September 30, 2024 • 38 mins
How can embracing technology not only streamline operations but also enhance the personal touch in hospitality? In this episode, Christian Müller, Group Manager of Technology at Schani Hotels, reveals how innovative tech solutions are reshaping the guest experience.
Key Takeaways:
- Discover how Schani Hotels transitioned from a traditional app-based check-in system to a seamless digital guest journey, achieving a remarkable 70% adoption rate for mobile check-ins.
- Learn about the importance of a flexible tech stack that integrates various systems, allowing for automation of 85 operational tasks, ultimately freeing staff to focus on guest interactions.
- Understand the surprising shift in guest communication preferences, with over 60% opting for WhatsApp over email, and how this personalizes the guest experience.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Usually, you get the commission invoice from the OTA,
and then you go through everybooking you get from the OTA,
count it together, calculate ifthe commission is correct, yes
or not, and then just go have asit.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
From Hotel Tech Report, it's Hotel Tech Insider,
a show about the future ofhotels and the technology that
powers them.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
In this episode, we chat with Christian Mueller, the
group manager of technology atChani Hotels, a hotel company
with 4 boutique hotels inVienna. Our conversation covers
a lot of ground from Christian'sadvice on change management to
his thoughts on how technologycan actually create a more
personal guest experience. Ifyou want to use technology to
(00:47):
improve the guest experience atyour hotel, you'll want to
listen to this one.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
I do like to start the conversations by getting to
know you a little bit better. Iwould love if you could share a
little bit about Shani, aboutyour organization, and about
your role. I'd like to get anunderstanding for what you're
doing at the organization.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Thanks for having me. I'm Christian Miller. Group
manager, technology for theCharny Hotels. Charny Hotels is
a hotel group based in Viennawith now 4 hotels. We are
private owned and alwaysundertaking to provide the best
(01:30):
technology solution for ourguests.
I'm always trying to step one orstep ahead of everything what's
out there in regards oftechnology, of comfort, of guest
welcomeness. There are differentkinds where we are standing for.
(01:50):
Shiny Hotel, the first one isbuilded, was constructed in
2015, and we were one of thefirst properties with a digital
signature in Europe. And one ofthe first properties with a
mobile boom key, also in Europe.And back in the days, it was
(02:15):
really outstanding to be there.
We had always the option to gowith providers together that
follow the same direction andhelp us to build this kind of
new hospitality set. And we arenever stopping by one property
(02:37):
and always try to go one stepfurther. Myself joining Shawnee
Hotels in April of 2022, and myrole by the shift from 2
properties to 4 properties, washired to take a look at the tech
(02:58):
stack, the shiny utils, and makeit a little bit more future
proof, Make it scalable. I wannaget caught like that. Within
this job definition, I wanna getcaught like that.
I've just really go around inthe industry, talk to a lot of
(03:21):
providers, get a lot intodetails, what is possible on
every kind of the text textthere. Within this, I've request
the current status and rather ifyou quickly find out that the
existing text deck was fine forwhat it was, but wasn't fine in
(03:48):
my opinion to be future proof.And if you're talking about
future proof text stack, thereis 1 big world and there is API.
And I found out that there are alot of things missing, and a lot
of things are impossible tobuild if you want to go ahead.
(04:10):
And, therefore, I was lookingaround if there's any provider
up there, any solution that canhelp me to get multiple
softwares, multiple solutionstogether, helped me to build the
best solution for us in Shiny.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
Could you tell me a little bit about what the tech
stack was when you stepped intothis role, and what systems are
you talking about specifically?Is it PMS, revenue management
system, channel manager?
Speaker 1 (04:46):
Correct. We had a really good PMS back in the
days. It was a stay in touch. Itwas really future proven, but
there was a lag on the APIcalls, or better, a lag on
interfaces to other softwareproviders based here in Europe.
(05:08):
This is sometimes a problem thatyou get PMS or a solution you
want to use, but they're typicalonly connected or available in
one specific area connected totypical providers in that
specific area.
But our main goal or my mainchallenge back in the day was
(05:35):
that our guest journey wasn'tfuture proof as we already
provide digital guest journey.That mean, just send a guest
confirmation with a link todownload our Shani application
to start pre check-in, to getthe mobile key, and then the
(05:56):
guest just arrive and cancheck-in at our kiosk. And
that's it. And in my opinion,that's okay in typical
wholesale, but we always want togo one step ahead. And we're
requesting that completely guestjourney and just relatively
(06:16):
quickly find out that this wholegap is by only providing guest
journey on our applicationitself.
In 2015, everybody was excitedabout an application for
whatever business you arerunning. Right? And, probably,
(06:36):
there are also areas on ourplanet where applications are
still valid sync. But in Europe,nobody wants to download an
application anymore. You havearound one application installed
already?
Why just download one more ifthis has only one usage just for
(06:58):
one day, one time? And we justhad around 8% of all guests
using that application. And Ireally was sure that it is
because of the application orthat you have to download it.
Therefore, I was just lookingaround if there's any web
(07:20):
application or any web solutionthat can help us. I was talking
to our existing providers, justlook around in the industry,
just talk to start ups.
I even talk to dedicateddevelopers and ask them, hey. Is
it possible that developers in aweb application that make it
(07:42):
sense for us to replace it asour provider mentioned that they
won't get a step to convert thenative application to a web
application. Yeah. In example, Iwas really looking around and
just found one provider. It wasa lucky call.
(08:05):
The provider wasn't on the mic.It was a product Then when I
found him on the talk to theproduct owner, we just had
really good 2 hours and talkabout what's possible. And 3
months later, he come to me andsay, hey. We're going to the
(08:26):
market. Do you see anyopportunity to join us or that
we can help Shani to build abetter tech stack or build a
better guest solution?
And in general agreement,anybody would read, hey. We need
to change something. Then I'vestarted to design. Text icon I
(08:47):
can see it I mean, I can say itlike this. A little bit from
scratch.
