How can you use a PMS to improve guest communication?

The pre-arrival communication heavily depends on the tech channels that sit inbetween. Why? Because hotels will not always get the phone number or Email (or just some group phone/Email) and therefore being able to have the guests to enter a "special request" field, which should automatically get analyzed by AI tools these days, is absolutely key.

I think this is one of the most important phases, as it helps you see a bit of who is the customer, what they want and what they like to ensure that upon arrival we are ready to host them

Improving guest's communication under the pre-arrival communication is essential with quality profiling. Profiling here takes into considerations everything that needs to be known about the guest, including his picture. Tech development is getting to that stage where there is no need to carry passport to travel and in the entire human endeavors, I think the hospitality industry should lead by sample. Therefore, a quality PMS that has the right profiling configuration will make check-in and stay experience worth the stay for every time demanding guests.

Deploying PMS for on-site communication with guests brings about them to feel they are important and worthy. This cultivates a sense of belonging to the brand so that upselling could be more possible. Also, it increases the brand engagement resulting in positive eWoM.

An easy way is to "simply" connect the clients upon check-in via QR code to some service channels to the hotels via messenger service (and those as well to be monitored by AI tools for automatic follow ups within the PMS system)

What is more welcoming at Check-in process when guest service agent can tell you almost everything about you and your stay. it reduces time and processes. It makes stay more welcoming and trust for the brand in question, just for having the right PMS in place. You can be reminded of your special days and so forth. Guest experience becomes seamless with the right PMS for on-site communication.

Thanking and asking how the experience at your establishment was can be very fruitful as you can detect all those promoters of your brand that can also contribute in improving your reputation scores and detractors that need to be contacted, heard and whichever problem they had, fixed

More and more important will be a structured-formatted invoice for business travelers which they simply can download after the stay - or the link is send to them (or a specified address, booking.com is doing a great job here) for automatic travel cost reimbursement and VAT reimbursement purposes

One of the best way to test the quality of guest service is in the review. You not only sends to them but the are willing to revert. It is either ways here, positive or negatively, your guests should be able to write back. With a good PMS and the right links interfacing the devices in the hotel, building on guest experience becomes easier. Hence, post-departure communication get complemented not just to guests but also for guest's experience management in the hotel. Post-departure communication also boosts future booking, next arrival experience and makes the brand more acceptable amidst others.

A perfect PMS should be 1) Cloud based and not on premise 2) Should fulfill the property level management requirements 3) Should be capable of distributing the available inventory across multiple channels 4) Should be at par on setting the dynamic controls and distributing them fairly on rev management calls 5) Should have integrated tools for effective guest communication 6)Should be able to run reports for auditing and monitoring 7) Should be integrated with intelligent tools to cross compare rates in competition 8) should be able to store and manage guest and agent profiles 9) Should be compliant to security standards 10) Should support directly or indirectly support property and product mappings

Today it should be a Cloud PMS system which has a well integrated marketplace, to allow addtionional services/channels easily be installed. Flat-fee Subscription-based models are here winning over transaction based models/one-time off additional costs

My concern is not limited to cloud base and so forth but the question of security MUST be properly addressed. How save or to what extent are details on the PMS protected for the sake of the esteemed guests.

Absolute key for customer retention: the PMS must be an integrated part of the complete travelers journey, from book to stay. Plus the won data is invaluable and allows to improve services (especially with the smart use of AI models)