[00:00:00] Oriol: Max Simpson, the mastermind behind Boostly.
[00:00:00] Mark: You don't have a business. You have a job. And Brian Chesky is your boss here. But I, I cannot disagree with this, uh, statement. In the world of hospitality, if you break it down to what we're selling, we are selling an experience. So the problem is what happens when that plate stops me?
[00:00:16] Mark: Anybody who works with me, I wanna get you to 65% direct, well
[00:00:20] Oriol: direct bookings to have a quality. Layer of bookings that you don't get with, with Airbnb because it's
[00:00:25] Mark: all about building a database that we've got a new demographic now with traveler coming out of, uh, of Covid. So
[00:00:30] Oriol: how do you see the difference between Dubai other markets and the,
[00:00:33] Mark: the different rules and regulations here that you may not see elsewhere?
[00:00:37] Mark: And you've got to be here to understand it. For example, with the, the tourism board where they make sure that you have to, uh, hand all of your guests IDs in, but within a certain timeframe.
[00:00:46] Oriol: Come to another episode of connecting Dots with or planner. In this episode, we're joined by Mark Simpson, the mastermind behind Bus Lee, the number one recommended agency in the short term rental industry for direct bookings.
[00:01:01] Oriol: Mark has been recognized as one of the top 20 most influential people in the vacation rental industry at longer, and has helped property manager rate over 50 million pounds in direct bookings. His mission, maybe he can explain it later, so. Welcome to the show. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Uh, so yes, explain us a little bit about your journey and about your mission.
[00:01:24] Mark: Yeah. So, um, first of all, thank you. That's a lovely intro. Intro. Uh, yeah. So my, my mission is to help operators, hosts, vacation or managers, however you wanna describe yourself, grow the business on, on their own terms. I am one of the rare breeds. I was born in hospitality. I grew up in a, in a hotel in the UK in Scarborough.
[00:01:47] Mark: It was a 200 acre farm that had, uh, accommodation on it. And, uh, it was like one of the thirst farm stay accommodation businesses in, in, in like our area. And I, I grew up in this industry. I've tried my best to leave and escape it, but it keeps like dragging me back. Spent many years coaching football or soccer in, in America, uh, for like all of like the early nineties, and then came back to the business in 2010.
[00:02:14] Mark: And then between 2010 and 2016, I was in it full-time. And, um, I was helping my parents basically get online before I, before I came back into the family business. They'd had it for 25 years. So they didn't have a PMS like Mr. Alfred, they had none of that. No website, no social media. It was all done on pen and paper.
[00:02:33] Mark: A lot of Tip X, a lot of scribbling out, uh, a lot of double bookings. Uh, but, uh, my role is basically get it online, uh, get it into social media, basically drag it into 21st century. And then in 2016, I noticed that there was a lot of hosts in our area in the, in Scarborough, um, but we're struggling with selling a market in their business.
[00:02:55] Mark: They would put a business, they put their listing on booking.com, Airbnb, uh, Expedia, and that was it. They were sort of struggling with, with getting bookings and I started helping a few people and it went down well. I created a Facebook group called the Hospitality Community Facebook Group, which is still going to this day.
[00:03:14] Mark: And I just started putting daily tips in there to show 'em how they can increase their direct bookings. Um, and like with anything online, especially in 2016, if something works, it drags attention and. We had people trying to join that group, not from Scarborough, which is my local area, but um, from all over the world.
[00:03:34] Mark: We had people from like America and Australia and France and Spain, uh, joining the group. So I saw it as a need for this. It wasn't just like my little area of the world, it was like a worldwide thing. Uh, the core principle is I can help you get bookings, but most importantly I can show you how to do it where you're not reliant on Airbnb.
[00:03:54] Mark: I. Started dictating your business and I just, I just made a plan, made a mission to, you know, put a stupidly high number of a million people. So I wanna help a million people, uh, grow their, you know, grow their business on, on their own terms. Um, and it's just taken, taken off from there. It's, um, started just me in a kitchen 2016 and now we have 1,200 clients around the world.
[00:04:19] Mark: Predominantly we do website design. Um, but we also do training, coaching, education, uh, and we now have A-A-A-C-R-M as well that we, we, we package all into this package. It's called the bookings booster package. And, um, yeah, it's, it's a worldwide brand. It's growing all the time and I'm just, uh, yeah, very, very lucky to be part of it.
[00:04:41] Oriol: Very good. And, um, and you said you work, uh, around the world. You work in the US and Canada and the UK mainly. Also you have clients in Dubai, I think you were mentioning before.
[00:04:51] Mark: Yeah, we, we majority, I would say 60% is American and Canada. Mm-hmm. We have, um, 5%, 10% over in Australia and New Zealand. And then the rest is probably scattered between the uk Yeah.
[00:05:05] Mark: Dubai, middle East, um, and, uh, mainland Europe.
[00:05:09] Oriol: And when you started Airbnb was, uh, very predominant already or what's the, what was the stage of Airbnb?
[00:05:15] Mark: Um, so obviously 2016 I'd been going for. Just under 10 years In America? Yeah, in the UK it was growing, but it was still, booking.com was the main player.
[00:05:28] Oriol: Even. Even with holiday homes or with, well,
[00:05:31] Mark: yeah, and Expedia, but yeah, holiday. So the thing about booking.com is that they were created for the hotel. Market and they've had to pivot and create their own office around like short term rentals with obviously the emergence of Airbnb. Airbnb have, have changed how the industry works.
[00:05:49] Mark: So in the UK we sort of had this halfway house between booking.com, um, Expedia obviously there, um, and then Airbnb was, was on the rise, but you had like other little smaller OTAs that were doing things as well in, in, in the uk. But.
[00:06:05] Oriol: And, and how did you, how, how, how did you see the evolution or the change or the shift in the industry when Airbnb b has become or became more, uh, predominant?
[00:06:13] Oriol: You know what,
[00:06:15] Mark: you know, what I've noticed is that, and this especially in America, is nobody around there walks around going, I'm staying in a booking.com. No one walks saying, I'm staying in a, in a vrbo. Everyone says I'm staying in an Airbnb. And then there are people who build their online brand, their social media brand, saying that I'm Airbnb hosts.
[00:06:34] Mark: So it's. I think in, uh, 2015, Airbnb had just under 15% of the market share. By 2030, they're predicted to have 65% of the market share, which is a massive shift. Like they've not only caught up with booking.com and the Expedia group, they've overtaken them to the point where now, like I say, people go around calling themselves, you know, Airbnb coaches and Airbnb hosts, and I'm standing in Airbnb, you know, uh, and.
[00:07:05] Mark: I got up on stage. I, I was very fortunate to be invited to speak in America. I went to, uh, Nashville. Uh, we're in this, this huge arena and there was like a thousand people there, and I got up in front of everybody and I just said, if you've got over 90% of your bookings that are coming from Airbnb. You don't have a business, you have a job, and Brian Chesky is your boss.
