5 Tips For a Successful Hotel Mobile App

The hospitality business is a booming industry in any part of the world. Everyone has the issue of shelter and good housing as part of their basic life needs. Also, in our modern-day world which is so interconnected, everyone now seems to have a connection or interest in places around the globe. 

A simple Skype call will connect you immediately to a person halfway across the world. Even more interesting is the fact that people have to meet physically to close deals and make stronger and more valuable connections with people in other countries. This is therefore why most people are always traveling these days. 

In fact, whenever people travel it means they as well need a place to stay. This is why the hospitality business will continue to thrive anywhere in the world.

A hotel is a place that provides accommodation to tourists and travelers all over the world. These tourists or travelers can decide to be in a hotel for the short or long term depending on the manner of business they came for. It is a very profitable business because work or leisure will always move people to travel from time to time. 

Hotels are graded according to their size, where they are located, and the quality of services they render, their customer service and customer satisfaction as well as their names. The five-star hotels around the world achieved their status because they provide luxury materials and facilities to tourists and travelers from all around the world. These luxury services include Jacuzzis, amazing views, a standard 24-hour room service, access to fast and reliable internet, and other amazing features.

There are several kinds of hotels all over the world. They include suite hotels that offer better space than average hotel rooms and resort hotels which are built-in beautiful environments. There are also convention hotels with over two thousand rooms to contain convention attendees and conference hotels that provide materials for events and conferences.

Others include business hotels, condo-hotels, airport hotels, casino hotels, apartment hotels, and bed and breakfast hotels.

However, with every industry come to its challenges and the need to flow with new trends. The hotel and hospitality industry is a perfect example of this. Today, we have several room-renting apps coming up as well as small-scale guest accommodation. 

There is no doubt that most of the big names in the hotel and hospitality businesses are struggling because of this and feel very threatened. This is why many hotels today are coming up with new and fresh ways to keep their customers. One way they are doing this is by listening to their customers to find out what they can improve on.

According to Forbes, for hotels to keep up with new trends from consumers, they must forget what the standard used to be. They have to listen to their customers and use the data gotten from that to choose how they will run their business. The things customers say provide a lot of help and knowledge about new trends in the hospitality industry as well as how the customers like to spend their money.

Smaller companies have more advantages when it comes to accepting new trends and putting them into practice. This is because they do not have several structures and people that need to approve a new move before it is taken. For big hotels, however, they may struggle with this because of their complex arrangement. 

One major move big hotel names can make in today’s hospitality industry is to set up a helpful and easy to use hotel mobile app.

Mobile internet has long gained more ground and more users than desktop or web. According to Digital Authority, mobile internet access has so much overtaken desktop internet usage. In 2018 alone, more than 70 percent of all web traffic came from mobile devices. This is different from 57 percent in 2017. 

We can then argue that creating a mobile app is the way to go for hotels.  Creating a mobile app involves you involves writing software that can work on a mobile device. This involves many technical steps but hotels who decide to create their own mobile app must not also forget that the app must show their identity and meet the needs of their target customer.

Digital Authority offers some handy tips for building a successful mobile app. They include a value proposition, market research, and SWOT analysis, stating the goals of your mobile app, knowing who your ideal user is, and stating how you will make money from the app. Let us see these key points in relation to a mobile app for a hotel business.

1. Value Proposition

Your hotel mobile app must be offering value. Don’t just put up information about how to use the app on it. When a customer downloads your mobile app, it shows that they trust you enough to have your app on their personal device and they expect you to provide enough value that will convince them to choose you.

Providing value is not just having great rooms and service that is better than your competitors. It goes more to mean how your mobile app is different from other similar apps. Your customers need to see the benefits of your app written in clear, short and interesting words. 

A typical benefit may be that it helps them reserve rooms without stress or that they get a discount when they book for a room on the mobile app.

2. Market Research and SWOT Analysis

SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. You should take up the task of finding out what all these are when building your mobile app. A SWOT analysis helps you find out any hidden faults before investing lots of your time and money into the app.

A SWOT analysis won’t exactly give you the best app but it is an important step because it shows you any problems affecting your mobile app idea. It shows you your strengths in the area of how users will benefit from the app and any weakness that comes from something you’re not doing right.

The opportunities part shows you where you can improve on and what you can do to be better than your competitors. A very good opportunity in hotel mobile apps is that not many hotels are doing it yet. Threats show you places where your competitors can overtake you.

3. Mobile App Goals

We see it all the time. Folks think they understand how to set goals, but then they never quite achieve what they were after because their goals aren’t inspiring. Define your goals well. This involves stating where you are now, what you want to achieve with your mobile app and how you want to achieve it. 

To do this, you can think about the kind of activities that users will be doing on your mobile app. Your customer may want to find out the price of a room, or if there are extra costs for staying a day longer, or if the facilities are up to standard. You may define the success of your mobile app goals as when your customer eventually books for a room.

4. Ideal User

A successful mobile app is also made possible by having the right sets of users or customers. You should also consider how these users will use your app. You may want your customers to be able to quickly pay on the app when they book for a room or to order on the app then pay at the hotel or through any other channel. 

Knowing who your ideal user is will help you choose what you should put on the app and what you shouldn’t. This is because you are not serving everyone. You can choose your ideal users by considering the type of mobile device they use, where they live, what they do and the kind of people they are.

5. Making Money from the App

You must have a clear method of how you want to make money from your hotel mobile app. A good money-making system will mean that the app stays around for much longer. There are several methods to this. You could choose to be paid for every time a user downloads your app. You could also decide to have slots where people can pay you to advertise their products and services on your app. 

A good example of this could be an airline company advertising on your app for tourists and travelers to patronize them when returning to their destinations. A useful method to make money on your app would be to offer users the choice tom upgrade to a premium plan in order to enjoy certain things or to remove disturbing ads.

As a big name in the hospitality industry, I understand that you are looking for practical ways to silence the competition. 

Creating your own app is a great first step to that. Not sure where to start with your mobile app efforts? Check out this list of companies that offer all the support you’ll need to set things in motion.