I won't change anything in thefirst place, but but changing
the guest journey was requestingmyself to maybe changing the
PMS, was forced me to change thepayment provider, bringing me to
(09:10):
the point that I need to changethe channel manager, I need to
change the RMS, and so on and soforth. And on that journey, we
really talk to a lot more andfind a solution that work for
us. And it's now on a pointwhere we can say, this current
(09:36):
stack stack is scalable. Andthat kind are also relatively
quickly rolled out. When I canthink about it, typical PMS
rollout times are 3 months, 6months, or more, depending on
the provider.
In the worst case, and if wekeep the OTAs out because
(10:02):
they're a little bit more painin the air, we are able to roll
out a new property within someweeks, but not less. So this is
really a big thing. What? We arecurrently working together with
Aperleo as a team, workingtogether with Light Magic for
(10:25):
the guest journey, for completemessaging, to complete web
application, the mobile keys,and the kiosk solution, working
together with Hairfellow, as adog provider, to provide us the
digital opening because this isalways the big point. Open a
(10:46):
door just only from the web, notrequired any Bluetooth
connection or any NFCconnection.
And we work together withSiteMiner as our channel manager
and Adian as a payment provider.And, nevertheless, pays us a
revenue system and for our makeit marketing campaigns. Our POS
(11:12):
system is Helen Chaz. We arelooking for a light POS solution
and event temple for our wholeevent space, you know,
properties. But back.
Just jump back. How to change itor how change came back. It was
really big point for us. And weare always requesting if we
(11:36):
really need to change the systemor if there is any way to keep
our current solution inpartition area. And for us,
there was no other solutions forour kind of hotel.
As I need to make a sidesentence, I'm always talking
(12:00):
about our Shani hotel solution,and this text deck won't fit to
any other hotel. As in general,every hotel hotel group chain
need to find their own perfectsolution, if there's any perfect
solution out there.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
I'm curious what specific parts of hotel
operations at Shawnee require acustom tech stack? Or what about
your tech stack makes it soperfect for your hotels?
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Yeah. May not only a specific feature. It's more in
regards that we got thepossibility to build things if
it's needed. That's the optionto really have an in PMS where
the whole API or the whole PMSis available via an API.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
So that allows you the flexibility. If you wanted
to build something on your own,you could plug it in to your
existing PMS.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Correct. And 2 steps more, it gives us the
flexibility to use local toolslike make.com. If there's
anything in the typical usagefor our front desk or our
reservation department, Waltdrives them nuts because they
(13:30):
need to do it on a daily basisone at a times. We have always
the option to take a look ifthere's any way to automate it
or just run it via make.com. Andthis brings us to the point
where we have automized a lot ofoperational tasks, 85 tasks
(13:50):
around that, now runningautomize wire and load tool in
background, and our operationstuff don't need to take
anything.
Or if there is anything, what itneeds to be done on a manual
basis, say, get informed orpinged via Microsoft Teams. As
(14:15):
we're using Office 365, we willnot. And using Microsoft Teams
as an internal messaging tool.There are a lot of options with
the use of Microsoft and the useof local tools, also other
providers to ping you on certaintasks. And the quickest thing is
(14:40):
if guests book, late checkout.
Our housekeeping departmentdirectly get a notification
message on Teams that this roomhas late checkout. It will check
out at whatever time. There's noneed to take a look at the PMS.
There's no need to take a lookat any other printed out sheet
(15:04):
of paper where I stand out thetime. What?
Just get a message. And you say,know what's going on.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
Can you tell me more about the tasks that you've
automated? Do you have someother examples? I mean, 85 is
pretty impressive. So I'mcurious what else you've
automated.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Yeah. For sure. Quickly take a look. There is a
lot. We just automate the taskfor payment links.
It's really cool. We get anoption inside for Palio to
create payment links, to sendthe guest the link where they
can pay their stay with creditcard, with direct bank transfer,
(15:44):
with Klarna, or PayPal. Andtypical, this link will get
created but not sent to theguest. And we just create a flow
that's read out the charge codeon the folio and then the
payment link gets created. Andif we create a message to the
(16:05):
email address from the gas,where it stands in, hey.
Thanks for your stay. What? It'sa little bit of reservation
details and see all the paymentlinks for that. And the reason
why we read out the charge codeis we just decided if the guest
just buy a voucher from us, thenthe whole message body needs to
(16:28):
be in a different formatting,holding a little bit of
different information. And whenwe read out the payment link is
created and on the folio is acharge code as well chart on it,
then we just rephrase the wholetext we sent it against.
And typical, the payment link isvalid for 7 days. And if the
(16:50):
payment link gets paid, justfine. If the payment link isn't
paid, we automatically notifyour reservation department and
the specific reception from thehouse that this payment link is
expired and they need to contactthe guest again. The link or
(17:11):
they could recreate the link.Just one easy solution.
Another solution we had is theguest data cleaning and the
comment cleaning. This mean wejust scan every incoming
reservation to read out thecomments attached to the
reservation. Every hotel nowsays nonsmoking comment on
(17:34):
whatever comment you typicallyget from the LTAs. Nowadays,
useless for us because everyroom is a nonsmoking room. Why
send us the comment?
It is only trash. And we justread out the comment, just
delete these typical outdatedcomments, and just leave in the
(17:56):
valid comments for us. And thencomes the point where it gets
interesting for us because ifthey are in the comments is
comment like baby bat or dog oranything like that, we just
notify our staff, hey. They arelooking for a baby vet. We need
to book a baby vet, or say justlooking for a dog.
(18:17):
Just contact the guest that theyneed to book the extra dog. Or
if a guest just already booksthe extra dog or baby bed, and
stuff like that, we just notifyall staff. And on the other
hand, we are looking fordeparture of departing rooms
(18:39):
with the extra dog or baby bedalready in it. So you only need
to change the linen on the babybed and not to remove the baby
bed around. So small things likethat.
Speaker 4 (18:51):
I'm curious how have staff and guests reacted to
these automated tasks? Areguests pretty happy with the
results, and are employees happywith how easy it is?
