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This article discusses the popularity of voice searches have become along with the advancement of technology and the impact it has made with hotel industry.

I find it interesting that corporations are doing research on voice command technologies like Alexa and Siri down to the specific wording, that because of the "conversational nature" of the voice command searches being executed by consumers, these companies are able to know what specifically to aim for, whether it be to be considered one of the "best" hotels in the area or "prettiest". I wouldn't think there would be a notable difference between google searches and voice command searches.

This article emphasizes the fact that Chinese consumers is thriving in outbound travel. The number of people in China traveling is expected to increase from the current number of 150 million trips to 700 millions trips in the upcoming five years. With its significant growth, Marriott is taking extra measures to capture the eye of the interest of Chinese travelers. The Chinese e-commerce giant, Alibaba Group and Marriott declared a joint venture with their main purpose of building guest loyalty and uplifting the traveling experience for the Chinese market. With the increased income for the average Chinese middle class, traveling to the United States and Europe has become popular. Therefore, enabling "Alipay" through Fliggy (which is Alibaba's travel service platform) assists Chinese consumers to conveniently access digital pay for their trips. This particular venture was a huge stepping stone in forming the relationship with the known e-commerce company. Particular information pertaining to Chinese travelers, such as favored promotions, programs, and content also became more accessible to Marriott as this venture launched. Marriott's owners as well as franchisees are expecting to grasp these information to seize an ever growing Chinese travel market. Although Alipay is only available in certain Asia-Pacific hotels, it is expected to expand to the U.S. markets as well as the European market. Easy to use technology will aid in all steps of the booking process, starting from planning, booking, to paying and even managing a particular trip. Additionally, for Chinese consumers, Alipay, as mentioned above, is the main method of payment for Alibaba. 80% of e-commerce is made in Alibaba. Finally, this joint venture also enhances a crossover loyalty program feature. Through Marriott and Alibaba's loyalty program, point will be exchangeable and redeemable to further enhance consumer satisfaction.

Module 3: Networking (Rebecca Noble)

This article is about the fast casual restaurant chain Vita Mojo and how they have incorporated software that has enabled them to provide a fully customizable meal service to their guests. With over 9 billion possible meal combinations, Vita Mojo uses iPads at their three locations to help customers create a fully customizable meal. The average lunch costs between $6.50 and $9.50 which is on average with most fast casual restaurants in London. Customer's are also able to create their meals based on the nutritional information of each ingredient and offering, and the average meal takes about 3 to 5 minutes to create. This software also enables Vita Mojo to track POS data and aids them with predicting future sales, reducing food waste, and staying on top of trends. Being a restaurant manager myself, I found this incorporation of softwares into the restaurant industry very fascinating. I can see how the POS tracking software would be extremely beneficial in menu planning and managing cost of goods, as well as continuously being able to adapt and stay on top of new dining trends. So much of what makes restaurants successful is the ability to evolve and adapt with consumer needs and expectations. Also, the ability to customize your own meal accompanied with nutritional information seems very appealing from a consumer's point of view. Our generation has become more interested in expressing themselves uniquely and creatively, while also being more health conscious, and Vita Mojo has found away to appeal to both senses. The incorporation of iPad ordering and the minimizing of labor costs has also enabled Vita Mojo to price itself competitively, while offering higher quality ingredients, while also providing their goods in a timely fashion.

This article states the differences in job description of both digital marketing manager and revenue manager, but LaRose focuses on the importance of having them work closely to best reach their goals. Basically you cant have one without the other and each position has something unique to offer to the hotels growth and popularity. Every hotel must sell a story and meet the demands of their guests, consistently adapting and changing, adding and subtracting when needed in order to maximize revenue and continue to be attractive to its consumer.

The article goes over the different ways that an Indian company is creating an e commerce platform to transform the way business is done. It goes over the benefits, challenges and impacts that are faced when trying to launch the platform, which is becoming more widely used. With technology providing a bigger platform for the industry, the e marketplace aims to help improve the way suppliers do business, by making it easier to manage sales. The article pointed out that companies who have started to implement the e-commerce have seen 51% increase in revenue, which is remarkable. With all that being mentioned the article does briefly mention how the use of this business aims to provide ways to bring suppliers and buyers to improve the way business is conducted. How the supply chain is handled seems to be the biggest priority of the platform. With e ecommerce being such a major market, the ability to capture the online market is important. I think that the article does not touches upon several points that need be focused on, such as website design and security. Having an operational website that is easy to read and directs the consumer to what they are exactly looking for is one an aspects that affects the way a company does business. I these cases, the quality is as important as the quantity of information that is being given. I went ahead and took a tour of the site and seems easy to use, which is important. The site is generating revenue sales, but with more sales creating more information being stored. Having the ability to adapt to higher volumes of personal information creates a security issue, that would need to be addressed if not handled correctly.

The article written by Kristine Loretta, details five key benefits of why business owners should launch themselves into the e-business market. 

Due to the growth and advancement of technology, businesses have been able to grow in ways bigger than ever before. As we all know, e-commerce has become more popular today and is taking over many industries now. In this article, it discusses how this trend of e-commerce is extremely innovative and is proven to be a good alternative to the normal ways of business is usually conducted. Just to name a few things, conducting business via the internet saves tons of money. Customers are now able to shop and add items directly into a virtual cart instead of it been a paper trail of the items that are attempted to be purchased. Also, in addition what was mentioned above, e-commerce has opened up new and better channels for communication that can occur faster. Convenience is another key role that e-commerce plays in this. "No longer do people have to wait for stores to open". Patrons can now shop whenever they want to due to online shopping and have the items shipped directly to their home. Which leads me to say that this also is way that reduces cost and save money, especially for small businesses.Last but not least, without a doubt, it is pretty evident that e-commerce create different and many avenues of ways for money to be made. All in all, e-commerce is relevant in today's industry and many other businesses and these are the advantages that allow for it to thrive as it does.