[00:07:28] Mark: And I said, it's your own fault. It literally, it's your own fault because you are walking around branding yourselves as Airbnbs. You're not branding yourself as your own business. You're not, you know, talking about your own company here and. And that's a big problem. And like I say, I'm, I'm here to sort of like, give people a bit of a shake, disrupt their thinking and sort of go, well, let's build this on your own breath.
[00:07:49] Oriol: So, um, not, not to to be the challenger here, but I, I kind of disagree with this, uh, statement. So I, and my position is that, um, you outsource sales to another company. Hospitality is extremely complicated. Hmm. Especially in in short rentals. You need to acquire apartments. You need to manage landlords. You need to do check in, checkout, cleaning, laundry.
[00:08:14] Oriol: So if there is a company that has really solved the problem of getting guests from anywhere in the world to your door, handles the payments, da da, dah, why you cannot work with them. They're very expensive. Yes, they're very expensive. But why you cannot work with these type of companies, especially if you are building a company, have a lot of costs.
[00:08:34] Oriol: And, and, and again, you need to focus probably on the core things that you have the best and you are super expert in marketing. There are bookings and all this, but not everyone is. So if we, if, if someone that is a bit more weak in marketing and sales can outsource this to the, probably the best brand in hospitality,
[00:08:53] Mark: why not?
[00:08:55] Mark: So I, I, uh, I agree. But the, the, there's a couple of things here. Number one is you are right. They do all of the work, they do all of the marketing, they do all of the things, and then they give you the sale. So in the world of hospitality, if you break it down to what we're selling, we are selling an experience.
[00:09:14] Mark: So the reason why people come and stay with us is that for, for the experience, there is no other industry out there that sell what we sell,
[00:09:21] Oriol: correct.
[00:09:22] Mark: It's very in demand. Even during the biggest disruptor to our industry, which was Covid, people were still looking to travel. They, they, they work hard all year to, to have a vacation or, or whatever.
[00:09:34] Mark: So that, that's number one. And so with that, there's a ton of demand and we are very lucky in this industry that there are. Two, maybe free websites that you can start a business today. So I could go and take over this apartment today. I can take a couple of nice pictures, and there's free websites that I can go onto that will pretty much be guaranteed revenue, right?
[00:09:55] Mark: Depending on the market time of the year, et cetera. That's, that's number one. That is a blessing. Um, we do website design. There is not an Airbnb of website design, right? This so is, um, so, uh, where I have got to do sales and marketing, I've got to literally drag people to come and do business with me. I. So that's a blessing.
[00:10:16] Mark: It's a curse because it is so easy that people become overreliant. And when you become overreliant and you've got all of these plates spinning. So for a, an operator who's doing the management model, it's, I've gotta take care of staff, I've gotta, um, I. Get a hold of apartments. I've got to, you know, do sales for, for, for homeowners.
[00:10:36] Mark: I've gotta do all of that. When it comes to the actual getting the guests, you just look at that plate that's spinning, that sales plate, that marketing plate, just go, yeah, right. Airbnb have got this right. The problem is what happens when that plate stop spinning and that plate can stop spinning for a number of reasons.
[00:10:51] Mark: Number one, you could just drop off the algorithm. Number two, you could get a couple of crappy reviews. Number three, your listing could get suspended. There's loads of reasons why that plate could stop spinning. I am not advocating for any company to just go cold Turkey and leave Airbnb. You've got to instead use them as a lead generation tool.
[00:11:14] Mark: So my whole goal, anybody who works with me, I want to get you to 65% direct. That leaves 35% to be OTAs. And the reason why that number is that. Eventually, if you are doing this as a career, you want to be able to start it, grow it, scale it, and potentially exit one day. And anybody who is looking to acquire any business, the first thing that you look at is where are the revenue streams coming from?
[00:11:40] Mark: And if you are an investor in a potential company, and if you see 90% of the revenue coming from one source, that is a risky investment. You wanna make sure there's multiple revenue streams coming in. If I can show you how to not only just tap into Airbnb, booking.com, uh, Expedia, but also have direct, 'cause direct has multiple strands of revenue as well.
[00:12:01] Mark: You've got, you've got email, you've got ads, you've got sales, you've got all of those. WhatsApp. I think WhatsApp is growing. WhatsApp, there's so many verticals that you can drive, drive bookings from. It's, it's about building a business that is sustainable and that can grow on, on your rules. 'cause we all focus on the money.
[00:12:16] Mark: Like one of the biggest kickbacks when I. Talk about that. The biggest kickback is that will Airbnb only take 3%, depending on your model, 3% commission. But I'm like, yeah, that sound, but don't just focus on the money because when any, any time a booking comes from Airbnb. You always feel like you've got, uh, a big brother that's looking over your booking and the guest knows this.
[00:12:36] Mark: The guest knows that if they complain at any point to Airbnb, for Airbnb will more likely side with the guests over, over the host. And they use that as a tool to, you know, to fre bad reviews because the host is so reliant on that five star review. Anything less than a five star review, if you drop below four point.
[00:12:55] Mark: Eight. Now on Airbnb, your listen is deemed not very good, which is bananas, right? And the guests know this. And so when a booking comes from Airbnb, if a guest complains, the host will bend over backwards because they are afraid that the guest will then leave a bad review. Or even worse, get the money back by going to to Airbnb.
[00:13:14] Mark: Now, if you've got a direct booking. And their guest has got an issue. Yeah, you can deal with 'em, you can come, you, you can work with 'em to have a resolution, but you are not fearing the, the, the bad review. You're not fearing like the drop of algorithm, you know what I mean? It's, uh, a a, a host is so scared to cancel a booking.
[00:13:32] Mark: 'cause if you cancel a booking, it's one of the easiest ways of losing your Superhost status that everybody is so obsessed with. You know what I mean? And, and that is why I, I, I'm not saying to people, listen, I'm not saying to cancel your list and I'm, I'm not saying to go a hundred percent direct. Being a hundred percent direct is as bad as being a hundred percent Airbnb.
[00:13:50] Mark: It's about making sure you've got a sustainable business that's got multiple revenue streams and you don't overly on a platform to bring your revenue in.
[00:13:59] Oriol: Yeah, totally agree. I mean, in my opinion, it's, it's about diversification. Yeah. I mean, don't get me wrong. When I talk about all source, uh, channels, I mean all channels.
[00:14:07] Oriol: So I think 90% Airbnb is a huge mistake. Think 30, 30, 30, 25, 20 is a very good market share for per channel. Obviously, we can grow the, the direct, uh, even more, but in, in my, in my opinion also the direct booking is not a matter of, of market share is a matter of the type of customers also that you attract, right?
[00:14:26] Oriol: You can have less than 60%, but have the best, the best, uh, guests or bookings, or have the ones that book more in advance. So you need to nurture very well, in my opinion, direct bookings to have a quality layer of bookings that you don't get with, with Airbnb, because maybe you don't control them with direct bookings.
[00:14:44] Oriol: You can go to the people that you want and try to convince them, right? Yeah. Corporate travelers, uh, again, people that book in advance, families, the families book much more in advance than, yeah, than, uh, non families. And everyone prefers to have family than, uh. Good up a friend. So,
[00:14:59] Mark: well, it's why I put that book together.
[00:15:00] Mark: The book Direct Playbook is because you're right, so many people will come into me going, you know how to sell the market, but I don't. So I was like, well, it's easy. All I am literally doing is taking tips that have been around since the dawn of time and just putting it into our world. And I kept getting asked the same question so far, right?
[00:15:16] Mark: Sort it. I'm gonna put it in a book. So I brought the book out and it's got 101 tips in there because there isn't just one type of guest that you can. This is all about building a database. Building a database is, is key because when you've got a database of, of emails, phone numbers, first name, last names, whether it's leisure, corporate, or everybody, then it is so much easier to market.
[00:15:39] Mark: If you have got last minute availability, or if you wanna pre-book out your Q4 bookings of 2025, if you've got a database of people that you can email to send SMS messages to WhatsApp messages to, uh. It's, you're much more likely that you are gonna do it than if you're just gonna put a post out on Instagram and hope that the algorithm god's, uh, favoring down on you.
[00:16:01] Oriol: Yeah, I agree. Very good. And then, uh, so also one of the, of the things that I wanted to get your, your brain is in, in the different markets that you're operating. Yeah. So, as you said, your brain in, in US Canada. As the main markets. Yeah. UK also. Yeah. So, so first, how do you see the global short term rental?
[00:16:21] Oriol: Airbnb, I think, released the 2024 results couple of days ago. Uh, they, they grow 12%, I think year on year in bookings, which is good for industry as global. Yeah. How you see the industry going moving? Because also, sorry, also there is these, uh, mergers. No, I think in acquisitions in the last also couple of months, we had two big ones.
[00:16:44] Oriol: Yeah. So how, how do you see the market going?
[00:16:46] Mark: Yeah. So whenever Airbnb released their numbers, they say they have grown to a biggest player. Now we have to pay attention to, to what they're saying because. The data that they have is probably some of the best data that that is out there. All of those stats that I saw, um, one of the interesting ones to me is that one in every five bookings is over 30 days stays.
[00:17:08] Mark: So Airbnb now are starting to bring out other, talking about bringing out more products and services to cater for those types of travelers. And a 30 day stay could be a number of reasons. It, it could be, um. Contractor, it could be, um, an an insurance day, for example, family that have had to get relocation or it could be digital nomads.
[00:17:31] Mark: And I know that in Dubai here, there's been a, a 12% growth, um, on the amount of people who are digital nomads who are coming to travel here, staying for more than 30 days stays. And I feel like this type of demographic of traveler started during covid. Obviously people, um. Weren't having to be in the office anymore.
[00:17:51] Mark: They were being able to work from home. And because of that, people were going, well, if I'm gonna work from home, I might as well work from Bad Beach. Or there's some places they wanna work from. And um. I feel like it's a combination of that with the whole Gen Z mindset. Now, the Gen Z mindset is not to own, it's to, it's to rent.
[00:18:10] Mark: So, for example, in America, so many more people now are buying cars. They're relying on, you know, uh, taxis and Ubers and whatnot. They're not buying houses as much. Now they're doing, they're, they're doing like, you know, short term rentals or medium term rentals. And I feel like that is. What I find fascinating, not so much Dubai, not so much America, but, but worldwide now, is that there's a new demographic of traveler and for, for operators who are watching this, so many more people now are pivoting their model.
[00:18:39] Mark: Because if you've got a guest who's staying for 30 days, then it's much more easier on operations, much more easier on linen, you know, and again, you don't have to always be scrambling to find, instead of finding, you know, people who are gonna stay two, three nights, four nights, seven nights, you just to find one person who's can stay for a, for a month.
[00:18:59] Mark: And, um, it, it's a different, uh, avatar. It's a different type of guest. It's a different way that you present your list and different way you market. But those are the sort of things that I'm finding fascinating is that we've got a new demographic now with Traveler coming out of, uh, of Covid
[00:19:14] Oriol: and then, uh, you also have clients in Dubai.
[00:19:16] Oriol: So how do you see the difference between Dubai or their markets and what our audience can learn from, from what happened, uh, abroad?
[00:19:24] Mark: Yeah, so I. I've been coming to Dubai for for many years, but it wasn't until the scale event in October when I came out, when I got to speak to a lot of operators and, um, the, the different rules and regulations here that you may not see elsewhere.
[00:19:39] Mark: And I feel that there's a lot of vendors who came over to the first time, um, other PMS providers, other operations providers who came here that. Weren't aware of maybe, um, the as many rules and regulations that there are maybe el elsewhere. And I feel like because of that, there's, you've got to be here to understand it.
[00:20:00] Mark: For example, with the, the tourism board where they make sure that you have to, uh, hand all of your guests IDs in within a certain timeframe. So it's like a, is it like a couple of hours after they stay or 72 hours before arrival? So things like that really interest me. Um, and. Where what is happening really fast in the short term rental market, doesn't matter what area you're in, America, uk, Dubai, Australia is that regulation is coming thick and fast.
[00:20:29] Mark: Before covid it, there wasn't really a lot of regulation, if any, and so many markets are having to pivot because of the new rules and regulations that are, are coming in. Um, it's at the core of it, what. Governments want to do is they want to make this industry more professional. And it's obviously been driven by the hotel companies because obviously it's, the Airbnb has done one thing, it's made, anybody can start a business on that platform and do really well, but without regulation, you've got the, the professional players.
[00:21:06] Mark: But you've also got a lot of bad actors. You know, the people who literally go, uh, on Instagram and they say, they talk about all the riches that come with short-term rentals. Um, but then their operations that they run, you know, aren't, aren't very good. And so regulation is coming to, to get rid of the bad actors, to make sure that it's only professionals that are in its industry.
[00:21:26] Mark: And fair regulation is fair. But as with anything, with governments, as things are getting pushed through. There's a lot of agendas and people who are trying to lobby for other things. They attach their agenda onto like the main agenda that's going through. And when regulation is done incorrectly, when it, and when it's, when it's been pushed through in some areas as it has been where it's, um, it's been, it's been driven because people are complaining about the lack of housing, uh, lack of opportunities for people to get on the housing ladder when it's not.
[00:21:56] Mark: It's it, you know, you can read between the lines here and because of that. Unfair regulation comes in, for example, Barcelona. Um. Businesses have just been, you know, one day you've got a short term rental. Next minute I would banning it. And so it's, it's, how do you navigate that rocky landscape is, is what I find that's fascinating right now.