Speaker 1 (19:05):
The guest won't realize it. What can I say about
texting and what typical is froma guest perspective? It's most
task for guests get automized byproviders. So a lot of things in
the hotel industry are builtwith guests in mind. So build
(19:29):
for guests to make a better stayfor them.
But a small portion of tools arebuilt in our industry for all
stuff or employees. And thinkabout it. Why an employee want
(19:50):
to use an tool that looks likeWindows 95 and works like Excel?
Sorry to say it, but a lot oftypical hotel employees don't
want touch tools, don't want towork with such solution. And if
you not find a solution thatwork for your employees, like
(20:13):
working for your guests Sooperating in as easy as usable
like WhatsApp, TikTok,Instagram.
Tools you already know fromeveryday usage. They don't want
to use it. And the most of theoptimizations we just build are
for our employees. And in thefirst place, we started to build
(20:37):
such optimization as employeesrequired it. As our colleagues
come to us and say, hey, we arejust missing this specific
function from our old textstack.
We just need it. Give it back tous. And, therefore, we start to
build it. And relativelyquickly, we go ahead. They
(21:01):
always come with new ideas andsay, hey, we have this
repetitive task once a week,once a day, once a month, if
there are any way to optimizesuch a process.
And that's a good example is thecommission invoicing with wasn't
typical OTA. So, usually, youget the commission invoice from
(21:27):
the OTA, and then you go throughevery booking you get from the
OTA, count it together,calculate if the commission is
correct, yes or not, and thenjust go ahead and say. And it
depends on the amount ofpostings you get from them 2, 3,
4 hours a month or more. We justgot the option to read out the
(21:53):
commission from our channelmanager and calculate it prior
to the invoice. And therefore,we send our stuff of this
specific employee that makes thecommission invoicing and
automated mail with theinformation, hey.
(22:13):
You will get a commissioninvoice from this specific OTA
about, whatever, 100 bookings or100 reservation with commission
sum x y that. And they only needto compare if the number from
the OTA is the number we sentthem. If yes, just send it out.
(22:33):
If no, go ahead and calculateit. What?
Count. And in the 1st month, wejust create that thing. We have
differences in in send area.Right? So 1, 2, 3, 20¢
difference from that what wecalculated and what the OTA just
(22:55):
sent us.
And then we just go ahead andsay, okay. There are some
rounding issues in ourcalculation. So it matches. And
our staff don't need to wastethe time anymore for it. Only if
they found €20, whatever, abigger amount is the difference,
and we need to take a deeperlook at it.
(23:18):
But this just really save time.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
I'm curious with so many changes to the tech stack
in the last few years, how haveyou made the transition easy for
staff? I'm sure you needed toget their support when you're
implementing a new system, andthen once the system has been
implemented, make sure thatthey're using it properly. Can
(23:42):
you tell me a bit about thatprocess and training and making
sure everyone is on the samepage?
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Get away from that ideal idea or set of changes
always on the sunny side. Changeis always a little bit connected
with pain. When you can say itlike that, gets through it. What
I mean with that is that in thefirst place, you always hear the
(24:10):
flowery words from theproviders, and everything will
get smooth. It will be betterafter the switch than prior to
it.
And to be honest, a switch,especially if we're talking
about PMS, other systemsconnected to it, is hard. You
need to find your own way todeal with it. And you need to
(24:33):
make it clear for you and youremployees that it will be
better, but not one day afterthe switch and also not 2 weeks
after the switch. Here what youremployees say. Get in touch with
the staff, not get in touch withthe line managers.
(24:55):
Just get in touch with thestaff. Talk to them. Get
feedback from them on every taskand talk to the staff. However,
what it is or what's point itis, the staff will have feedback
for you. And talk to thedepartments that are related to
the specific software.
So if you change your sense ofcatering software, then not talk
(25:19):
to your, whatever, housekeepingmanager because a lot of things
are not relatable for him. Buttalk to your banker team staff.
Talk to your catering staff.Talk to your marketing
department because maybe theyneed to change the whole
marketing since building thetool and get sure that interface
(25:41):
requirements are the same fromone provider to another. And not
get or not fall into the trapthat, yeah, we have an interface
to that provider.
That is okay. They always canpay it. And then the connection
points are only 50% from thelast connection. And in the
(26:04):
whole process, it's a constantreminder to everybody that is
involved in the whole changethat these are the good points.
We already changed.
We are now already better than 1year ago. Focus also on the good
things. A lot of employees andalso a lot of managers, well, I
(26:31):
think it's human thing, quicklyfall into pointing to not
functional things or pointing towhat's going wrong with whatever
interface, with whateversolution. And it's okay. Just
name it.
Just make it clear what's goingwrong. But always remind them
that these are opponents. Make alist. X lives. Whatever.
(26:55):
Talk to them. These areopponents. So really looking
better than 1 year ago, and weare really on a better way for
our guests, for our staff, forthe interfaces since 1 year ago.
And if you constantly remindthem, hey. We are on the right
way.
There won't be the goldenunicorn solution for you that
(27:21):
makes everything what you arewishing for, then they get away
with it. Because, however,solution your property, your
chain currently using, you willalways find at least one
employee that has one big badthing to say about it. And even
(27:44):
if it's because the color of thePMS on one specific button is
now green and not red.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
You mentioned when the option for check-in was with
the app, only 8% of guests wereusing the app. Now that you have
some better solutions in place,what percentage of guests are
using some type of digitalcheck-in?
Speaker 1 (28:08):
May we need to differentiate a little bit
because when we are talkingabout pre check-in, so guests
making the pre check-in on theirmobile phone or making the
digital check-in on our kiosksolution inside of our
properties. But somewherearound, we are talking about 70%
using the complete digital precheck-in privacy. Depends on the
(28:32):
property because depends alittle bit on the guests, where
are the guests coming from,things like that. But all around
about or overall for properties,we're talking about 70% using
mobile check-in, digitalcheck-in, and 98%, 99% using
(28:54):
overall the digital check-in aswe required it to check-in on
our kiosk. It's huge.