Wellness based tourism has become very popular lately. This kind of experience is meant for self-actualization. Typically people head to Europe or Asia for a wellness vacation. Asia is attempting to turn this into a luxury safari experience. In my eyes, the way I see Singita going "green" in a way is that their experience has a lot to do with nature itself, includes community work, and contains mainly organic ingredients i their menu.

There are various forms of e-marketing, and this particular article zooms into the principle of e-marketing through social media influencers, or in other words, social media celebrities. Social media celebrities have a significant amount of followers and dictate what is good, negative, fun, popular, or high quality in different segments- food, places to go, accessories, brands, and etc. They have the power to engage their audience and influence favoritism through their postings. These people often have a large number of followers and provide audiences with an insight of their private and social lifestyle. This article highlights the importance of capturing social media influencers because it can be a great way to market the property. According to this article, traditional form of advertising, or marketing, is no longer becoming as effective. Social media influencers have far more power than businesses believe. It is important, before a business dives in to capture a social media influencers interest, to dictate whether or not the influencers' number of followers are "real" and not "bought." Usually influencers will have a number over 50,000 followers, and a micro-influencer will have an average between 1,000 and 50,000 followers. The key to distinguish if these followers are "real" is through active engagement from the audience. The ultimate goal of a hotel is to have influencers visit their property, utilize their services, take beautiful pictures and add positive and descriptive captions, geotag location of the business, and finally, tag the hotel they are visiting. It should enable followers to easily click on the link or look up the property, so they too, can experience what their influencer has experienced. It is important that both parties adhere to the standards conformed by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). It is an absolute must for influencers to include in their post that they are being compensated for sharing the experience.

Here is an article that discusses an event management software that I first used with SoBe WFF. It has hit more popularity as of late, and FIU uses it regularly as a University.

This article talks about three new innovative trends in the online food delivery market that satisfy the highly connected consumer: Group Ordering, Multiple Platforms, and Remote Location Delivery.

The new travelers are now the millennial generation and those that follow them. As a result of this hotels are making changes to attract and suit this new travel market. This industry is all about people and their experiences, hotels have to now ensure that travelers know they exist to encourage business for themselves. Digital marketing is very popular in all industries. In this age, marketing budgets are expended mostly on online marketing than traditional marketing. It is also noted than travel and accommodations are more affordable for everyone, therefore resulting in the everyday person traveling for countless reasons. Information is readily available to modern travelers and above average spenders who have high expectations in a very competitive market. Travelers have more freedom now then before and are now traveling to new destinations this is pushing the digital market strategies and driving hotels to use modern approaches in reaching guests. The article also elaborates on how you can stack up with your competitors. Competitors include modern travelers who want authentic and crafty experiences and will listen to others with information about it.

This article talks about both the pros and cons of eCommerce in the hospitality industry. It talks about how it has changed and helped the industry but also the side effects that it may have.

This article details the up and coming new trend of restaurants offering customers the ability to be able to pay at their table. The article details the various pros and cons associated with the type of service and how it can benefit the customer as well as the employees of a restaurant establishment. While not perfect, there are many pros associated with a pay-at-the-table service that are hard to ignore, and it is my humble opinion that this kind of service will continue to catch on into the near future. Customers are increasingly looking for new ways to utilize technology to their advantage to be able to get in and out of a restaurant and pay-at-the-table technology definitely allows that. The companies that adopt this kind of technology will increasingly see their profits grow as well as their table turn increase.

This article outlines how hotels are trying to become eco-friendly sustainable and still able to paramount guest needs. With this initiative, modern consumers are showing a definitive preference for experiential purchasing over material goods.

The articles talks about trends in Point of Sale systems, with new software and devices that offers more options such as mobile use, customer preference tracing, and table management.

This is an interesting article that describes some of the new technology being implemented to improve how employees are getting paid based on the current workforce's spending habits. These include the ability to be paid by debit cards, ability to be paid daily and have the flexibility to move the money around, AI intelligence to keep track of the employees' work hours on their own devices, and integration of many payroll functions into one platform. With so much technological advancement, it seems that payroll management is one that is still behind with many companies still working with the old clock in and out method which is time consuming.

This is an awesome article describing the growth of technology in marketing strategies. It lists some of the many ways that eMarketing is evolving, and how these changes are affecting the hospitality industry.

Wow that was a good article! Thank you for sharing!

Introduction Many Fast Food Restaurants are using the Point of Sales Systems in their food and beverage establishments to take orders from their customers. These systems are being distributed rapidly at a fast pace and has become increasingly popular in the food and beverage industry to improve customer service, operational efficiency and food safety. Food and Beverage entrepneuers are also adapting to these emerging technological systems to remain competitive in their industry and to increase growth of the business. There are diverse Restaurant Management Information System components that are used in the fast food industry. They comprise of Inventory Menu Managements control Systems, Labour Scheduling and Time Management Systems, Reservations and Table Management. . This study reviews the constraints of the existing system used in the restaurants and proposes a potential System solution called Restaurant Customer Self Ordering System. Customer Self-Ordering Systems allows prospective customers to order for food electronically while in the restaurant. This system proposes to limit customers' wait time and improve customer service. However, it may have some challenges that include a high cost to implement the system, the intergration into existing systems and staff adoptability of the proposed system. It was further recommended that a solution to the implementation of the proposed Customer Self-Ordering System could be to implement a web-based system that allows customers to access food menu/beverages and order via the internet with the use of their mobile phones at any time and any where they may be. It is anticipated that this new system feature will attract a wider range of audience and potential customers.