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This is an interesting article about the benefits of SMS marketing for hotels and spas. While SMS marketing have been adopted by other industries, the hospitality and tourism sectors have not taken full advantage of this fastest e-marketing tool. SMS marketing is considered non evasive faster, cheaper and increase the relationship between you and the guests. Moreover, SMS marketing help to promote your special events, offers and the customers have them readily available in their smartphones. In conclusion, SMS marketing can increase the hotels or spas revenues as more people have access to SMS message and will take advantage of the promotions that the hotels or spas are offering.

This article focuses on the integration of SMS in hotels to increase guest engagement. With 82% of SMS sent are read within 5 minutes of receiving, why aren't more hotel using SMS to interact with their guests? The use SMS communication will help the hotel meet your needs quicker boosting their experience. It will also be used to inform guests when their room is ready, offer late check out and send discount codes that can be shared to family or friends.

Relatively speaking, GDS's have been around for a while now, with iterations stretching back a few decades now. SiteMinder has worked to integrate cloud technology into traditional GDS models to streamline distribution. They have had strong success, powering over 200,000 reservations in the past year, generating over $60 million in hotel revenue. Over 900 hotels are now poised to receive SiteMinder services, making them the industry leading GDS cloud platform. To date, SiteMinder is represented in the globe's most influential cities, including New York, Los Angeles, London, Honk Kong, Paris, Munich, and Sydney. GDS technology has come a long way from the early models that airlines used solely for in-house purposes. New GDS's such as SiteMinder are both a testament to adaptation and the appeal of cloud technology.

MODULE 6: This article about the PMS company called Springer-Miller Systems (SMS) expanding their mobile PMS to include housekeeping functions. Earlier this month, SMS released their latest update of their mobile PMS application SMS|Host Anywhere. With this latest update, hotel staff will be able to enhance their guests experience more efficiently. Through the mobile housekeeping section of SMS|Host Anywhere, properties will be able to execute check-in/check-out assignments for the room attendants and provide accurate room status updates for the front office. Through the mobile app of SMS|Host Anywhere it can also be used for multi-property functions as well. This mobile app is essential for the front office since it can alleviate some of the wait times for the check-in/ check-out lines. The mobile app functions the same as the regular PMS on the computers. This mobile app can also safely take secured payments during the check-in/ check-out process for the guest.

They can work together. Based on this article, this can be beneficial for all industries.

Robotics, virtual reality, and augmented reality can work together to create cutting-edge solutions for diverse businesses. Businesses use robots to increase efficiency while also ensuring employee safety in potentially dangerous situations. Virtual reality and augmented reality, two contemporary technologies, have provided an immersive platform for media and gaming. People can explore strange environments both indoors and outdoors with the aid of AR and VR. The "Three Amigos" can be augmented reality, robotics, and virtual reality when they work together. Robot control using immersive technologies like VR and AR is possible. Business executives need to be aware of the potential benefits of combining virtual reality, robots, and augmented reality. Robots can be programmed to do a variety of jobs using virtual reality and augmented reality. There are two different kinds of neural networks: imitation networks, which attempt to comprehend demonstrations and examine how actions are executed, and visual networks, which use images taken by the robot's camera to understand the current state of an object. Dual neural networks can be used by organizations to enable robots to learn new tasks by monitoring and dissecting several behaviors. Robots that use artificial intelligence (AI) are exposed to a wide variety of data, which helps them learn how to distinguish between distinct objects, group related objects together, and recognize new objects that resemble what they have already seen. The expense and effort needed to gather data and real-world items can be reduced by trainers and developers. Robots can also be taught to recognize certain biological structures in the human body using 3D models. Virtual reality can be utilized to construct teleoperating robots that can function with the help of many sensor displays by employing hand controllers. The homunculus concept of the human brain, which postulates that there is a miniature human inside the brain that controls movement

GrandStay Hospitality has selected ZDirect for its eMarketing and eCRM provider. ZDirect also has ZMail which includes Mobile Passport, SMS Messaging, Apple Passbook, and Responsive Email Design. According to Jon Kennedy, president of GrandStay Hospitality, ZDirect has an impeccable reputation in regards to their services and customer successes. He believes that ZDirect will give it the leverage needed to help the "small, transitional" company quickly grow. The tools of ZDirect and ZMail will "enable each property to send electronic guest confirmations, pre-arrival email promotions, post-stay satisfaction surveys", which will allow the hotel and its guests to communicate. This two-way communication will help to increase revenue and maximize profits.

eMarketing is a great way for smaller companies to grow in the hotel industry. But if planning to run eMarketing all on your own it can get costly. The amount of severs, maintenance, and man power to run a successful eMarketing campaign is more than a small hotel chain can handle. Allowing a third party company like ZDirect to come in and help orchestrate an eMarketing campaign is a great solution for smaller hotel chains a chance. 

