Integrating Hotel
Technology
By Josef Lapka
The hospitality industry has struggled
for years with legacy technology
systems. Historically an independent
hotelier didn’t have access to the same
competitive advantages that technology
provided chain hotels with, as the barriers
to entry and cost of these systems was
simply preventative. In the last 5-10
years, however, the hotel market has
been flooded with new and innovative
60 ILHA
tools to help independent hoteliers
manage all aspects of their business, from
rates and inventory distribution to guest
engagement tools and RFP management.
These tools have emerged as a reaction
to a more complex and diverse
distribution landscape, brought on by
pricing transparency and increased
competition through new channels such
as meta search and online travel agents,
coupled with more demanding customer
expectations fuelled by peer reviews.
How technology is chosen by the
modern hotelier depends on many
factors and may need to be different for
each property. Nevertheless, there are
two key questions hoteliers should ask
themselves: