Delivering exceptional customer support can be the difference between a one-time visitor and a loyal customer.
Yet meeting customer demands around the clock is challenging, especially for any tour and attraction operators juggling limited resources and high seasonal demand.
Enter automated customer support. Automated tools provide a win-win scenario for operators like yourselves. Guests receive instant, accurate answers to their questions while you save time and reduce overhead costs.
From assisting with booking inquiries to resolving common concerns, automated support empowers businesses to scale their operations without compromising service quality. In this article, we’ll explore the key benefits of automated customer support in travel, best practices for implementation, and a glimpse into future trends transforming the travel industry.
- 5 benefits of automated customer service
- 7 best practices for implementing AI in customer service
- Automated customer service future trends
5 benefits of automated customer service
AI-powered tools and chatbots are talking to millions of users around the world, right at this very second. Below, we outline some key benefits of automated customer support related to the travel industry.
1. Open 24/7
One of the key advantages of automated customer support is round-the-clock availability. As someone who works for an attraction or tour company, you’ve probably noticed that travelers have questions at all hours of the day. (Why is someone asking about parking at 3 in the morning?!) Inquiries often fly outside traditional business hours, especially when offering services across time zones. With automated tools like AI chatbots, you can instantly tackle guest requests, ensuring no customer is left waiting.
A chatbot integrated into a tour operator’s website can provide immediate answers about tour schedules, ticket availability, or weather conditions, regardless of the time of day. The easier it is for guests to communicate with your brand, the more they trust and feel comfortable booking with you.
2. More satisfied customers
On that note… quick response times lead to satisfied customers. Today’s travelers want fast responses, especially when booking last-minute tours.
Response times can heavily impact customer satisfaction. About 90% of people who experience effortless customer service are likely to purchase from that brand again, versus only 4% of those who need help solving a problem. That’s exactly what the Customer Effort Score metric tracks: the ease of interacting with your company.
A CES survey can be used to identify high-friction touchpoints that are making guests unhappy. Then, you can apply automated customer support tools in those areas, allowing your business to provide quicker assistance to all your guests.
3. Offer support in other languages
Travelers from around the world won’t necessarily speak enough English to decode an English-written website. Automated customer support tools with multilingual capabilities can bridge that language barrier. AI-powered chatbots can communicate in multiple languages, making it easier for international customers to interact with your business.
For example, a European river cruise operator might use a multilingual chatbot to answer English, French, German, and Spanish questions. This expands the operator’s reach to a broader audience. Plus, it makes all customers, no matter what language they speak, feel welcome and understood.
4. All things considered, it’s a cost-effective solution
Hiring a full-time customer support team can be expensive, particularly for small and medium-sized businesses. Automated customer support tools like AI chatbots can be a cost-effective alternative. These bots can handle a high volume of inquiries without requiring additional staffing. For example, consider leveraging an automated tool instead of hiring multiple agents for your subsequent peak-season demand. The right chatbot can effectively manage customer inquiries while freeing up your resources, allowing you to focus on other business areas.
5. Handle multiple requests simultaneously
Automated customer support tools can manage multiple customer inquiries as they come in. This means you can quickly scale your customer service during peak season when the number of customer questions spikes. Whether you’re running an attraction or a tour, things can quickly get out of hand during the summer holidays. When our customer support staff gets overwhelmed with the number of questions and support requests, service quality can dwindle. A chatbot can field all these questions simultaneously, reducing wait times for guests and the stress on your staff.
7 best practices for implementing AI in customer service
Let’s take a look at how to best integrate AI tools into your customer support system.
Define your objectives
Before introducing AI to your customer support system, define your goal. This might be “reducing response times” or “handling more inquiries simultaneously.” This is the first step in working with AI tools because, without clear objectives, you risk implementing AI without direction or focus, leading to wasted resources and underwhelming results.
If you’re looking for an AI solution, you’ve likely already Identified specific pain points in your current support system. This is the moment where you set measurable KPIs. Think: “Reduce average response time by 50%” or “Increase resolution rate by 20%.” Once you have these goals in mind, you can continuously monitor performance to see if your AI tools are helping you meet your goals.
A mid-sized museum wants to address frequent inquiries about hours, ticket pricing, and exhibit details. By setting a goal to handle 80% of these common inquiries through AI, they can track how many queries are resolved without human intervention.
Choose the right AI tools
Many different AI-powered tools exist, from basic chatbots to advanced systems capable of natural language processing (NLP). Selecting the right tool depends on your business size, customer needs, and budget.
The first step is becoming aware of AI tools specializing in travel and attractions. This includes booking software like Xola and cloud-based customer service platforms like Zendesk. Next, evaluate your requirements: Do you need a chatbot to handle your FAQs or a more robust virtual assistant capable of handling bookings?
For example, a zipline operator might use Xola’s AI-powered booking assistant to handle reservations, answer FAQs, and provide safety guidelines in one integrated platform. Finally, consider choosing tools that integrate seamlessly with your existing CRM or booking systems. Xola, for instance, can integrate with Google Analytics, MailChimp, Salesforce, and much more.
Offer multi-language support
Many attractions cater to an international audience. Even if yours doesn’t, you can start thinking about reaching a wider audience with a multilingual chatbot. When guests from different regions arrive on your site and can communicate in their native language, they’ll create a stronger connection with your brand.
Language barriers are an easy way to create friction in the customer journey. If this makes sense for your business, consider choosing AI tools with multilingual NLP capabilities. Before that, analyze your customer demographics to understand better what languages you want to cater to. For example, investing in an AI chatbot that communicates in English, Spanish, and Portuguese for someone running a theme park in Florida makes sense. Then, test the chatbot’s accuracy in each language to ensure it provides consistent support.