[00:22:17] Mark: And, uh, and it's, it's, it's one you obviously gotta keep a, keep a attention to. And I think my advice to every operator who is watching this wherever you're in the world, is you'd much rather. Be at the table than be in the lunch. So my, what I mean by that is where you can try and get to local council meetings, try and get in the ear of the people who are making these decisions, because they're using their decision makings on what other people are telling them.
[00:22:49] Mark: And they need like your guidance on this. And so many people now are having to operate as are having to. Talking about spinning all those plates. There's another plate that's appeared now, which has been like, you know, going to the, you know, council meetings and being in the ears of it and making sure that, you know, your business is gonna be here.
[00:23:08] Oriol: Yeah. Here in Dubai, the, the, when it comes to regulations, we are quite, uh, I. Flexible. Yeah. I mean there is not a very strict regulation. On the other hand that has generated an oversupply in the market and all the operators in Dubai are suffering that oversupply. Yeah. So, but anyway, that's free market.
[00:23:25] Oriol: It's auto regulates. Yeah. When you have a lot of, um, holiday homes, the price goes down and people move to long-term rentals. Yeah. And then the prices will regulate. No. So I think that's the best way. Of course regulations are important. I agree with you. And, and, and here the, the struggle is this quality control.
[00:23:42] Oriol: Yeah. Not only, uh, this part of the quality. Okay. Very good. So, um, can you give us like the top five tips from the book?
[00:23:50] Mark: Top five tips from the book? Well, the first one and the first chapter is about your ideal guest avatar. And this is really important because when people get going in business. They just want to take on any money that is given to 'em, and you have to, as you grow and you say yes to everything, but over time, as you grow what you need to, what you need to do is you need to make sure that you build that business on, on your terms, which a big part of that is making sure that your, the guests that are walking through your door at your ideal avatar.
[00:24:23] Mark: Again, the most mistake your people make is that they try and appeal to everybody. And when you appeal to everybody, you appeal to nobody. So in the book it talks about how to discover what your avatar is, your ideal guest is how to find them and how to market to 'em. And when you've got that, I. So, for example, if, if, if our farm stay business, it was obvious that our appeal was that families can come and stay on a working farm.
[00:24:49] Mark: So our, our ideal guest, our avatar was, was young families, uh, from the cities that were about two hours out drive away that they could come and stay with you for, you know, however long and they get to, um. Live on a farm for how many days that they were there. Obviously our avatar was not, uh, a couple who wanted to come nightclub in, you know, appear like rocking up on the farm with their, with their heels.
[00:25:11] Mark: That's not our avatar, so we never appealed to them. But by focusing on who we. Attracted who we were made for. It made marketing and sales so much easier because our website was speaking to our ideal guests. Our marketing was speaking to our ideal guests. Our listings was speaking to our ideal guests. So every single person, well, 90% of people that walk through the door were our, our ideal brand.
[00:25:33] Mark: And when when you do that, it life just becomes easier because everybody who walk through the door is gonna be a five star review. That's the, that's the main big tip. And the other big tip from the book is that. You have to spend the first 30 minutes of every day doing new business sales. The biggest problem in this industry is that we just overly on the OTAs, the drivers bookings.
[00:25:56] Mark: If you can spend the first 30 minutes of your day doing new business sales, so whatever that may be, sending that email, sending that post on Facebook, looking for that introduction to, to like a, a new partner or whatever. You do it consistently, then again you do the compound effect. If you do it over a year, two year, three years, um, it's so much easier to do this thing called business.
[00:26:18] Oriol: Very good. So now, I mean, it's a very good segue. Let's go to your, your sales. Yeah. So you're very strong in LinkedIn, in personal branding. Uh, I, I don't know when you started doing a personal, like building public, I dunno if you build in public or how you call it, but, uh. Can you explain us why you do it?
[00:26:37] Oriol: What brings you In terms of business? In terms of person? Yeah, personal. Uh,
[00:26:42] Mark: so, uh, I've done it since day one. Um, when I first got going in ly, which is 2016, I was watching a lot of Gary v on, uh, on YouTube and he talks a lot about document over creation. So document in the journey, uh, because people like to, people like a story, right?
[00:27:01] Mark: People buy from people. They don't really like buying from like, nameless, faceless brands. And I thought, well, they're just easy. I like creating content. I like posting on social media. I've come from the, from the generation that, you know, was, was, you know, we've not had sort of social media, but I know how to post online and how to, to do it.
[00:27:22] Mark: I know how to create content and a lot of people shy away from showing their true personality, but. What I did first is I built the community and then I build the business on top of it, and there wasn't many vendors in our space who were posting content, if any. And so my, you know, I started posting content and literally on LinkedIn and I started going to events.
[00:27:48] Mark: People were like, oh yeah, the. The guy's posting content because nobody else was. Now everybody does. Right? I, but for me, I've been posting my journey since like 2016, documenting the, the high points, but the, the, the shitty points as well, the, the, the low points. 'cause nobody talks about the low points.
[00:28:04] Mark: Nobody talk. Yeah. And I find that by doing both, it makes me feel more real. Uh, people can trust, trust wherever you are. And, and, and I say people like to follow the journey. So I've done that since day one. And
[00:28:15] Oriol: which, uh, I mean. Uh, what would you say to the people that want to do it, but maybe it's a bit shy or a bit, uh, any deep on like how to do it or, but just do it.
[00:28:27] Mark: The advice is just do it. Yeah. But that's just start, it's gonna be crap when you start. When I look back at how I got going, it was just me and a crappy iPhone and, you know, but I did it and I, I did it consistently for. A, a month, every day for a month. And you know, after the, the, the, the sort of, the rule is if you do something consistently over 23 days, it just becomes routine.
[00:28:50] Mark: Just becomes those routine as brushing your teeth. And I thought, right, if I can do it every day, it just becomes normal. And now it is just, just normal. So you just gotta start and don't post content for other people. Post it for you. Because now I can look back on nine years worth of doing this every single day.
[00:29:07] Mark: And you know, there's some really cool memories that come up on my phone. And, you know, I started this when my eldest was four, uh, and my second child only a year out. So I've grown the business, documented all, but I can also see how it's grown around the kids as well. Um, which has been, which has been awesome.
[00:29:25] Mark: But yeah, just that.
[00:29:28] Oriol: Very good. And, uh, lately you have been posting a lot about ai, which is the new trend in the industry. Well, in industry, in the world of technology. What have you been, uh, experimenting with?
[00:29:39] Mark: Yeah, so apart from Gary V when I first got going, Tim Ferriss was another big sort of person I looked up to online and his whole shtick was that he was a Guinea pig for people.
[00:29:50] Mark: And he then took that what he was learning and put it into words that he could explain. And I've always tried to do that with hospitality. So I read, watch, listen to a, a, a range of topics, but whatever I learn. How can I take that and explain it to somebody who is a short term rental operator or in hospitality and AI is no different.
