I recall a time when software for the hospitality industry was almost non-existent, mostly consisting of Excel spreadsheets and Word documents to track revenues and maintain customer records. Utilizing Excel to maintain customer accounts and ensure opportunities for future marketing campaigns was extremely inefficient and cumbersome at best.
Driven by the lack of a comprehensive events management program available at the time, or the costs to purchase what was available on the market were prohibitive or inadequate at best, led me to develop a software application of my own. Utilization of relational databases to track client contracts, determine pricing models, ensure operational efficiencies, and ensure revenue capture took years of toiling to create a system that would automate the process of maintaining sound client relationships and ensuring operational efficiencies.
Today, the hospitality industry has grown to such levels where projections for current revenues in the United States have surpassed the hundreds of billions of dollars and increasing exponentially by roughly 7% yearly to 2028. The hospitality software industry’s revenue projections in the United States are slated to be in the tens of billions and growing.
The multitude of systems available on the market is vast, and often confusing, requiring a deep dive into understanding what each system does, and how it might compare to its competitors. Systems exist for point of sales (POS), integrated operations, customer retention and marketing, small restaurant and online ordering, and the list goes on and on. Most likely, any hospitality industry venture may require several different software applications to run a particular business.
It is important to remember that when choosing software ensure that you are choosing wisely. Selecting software that is easily updateable and will not become obsolete within a few years, or that information inputted into past systems can be easily migrated to new systems as your company scales and grows are keys to successful software mitigation and renewal.
Because the hospitality software landscape is so vast, I selected a number of different types of software available on the market to synopsize.
1. Cloudbeds
Cloudbeds is an integrative software service available for the hospitality industry. Using the latest technological improvements to ensure viability between various booking platforms, Cloudbeds provides users with opportunities to not only customize the guest experience but enhance marketing efforts and increase efficiencies within the operations sphere. Cloudbeds provides a wide variety of software modules to create a seamless operational platform to better serve guests' needs through increased efficiency, tracking guests’ reservations and history, and managing the backend operations in the hospitality industry.
2. Dack
Dack software assists the vacation rental market by helping to manage the user experience and ensure seamless opportunities by making the check-in and checkout process easier for guests. Additionally, Dack provides rental owners the ability to customize guests' experiences by offering additional services, and to increase revenue potential. Ensuring that customers receive specialized booking availability as well as providing useful information about the rental and environs increases opportunities for guests to enjoy their stay.
3. Lighthouse
Lighthouse Hospitality Management software provides users with insights into their business by integrating functionality of disparate data into one system. Lighthouse enables the user to understand the competitive landscape and ensure that room rental pricing complies with current market rates by viewing and comparing competitors’ pricing. The software also enables users to develop targeted marketing campaigns for potential customers through predictive analysis.
4. Revinate
Revinate software for the hospitality industry provides users with the ability to advantage marketing through customer contact and reviews. Utilizing customer feedback to develop marketing campaigns is an essential means for hospitality properties to ensure that information is current and accurate. Additionally, Revinate enables users to contact guests for follow-up through a variety of different mediums to maximize potential outreach.
5. Superb
Superb POS software provides restaurants and customers with the useability to meet current market demands. Superb acts as an all-in-one system for restaurants and cafes whereby ordering, seating, kitchen menu management, customer online ordering, and payment are integrated for a seamless experience. Currently, the drawback of Superb POS is it is only used in Europe and may not be available in the United States.
6. Tablevibe
Tablevibe enables restaurants to take control of their online ordering opportunities and maintain customer data which is so important to engendering customer loyalty and customer promotion. Additionally, Tablevibe enables restaurants to market directly to past customers and create marketing schemes to further engender loyalty. Lastly, Tablevibe aggregates online ordering initiated through other online ordering systems that a restaurant may use and ensures a seamless experience for the customer.
7. Thynk
Thynk hospitality software provides users with an integrated solution to better manage various aspects of the user’s business and integrate multiple properties into one seamless application. Thynk software enables users to have greater control and functionality of the data available to make more informed decisions regarding future revenue streams and opportunities. Additionally, Thynk software helps to automate specific processes and generate functional reporting on a consistent and easily accommodating basis.
8. Vouch
Vouch hospitality software automates operational tasks to increase efficiency for both guests and staff through an easily usable and highly functional application. Increasing efficiencies in hotel operations engenders added customer satisfaction and generates greater operability for staff. While human interactions are important in the guest experience, having the ability to bypass lines during check-in or ask for more towels in your room enables staff to better manage guests’ expectations and reduce wait times for needed services.
9. Wheelhouse
Wheelhouse hospitality pricing software enables users to better understand the market and competitive marketplace when determining pricing strategies. Wheelhouse software uses available data to help users better understand what aspects competitors may be using to develop pricing strategies and better help you understand how these aspects can increase profitability and generate additional revenue opportunities. Wheelhouse enables users to better understand the competitive marketplace by developing data sets that generate increased insights into the competitive landscape.
Determining which software to purchase depends on the type of business that you have and the needs of your operations. Understand that when selecting software, it is important to ensure that what you purchase will integrate with your current systems, or that your current systems will allow for the information to be migrated to the new software. Do not get caught up with the idea that one software system will do it all, but rather ensure that if purchasing multiple systems they are working together with either your current systems or that the underlying architecture allows for easily migrating information in the future.
Assume that you may be required to take smaller steps toward software integration or capacity versus ensuring that you are set for the next 10 years. Remember that technology changes so rapidly that most likely by the time you have purchased a new system, it is already out of date.
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