Hyper-personalise data and hack search results: Five lessons from the AI for Guest Experience webinar

At The Caterer’s AI for Guest Experience webinar, sponsored by Lolly, industry experts shared how AI is becoming an everyday technology when it comes to operators finding ways to improve on guest experience.

The speakers at the webinar provided practical tips on how to build AI effectively into a business to attract customers, elevate the guest pathway and drive revenue and profit.

The audience heard from Peter Moore, chief executive officer at Lolly, Will Francis, digital marketing and AI expert, Dean Culpan, general manager at Miiro Templeton Garden in London, and David Turner, chief technology officer at Compass UK & Ireland.

Make sure you’re top of the search results

Google remains the dominant search engine, accounting for around 90% of all internet searches, but guests are increasingly turning to AI tools, such as ChatGPT, for more complex queries, Francis said.

He added that, unlike Google, which produces hundreds of results, AI tools return three or four recommendations: “If you’re not in those top two or three recommendations, you basically don’t exist,” he said.

He shared a couple of hacks for operators looking to stand out. Firstly, you need to appear “everywhere online”, which can be achieved by strong, consistent search engine optimisation alongside regular PR activity. Secondly, timeliness is a key advantage. While Google will search older content, AI platforms prefer to present fresh content, which means businesses need to maintain a steady presence on social platforms such as Reddit, TikTok and Instagram, and being disciplined about volume, quality and consistency of messaging.

This approach worked for Culpan while he was general manager at South Place hotel and where he implemented an AI-driven SEO strategy in 12 different languages. By using AI to analyse and adapt search phrases for different key markets, the hotel’s website appeared more frequently in search results, driving increased web traffic and higher booking conversion rates, sometimes by up to 120%.

Hyper-personalisation wins

Customers are familiar with a digital experience in technology, but making it personal adds a human element back in. Moore said this can be achieved by knowing customer preferences: their likes and dislikes or health conditions, such as allergens. This kind of information can significantly reduce the “frictions and pain points” that often arise in hospitality, Turner added. For example, if a restaurant holds accurate data on a guest’s allergen profile, they can recommend suitable menu items and help customers make decisions more easily and safely.

However, Francis warned: “People want to feel handled by a human, but with AI in the background.” Similarly, Culpan added that business should use AI but “don’t be creepy”.