The travel industry is forecasted to grow at an average of 5.8% a year through 2032. The widespread adoption of emerging technologies in the sector could be one key to unlocking this potential and ultimately reshaping the travel experience for people around the world.
Digital Technology is a Big of the Travel Industry
With existing technologies, the industry has already seen decent progress, even recovering by 43% post-COVID in 2021, with the emergence of digital solutions like contactless services, which has defined a new behaviour for travellers tied to ease and convenience, among other growth factors.
Travellers are now able to easily plan, book, and experience travel digitally, thanks to the industry’s reception of innovation. This is to say that digital technology has played a major part in shaping travel as we know it, and more could be achieved with promising technologies like artificial intelligence.
The buzzword “AI” became more mainstream in late 2022 with the launch of ChatGPT, a chatbot that uses natural language processing to create humanlike conversational dialogue. AI technology holds immense benefits for many sectors, and the travel industry is no exception.
AI can help travel companies birth the next age of travel, one that is characterised by exceptional customer service, satisfaction, and travel experiences. But how?
How Can AI Reshape Travel?
One of the standouts of artificial intelligence technology is the ability to sift through a vast amount of information and return relevant insights. This potential is particularly useful even in the travel industry.
Many travel companies deal with a large volume of customers’ travel data. While many often outsource to third-party companies to process the information and detect patterns in the customers’ travel records, some do less with the data due to inadequate analytics systems.
Using AI tools, these companies can process the data much faster and identify changes among customers as it concerns their behavioural, commercial, operational, and financial choices when it involves travelling.
With this information, it becomes a lot easier for companies to deliver better services tailored to meet the needs of the customers, leading to customer satisfaction, which is a key element envisioned for the new future of travel.
Travel companies can also leverage AI to create chatbots or digital assistant that interacts with customers throughout the journey and resolve some issues they may have. This could immensely boost customer’s experience, from the moment of planning trips to booking.
