectively speak to these audiences across all touchpoints and devices.Map the path to purchase for your travel consumer and launch initiatives that will reach guests across devices and throughout all stages of the lifecycle, from the dreaming to planning and booking phases and beyond.Integrate powerful and engaging technology that assists in lead generation, relationship building, and driving direct bookings.Reserve 15-25% of your property's digital marketing budget for multichannel campaigns.To achieve mobile-readiness, hoteliers must invest adequately in a mobile-first website and digital marketing campaigns. Bying, and future guests, hotels can drive more direct bookings throughout the entire path to purchase, especially from the mobile channel.

One thing I remember vividly is that every Friday night was family movie night at home. My parents received a weekly "TV program magazine" - every Thursday. Whilst it had some stories about god-knows-what, the main feature was the TV program. This might sound bizarre but even those magazines provided "upgrades" over time when pictures of the movies were included in the generally text heavy program.Here is the amazing thing - Friday night was something the family looked forward to. As we would receive the magazine on Thursday, we would have discussions around "what movie to watch". We had to decide as a family as we could only watch one movie at one channel. Back then there was six channels that were typically wrestling for the top spot - and the winner would get us "brickwalled" for about 90 mins.Crazy to think that a TV program could make you be at a place in a certain time. How was that possible? Well, you could argue that back in the day the most important job at Television was deciding what program to show at what time as it would capture the consumer and how to "present" a small extract to get you hooked. For us - it was a "date" with the TV, a Friday night thing, a time that was planned.Wondering about the parallel to Revenue Management? Here is what happens in most hotels:Daily - RM comes in, runs pick up report, prepares morning meeting numbers, prepares "the story to tell", comes back to do an hour of pricing. If unlucky, GM is already in asking you "what happened?" a question that at that point in time you are not able to answer.Weekly - Revenue meeting - dedicated time to bring everyone together to talk revenueThe above is not uncommon and gives the RM the same "power" as to what "movie to watch". The RM follows the "program" - come in, do pick up report, tell people about it - a morning ritual, a copy and paste exercise that rivals the holy grail. Information shared is solely at the mercy of the revenue manager.Weekly revenue meetings are nothing else than the Friday night movie night - however in this case, the RM decides the movie and dictates what to "watch when". There is only one program, one channel. The numbers are set in the same format every week and the importance of a "revenue meeting agenda" is highlighted in every training you go to - even if you have weekly variations of focus areas, more often that not you are running the same movie repeatedly.And then there is Netflix.My family and I went to Bali for a weekend trip. Arriving at the hotel the kids were tired after the trip - if you have a five and a three-year-old you know that tired, hungry kids coupled with unfamiliar environment is a highly explosive emotional environment to be in. We decided to switch on the TV as a reward for being amazing little travelers. However, try and explain to a five-year-old the concept of TV channels / programs in a world of on demand on device Netflix streaming that they are used to from home.We decided to give a phone to Rafa (5) and the iPad to Hayden (3) ...oh boy - my Netflix subscription did not cover enough devices which left Rafa empty handed (Hayden was just a bit faster on the Peppa Pig). Remember: Tired, Hungry, don't get what I want = tantrum.This situation taught me two important things:The way we deal with information has changed: it is now at the time we want it, at the device we want it, on demand - fast-forward, start again, continue where you left off: as often as you like.Paying $2 a month more for simultaneous device usage is 100% worth it. Ability to upgrade the plan within seconds and making use of it - priceless. In pricing, we would call that "Versioning"."Netflix" your Revenue Management CultureThe biggest barrier for the creation of a revenue culture is: Rigorous tasks and static meetings.If you are currently living in a revenue world where you are dominated by rigorous tasks and unproductive meetings - great agenda, loads of talk, little action (most people know that I never showed up to my own revenue meetings, and I was supposed to run them) - then it is time to change now.Imagine an environment where the full-on meeting is split intoTwo tips to get you started:On demand revenue meeting challenge: Get off your backside, grab any staff member and try and run a revenue meeting RIGHT NOW! Few possible outcomes: A) you can do it, B) you feel lost, C) you are not able to do it, D) staff member think you went "coocoo"Price in the moment: Spending two hours each morning to do your pricing is not going to help you. It slows you down. It is wasted time to do everything at once. Instead of tackling all at once - break it down into little chunks across the day (chances are your insights will skyrocket). Imagine it like a box set series. Whilst there are times where you binge-watch, more often than not you take each episode as it comes (and if you mix it up and watch multiple shows at same time - Good, continue!)Truth is we are lacking agility and speed of decision making. Whilst tasks and structure are important if you are in your infancy of revenue management - a true culture can only be bread across the organization if you bring it into the 21st century - mobile, mobility, on demand!