Site Minder by GDS experience, serves as good example to better understand the impact of a GDS's impact on the hotel industry. GDS by SiteMinder provides a single point of entry to over 500 000 travel agents across the globe, which means that hotels can target many type of travelers in multiple geographic regions. By connecting hotels directly to the world's major GDS providers - Sabre, Amadeus, and Travelport - and travel agent network, GDS by SiteMinder offers a major convenience to participating hotels. Through this service, hotels don't have to worry about signing up with each one of these providers. Another advantage of SiteMinder is its affordability; there are no commission fees, rather, just one flat transaction fee per reservation. The company offers free services from GDS experts and free technical account management advice which are other benefits. For instance, in another article, in mid-2013, South Beach Group who has boutique hotels in the heart of Miami Beach, decided to switch its 12 hotels to GDS by SiteMinder. After moving to GDS by SiteMinder, South Beach Group representative highlights the significant increase in bookings leading to a growth in annual revenues by17% in 2013. In essence, GDS by SiteMinder advertises participating hotels to more customers globally within an incomparable distribution platform, with real-time and two-way GDS connectivity. As we can see in the article, in 2016, just within 12 months the total number of users of GDS by SiteMinder increased from 250 to almost 900. This article underlines the importance of GDS for the growth of travel industry. With Site Minder by GDS, one can realize how GDS helps increase hotel bookings by placing hotels on more virtual channels (an analogue of supermarket shelves) globally.  

Expect the hospitality industry to capitalize on these trends in 2017. Get ready to pay for your stay with a mobile app. Also, we will see more and more digital marketing.

With the new year upon us, this article describes the biggest trends of 2017. The biggest trend is the most obvious, more people are using their mobile device/ smartphones to search for restaurants locations or make reservations. The other trend, is how advertising through digital platforms is more cost effective than traditional marketing methods such as email campaigns. Projections show that 80% of restaurant operators agree that investing in technology helps the increasing of sales and gives them a competitive edge. Another statistic shows that mobile pay transactions will be the future.

This site explains the benefits of using Proximity Marketing but this is the side of a company that is selling this marketing tool. It goes into detail of how it works and gives examples. I like how this site goes over the benefits and does touch base on how connectivity is important. It goes over how sms, email, mobile aps and wifi captive portals are beneficial.

The article I chose was based on disruptive innovations (DI) in a post pandemic world. In this article DI is represented as a necessary change through the additions of increased safety measures by implementing contactless ordering and payments to keep not only the guests safe but staff as well. This article describes how DI will not only give customers a stronger sense of safety but also give staff the opportunity to collect more data on customers in turn enhancing the guest's possible future experiences. This is just one example of how DI is helping to make customers experiences better during the COVID pandemic.

New advancements in technology and the hospitality and tourism industry have led to the collaboration of both sides to create better guest experiences. By using new technological products in the hospitality industry, guests can have contactless interactions to reduce their health concerns, brought on by the pandemic, as well as increase a business's productivity at the same time. The new innovations can also give more data on guest interests and help businesses learn more about their audience to make better decisions later on.

"Disruptive innovation is nearly as old as the hospitality business itself." A post pandemic world has taken a new direction towards contactless service, and DI technology has played a huge role in how we now operate going forward. Sevenrooms is a online reservation software similar to open table that allows for a seamless reservation process. It tracks data such as how much a guest has spent, how frequent they visit and even table preference. "This helps tailor the guest experience and personalize your communications with guests, resulting in increased loyalty and retention." Sevenrooms also uses an SMS messaging feature to notify guests about any updates to their table, which allows them to enjoy themselves freely while waiting instead of being crammed up in the front of the restaurant.