Another number that really blowsmy mind was the usage of
WhatsApp. With the change, wegive the option to every guest
to choose the communicationchannel. And now we're just
(29:18):
offering the communication orthe contact channel email and
WhatsApp. We're always lookingto expand a little bit and also
use other messaging solutions.But in our current stack, it's
WhatsApp.
We get a little bit in troublewith typical SMS, especially in
regards of the country codingsand by sending SMS and sending
(29:43):
links. Yeah. However, everyguest gets an email and gets
WhatsApp message with theconfirmation and a link in it.
And as soon as the guest clickon the link, he gets requested
his preferred communicationchannel and took every guest
(30:03):
make a choice in the one step inthe first step. And over 60% of
all guests using WhatsAppinstead of email.
And it's really interesting. Thenumber are growing, and the
number are also gets higher asall the guests are. It's really
(30:25):
crazy. And we get a betterfeedback from guests using
WhatsApp. And another kind ofmessages from guests using
WhatsApp say, just send usmessages with heart emotion,
smileys in it, or voice messagesor things like that.
(30:47):
And they have another whilecommunicating with us as a whole
time prior to communicating viaemail result. Then we're
connecting with this is youusually write an email in your
work environment. Think aboutwhen you write the last email on
(31:10):
a private basis. For me, it's 2months, 3 months ago. I don't
know.
Emails are only used fornewsletters or to get in call to
action link. But a messageinside of WhatsApp is always
(31:32):
connected to a more privateline. You're texting with your
colleagues, with your friends,with your panel there. You have
typical family groups andscented memes. Right?
This is an personal vibe. Andthen you get a confirmation from
(31:52):
your hotel inside of WhatsAppthat's directly transfer this
typical stay into a personalexperience. And therefore, all
the guests are really moreconnected to us or frontier to
us. And this reflects a littlebit in the feedback from the
guests. So most on the personalspace as on the working space.
(32:17):
In my opinion, this is this isone way into the future. And the
next way into the future isconnecting this to any automized
large language and some modelchatbot, whatever you want to
call it, that can quicker replyto the guests with our stuff.
(32:40):
Yeah. By the way, right in themoment or in the middle of the
night, and give the guest directfeedback. Always with the option
to our staff to jump in thisconversation, take it over.
This is just one big part. Onthe other way, the whole digital
gesture changed, I should say,as we just typical upper right
(33:07):
or properties with check-in isis checkout. That mean
everything's prepaid or withyour check-in, everything's
prepaid for your stay. There'sno option to book anything on
your specific room. However,there are always special things
where we need to put things onthe room, or we have the
(33:30):
specific guests that can't paynow, that can't pay in 2 days.
We just book one specific billor whatever on the room from the
guest because they haven'tcalled with it. And they get
wild as when we book somethingon the room. The guest can
(33:51):
automatically notify it. Hey,this is your invoice. This
specific extra isn't paid now.
You can pay it now on yourdigital guest journey with Apple
Pay, Google Pay, or whatevercredit card you want to dive in
there. Or at least you need topay it by checkout. And this is
the thing where, especially,older guests get wowed by what's
(34:19):
possible with technologynowadays. And that isn't the
point where a typical guest stepaway from it and say, hey. Don't
want this specific kind oftechnology or get a little bit
frustrated by the over amountwhat is possible.
(34:40):
A lot of guests are wowed with,this is possible. This is cool.
This makes my life easier, andtherefore, I want to use it also
in the future. And I think thisis connected to a lot of other
situations where technology isimplemented in certain places of
(35:01):
our life. And in the firstplace, it won't make life
easier.
So we need to adopt it. We needto learn to work with it that it
solves our issues or challenges.But soon as you get a good
experience with whateversolution, you get into it. You
(35:21):
want to have it by the next withwith the next say. Same thing
with digital room key.
Since I'm constantly using thedigital key on my phone, on my
Apple Watch, whatever, I alwayslooking for digital room key in
(35:42):
every property I'm staying,although if it's not Johnny.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
Do you find it often?
Speaker 1 (35:47):
No. Not really. If you have it one time, you want
to have it back. It's the samething like a kiosk check-in.
They are part of guests thatwant a typical reception
check-in, a personal check-in, aconversation with the staff
on-site.
But they won't fill out theregistration card on a sheet of
(36:10):
paper and type in the sameinformation by every check
inside. Say, want to have a chatwith the stuff for myself. I
always get mad to chat tosomebody in reception. Not about
that I won't chat with him. Morein relation that this is not the
(36:32):
chat that I want to have withhim.
I want to chat with him aboutcity, about recommendations they
have. About his last weekendonline travel. But the typical
chat is, oh, can you give meyour passport? Can you fill out
this line? Is this still youraddress?
(36:53):
Sign this. Sign this. Breakfastis at 6. So this is not
personal. This is not a goodexperience.
Therefore, I'm a typical guestat directly running to an online
check and make everythingprefilled. Just give me a key.
Leave me on my room. Or directlymove to the kiosk, talk to
nobody, and better later oncoming down to the reception,
(37:16):
talk to yourself, to have apersonal conversation. And a lot
of hotels out there are alwayssaying, hey.
We can't put a kiosk on ourreception because this isn't
personal, and we want to havethis last big barrier on
personal experience in ouraltar. I've always come around
(37:37):
and say, hey. Do you reallythink this is personal? Talking
about a registration card andthe payment method. This is not
isn't personal.
Put it away from the checker.Put it on the guest journey. Put
it on a digital way and have areal conversation with your
guests.
Speaker 4 (37:57):
Well, I think that's a really good topic to end on.
