Tech Tourism Cluster organises for the first time an event that concentrates in two days talks, round tables, workshops and a lot of networking between partners and other companies of the travel tech sector.
GuestPro participated in the event, specifically at the table "Beyond the revenue manager" with the presence of our COO and revenue manager Luisa Souki and attended all the activities held during two days in the Catalan Costa Brava. A perfect opportunity to take the pulse of the sector and meet with clients and partners.
Park Hotel San Jorge, Calonge. 12th and 13th November. 120 professionals from the travel tech sector gathered to connect, learn and exchange views on how technology impacts tourism. This initiative by the Tech Tourism Cluster association gave us the opportunity to learn and deepen in some very interesting topics such as AI, tourism and sport, disruptive communication, phygital concept, MICE or Tik Tok and the Z generation. Many topics that have helped us to have a broad vision of the future of travel tech.
Beyond revenue management
Luisa Souki participated in the round table on Revenue Management together with Ariel Caballero from Luderna and Laia Carreras from 123Compare.me. The three speakers reflected on the role of the revenue manager within the management and marketing of a hotel: "his figure must be transversal, taking advantage of how to get the most out of each department and also of technology". In this sense, Luisa spoke about the relationship she establishes with the hotelier and how from the outside she gives support to all the departments. Ariel, for his part, commented on how important it is for a hotel to know what it wants to sell and how it can be relevant. And Laia, on the more technological side, said that it is important to know how to use the tools that work best for each business and to know which distribution channels are best for them.
The debate continued about which model works better, external revenue or in house; here each one spoke about their experience and it was clear that both options can work perfectly if done well. Finally, on how AI can impact this sector, Luisa commented on how technology provides data that can then be analysed by the revenue manager and was convinced that artificial intelligence will be important to get more data and improve our algorithm and pricing proposals. Time will tell.
The best of Tech4 Travel Summit
What did we take away from these two days? A difficult question to answer... But here is a short list of the Top 10 most interesting for the team that travelled to the Costa Brava to attend the event:
1.- Make no mistake, artificial intelligence is not a tool, it is a structure similar to the internet that will affect us as a society: "computers capable of doing human things", according to Jon Hernández, AI communicator. In 2025, artificial intelligence agents will arrive, "changes that will bend our minds".
2.- The "journey to cloud" is over, now "we are already here". Three of its major benefits are data security and protection, scalability and operational efficiency.
3.- Sports tourism is growing with companies dedicated to group sports trips and all kinds of services related to mass sporting events.
4.- For an external revenue manager to provide maximum value, he/she must feel part of the hotel, be one more and, in addition, contribute his/her global vision of the market and the competition. A model like this: it works.
5.- The future of travel tech:
- technology should be invisible, accompanying the customer.
- importance of cybersecurity
- knowing the customer, hyper-personalisation
- digital agents that improve the relationship with humans.
Disruptive communication, the importance of storyscaping: tell the story of your customer, not your brand.
Phygital leaders, between the real world and the digital world: innovative solutions that combine digital experiences with physical elements.
8.- The rise of the professional MICE events industry .
9.- Data-driven destinations, the importance of public-private collaboration that empowers destinations through better data analysis and management.
Smart phones for smart travellers: the emergence of Tik Tok among Generation Z and its key role in the discovery of a destination or a travel product. In 2024 it was the leading search engine for this generation, ahead of Google and YouTube.
A lot of concepts to assimilate in two days and a lot of networking in which to strengthen ties with the technological and hotel business fabric.