Balance automation with human support
The more an AI tool learns about your audience, the better it can provide them with personalized support. However, leveraging AI automation can dehumanize your customer service experience. From a guest’s perspective, speaking to a robot makes things feel less personal. Of course, one way around this is to balance automation with human support.
More than relying on AI with a human fallback can frustrate customers who need solutions tailored to their specific situation. AI is very efficient at handling repetitive tasks, like answering FAQs and booking assistance. Yet, when it comes to complex or sensitive issues, human intervention is necessary. This is why staff training is required when you invest in AI solutions. Your staff should know exactly what steps to take when AI cannot resolve a query and be able to address escalated tickets promptly.
Train your chatbot to reflect your brand voice
Every brand has a personality, whether playful, professional, or adventurous; your chatbot should effectively reflect yours. A consistent brand voice makes customers feel at ease. When you provide a cohesive experience across all touchpoints, guests will feel a sense of familiarity in their interactions with you.
When you start working with AI tools, get together with your marketing team to craft a chatbot tone that aligns with your brand. This can be as simple as using specific language and phrases that make sense for your industry. For example, a family-friendly amusement park’s chatbot is cheerful and light-hearted to create a welcoming atmosphere.
Test and continuously improve
Like every tool, chatbots require regular updates to stay effective. Just as customer needs evolve, so should your AI system. Outdated scripts, for instance, can provide guests with the wrong information and harm their experience.
Remember to regularly review your performance metrics — such as resolution rates and customer satisfaction scores — to pinpoint areas that need improvement before they become more significant issues. You should also gather customer feedback about their AI interactions and update scripts.
For example, a fishing charter business notices an increase in group bookings. In response, the operator updates its chatbot to highlight special group discounts and packages in future conversations.
Ensure data privacy and security
AI systems collect and store a lot of customer data, and it’s your responsibility to keep it safe. It is crucial to prioritize compliance with privacy laws, like GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) and CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act), which give individuals greater control over how their information is used.
When you’re investing in an AI tool, make sure to choose one with a robust encryption system and secure data storage. Then, feature a privacy policy on your website stating how customer data is used. Finally, remember to regularly audit your systems to ensure compliance with local and international regulations.
Automated guest service future trends
Looking to the future, these are the AI-powered innovations set to redefine customer support and travel experiences in the tours and attractions industry.
Hyper-personalization of travel experiences and customer support
AI-powered chatbots can provide highly personalized travel recommendations by analyzing vast amounts of user data, such as user preferences and past bookings. Consider someone searching for “flights to Miami.” With AI, the person may also receive relevant recommendations for hotels, restaurants, and even things to do.
We’re already seeing this play out in real life: Marriott International’s AI-powered chatbot, “Marriott Bonvoy Chat,” assists guests with booking reservations, answers questions about hotel amenities, and provides recommendations for local attractions based on their preferences.
With AI, we’ll see this trend escalate even further. Whereas before, we could create customer segments based on macro characteristics like “business vs. leisure travelers,” now we’ll be able to hone in on individual traits, essentially creating “segments of one.” This means providing customer support uniquely tailored to a single guest’s needs. For example, guests check into a hotel room, the AC is set to their preferred temperature, the minibar is stocked with their favorite snacks, and the TV displays a warm, personalized welcome message.
Proactive customer support is the new standard
One of the biggest trends in customer service is proactive customer engagement, where companies anticipate customer needs and address potential problems before they escalate. When a business can predict customer behavior beforehand, it can also take action in advance. For example, UPS uses proactive alerts to notify customers of potential delivery delays caused by weather conditions. This kind of real-time communication minimizes frustration and builds trust. Similarly, Spotify sends personalized notifications about upcoming subscription renewals, ensuring users aren’t caught off guard when that bill arrives.
In the travel industry, proactive customer engagement can enhance guest experiences by offering timely updates — like flight delay notifications or early check-in options. Just recently, Air France-KLM partnered with Google Cloud to tap into its generative AI technology to better analyze passenger travel patterns, offer newly tailored travel services, and enhance predictive plane maintenance operations. This level of anticipation makes customers feel cared for before they even need to voice a concern.
A solution to workforce challenges
The travel industry is grappling with significant labor challenges, including high turnover rates and difficulties hiring and retaining employees. Today, 7% of U.S. travel and tourism jobs remain vacant, with even higher vacancies across Europe. To address these challenges, companies must prioritize equipping their frontline workforce with the right tools that allow them to perform their jobs to the best of their abilities.
With AI and automation, employees can focus on higher-value tasks while automating routine activities. Technologies like digital twins — virtual models that simulate real-world scenarios — are helping travel companies optimize day-of operations. For example, cruise operators can use digital twins to create real-time contingency plans in case of itinerary disruptions. This allows operators to provide live guidance and feedback to the frontline, lessening the stress on individual employees. Virtual reality simulations also enable employees to practice lifelike scenarios, significantly reducing training time and boosting confidence.
Together, these technologies improve workforce efficiency and reinforce our industry’s focus on human relationships, which, no matter how many technological advancements exist in the world, remain at the heart of travel experiences.
***
Automated customer support is no longer a luxury. It’s a necessity for tour and attraction operators looking to stay competitive. AI-powered tools can significantly enhance guest satisfaction and loyalty by providing 24/7 assistance, reducing response times, and personalizing customer interactions.
However, the true power of automation lies in strategic implementation: knowing how to use these tools to balance efficiency with the human touch.
As AI technology evolves, tour and attraction operators can deliver unforgettable guest experiences — long before customers set foot in their destinations.
