Part 1 - How can travel agents use AI to enhance their service offering?
Artificial intelligence touches aspects of our lives every day without us even being aware of it. Spam filters, smart personal assistants like Siri, personalisation of news feeds, ad targeting and dynamic pricing – AI is all around us.
Riaan van Schoor Co-founder and CEO of Agentivity, told Travel News that AI provided an unbelievable pool of opportunity for our industry to elevate service to a new level. “One of the biggest benefits of AI in travel is the increased efficiency for tasks such as booking, enquiries and customer service. Exciting times ahead!”
An advantage for travel agents
Flight bookings
AI can analyse millions of data points to find the most cost-effective and convenient options using predictive analytics to determine the best time to buy a ticket, potentially saving customers money.
Itinerary planning
AI can help plan a customer’s itinerary, suggesting attractions, restaurants, and experiences based on their specific interests. AI can generate personalised itineraries, taking into account budget, interests and travel dates.
Accurate recommendations
AI makes it possible for travel agents to easily track customer reviews, comments on social media, and other mentions about suppliers/airline/destinations. AI can analyse online guest reviews and assist agents with recommendations and decision making to choose the best possible products for their clients’ needs.
Travel packages
AI can put together travel packages tailored to your customer’s preferences. It can analyse client’s preferences to curate a travel package that includes flights, hotels, and activities, cutting down on consulting and research time significantly.
Travel safety
AI can provide real-time updates about travel safety, weather conditions and travel advisories. AI can analyse data from various sources to provide real-time updates helping you to advise your customers how to stay safe during their travels.
Efficiency
AI can handle multiple tasks and queries simultaneously, saving consultants’ time and effort and get more done in less time, making your travel planning process smoother and faster.
Cost savings
AI can analyse vast amounts of data to find the best deals and discounts all over the world.
Virtual tours
AI can offer virtual tours of destinations, helping your customers to explore places before they travel. AI-powered virtual reality can provide immersive tours of destinations, giving your customers an accurate picture of what their destination will look like before they get there.
At a US Tour Operators Association’s Travel Industry Trends & Insights panel discussion, Susan Black, Chief Commercial Officer for CIE Tours, said althoughAI was poised to revolutionise the way customers booked their holidays, travel agents who embraced the technology could adapt and thrive.
“We believe travel agents have a great future. We have all this technology, but we need someone to help with this technology. There’s something about visiting a destination for the first time – you want to make sure you get it right and that takes a travel expert to help sort through all the information.”
