In today’s competitive travel industry, providing prompt and automated support is crucial. Without an automated solution, travel agencies can only assist a limited number of customers at once. This limitation can leave customers feeling neglected and may prompt them to seek better customer service from competitors. Here’s where chatbot solutions can shine. Travel chatbots have the potential to answer frequently asked questions, available 24/7, provide personalised recommendations, manage reservations, plan trips and free up your customer support representatives to handle more complex tasks.
Don’t just believe us, check out these impressive stats:
- 87% of customers would love to prefer travel chatbots if they could save them time and money.
- 80% of customers who have interacted with a chatbot reported it as a positive customer experience.
Hence, in this guide, we’ll explore the essential benefits of chatbots and also discuss their key use cases in the travel industry.
But before diving into the benefits, let us briefly introduce you to the AI chatbot for the travel and hospitality industry.
What is a Travel and Hospitality Chatbot?
Travel and hospitality chatbots are AI-powered virtual assistants that provide 24/7 support to travellers. Travel bots converse in text-based chats with travellers to help them complete various travel-related tasks such as planning trips, making bookings, sharing personalized travel recommendations, offering real-time trip updates and much more. Additionally, travel bots can answer FAQs and direct travellers towards helpful resources.
Travel and hospitality chatbots leverage AI, machine learning and natural language processing to understand the user intent, make predictions and then provide relevant solutions.
Benefits of Chatbots for Travel and Hospitality
- Drive Conversions with Personalized Messaging
AI chatbots for the travel and hospitality industry can drive conversions by sending prospective travellers personalized messages and relevant offerings based on previous interactions. This means travel bots can also automate upselling and cross-selling activities of travel companies which leads to increased sales.
For instance, a travel bot can reach out to a customer with an effective offer or discount for a car rental service after assisting them in the hotel reservation process.
- Eliminating Language Barriers
As the travel and hospitality industry has to deal with customers from around the globe, language should not be a barrier. That’s where a chatbot with multilingual support ability can benefit. Such bots can bridge the communication gap between customers and hotels by understanding and responding in the customer’s native language.
- Serve Customers in Different Time Zones
Chatbots never take a rest. They are available 24/7 even during non-business hours to address customer concerns. This means that by using chatbots, travel agencies can answer customer queries at all hours of the day, no matter where they live in the world.
Use Cases of Chatbots for Travel and Hospitality
Below, we have mentioned key use cases of AI chatbot for the travel and hospitality industry.
- Compare Itineraries
Travel and hospitality chatbots streamline the whole travel experience for travellers by helping them plan and compare itineraries. These bots assist customers in searching for their desired destinations or accommodations and compare the better results. Travellers can enter their preferences and then the bot will suggest the relevant and best options that suit their needs.
- Deliver Real-Time Travel Updates
AI chatbot for travel and hospitality industry excels at delivering real-time travel updates. By delivering real-time updates, they ensure travellers stay well-informed throughout their journey. They provide instant access to all the essential information such as weather conditions, flight statuses, reservation changes and trip advisories. With this type of digital assistance, travel agencies can improve their overall customer experience with seamless and uninterrupted communication.
- Manage Cancellations
There are many such unforeseen events where customers have to cancel their bookings and reservations. The travel bot can handle these situations without transferring the requests to live agents. In addition, the bot can suggest replacement bookings and process a claim for a refund.
Wrapping Up
Now that you understand how travel chatbots can transform the travel and hospitality industry from enhancing operational efficiency to boosting the travel experience, you might be wondering about the ideal chatbot solution for streamlining your travel-related processes. But with so many chatbot-building platforms available, choosing the right one can be challenging. To help you, we suggest trying SmatBot. It is a no-code chatbot building platform that gives you the flexibility to design your bot that meets your needs and your customers’ needs. To experience its advanced features, you can book a demo with SmatBot.
