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Apply HN: Tailored events info for hotel guests

3 points by alva 11y ago

A value added service for hotels looking to provide an even greater customer experience. The service classifies guests on booking into a hotel and provides them with a hotel-branded, customised pdf of events happening during their stay that may be of interest to them. Using fairly simple classifiers ( work traveller, family, area of hotel ), the system grabs a selection of top 10 events, restaurants, activities from numerous, public APIs. A pdf is produced that is branded and styled according to the hotels existing marketing and emailed in advance to the guests. For example, a booking made for a hotel in Mayfair London suggests gallery viewings, auctions, Michelin starred restaurants. In trendy Shoreditch for a single traveller, the latest pop-ups, nightclubs and gigs. Pricing is based per guest at a reasonable rate of around £0.50-1.00

Stanleyc23 10y ago
You mentioned "hotel-branded". So is adoption dependent on getting interest from hotels first?
- alva 10y ago
  Adoption is definitely dependent on interest from hotels. We would offer either a generic non-branded pdf/email or something that fits with the hotels current marketing style to give the feeling of a more personal service.
danieltillett 11y ago
The key to making this work is the quality of the listings. It has to significantly better than a Google search of what is on locally. Unless you have some serious AI this will need to be done manually by a highly skilled team. Do the economics work when you need lots of expensive labour? Do you know how homogeneous the interests hotel guests are by location? If they aren't homogeneous then it will be very hard to create a list of interest to more than a minority of guests.
- alva 11y ago
  Thanks for the feedback. -Unless you have some serious AI this will need to be done manually by a highly skilled team. Do the economics work when you need lots of expensive labour? For a near to perfect set of listings, I think you are right, however I expect the fairly straightforward algos I will be using will get 90% there. Regarding the need for manual work, manual classification tags for each hotel would take around 20 minutes. -Do you know how homogeneous the interests hotel guests are by location? This is the bulk of the manual work stated above. Take Amsterdam, there are boutique, arty hotels in some of the poshest districts. Events for this hotel will have to differ from the 5-stars in the area. Tagging the hotel appropriately is required only once and should remain relevant throughout the contract. Overall, although some manual work is needed, it only needs to be carried out once and takes little time. Once this is done, the events should remain relevant over time

3 points by alva 11y ago

Stanleyc23 10y ago

You mentioned "hotel-branded". So is adoption dependent on getting interest from hotels first?

alva 10y ago
Adoption is definitely dependent on interest from hotels. We would offer either a generic non-branded pdf/email or something that fits with the hotels current marketing style to give the feeling of a more personal service.

danieltillett 11y ago

The key to making this work is the quality of the listings. It has to significantly better than a Google search of what is on locally. Unless you have some serious AI this will need to be done manually by a highly skilled team. Do the economics work when you need lots of expensive labour? Do you know how homogeneous the interests hotel guests are by location? If they aren't homogeneous then it will be very hard to create a list of interest to more than a minority of guests.

alva 11y ago
Thanks for the feedback. -Unless you have some serious AI this will need to be done manually by a highly skilled team. Do the economics work when you need lots of expensive labour? For a near to perfect set of listings, I think you are right, however I expect the fairly straightforward algos I will be using will get 90% there. Regarding the need for manual work, manual classification tags for each hotel would take around 20 minutes. -Do you know how homogeneous the interests hotel guests are by location? This is the bulk of the manual work stated above. Take Amsterdam, there are boutique, arty hotels in some of the poshest districts. Events for this hotel will have to differ from the 5-stars in the area. Tagging the hotel appropriately is required only once and should remain relevant throughout the contract. Overall, although some manual work is needed, it only needs to be carried out once and takes little time. Once this is done, the events should remain relevant over time