Chatbot usage on rise in travel, but effectiveness is tied to saving guests’ time

According to research from Salesforce, the use of chatbots in travel, transportation and hospitality is expected to increase 241% by mid-2020.

Already many hotel brands, airlines and online travel agencies use chatbots on their websites, in text and through Facebook Messenger to communicate with customers.

But how those chatbots are implemented can determine whether users view them as a help or a hindrance.

B2C messaging solution Zingle, which works with a variety of hospitality clients, surveyed more than 1,400 consumers about how they feel about bots versus humans for customer service.

The majority of respondents (66%) said they had interacted with a chatbot or digital assistant for service in the past month, whereas slightly less (59%) had called a customer service phone line during that period.

More than half of respondents - 57% - said human customer service agents are more effective at handling their needs than a chatbot, and 49% said humans are also more efficient at handling their needs.

Nevertheless, willingness to use a chatbot is high if the user believes it will save time. Forty-six percent of respondents said they would “pick a chatbot if it meant I could solve my issue faster.”

Zingle senior vice president of marketing Jason Hekl says the findings “should both be encouraging to businesses, but also a warning not to overplay it [chatbots].”

In hospitality, the most effective use for automated chatbots, Hekl says, is to handle simple guest requests, for example for information about accessing Wi-Fi or checkout procedures.

“People are willing to try it, I think more than anything else to avoid waiting in line, on a phone or at a front desk or concierge,” he says.

“People are craving ways to save time.”

But for more complex requests that may require a back-and-forth conversation, messaging systems need to integrate capabilities to route the message to a human customer service agent as needed.

“If you put in a chatbot intending to replace a human, to deflect calls, I think it’s a miss and you run the risk of alienating your guests,” Hekl says.

“I don’t think the technology is there yet to replace a human interaction. And for hospitality in particular, you are selling an experience. Using it for deflection is almost counter to the idea of delivering a brand differentiated service experience.”

Hekl suggests brands that use chatbots make it clear to guests whether they are fully automated or connected to human service agents as well.

“Otherwise if they expect a human and it is fully automated, you run the risk of creating a problem as opposed to solving one,” he says.