Thank you so much for your time.It was great chatting with you.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
That's all for today's episode. Thanks for
listening to Hotel Tech Insiderproduced by Hotel Tech Report
.com. Our goal with this podcastis to show you how the best in
the business are leveragingtechnology to grow their
properties and outperform theconcept by using innovative
digital tools and strategies. Iencourage all of our listeners
to go try at least one of thesestrategies or tools that you
(38:27):
learned from today's episode.Successful digital
transformation is all aboutconsistent small experiments
over a long period of time, sodon't wait until tomorrow to try
something new.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Do you
Speaker 2 (38:38):
know a hotelier who would be great to feature on
this show, or do you think thatyour story would bring a lot of
value to our audience? Reach outto me directly on LinkedIn by
searching for Jordan Hollander.For more episodes like this,
follow Hotel Tech Insider on allmajor streaming platforms like
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Usually, you get the commission invoice from the OTA,
and then you go through everybooking you get from the OTA,
count it together, calculate ifthe commission is correct, yes
or not, and then just go have asit.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
From Hotel Tech Report, it's Hotel Tech Insider,
a show about the future ofhotels and the technology that
powers them.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
In this episode, we chat with Christian Mueller, the
group manager of technology atChani Hotels, a hotel company
with 4 boutique hotels inVienna. Our conversation covers
a lot of ground from Christian'sadvice on change management to
his thoughts on how technologycan actually create a more
personal guest experience. Ifyou want to use technology to
(00:47):
improve the guest experience atyour hotel, you'll want to
listen to this one.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
I do like to start the conversations by getting to
know you a little bit better. Iwould love if you could share a
little bit about Shani, aboutyour organization, and about
your role. I'd like to get anunderstanding for what you're
doing at the organization.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Thanks for having me. I'm Christian Miller. Group
manager, technology for theCharny Hotels. Charny Hotels is
a hotel group based in Viennawith now 4 hotels. We are
private owned and alwaysundertaking to provide the best
(01:30):
technology solution for ourguests.
I'm always trying to step one orstep ahead of everything what's
out there in regards oftechnology, of comfort, of guest
welcomeness. There are differentkinds where we are standing for.
(01:50):
Shiny Hotel, the first one isbuilded, was constructed in
2015, and we were one of thefirst properties with a digital
signature in Europe. And one ofthe first properties with a
mobile boom key, also in Europe.And back in the days, it was
(02:15):
really outstanding to be there.
We had always the option to gowith providers together that
follow the same direction andhelp us to build this kind of
new hospitality set. And we arenever stopping by one property
(02:37):
and always try to go one stepfurther. Myself joining Shawnee
Hotels in April of 2022, and myrole by the shift from 2
properties to 4 properties, washired to take a look at the tech
(02:58):
stack, the shiny utils, and makeit a little bit more future
proof, Make it scalable. I wannaget caught like that. Within
this job definition, I wanna getcaught like that.
I've just really go around inthe industry, talk to a lot of
(03:21):
providers, get a lot intodetails, what is possible on
every kind of the text textthere. Within this, I've request
the current status and rather ifyou quickly find out that the
existing text deck was fine forwhat it was, but wasn't fine in
(03:48):
my opinion to be future proof.And if you're talking about
future proof text stack, thereis 1 big world and there is API.
And I found out that there are alot of things missing, and a lot
of things are impossible tobuild if you want to go ahead.
(04:10):
And, therefore, I was lookingaround if there's any provider
up there, any solution that canhelp me to get multiple
softwares, multiple solutionstogether, helped me to build the
best solution for us in Shiny.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
Could you tell me a little bit about what the tech
stack was when you stepped intothis role, and what systems are
you talking about specifically?Is it PMS, revenue management
system, channel manager?
Speaker 1 (04:46):
Correct. We had a really good PMS back in the
days. It was a stay in touch. Itwas really future proven, but
there was a lag on the APIcalls, or better, a lag on
interfaces to other softwareproviders based here in Europe.
(05:08):
This is sometimes a problem thatyou get PMS or a solution you
want to use, but they're typicalonly connected or available in
one specific area connected totypical providers in that
specific area.
But our main goal or my mainchallenge back in the day was
(05:35):
that our guest journey wasn'tfuture proof as we already
provide digital guest journey.That mean, just send a guest
confirmation with a link todownload our Shani application
to start pre check-in, to getthe mobile key, and then the
(05:56):
guest just arrive and cancheck-in at our kiosk. And
that's it. And in my opinion,that's okay in typical
wholesale, but we always want togo one step ahead. And we're
requesting that completely guestjourney and just relatively
(06:16):
quickly find out that this wholegap is by only providing guest
journey on our applicationitself.
In 2015, everybody was excitedabout an application for
whatever business you arerunning. Right? And, probably,
(06:36):
there are also areas on ourplanet where applications are
still valid sync. But in Europe,nobody wants to download an
application anymore. You havearound one application installed
already?
Why just download one more ifthis has only one usage just for
(06:58):
one day, one time? And we justhad around 8% of all guests
using that application. And Ireally was sure that it is
because of the application orthat you have to download it.
Therefore, I was just lookingaround if there's any web
(07:20):
application or any web solutionthat can help us. I was talking
to our existing providers, justlook around in the industry,
just talk to start ups.
I even talk to dedicateddevelopers and ask them, hey. Is
it possible that developers in aweb application that make it
(07:42):
sense for us to replace it asour provider mentioned that they
won't get a step to convert thenative application to a web
application. Yeah. In example, Iwas really looking around and
just found one provider. It wasa lucky call.
(08:05):
The provider wasn't on the mic.It was a product Then when I
found him on the talk to theproduct owner, we just had
really good 2 hours and talkabout what's possible. And 3
months later, he come to me andsay, hey. We're going to the
(08:26):
market. Do you see anyopportunity to join us or that
we can help Shani to build abetter tech stack or build a
better guest solution?
And in general agreement,anybody would read, hey. We need
to change something. Then I'vestarted to design. Text icon I
(08:47):
can see it I mean, I can say itlike this. A little bit from
scratch.
I won't change anything in thefirst place, but but changing
the guest journey was requestingmyself to maybe changing the
PMS, was forced me to change thepayment provider, bringing me to
(09:10):
the point that I need to changethe channel manager, I need to
change the RMS, and so on and soforth. And on that journey, we
really talk to a lot more andfind a solution that work for
us. And it's now on a pointwhere we can say, this current
(09:36):
stack stack is scalable. Andthat kind are also relatively
quickly rolled out. When I canthink about it, typical PMS
rollout times are 3 months, 6months, or more, depending on
the provider.
