NATIONAL REPORT—Whether it’s celebrating an anniversary, receiving an award, earning a certification, debuting a new product or expanding the business, hotel companies and vendors achieve new milestones on a daily basis. Here’s a look at recent accomplishments:
Zoox Smart Data to Oversee Choice Hotels’ WiFi Landing Pages
Zoox Smart Data, an international provider of technological solutions that harnesses big data to build customer profiles from existing Wi-Fi networks, has successfully deployed its Zoox Media solution across 4,141 Choice Hotels branded hotels along with the Zoox Smart Data platform at 197 properties.
Zoox Media integrates with the hotel’s guest WiFi landing page, providing a fast and direct communications channel to its guests that enhances awareness of available hotel services or promotions. By also integrating Zoox Smart Data with the existing network infrastructure managed by their partner, Safety Net Access, the 197 Choice Hotels locations can now further analyze guest preferences to match available offerings with experience expectations: potentially boosting satisfaction, loyalty and hotel reputations.
With Zoox Media, Choice Hotels can offer each guest a seamless log-in experience into each property’s WiFi, while connecting them with the opportunity to receive details on preferred offerings. The Zoox Media solution includes the opportunity to communicate directly with guests using image, video and GIF-based messaging. Using the Zoox Media dashboard, Choice Hotels personnel can access reports that demonstrate the effectiveness of matching offerings with guests by providing insight into metrics such as the number of clicks on a particular offering. Combined with the ability to determine when and where a guest interacts with hotel messaging using location targeting, Choice Hotels can identify what offerings resonate best with a particular guest during a specific moment in time.
Assa Abloy Chosen by Utah TownePlace Suites
Assa Abloy Global Solutions has enhanced the abilities of TownePlace Suites by Marriott St. George in St. George, UT, in maximizing guest safety, convenience and operational efficiency with the implementation of VingCard Classic RFID door locks equipped with Mobile Access.
Following a speedy and hassle-free upgrade experience, the 84-room Utah-based property is not only able to ensure that guests are protected using the industry’s highest security encryption standards, but can also provide them with the enhanced convenience of contactless digital key room entry for multiple areas throughout the hotel. With its full compatibility with the latest in IoT technology, VingCard Classic RFID further provides property leadership with the ability to run a more efficient hotel operation while offering the opportunity to minimize energy costs without coming at the expense of guest comfort.
By implementing VingCard Classic RFID along with the Visionline access management system, hotel staff can instantly extend guest stays or provide access to additional hotel areas such as conference rooms without the need for guests to visit the front desk in order to receive a new key. Combined with Mobile Access, which is available to guests via the Marriott Bonvoy app, guests can sidestep the front desk altogether and can instead check-in digitally. They then can proceed directly to their guestrooms or to other hotel locations requiring authorized access while minimizing contact with others and with shared surfaces.
Phonesuite Direct Separates from Phonesuite into Standalone Company
Phonesuite, a provider of hospitality communications for 30-plus years, has revealed that Phonesuite Direct is now a standalone, focused company dedicated to serving the needs of its most important end-user customers, including hotels, management companies and major brands. As part of the spinoff, Phonesuite Direct has formed a new leadership team, with each member bringing years of industry experience.
Introduced as a division of Phonesuite in 2016, Phonesuite Direct has enjoyed success in working directly with customers who desire a direct-to-the-manufacturer relationship. But in order to continue refining the core-competency of delivering projects and after-the-sale service and support to hotels on a 24×7 basis, while allowing the R&D, manufacturing and development efforts to flourish, it became clear that two separate companies, each focused on its own very separate yet crucial function, was needed.
The new Phonesuite Direct leadership team consists of three hospitality technology veterans: Scott R. Jamison, president/COO; Justin Soler, director of engineering; and Jamie Prestileo, director of sales & marketing.
Davonne Reaves of The Vonne Group Receives Award
The International Society of Hospitality Consultants (ISHC) named Davonne Reaves, founder and chief hospitality strategist of The Vonne Group, as the recipient of the sixth annual Lori Raleigh Award for Emerging Excellence in Hospitality Consulting during its annual conference. Reaves received a one-year associate membership to the ISHC to further professional relationships and experience all that the group has to offer through planned events and interacting with top hospitality industry consultants from around the globe.
The Vonne Group is a firm specializing in travel market research, asset and operational management and brand development for boutique hotels. Reaves is a hotel consultant, hotel asset manager and published author, with more than 14 years of experience in the lodging industry.
Curator Collection Selects Alice as Technology Provider
Alice, a leading hospitality operations and management platform, has become the preferred operations technology provider for Curator Hotel & Resort Collection, a hand-selected group of small brands and independent lifestyle hotels and resorts worldwide. In selecting Alice as its preferred operations technology provider, Curator Hotel & Resort Collection is ensuring its properties have the proper tools for its hotels and staff to provide a superior guest experience.
Focused on operational excellence and guest satisfaction, Alice connects all hotel departments on a single platform for centralized staff communications and task management, creating a seamless guest experience. The platform breaks down the barriers between departments and fragmented systems by equipping hotel staff with modern tools to work together as a unified team to exceed the expectations of today’s guests.