[00:30:12] Mark: I did the exact same thing with NFTs and I did the same thing with crypto and I looked at everything that comes and I goes, how can I explain it if I think that it's not gonna work? I don't bother. But I could see with AI the instant wins that it would have for so many people. And, um, I started messing about with it when OpenAI announced chat, GPT.
[00:30:32] Mark: And it, I've just gone further down the rabbit hole as as we go. And, um, yeah, we, we, we now at Brucely, we, we use chat GPT that helps build out our websites. We show people how to use chat GPT to create content. Um, we, uh, we've even created AI sales reps now within our CRM and we have tapped into something where it reads the website that we create.
[00:30:59] Mark: Creates a little chatbot widget in the bottom right hand corner, and that widget now is 24 7. So if a guest lands on it, even at one o'clock in the morning, asks questions. It is trained based on the copy on the website and the information that's in, uh, uh, the, the, the, the guidebook, for example, or the PMS, and it will be able to answer all the questions and get a booking out of it.
[00:31:19] Mark: So we're, we're, we're tapping into it more.
[00:31:21] Oriol: And what are the two or three things that you see that can transform the industry the most? And it can be di bookings, it can be any other aspect of the Holly Homes.
[00:31:30] Mark: Well, the first easy win is guest communication is such an easy win because again, uh, AI chat, GPT, large language models, they can only work off the data it is provided with.
[00:31:42] Mark: Right. And um, the more data you can give it, the better. And so. If you were a guest who was looking to, um, find a place to stay and, and you're on this website or wherever you're gonna be asking questions, that it can just read off a, a website or a guidebook or whatever, and it'll be able to give that, that response to guest communication number, number one, is the easiest win, um, moving forwards.
[00:32:09] Mark: Who, who knows what, where we can go down. There's obviously with sales, ai, um, LLM models, you've got potentially something that could be messaging people on your behalf on say, LinkedIn or sending emails, um, what, while you sleep, sort of introducing your brand and your business and, and, and what you do. Um, and who knows where we can potentially.
[00:32:31] Mark: Go from there. But it's, uh, there, there's loads of short-term wins that I can see. Medium term winds and, and long-term wins by tapping into this, uh, ai. I mean, we're 2025 now, so we're in the, in the start of what is gonna be AI agents. It's gonna be everywhere by the end of this year. Um. Think companies are tapping.
[00:32:49] Oriol: You think, uh, OpenAI just released also agents.
[00:32:52] Mark: Yeah. They, they, they released operator, which is, if you're paying $200 a month, you get access to it. I add a little dabble with it and it can help you, you know, book accommodation and things like that. It's still at its infancy, but this technology is moving rapidly and before you know it, you know, these phones are gonna have it built into, into Apple, into, into Android, and, um, you.
[00:33:13] Mark: You'll notice that it really takes off when it impacts the everyday user, not business owners who are maybe tapped into this. It's like, you know, the the average Joe who is using this to automatically do things for them.
[00:33:27] Oriol: And any other piece of technology that you think that is maybe not developed enough in the industry that you say, like for example, many years ago, we would say the smart locks, right.
[00:33:37] Oriol: Anything that you see in the industry happening or AI is going to, to, to monopolize the conversation and the innovation.
[00:33:44] Mark: I, I think the next thing is going to be, uh, voice ai. So voice ai, sales. Um, I think that there's gonna be a case in point in time where any digital message that you get online, you're gonna doubt if it's from a human or a robo.
[00:33:58] Mark: And, um, the next evolution of that is where voice. So you'll have a phone call and again, you won't know if it's gonna be a human or if it's gonna be a robot speaking to you on, on, on the other end.
[00:34:08] Oriol: It was this morning with a startup that is doing that and, uh, uh, in, in the, in our space. And, uh, you were, they, you were talking to some, to, to someone, to chatbot and in any language.
[00:34:22] Oriol: And it was, it was answering in text, in, in your language. So, and languages you could. Like the guy was talking out language, he was talking out language and he was taking the information from your listing.
[00:34:32] Mark: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I, I have dabbled with the AI voice, um, and it's not quite there. It has long, awkward pauses.
[00:34:41] Mark: It's, it's a bit as if
[00:34:43] Oriol: the answer is texts. You don't, you don't mind that much. I mean, they were used at text, right? Yeah. And everything.
[00:34:49] Mark: I, I find that the AI sales reps that are there right now, it, it has to be based on very strict script. If it goes off that it's not the best,
[00:34:57] Oriol: but that will change. Yeah.
[00:34:58] Oriol: But also the virtual assistance. Yeah. Uh, human. Yeah. Need to have a script.
[00:35:02] Mark: Yeah, absolutely. So it's, it is going to be impacted, I feel. So I always look at what do I look at now that 30 years ago I. My parents were, were doing that. I think that was archaic. Right? And I'm thinking in 30 years time when my kids, uh, I'm chatting to my kids, what will they look back on?
[00:35:23] Mark: Our time thinking what we did was archaic. And I, I feel like the next level of all of this is that there won't be any translation issues, angry. Um, I've got a pair of those meta ray bands and now it's built in where if I'm wearing those glasses. If I'm downtown and you know, I'm looking at a menu that's in another language, it will instantly translate it into my language and it's only gonna get quicker and smarter.
[00:35:46] Mark: Where, you know, at the moment you have to have that awkward conversation with Google Translate, where you can say, you know, speak to somebody. There's that really long pause. That's not gonna be the, I feel like translation is gonna be something that will never be, never be an issue.
[00:35:57] Oriol: Yeah, I agree. For me, the next transformation is voice.
[00:36:00] Oriol: We will not use the hands, anything, anywhere, and voice is translational. Yeah, and, and the problem is this, is that. You will not know who you're talking to. Yeah. And that is a bit scary.
[00:36:10] Mark: Yeah. But I mean, we, we've, we've always adapted. I feel like if you were to say a lot of things to our parents 34 years ago, and this is gonna be the next step, they'll go, wow.
[00:36:17] Mark: That's, that's scary. Um, I mean, even if you look at Airbnb, so many investors passed upon it because the premise of you letting strangers stay in your house with too much for too many people and those investors, they're passed upon that opportunity. They've passed off on an absolute unicorn, but. We've adapted and, and we as humans, we, we adapt rapidly.
[00:36:37] Mark: And I feel like the, the next evolution is coming so fast. And the the worry is for me is the entrepreneurs, the business owners, and the people who just bury their head in the sand and go, that's not for me. Uh, I feel like you're gonna be left behind quick.
[00:36:53] Oriol: Very good. So we're reaching an end. Before finishing, I want to also thank BMBE.
[00:36:59] Oriol: Who is the, our friends that, uh, allow us to, to record this podcast in this beautiful location. We have Bur Khalifa. I don't know if it's in the camera, but we have Bur Khalifa behind us, and that's quite unique here in Dubai. And I always end with a question, which is which, where do you seek inspiration in terms of podcast?