In the worst case, and if wekeep the OTAs out because
(10:02):
they're a little bit more painin the air, we are able to roll
out a new property within someweeks, but not less. So this is
really a big thing. What? We arecurrently working together with
Aperleo as a team, workingtogether with Light Magic for
(10:25):
the guest journey, for completemessaging, to complete web
application, the mobile keys,and the kiosk solution, working
together with Hairfellow, as adog provider, to provide us the
digital opening because this isalways the big point. Open a
(10:46):
door just only from the web, notrequired any Bluetooth
connection or any NFCconnection.
And we work together withSiteMiner as our channel manager
and Adian as a payment provider.And, nevertheless, pays us a
revenue system and for our makeit marketing campaigns. Our POS
(11:12):
system is Helen Chaz. We arelooking for a light POS solution
and event temple for our wholeevent space, you know,
properties. But back.
Just jump back. How to change itor how change came back. It was
really big point for us. And weare always requesting if we
(11:36):
really need to change the systemor if there is any way to keep
our current solution inpartition area. And for us,
there was no other solutions forour kind of hotel.
As I need to make a sidesentence, I'm always talking
(12:00):
about our Shani hotel solution,and this text deck won't fit to
any other hotel. As in general,every hotel hotel group chain
need to find their own perfectsolution, if there's any perfect
solution out there.
Speaker 4 (12:21):
I'm curious what specific parts of hotel
operations at Shawnee require acustom tech stack? Or what about
your tech stack makes it soperfect for your hotels?
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Yeah. May not only a specific feature. It's more in
regards that we got thepossibility to build things if
it's needed. That's the optionto really have an in PMS where
the whole API or the whole PMSis available via an API.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
So that allows you the flexibility. If you wanted
to build something on your own,you could plug it in to your
existing PMS.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Correct. And 2 steps more, it gives us the
flexibility to use local toolslike make.com. If there's
anything in the typical usagefor our front desk or our
reservation department, Waltdrives them nuts because they
(13:30):
need to do it on a daily basisone at a times. We have always
the option to take a look ifthere's any way to automate it
or just run it via make.com. Andthis brings us to the point
where we have automized a lot ofoperational tasks, 85 tasks
(13:50):
around that, now runningautomize wire and load tool in
background, and our operationstuff don't need to take
anything.
Or if there is anything, what itneeds to be done on a manual
basis, say, get informed orpinged via Microsoft Teams. As
(14:15):
we're using Office 365, we willnot. And using Microsoft Teams
as an internal messaging tool.There are a lot of options with
the use of Microsoft and the useof local tools, also other
providers to ping you on certaintasks. And the quickest thing is
(14:40):
if guests book, late checkout.
Our housekeeping departmentdirectly get a notification
message on Teams that this roomhas late checkout. It will check
out at whatever time. There's noneed to take a look at the PMS.
There's no need to take a lookat any other printed out sheet
(15:04):
of paper where I stand out thetime. What?
Just get a message. And you say,know what's going on.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
Can you tell me more about the tasks that you've
automated? Do you have someother examples? I mean, 85 is
pretty impressive. So I'mcurious what else you've
automated.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Yeah. For sure. Quickly take a look. There is a
lot. We just automate the taskfor payment links.
It's really cool. We get anoption inside for Palio to
create payment links, to sendthe guest the link where they
can pay their stay with creditcard, with direct bank transfer,
(15:44):
with Klarna, or PayPal. Andtypical, this link will get
created but not sent to theguest. And we just create a flow
that's read out the charge codeon the folio and then the
payment link gets created. Andif we create a message to the
(16:05):
email address from the gas,where it stands in, hey.
Thanks for your stay. What? It'sa little bit of reservation
details and see all the paymentlinks for that. And the reason
why we read out the charge codeis we just decided if the guest
just buy a voucher from us, thenthe whole message body needs to
(16:28):
be in a different formatting,holding a little bit of
different information. And whenwe read out the payment link is
created and on the folio is acharge code as well chart on it,
then we just rephrase the wholetext we sent it against.
And typical, the payment link isvalid for 7 days. And if the
(16:50):
payment link gets paid, justfine. If the payment link isn't
paid, we automatically notifyour reservation department and
the specific reception from thehouse that this payment link is
expired and they need to contactthe guest again. The link or
(17:11):
they could recreate the link.Just one easy solution.
Another solution we had is theguest data cleaning and the
comment cleaning. This mean wejust scan every incoming
reservation to read out thecomments attached to the
reservation. Every hotel nowsays nonsmoking comment on
(17:34):
whatever comment you typicallyget from the LTAs. Nowadays,
useless for us because everyroom is a nonsmoking room. Why
send us the comment?
It is only trash. And we justread out the comment, just
delete these typical outdatedcomments, and just leave in the
(17:56):
valid comments for us. And thencomes the point where it gets
interesting for us because ifthey are in the comments is
comment like baby bat or dog oranything like that, we just
notify our staff, hey. They arelooking for a baby vet. We need
to book a baby vet, or say justlooking for a dog.
(18:17):
Just contact the guest that theyneed to book the extra dog. Or
if a guest just already booksthe extra dog or baby bed, and
stuff like that, we just notifyall staff. And on the other
hand, we are looking fordeparture of departing rooms
(18:39):
with the extra dog or baby bedalready in it. So you only need
to change the linen on the babybed and not to remove the baby
bed around. So small things likethat.
Speaker 4 (18:51):
I'm curious how have staff and guests reacted to
these automated tasks? Areguests pretty happy with the
results, and are employees happywith how easy it is?
Speaker 1 (19:05):
The guest won't realize it. What can I say about
texting and what typical is froma guest perspective? It's most
task for guests get automized byproviders. So a lot of things in
the hotel industry are builtwith guests in mind. So build
(19:29):
for guests to make a better stayfor them.
But a small portion of tools arebuilt in our industry for all
stuff or employees. And thinkabout it. Why an employee want
(19:50):
to use an tool that looks likeWindows 95 and works like Excel?
