The Sleepbox in an ingenious idea that leases small hotel boxes by the hour or night.  The first use of the Sleepbox was to put it in an airport, but it could prove to be common in many other locations. Sleepbox rooms are 40 square feet or 3.7 square meters in size with single or double bed configurations. They're renting for $30 an hour or $100 a night. The bedroom has access to a shared bathroom and a tub. The Sleepbox can be set up anywhere, and it's not just for the airport. It's just a matter of time before we can see them popping up everywhere.

The Sleepbox is just like a hotel where you make an online reservation and check-in as soon as you get there. The new sleepbox is set up at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport, Stockholm, and will soon be available at Washington Dulles Airport, downtown Boston, and Atlanta. As this new hotel design attracts attention and popularity, Sleepbox hopes to see their inexpensive, space-efficient hotels in locations like parks and office buildings. The Park Hotel design will feature long glass tubes with sleeping boxes set in the middle of the park. Not a bad morning view, that's for sure.

In this #Travelcast episode, I receive Mikhail Krymov Founder and CEO of Sleepbox as we discuss the future of hospitality.

Sustainable travel should be the only way we can fly. International travel and tourism are far from sustainable as a result of excessive air travel, which creates toxic CO2 pollution, to package holiday resorts built on natural areas. Our planet has a finite resource. There are only so many magnificent, natural, untouched places on our planet, and mass tourism threatens their very existence. Nature, culture, and history must be preserved, not commodified.

Unfortunately, many travelers and travel industry operators continue to deny how scarce our world's resources are and how adversely tourism impacts the climate, local cultures, and communities. That's where sustainable travel comes in.

In this episode, I had the opportunity to interview Alexandra Pastollnigg,   Founder at Fair Voyage. We spoke on the subject: Is there a more sustainable way to travel?

The World Tourism Organization describes sustainable tourism as' development[which] meets the needs of current visitors and host regions, while at the same time protecting and improving opportunities for the future. It is envisaged that it will contribute to the management of all resources in such a way that economic, social and aesthetic needs can be met while preserving cultural integrity, critical ecological processes, biological diversity, and the life support system.

Sustainable travel is about understanding the climate and looking after our natural resources. Travelers need to be more aware of the levels of pollution caused by travel and how this impacts the climate and local wildlife. We also need to be aware of the impact of tourism on local people, industries and native cultures.

Website:  

Over the last four years, travel content has grown steadily. Travelers share their stories on social media, continuously producing high-quality videos, images, and diaries.

Engaging with travel influencers has become an important way for companies within the travel industry to create brand awareness and for tourist boards to promote new destinations.

48 percent of users have chosen Instagram to discover new travel destinations, while 52 percent have been motivated by their friends ' Facebook posts to book new travel.  Nonetheless, video is the current and future of content marketing, and this is further illustrated in the chart below: by 2020, marketers are expected to spend up to $28 billion on digital marketing strategies.

Nowadays, "amateurs" do not necessarily mean blurred pictures or shaky clips. Travel vloggers are talented and professional video makers who use the most sophisticated equipment expertly. The Travel channel has its own style, some YouTubers prefer long-distance and international travel, and some explain the hustle and bustle of living in the largest cities in the world. Some of them are focused on experiencing new cuisines and local cultures, and some share their major and sometimes dangerous adventures in the most evocative destinations.

In this #travelcast series, you'll learn from Sabrina Meyers, an accomplished blogger, how to use video for your hotel, destination and/or your personal brand. How do you start with a video, and how do you plan for your first video? How do you add a clip to your strategy? And why is video so important today, particularly for our industry? Sabrina will share her journey with us, including best practices, tools, and tips.

When it comes to travel, the timetables are constantly changing, and people are in constant motion. Location-based services, triggered by real-time local users, will play a key role in shaping the next generation of travel technology.

There are two types of use cases according to Gartner for location-based services: static and dynamic. In the case of static use, all relevant information is collected beforehand, while in case of dynamic use, data is collected in real-time. Each of them presents interesting opportunities for an evolving mobile travel experience. Dynamic use cases require more robust technical capabilities, such as real-time analysis and spatial processing, so that they do not necessarily make sense in every context. They do, however, create incredibly interesting opportunities, which we are likely to see broadly implemented in the coming year.

By means of geofencing and the use of beacons (devices that track activity more specifically than a wide GPS location), travel companies already have the ability to know exactly where their customers are. This is important information because it gives businesses the opportunity to react. Imagine arriving at the airport and immediately being notified that your gate has changed, or offering a quick security line purchase pass if you're running late. Hotels can deliver customized restaurant recommendations depending on the location of the client. Apps that give directions within the airport or train station, make recommendations for connecting transportation or warn users if they are heading in the wrong direction. They could also help businesses to know whether there is a persistent area of customer confusion or a potential issue (such as an overbooked flight).

In this #Travelcast,  I had the opportunity to interview Gordon Ryan (Managing Director of Expology). We spoke on the subject: Creating Digital Experiences & Location Based Content.

He is an exhibition Designer with over 12 years of experience in Design and Production Management of events and exhibitions and Museums. Gordon's earlier years were spent teaching furniture making, and working as a design consultant for contemporary artists in Ireland. He was Designer/Production Manager for Dublin Contemporary 2011 (Irelands' largest ever contemporary art exhibition) as well as Exhibition Designer for TurnerPrize in 2013. 