This article is about Task Retail Technology which is a cloud based point of sale software being selected for Rubio's Restaurants. The POS system is a touch screen system powered through the internet and has a centralized POS terminal. It also has digital menu boards, mobile applications, and SMS. It uses Microsoft's latest technology and features a loyalty system that can reward customers and has an upsell feature. 

This article discusses how CRM's use social media to promptly communicate with customers. I thought it was very interesting that 70% of the complaints made by customers via a sm outlet are not responded to. Examples are given as to how some companies use teams whose specific responsibility is to respond to customer complaints by text, email, twitter, and/or facebook. I thought it was cool that one guests tweet about loving cornbread, turned into a response by room service to deliver cornbread right to her room.

Summary: The variety of gifting options has grown from a simple plastic gift card to virtual cards delivered by email, text, debit/credit cards and more. The prediction for 2013 will exceed a billion dollars of digital gifting for the holiday season and continue to grow. Digital gift cards have made giving easy due to the convenience of redemption. Paper coupons have proven to be successful to draw in consumer activity, but the digital revolution in virtual gifting is expected to explode as people are so connected to their mobile devices. Even with the convenience and growing popularity of digital gifting comes barriers and security issues. Such issues include personal banking security and privacy. Some small to midsize businesses may not be able to participate in digital gifting due to cost barriers or lack of technology. Due to electronic process, paper receipts will be obsolete. Computers aren't perfect so how does one resolve dollar discrepancies. One benefit of virtual giving is the bar codes/QR codes. Companies are able to collect and retain additional information of givers and receivers by scanning the bar code/QR Code. Often people are reluctant to provide contact information, but in this case they aren't being asked, they have no choice. This is a benefit to the companies because they can make other promotional offers to engage and possibly retain both parties, thereby increasing sales. There are a variety of methods of virtual gifting and redemption. One example is Giftly. Giftly adds the value of the gift to the recipient's credit or debit card which can be used anywhere. This is super convenient for many people and they are able to choose whatever they wish rather than receive a gift chosen for them. This is certainly the digital age version of sending a check via mail to a loved one. Other corporate examples that have impacted the transition from plastic gift cards to virtual gifting are Burger King, Dunkin Donuts, Applebee's and Starbu

Location based advertising is proven to be very effective. Brands can connect with customers in the area, offer discounts/sales, engage with them and collect data about buying habits and demographics.

This article is about what can be LEED certified and how to go about getting certified. I just learned about this topic in my Hosp. Fac. Enviro. Sys. class, when I learned about it, I didn't realize that you have to be reevaluate.

This article goes over proximity marketing in a more general sense for those who are new to it. I enjoyed that it really gets into what are the different types, as well as how each of those are used today. When talking about proximity marketing, it gives the business a closer range when they are marketing to their audience. Here are the different types the article listed: - sending advertisements to mobile devices over the Bluetooth network, - Wi-Fi or SMS messages, - distribution of special offers, - digital coupons or promotional codes, - interactive digital scoreboards, - QR or barcodes.

this article is very interesting, going over the future of hospitality and social media. It goes over 6 major changes they believe are affecting hospitality directly. The one that i found interesting is the use of twitter as a concierge as well as a method to improve costumer service. I never thought about the ability to use this technology as a concierge with the ability to have access to hotel services!

Here Forbe magazine offers some tips on how to do proximity/mobile marketing right and some of the advantages. Companies need another marketing avenue to reach customers in this diverse field where competition is so intense. Technological advances will help one stand out in this large crowd.

This article give us an idear about use technology to promote marketing. In 21st century the mobile device is indispensable for everybody, for company, we have to keep forefront on technology.

Biometrics is becoming more popular.  49% surveyed stated they would like biometric payments.  In relation to smartphones, 20% have made payments, 45% browse in-store & shop online later, 45% check prices, 31% comment re shopping on social media, and 28% download coupons. Steps need to be taken to ensure implementation such as provide support to retailers and educate staff. 

As GDS technology has taken place in the past 2 decades in hospitality in dustry, a branch of it, mobile technology, is also showing its great potencial. Now more and more people can not live without mobile and mobile could be very useful when people are on their vacation like planning and booking hotel or airlines. Besides "pure" mobile devices, tablets also generately damatical revenue for hotel industry. As a result, hoteliers should notice those trends in customers purchasing habits and make a new maketing plan in a SoLoMo(Social, Local, Mobile) world, considering how to best utilize SoLoMo to engage their guests and generate incremental revenues.