Sorry to say it, but a lot oftypical hotel employees don't
want touch tools, don't want towork with such solution. And if
you not find a solution thatwork for your employees, like
(20:13):
working for your guests Sooperating in as easy as usable
like WhatsApp, TikTok,Instagram.
Tools you already know fromeveryday usage. They don't want
to use it. And the most of theoptimizations we just build are
for our employees. And in thefirst place, we started to build
(20:37):
such optimization as employeesrequired it. As our colleagues
come to us and say, hey, we arejust missing this specific
function from our old textstack.
We just need it. Give it back tous. And, therefore, we start to
build it. And relativelyquickly, we go ahead. They
(21:01):
always come with new ideas andsay, hey, we have this
repetitive task once a week,once a day, once a month, if
there are any way to optimizesuch a process.
And that's a good example is thecommission invoicing with wasn't
typical OTA. So, usually, youget the commission invoice from
(21:27):
the OTA, and then you go throughevery booking you get from the
OTA, count it together,calculate if the commission is
correct, yes or not, and thenjust go ahead and say. And it
depends on the amount ofpostings you get from them 2, 3,
4 hours a month or more. We justgot the option to read out the
(21:53):
commission from our channelmanager and calculate it prior
to the invoice. And therefore,we send our stuff of this
specific employee that makes thecommission invoicing and
automated mail with theinformation, hey.
(22:13):
You will get a commissioninvoice from this specific OTA
about, whatever, 100 bookings or100 reservation with commission
sum x y that. And they only needto compare if the number from
the OTA is the number we sentthem. If yes, just send it out.
(22:33):
If no, go ahead and calculateit. What?
Count. And in the 1st month, wejust create that thing. We have
differences in in send area.Right? So 1, 2, 3, 20¢
difference from that what wecalculated and what the OTA just
(22:55):
sent us.
And then we just go ahead andsay, okay. There are some
rounding issues in ourcalculation. So it matches. And
our staff don't need to wastethe time anymore for it. Only if
they found €20, whatever, abigger amount is the difference,
and we need to take a deeperlook at it.
(23:18):
But this just really save time.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
I'm curious with so many changes to the tech stack
in the last few years, how haveyou made the transition easy for
staff? I'm sure you needed toget their support when you're
implementing a new system, andthen once the system has been
implemented, make sure thatthey're using it properly. Can
(23:42):
you tell me a bit about thatprocess and training and making
sure everyone is on the samepage?
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Get away from that ideal idea or set of changes
always on the sunny side. Changeis always a little bit connected
with pain. When you can say itlike that, gets through it. What
I mean with that is that in thefirst place, you always hear the
(24:10):
flowery words from theproviders, and everything will
get smooth. It will be betterafter the switch than prior to
it.
And to be honest, a switch,especially if we're talking
about PMS, other systemsconnected to it, is hard. You
need to find your own way todeal with it. And you need to
(24:33):
make it clear for you and youremployees that it will be
better, but not one day afterthe switch and also not 2 weeks
after the switch. Here what youremployees say. Get in touch with
the staff, not get in touch withthe line managers.
(24:55):
Just get in touch with thestaff. Talk to them. Get
feedback from them on every taskand talk to the staff. However,
what it is or what's point itis, the staff will have feedback
for you. And talk to thedepartments that are related to
the specific software.
So if you change your sense ofcatering software, then not talk
(25:19):
to your, whatever, housekeepingmanager because a lot of things
are not relatable for him. Buttalk to your banker team staff.
Talk to your catering staff.Talk to your marketing
department because maybe theyneed to change the whole
marketing since building thetool and get sure that interface
(25:41):
requirements are the same fromone provider to another. And not
get or not fall into the trapthat, yeah, we have an interface
to that provider.
That is okay. They always canpay it. And then the connection
points are only 50% from thelast connection. And in the
(26:04):
whole process, it's a constantreminder to everybody that is
involved in the whole changethat these are the good points.
We already changed.
We are now already better than 1year ago. Focus also on the good
things. A lot of employees andalso a lot of managers, well, I
(26:31):
think it's human thing, quicklyfall into pointing to not
functional things or pointing towhat's going wrong with whatever
interface, with whateversolution. And it's okay. Just
name it.
Just make it clear what's goingwrong. But always remind them
that these are opponents. Make alist. X lives. Whatever.
(26:55):
Talk to them. These areopponents. So really looking
better than 1 year ago, and weare really on a better way for
our guests, for our staff, forthe interfaces since 1 year ago.
And if you constantly remindthem, hey. We are on the right
way.
There won't be the goldenunicorn solution for you that
(27:21):
makes everything what you arewishing for, then they get away
with it. Because, however,solution your property, your
chain currently using, you willalways find at least one
employee that has one big badthing to say about it. And even
(27:44):
if it's because the color of thePMS on one specific button is
now green and not red.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
You mentioned when the option for check-in was with
the app, only 8% of guests wereusing the app. Now that you have
some better solutions in place,what percentage of guests are
using some type of digitalcheck-in?
Speaker 1 (28:08):
May we need to differentiate a little bit
because when we are talkingabout pre check-in, so guests
making the pre check-in on theirmobile phone or making the
digital check-in on our kiosksolution inside of our
properties. But somewherearound, we are talking about 70%
using the complete digital precheck-in privacy. Depends on the
(28:32):
property because depends alittle bit on the guests, where
are the guests coming from,things like that. But all around
about or overall for properties,we're talking about 70% using
mobile check-in, digitalcheck-in, and 98%, 99% using
(28:54):
overall the digital check-in aswe required it to check-in on
our kiosk. It's huge.
Another number that really blowsmy mind was the usage of
WhatsApp. With the change, wegive the option to every guest
to choose the communicationchannel. And now we're just
(29:18):
offering the communication orthe contact channel email and
WhatsApp. We're always lookingto expand a little bit and also
use other messaging solutions.But in our current stack, it's
WhatsApp.
We get a little bit in troublewith typical SMS, especially in
regards of the country codingsand by sending SMS and sending
(29:43):
links. Yeah. However, everyguest gets an email and gets
WhatsApp message with theconfirmation and a link in it.
