How Will Voice Technology Change Travel

In the first of our series of predictions about the key trends and tides that will affect travel this year and beyond, we look at the power of VOICE and why we think it will drive the biggest shake up since the Internet first arrived.

VOICE TECHNOLOGY IN THE TRAVEL INDUSTRY

There are plenty of naysayers who doubt the potential of Voice to completely change travel. It is just too complex, too nuanced for technology to do the job of a human being (in this case, the travel agent), and that for every Teletext Holidays that launches a Voice-compatible skill, there’s still a person who you have to call to make the booking. Even the mighty Skyscanner can’t get it right after nearly five years of trying. It’s just the latest gimmick, they say

The fact is that speech is a more natural mode of communication – not to say a faster one – than typing (try typing out the 150 words you speak on average in a minute and see how long it takes). That convenience is increasingly making voice the search and engagement mode of choice for the next generation of consumers – 25% of 16-24 year olds use voice search on their mobiles already, 40% of 25-29 year olds state they use it once a day, and the proliferation of voice-activated devices is outstripping the adoption of mobile phones at the same period in their evolution.

Anyone with anything to sell should want to make the process of purchase as easy as possible. If you want someone to do something, make it simple for them to do it. The tech giants recognise this and are ploughing huge resources in to creating frictionless experiences for consumers that are built around screenless interactions with their platforms. Tapping a screen to open an app, before labouriously typing out a series of search instructions, will soon seem hopelessly quaint. Voice meets the expectation for instant service – from food to transport, we expect to get what we want, right now.

What is holding back progress? The speed of development in machine learning and the ability of voice assistants to learn from their users and make judgment calls – understanding previous information to make an informed decision, and improve accuracy. The more informed, the more personalised, and the more personalised, the higher the demand – all of which will only make the assistant more informed: a virtuous cycle.

Granted, travel’s resistance to commoditisation and neat packaging will make the transition to voice a long play. In even the simplest point-to-point itinerary, multiple variables can change availability and price in an instant. Full integration, and transactions – vcommerce, instead of ecommerce – are some way off being the norm. But we agree with predictions that forecast up to half of all searches being conducted via voice by 2020 – primarily because of the innovation the technology can bring to the inspiration and discovery phases of the customer journey. By integrating with social media, Outlook and other trackable metadata, voice will be there to help people know what it is they want faster and more conveniently than ‘traditional’ search. For example, when you ask it ‘give me some holiday ideas’, it will know, based on data it has accessed from other sources, that you have no kids, like Spain, enjoy mountain biking, or whatever – and make an appropriate recommendation accordingly.

And why is this so significant? Because, gradually, voice has the potential to achieve what it is that travel agents, in their current form, and de-mystify the process of booking travel. The resources of the technology giants driving developments in voice are focused on advancing the ability of the assistants to recognise conversational language, improving their ability to answer simple questions and gradually get more experienced, more knowledgeable and more trusted. Like a travel agent.

How do travel businesses start getting ready for voice in 2020? They need to bring in people who understand voice search, and who can review their SEO strategy and optimise their websites to follow the conversational tone and longer keywords that voice searches are typically characterised by. Already, the big technology firms in the voice space means they’re creating a monopoly that travel firms will struggle to break in to, by owning the technology that the travel brands will need to use if they’re to build their own voice proposition. Eventually, the tech firms will start charging for the chance to be listed in their voice search capabilities, and those travel businesses will have to start asking what they’ll have to pay to be referenced. Small businesses may be priced out of the market in the same way they have been from Google itself.

It is critical brands get on the front foot with this by resourcing and upskilling accordingly, bringing in people who can optimise the content on their websites to follow a conversational tone, to offer responses to anticipated queries, and develop the longer keyword strategies which typically characterises voice searches (‘what are the cheapest flights to X?’, instead of ‘cheap flights to X’).

We’ve attended many events and industry talks where voice has been dismissed as hype – the latest fad for the traditional agent to outlive. True, the travel industry has a history of getting over-excited about the Next Big Thing, and still needs to get a lot of its existing technology to function effectively. But the bringing together of convenience, adaptability, learning, inspiration and engagement that voice offers, in our opinion, makes it different – makes it, potentially, industry-changing.