[00:37:18] Oriol: Uh, books, uh, people. Yeah.
[00:37:22] Mark: I, I watch a lot of YouTube videos. I listen to a lot of audio books. Um. Uh, so yeah, YouTube, uh, audio books, anything that you can recommend if you're looking for the industry, the short-term rental industry. There's a really good, uh, podcast, good morning hospitality. Yeah. Uh, really good.
[00:37:42] Mark: They, they do industry from like the USA Europe and, and further field business on a whole, um. I really enjoy the, well, well, marketing. I, I love everything marketing. So there's a podcast called The Marketing School, uh, podcast, which is four episodes a week and it talks about everything marketing. And there's a new podcast that I've started listening to talking about AI that is a hundred percent created by ai.
[00:38:06] Mark: So it's an AI voice, ai, everything is done by perplexity. It's a five minute daily podcast and it takes all the news that's from around the world and it condenses it. We do a little bit on ai, we do a little bit on cool topics, and it is done so well, six minutes. So for me to drive to the gym every day, it's like six minutes.
[00:38:24] Mark: I have it running in the car and that's where I keep up to date with, with like topical stuff. Outside of that, I don't really take pay attention to current events in the news and everything like that. Uh, so those are the podcasts and things that I sort of stay up to date with.
[00:38:39] Oriol: So thanks for joining us once again.
[00:38:41] Oriol: I'm pleasure. Thank you. Enjoyed the, the chat and uh, for the rest of of the audience, like see you in the next episode.
[00:38:46] Mark: Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Boostly podcast. Boostly. Let Bruce Lee 'cause it's so hard on the teas. Loosely. Looking up those rhymes. Don't write it. Just do we Boostly.
[00:00:18] Liam: And I'm joined by Luca Zabell. He's the co-founder and CEO of Journey, which is, if you've not heard of it, it's an AI driven tech company that automates and personalizes a hundred percent of the guest journey while simplifying the operations for people like you and me, people like real hosts. So welcome along Luca.
[00:00:37] Liam: It's great to have you here.
[00:00:39] Luca: Yeah, thank you for having me. Excited to be here.
[00:00:42] Liam: So what is one thing you'd like people to remember from this episode?
[00:00:47] Luca: Uh, well, I, I think there's a lot of misconceptions around AI and, um, uh, especially even how will impact different, uh, industries and hospitality, uh, more specifically.
[00:01:00] Luca: And, uh, we'll love to, to dive deep in, uh, into that and, uh, you know, uh, shine some light on some of, uh, uh, of what we think that this technology can do for our industry.
[00:01:12] Liam: Cool. I'm looking forward to diving in, and this is something which I think everybody needs to stick around for, which is when we talk about AI in general, there's so many nuances and misconceptions and that's what we're gonna gonna dive into today.
[00:01:24] Liam: Before we do that, can you give us like an elevator pitch of what, uh, journey is, just so people get an understanding of, of what it is? And, uh, we'll go from there.
[00:01:34] Luca: So, I mean its core. We obviously build A-A-A-P-M-S because to build what we wanted to build, we need to build A PMS, but ultimately we see journey as an operating system.
[00:01:45] Luca: Um, and, uh, and the ability to unify into single dashboards, multiple different tools, like, uh, even if they're not run by us, but like, let's say that your dynamic pricing tool, uh, your guest verification system is all unified, even if it's done by other people. Other companies into a single system. So you have a unified experience as a user, but most importantly is all centralized, so you can automate everything while using ai.
[00:02:10] Luca: So it's uh, um, pro like to call it like next gen property management system. Um, and, uh, that it's amplified by, by AI that allows you to automate a lot of the moving aspects that comes with hospitality.
[00:02:26] Liam: That's cool. And, uh, just a quick apologies for anyone watching the visuals there. Um, I've just made sure that you can see Luca as, as he's talking there.
[00:02:34] Liam: Um, so we're gonna dive more into the, uh, journey and, and, and what it does, uh, later on in the show. But I want to talk broadly about AI and how it's transforming every area of every business, but especially hospitality. What's one big way that you've seen it changing? How hosts manage their properties?
[00:02:56] Luca: I think the shift is just happening.
[00:02:59] Luca: So I, I think we haven't, uh, um, we we're yet to see the, the, the, the true potential some hosts are, are now. Um, start seeing more and more, uh, results. We have, like obviously some early adopters, but even us as a company, which we think we're, uh, definitely on the cutting edge when it comes to, to, to, uh, re releasing features utilizing this technology.
[00:03:21] Luca: We haven't even scratched the surface, um, for what even it's about to come and where what we have in the roadmap within the next six months. It's much more than what's up. There, and it's already much more than, than what people even know that it exists. Um, but obviously the number one thing that everybody's seeing is the guest communication.
[00:03:39] Luca: But there's so many different layers of automated guest communications. 'cause again, ai, AI is just as good as your data. And, uh, prompt is a form of data by the way that you, you provide to, to, to your ai. And I think that's, that's actually number one issue that exists in almost every industry is the lack of infrastructure and so lack of data.
[00:03:59] Luca: But yeah, so to answer your questions, I, uh, um, guest com, automated guest communications, automated guest reviews. That's, that's the number one tool that people are using today, but it's evolving to a lot more than that.
[00:04:13] Liam: It's cool and I'm excited to see what's to come. 'cause I mean, I don't know of any other time personally.
[00:04:18] Liam: I mean, I've only been in hospitality for six years, but even during that time, um, obviously PMSs were quite new and some of the automation tools, but actually now being able to see. The AI being integrated into that is, is changing how I operate every day in my business. And hopefully for people listening to this, they can, they can get the step ahead or, you know, to, to put it into their business as well by, by listening to podcasts like this, so, hundred percent.
[00:04:45] Liam: I understand that journey. A a, a core is a PMS and it automates the, uh, the communication, the bookends and operations, you know, it, it does all of that. What features do you think have the biggest impact? Um, and why have you tried to tackle the AI side of things within the PMS?
[00:05:05] Luca: Yeah, so I, I do believe that I, I would like to clarify one misconception mm-hmm.
[00:05:11] Luca: Before we go without even into that. And it's like a lot of people, um, their experience of AI is, uh, just. Chatting with JGPT giving a very simple prompt and getting like a very basic answer. Um, and, and a challenge that I, that I say to anybody that, that, that is yet to see the potential in this technology is like to, to actually try to, to really get good at prompting and then sometimes even asking the AI itself if you have a task that you want accomplish.
[00:05:38] Luca: What kind of information do you need to accomplish your job at your best? And when you start really leveraging that and you start seeing the results of like what more data does for you and what kind of quality of results you, you are going to get you, you'll be shocked. Mm-hmm. Um, and this is really like, so, so, so that's.