And as soon as the guest clickon the link, he gets requested
his preferred communicationchannel and took every guest
(30:03):
make a choice in the one step inthe first step. And over 60% of
all guests using WhatsAppinstead of email.
And it's really interesting. Thenumber are growing, and the
number are also gets higher asall the guests are. It's really
(30:25):
crazy. And we get a betterfeedback from guests using
WhatsApp. And another kind ofmessages from guests using
WhatsApp say, just send usmessages with heart emotion,
smileys in it, or voice messagesor things like that.
(30:47):
And they have another whilecommunicating with us as a whole
time prior to communicating viaemail result. Then we're
connecting with this is youusually write an email in your
work environment. Think aboutwhen you write the last email on
(31:10):
a private basis. For me, it's 2months, 3 months ago. I don't
know.
Emails are only used fornewsletters or to get in call to
action link. But a messageinside of WhatsApp is always
(31:32):
connected to a more privateline. You're texting with your
colleagues, with your friends,with your panel there. You have
typical family groups andscented memes. Right?
This is an personal vibe. Andthen you get a confirmation from
(31:52):
your hotel inside of WhatsAppthat's directly transfer this
typical stay into a personalexperience. And therefore, all
the guests are really moreconnected to us or frontier to
us. And this reflects a littlebit in the feedback from the
guests. So most on the personalspace as on the working space.
(32:17):
In my opinion, this is this isone way into the future. And the
next way into the future isconnecting this to any automized
large language and some modelchatbot, whatever you want to
call it, that can quicker replyto the guests with our stuff.
(32:40):
Yeah. By the way, right in themoment or in the middle of the
night, and give the guest directfeedback. Always with the option
to our staff to jump in thisconversation, take it over.
This is just one big part. Onthe other way, the whole digital
gesture changed, I should say,as we just typical upper right
(33:07):
or properties with check-in isis checkout. That mean
everything's prepaid or withyour check-in, everything's
prepaid for your stay. There'sno option to book anything on
your specific room. However,there are always special things
where we need to put things onthe room, or we have the
(33:30):
specific guests that can't paynow, that can't pay in 2 days.
We just book one specific billor whatever on the room from the
guest because they haven'tcalled with it. And they get
wild as when we book somethingon the room. The guest can
(33:51):
automatically notify it. Hey,this is your invoice. This
specific extra isn't paid now.
You can pay it now on yourdigital guest journey with Apple
Pay, Google Pay, or whatevercredit card you want to dive in
there. Or at least you need topay it by checkout. And this is
the thing where, especially,older guests get wowed by what's
(34:19):
possible with technologynowadays. And that isn't the
point where a typical guest stepaway from it and say, hey. Don't
want this specific kind oftechnology or get a little bit
frustrated by the over amountwhat is possible.
(34:40):
A lot of guests are wowed with,this is possible. This is cool.
This makes my life easier, andtherefore, I want to use it also
in the future. And I think thisis connected to a lot of other
situations where technology isimplemented in certain places of
(35:01):
our life. And in the firstplace, it won't make life
easier.
So we need to adopt it. We needto learn to work with it that it
solves our issues or challenges.But soon as you get a good
experience with whateversolution, you get into it. You
(35:21):
want to have it by the next withwith the next say. Same thing
with digital room key.
Since I'm constantly using thedigital key on my phone, on my
Apple Watch, whatever, I alwayslooking for digital room key in
(35:42):
every property I'm staying,although if it's not Johnny.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
Do you find it often?
Speaker 1 (35:47):
No. Not really. If you have it one time, you want
to have it back. It's the samething like a kiosk check-in.
They are part of guests thatwant a typical reception
check-in, a personal check-in, aconversation with the staff
on-site.
But they won't fill out theregistration card on a sheet of
(36:10):
paper and type in the sameinformation by every check
inside. Say, want to have a chatwith the stuff for myself. I
always get mad to chat tosomebody in reception. Not about
that I won't chat with him. Morein relation that this is not the
(36:32):
chat that I want to have withhim.
I want to chat with him aboutcity, about recommendations they
have. About his last weekendonline travel. But the typical
chat is, oh, can you give meyour passport? Can you fill out
this line? Is this still youraddress?
(36:53):
Sign this. Sign this. Breakfastis at 6. So this is not
personal. This is not a goodexperience.
Therefore, I'm a typical guestat directly running to an online
check and make everythingprefilled. Just give me a key.
Leave me on my room. Or directlymove to the kiosk, talk to
nobody, and better later oncoming down to the reception,
(37:16):
talk to yourself, to have apersonal conversation. And a lot
of hotels out there are alwayssaying, hey.
We can't put a kiosk on ourreception because this isn't
personal, and we want to havethis last big barrier on
personal experience in ouraltar. I've always come around
(37:37):
and say, hey. Do you reallythink this is personal? Talking
about a registration card andthe payment method. This is not
isn't personal.
Put it away from the checker.Put it on the guest journey. Put
it on a digital way and have areal conversation with your
guests.
Speaker 4 (37:57):
Well, I think that's a really good topic to end on.
Thank you so much for your time.It was great chatting with you.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
That's all for today's episode. Thanks for
listening to Hotel Tech Insiderproduced by Hotel Tech Report
.com. Our goal with this podcastis to show you how the best in
the business are leveragingtechnology to grow their
properties and outperform theconcept by using innovative
digital tools and strategies. Iencourage all of our listeners
to go try at least one of thesestrategies or tools that you
(38:27):
learned from today's episode.Successful digital
transformation is all aboutconsistent small experiments
over a long period of time, sodon't wait until tomorrow to try
something new.
Speaker 1 (38:38):
Do you
Speaker 2 (38:38):
know a hotelier who would be great to feature on
this show, or do you think thatyour story would bring a lot of
value to our audience? Reach outto me directly on LinkedIn by
searching for Jordan Hollander.For more episodes like this,
follow Hotel Tech Insider on allmajor streaming platforms like
Spotify and Apple Music.
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I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy And Charlamagne Tha God!
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.