At Expology, he works on a strategic level with clients to establish a good connection between projected objectives, and exhibition or experience deliverables - establishing robust design briefs, and effective conceptual response by safeguarding good team and client creative cooperation.

Chatbots, chatbots all over the place... every travel web site wants to have a chatbot these days, so it seems; similarly, there is a difference between simply having a chatbot and deploying a chatbot in such a way as to achieve higher levels of customer engagement and, indeed, better business outcomes. 

In this #Travelcast,  I had the opportunity to interview David Curran.  He is a Machine Learning Engineer responsible for making natural language processing applications for OpenJaw technologies. He has made chatbot systems for the Mercedes, Orange Bank France, Travelsky, the Dubai Government, la Caixa, Crédit Mutuel, and others. He is currently leading a team creating a classification system for Chinese.

Customer experience is everything in the hospitality field. Ensuring that guests are pleased is crucial to the success of a market that is increasingly competitive and where poor customer reviews can be disastrous for a brand.

Technology is a key component of helping hotels provide the best guest experience, from the moment the reservation is made to the moment the guest checks. Everything in between — from the ease of connecting to the hotel's guest network to the temperature of the guest room when entering for the first time, or even the speed of delivery of a room service order— has the potential to be enhanced by the right technology.

In this #Travelcast,  I had the opportunity to interview Barry Clemens. He is a through and through business professional with extensive experience in the Hospitality & Tourism trade.  Recently made major inroads in the tech startup industry in the hospitality industry and consistently met aggressive targets set and has been a speaker at various conferences relating to digitalization and sustainable tourism.  We spoke on the subject: The fear of implementing technology in the hospitality sector.

Moreover, both large and small hotel brands recognize the impact that digital transformation can have on helping to increase guest satisfaction and guest loyalty. In fact, many companies reported that their top tactical tech objective in 2018 was to improve digital customer engagement and guest loyalty.2 Now that hotels are moving into the second phase of their digital transformation efforts, many are expanding their initiatives to further improve the guest experience and create even more opportunities. 

According to Julián Guerrero Orozco, Vice-President of  Tourism, PROCOLOMBIA : “Music is one of the greatest motivations for  tourism. Whether live or recorded, experiencing the music of the world  is celebrating its rich diversity and talent, promoting intercultural  dialogue and encouraging exchange.”

Music is one of the biggest  motivations for tourism. Whether live or recorded, experiencing the  music of the world’s cultures is celebrating their rich diversity and  talent, as well as promoting intercultural dialogue and exchange. Music  has the power to connect the physical journey with the intellectual and  emotional experience of travelers to make their trips meaningful,  memorable and transformative. A music and tourism partnership also holds  investment and innovation opportunities, and potential for decent  employment.

In this #Travelcast,  I had the opportunity to interview Dr Julia Jones, CEO of Found in  Music. We spoke on the subject: Is music the new gastronomy?

UNWTO  is co-author together with Colombia and Sound Diplomacy of a  forthcoming white paper that explores and celebrates the links between  music and tourism. Its purpose is to identify areas for discussion,  raise questions and suggest possible ways for developing musical tourism  products and using music to its full potential to promote destinations,  brands and companies.

As their numbers continue to grow, Chinese outbound tourists areundergoing significant changes in travel preferences, behaviors, and spending patterns. However, numerous myths and outdated impressions of Chinese tourists persist in the tourism industry.

The Chinese digital market has the highest amount of internet users in the world, making it an attractive market for any brand to enter. We help brands who are seeking to grow within the Chinese market harvest its full potential through a holistic approach and thorough planning, as Chinese audiences are different not only demographically, but also the way they think compared to western customers.

In this last #travelcast episode, I had the pleasure of interviewing Rossella Pfundt, a consultant and expert for the Chinese market.

China is the world’s largest outbound travel market when measured by trips and expenditures. As of 2015, Chinese tourists took 4 billion domestic tourism journeys and 117 million outbound trips; outbound trips are expected to reach 160 million by 2020. In 2017, Chinese outbound tourists took approximately 131 million trips.3 More than 70 percent of Chinese tourists travel with family and friends, and they exhibit the highest international spending per trip among global travelers. In addition, Chinese outbound tourism market expenditures are expected to grow by a compound annual growth rate

The number of outbound trips from China more than doubled from 2010 to 2015, growing at a CAGR of 15 percent.

The tourism industry still hasn’t discovered that #Itunes, #Spotify, #Soundcloud, TuneIn, Blubrry and Castrex can communicate content. But which content is suitable for audio influencing, and who can produce it?

With all of the attention given to grabbing eyeballs with visuals, however, it’s easy to overlook the different ways of reaching your visitors, guests, or customers through their ears…. with audio.

In my last #travelcast episode, I had the pleasure of interviewing Henry Barchet. In this episode, we spoke:  Audio in  destination marketing: how to reach people through their ears?

 With over 1 BILLION monthly users and growing, Instagram is the place to be in 2019. Thousands of brands are searching for influencers of all sizes to help spread the word about new products and experiences.  Learn how you can monetize your passions while helping brands gain awareness. 

 In this episode, I interviewed Kamelia Britton, who is is a full-time travel influencer who has created content for major brands such as Expedia Group, The Fairmont, Intercontinental, Kandima Maldives, Google, Facebook, Coca-Cola, and many more. 

We answered those questions:

Links

Website: hackerette.com/