[00:05:56] Luca: That's what we, we, uh, focus on as a company in the past three years was to centralize as many information as possible and to be able to train this, these AI models to give the most accurate answers. Because in the end of the day, you're only gonna use AI when it's accurate and it has to be better than humans.
[00:06:15] Luca: And so obviously the, I, I kind of divided in, in, in three, three stages that there are gonna be the most useful thing in, in the industry and what people are utilizing already today. One obviously is accuracy in guest communications, which is, which is very important, but it's more of a reactive way. That's kind of phase one, right?
[00:06:33] Luca: Um, then you'll have, uh, in, in between that you have another phase, which is. Uh, we, which is a product for example, we just recently released, which is, uh, it's called Neo copilot, which is having the ability to have an AI model that communicates within different. Parts of your system and different AI agents, they're working in your system.
[00:06:56] Luca: So you have one that specialize on answering, obviously guest communication. One for reviews, one for uh, uh, pricing, one for up sales, one for your CRM, one, for, for, so you have, uh, one for SOPs, right? One for frequently asked questions. So you have different agent within the system. And you wanna make, make sure that your guests can access information, but you also wanna make sure that you change the way you interact with your system for your software.
[00:07:23] Luca: Where you can just simply ask a question. For example, Hey, what's my, my, um, uh, average a DR for for this weekend? What's my occupancy for this weekend? Hey, can you help me? Can you just lower pricing by, by 30% across the board? Mm-hmm. Can you make a calendar block and you can just talk to your software and have it doing action for you?
[00:07:43] Luca: So we, we released already. A version of that, which is, uh, called copilot. So I call that phase two, phase three is, which is already a game changer, right. And phase three, it's what I think is even more exciting, which is the personalizations of the guest experience. Mm-hmm. So, so I think this is really where, where things are gonna start, uh, completely, uh, changing the industry forever is where you're not just reactive, you're not just like.
[00:08:13] Luca: Just having a more efficient operation, but you actually are going to create better guest experiences, fully customized guest experience, anticipate guest needs, um, make sure that you, you, you create brand loyalty with your, with your own, uh, your own brand, which is something that, that for small operators was unthinkable.
[00:08:30] Luca: Uh, up until now, even for the large operators in the short rental, unless you're like a larger tail, it was really hard to, to, to build customer loyalty and a brand, and that's going to completely change.
[00:08:42] Liam: It's exciting to even think about, and I've never thought about it in the phases that you're talking about, but there's, I mean, there's a big phase zero at the moment where so many people listening to this just will not use any AI in their business.
[00:08:54] Liam: Mm-hmm. Which is uh, which is crazy. If you're one of them people listening to this, then there's so many reasons to just get on the AI bandwagon, because I liken this to the early days of the internet. Of those who are creating, uh, websites and, and doing all that stuff. We, we we're a couple of years in now with, with AI or two and a half years in with ai, aren't we, since chat, GPT launch and I am definitely one of those people you've just described.
[00:09:17] Liam: I'm probably in that kind of phase one myself, maybe, uh, starting to dabble in in phase two and things like that. But that kind of, initially, when people think of ai, I think you're absolutely right. That misconception. People just think of it as like, well, it's just guest communication. I, I don't trust ai and therefore I want to do guest communication.
[00:09:36] Liam: And they may have dabbled. Um, but even if somebody has dabbled six months ago, a year ago, then it's, it's changed already, hasn't it? And this is the, the exciting thing of how fast this is moving. So the sheer fact that you can do things that you mentioned there, where there's this co-pilot on journey sounds amazing.
[00:09:53] Liam: Because I'm one of these people who I, I voice note, I, uh, I like the fact that I can voice note something and turn ideas very quickly into actions and that's, that's gonna be such a time saver. And that phase three, which is where suggesting, um, things that can improve guest journey, then, then I'm excited for that.
[00:10:12] Liam: This is going to change.
[00:10:15] Luca: We obviously still change everything.
[00:10:17] Liam: I, I mean, it's in every part of our lives as well, isn't it? But obviously at Brucely, we, we really focus on direct bookings. So a question I've gotta ask you is, um, you know, the, the, the co-founder is, how does Journey in particular help our listeners with, uh, reducing their reliance on, on things like OTAs and, and how can it help them get direct bookings?
[00:10:41] Luca: I think stage three segues perfectly into this question, actually. Mm-hmm. Um, because once you are able to create brand loyalty. Full customizations and full like personal touch for guests. And this is, this is one of the biggest misconception, right? Oh, well, uh, AI is never gonna be as good as humans, uh, at, at creating a, a personal experience.
[00:11:06] Luca: And, uh, uh, yes, you're actually right. It's never gonna be as good as humans. It's gonna be much better in humans. I like that. Um, and, and, and so like, especially if you are like, the reality is when do you have direct bookings? When you build a brand? Right. Um, whether it's even like a single home, uh, but you created a brand around that home or you have a collection of properties in the end of the day.
[00:11:30] Luca: Like once you, once once people. People wants to come back to you because of a specific experience you give them. Um, and, and they don't wanna look elsewhere, right? Mm-hmm. When, when you're just providing a place and you're just like everybody else, you, you have no loyalty. So, so people will just go back to an OTA and, and trying to shop around for best pricing or best reviews, right?
[00:11:51] Luca: Or, or a combination of both, or locations and so on, right? But when you create a brand, brand loyalty, and when you create like unforgettable experiences. That's when people come back. And it's so hard when you like, I mean, I used to be, um, a former host myself. I managed up to 300 units. That's kind kinda why I started like building this company and, and it was almost impossible to think about the guest experience because I was so busy with everything else.
[00:12:18] Luca: Mm-hmm. Right. Um, and I think what's super exciting and fascinating about AI is that it's about to change. Completely. Uh, it's actually a big core believer of our companies. Like to really, uh, give your time back and, uh, and your why back, right. Why you started this and what you want to do in the first place, and then you end up not being able to do it because you're busy with everything else.
[00:12:41] Luca: Yeah. I used to be able be so busy managing my own software versus thinking about guest experiences, busy managing my own operations, and so like. Uh, this is gonna really change. One is gonna streamline obviously, your operations, but two, you're gonna be able to automate, uh, this super personal touch, uh, and super personalized guest experience, which ultimately is gonna lead to a lot more direct bookings, a lot more brand loyalty.
[00:13:09] Liam: There, there's two things that I want to touch on that you've mentioned there, which first of all, uh, you know, AI will be better. I know there's a lot of people including me, who go, uh, I don't want it to replace me. And, and a little bit like, uh, cringe when they think of it. But this is, I completely agree with you by the way, that ultimately, um, can a person, one to one be better?
[00:13:28] Liam: Well, yes, but you can't multiply yourself for, like you say, in your case, 300 people hosting 300 guests at a time. And this is where can AI do it? Better and more consistently. And that's that consistently, uh, thing, which as humans we're fallible. Right? And this is where with a piece of tech, it will improve the chances that we are offering the right things at the right time and talking about our brand to encourage more people to come back and book direct.
