Digital transformation is well underway in the hospitality industry, offering a much more personalized, customer-centric experience. Digital twin technologies exemplify this trend by empowering guests with greater control over even the smallest details of their stays.
Digital twins are virtual models of real-world objects, such as hotel rooms, floor plans, and equipment assets. They’re frequently paired with IoT data to provide real-time insight, which benefits both guests and property managers.
Benefits of Digital Twins in the Hospitality Industry
With the hospitality industry becoming more competitive, it’s vital to remain cutting-edge. Digital twins offer a multitude of benefits that help resorts, hotels, and other hospitality organizations get a leg up on the competition. Let’s explore further.
Indoor Navigation
Indoor navigation is likely the most immediate advantage of using digital twin technologies in the hospitality industry. Typically accessed through a mobile app, virtual models of resorts let guests find their way with turn-by-turn navigation to various on-site facilities, such as the pool or bar.
Indoor navigation also allows guests to virtually tour a hotel room or even an entire resort. Guests can even choose which suite room to reserve, based on view or location. These features are an excellent way for potential guests to decide if they want to stay at a particular hotel.
Virtual Concierge
It’s difficult to match the degree of personalization and virtual concierge service that digital twins can offer. Whether it’s remotely customizing room temperature and lighting, selecting a room from digital floor plans, requesting a drink delivered directly to wherever the guest happens to be within the resort, or issuing maintenance requests, digital twins allow guests to do it all.
Tailored Marketing
The tailored marketing advantages of this technology are mutually beneficial for guests and management. Management can market specific room or service upgrades to customers based on their habits, promoting guest spending. In turn, guests are happier with relevant, timely, and personalized offers.
Operational Efficiency
The operational benefits provided by digital twins greatly improve the hotel experience. Management can use data from customer behavior to identify how to decrease costs (optimize staffing, lighting, and temperature during certain hours), understand how facilities are actually used, and achieve operational performance goals. This information is critical to finding opportunities to improve the bottom line, increase customer satisfaction, and optimize staff productivity.
Use Case of Digital Twin in Hospitality
Perhaps the best example of digital twin technologies in the hospitality industry is ATELIER de Hoteles. The luxury hotel chain turned to WRLD to develop a digital twin of its state-of-the-art, five-star resort, ATELIER Playa Mujeres.
ATELIER Playa Mujeres guests now have futuristic capabilities to make their stay even more relaxing, such as:
- Real-time location information: The integration of WRLD’s digital twin technologies with Cisco Meraki’s positioning system gives guests real-time location information. This feature is critical for estimating (and lowering) wait times.
- 3D visual experiences: Guests can have 3D visual experiences to gather their whereabouts in relation to the resort as a whole, as well as virtually experience different resort amenities to determine which they want to use.
- Remote ordering: Resort guests enjoy the luxury of ordering refreshments via a mobile app. The refreshments are then brought to the guests, wherever they are on the grounds.
The hospitality industry is about to revolutionize the guest experience with a whole new level of relaxation, personalization, and technology, thanks to digital twins.
Digital Twins Are the Future of Hospitality
Digital twins are beneficial to both guests and property managers. They offer guests personalized experiences through wayfinding, 3D visual experiences, virtual concierge services, and more. They also provide analytical insight into how management can maximize operational efficiency, make staff more effective, and offer personalized guest marketing.
Digital twins’ virtual models and remote capabilities are the future of the hospitality industry. To experience the difference digital twins can make for your hospitality organization, contact WRLD today.