[00:13:56] Liam: And that's what I'm really excited about, especially as, um, I mean I, I look after, at the moment, 23 units and when it comes down to thinking of how would I. Manage my time. If it was 230 units or like you 300 units, well, I would really need to get good at, at having the right tools, the right systems in place.
[00:14:17] Liam: Uh, and I can already see as, as, as most listeners to this, hopefully use some automations where emails go out at set times and and, and things like that. But ultimately, with what you're saying here around ai, especially around the personalization in the journey, you can kind of have the message go out when it's.
[00:14:36] Liam: Most impactful instead of just at a set time or when a guest has said or done something, that information can be pulled on by the AI to be able to be sent at that time. Is, is, is that am am I right in thinking that
[00:14:50] Luca: I give the perfect example? Yes, absolutely. And, and I give a perfect example. Like, uh, you can set up automated messages, for example, to, for, for guests who leaves your reviews, right?
[00:14:59] Luca: Mm-hmm. What happen if that that automated message gets sent to somebody who's actually had a bad, negative guest experience with you? Yeah, that's, that's not a good, that's not good, right? Same thing is like, you know, what happens. So obviously AI can, can prevent, absolutely prevent that, but that's a, a very basic, but then it gets way more advanced than that, right?
[00:15:22] Luca: In which. It's basically impossible for you to gather information about every single guest and, and, you know, record it in a CRM and in a really organized way. It's, it's basically impossible, especially for small, small operators, right? Mm-hmm. But even for large, this happens and it happens in even big brands hotels, right?
[00:15:41] Luca: This is, this is not a problem just for short term rentals across the board. Although they're better at it, it's still hard for them to imagine a system where basically every single time a guest stay with you. Every single interaction is being recorded. It's being stored. And then those information can be utilized for personalized services.
[00:15:59] Luca: For example, you know, you're gonna remember the guest name, you're gonna remember the family name. You're gonna know what their birthday is. You're gonna know, uh oh. They travel to, um, I don't know, like, uh, uh, Florida with their kids, uh, during this time because it was like their daughter's birthday. Well, guess what?
[00:16:16] Luca: You can remind. Remind them. Three or four months earlier, like, Hey, I know your, your daughter's birthday is coming up, so I wanted to give you like a, a, a discount for your next day if you're coming for here for your daughter's birthday. And like those, those type of, those type of experiences, they're impossible at scale, but even in small scales, it's almost impossible to be on top of that.
[00:16:37] Luca: That's, that's just, uh, another example. But also I want to address one, one misconception that, that it is happening and that you touched upon, is that AI is going to substitute me. Um, and, and we need to start from the fact and all agree on the fact that AI is an an answer. It's not gonna substitute humans in the end of the day.
[00:17:00] Luca: It's gonna take whatever your vision is. And make it bigger, better, and, and, and, and, and, uh, enable you to execute it faster. So, so like, it's going to really gift and, and be an amazing tool for creative people, um, and for people that properly leverage this, this technology, right? If you don't, AI is not gonna substitute humans.
[00:17:26] Luca: It's gonna substitute the humans that don't know how to leverage it. And that is going to happen much faster than people think. And, and this is, this is why it's important that, that we don't, we're not scared of this technology where we actually embrace it and try to utilize it every day and see how we can get advantages from this technology in our day, day-to-day operation and life.
[00:17:48] Liam: And would you say that's a, a myth about, uh, AI that you'd like to debunk? Is, is what we've just mentioned, or, or is there other myths that you go, well, actually people get a lot wrong about ai.
[00:17:59] Luca: Well, I think there's, there's, there's a, literally like, it, it's hard for people to sit in, in, in, in the middle.
[00:18:06] Luca: The truth is in the middle. There's people that are like, well, AI is not that good. Cannot do much about it, but cannot do much. With it. And I think that's a me and it's wrong. I think ice huge and it is gonna change a lot of things. It's gonna revolutionize all things. And then, you know, on the other end you have people that are like absolutely terrified by this technology.
[00:18:25] Luca: They're gonna be like, it's replacing our jobs. Like what are we gonna be able to do? And stuff like that. And, and by the way, I saw this phase with inside of my organization because. We don't use AI only as within obviously our software as a service, but also inside it as a company, right? Mm-hmm. Making things more efficient as a company and, and definitely there was, we got, got both phases.
[00:18:47] Luca: We had a skepticism at first for majority of the company and then we got the, everybody being terrified. It's like, okay, we're all gonna be out. Jobs, once they understood the power of this technology. And now finally we got to the, to the truth phase, which is like, okay, but this is, if everybody's going to use this technology, the only thing is going to happen is that we're gonna 10 x our output.
[00:19:08] Luca: Mm-hmm. And so we're gonna be able to do what we want to do in the first place, much better, much faster. Because the reality is like, if you think about it like. Nobody's doing what they want to do in the ultimate way. There's always room for improvements, huge room for improvements. And so all it's going to do is gonna ultimately improve That.
[00:19:28] Luca: I, I'll give A-A-A-A-A, a practical example like content creation used to be done only by. Massive production company that cost like, you know, millions of dollars to produce even the smallest piece of content. Now you now you have, now you have, uh, uh, content creators, influencers, they create content with, with a, with an iPhone or a phone, right?
[00:19:51] Luca: Like there, there's just a camera. So content creation costs just went down drastically. And what all it meant is that now a lot more people could create content. And so a lot more people could get a piece of the pie. Um, that's, that's really what's going to happen at a much even bigger scale, almost across every single industry.
[00:20:09] Luca: With ai, I can,
[00:20:11] Liam: I can definitely see it, and, and it's exciting. I mean, what a great time to get involved in. Any business, but especially hospitality. 'cause it's something which can be it, it can actually be on the tip of the spear of some of these new technologies and how people interact with, with, with a business, which is, is super cool.
[00:20:27] Liam: But I guess one of the questions that I've got and that people listening to this is, is how can some of these automations enhance rather than replace that personal guest experience? Like I know guests where I know what their favorite drink is, and, and I know that, am I, am I still overly worried about this?
[00:20:47] Luca: Yeah. No, I, I, I think, I think as I said, ultimately it is going to, to enable humans to do a lot more less re like, it's going to substitute the repetitive task and the annoying work, but it is ultimately going to enable you to do a lot more. Right. Um, so I, I give a perfect example. So for, let's say you have, uh, uh, you, you have a team that, that takes care of guest communication.
[00:21:13] Luca: So think about if you, if you can remove them from the day-to-day guest communication of answering silly question, where is the coffee machine? How do you turn it on? How do you turn on the tv? Like, and so on. But you are gonna actually have them dedicate their time to, to create custom customer experiences, right?
[00:21:30] Luca: To give to the ai like, so for example, like, like what I give you the, the, the example before, like when somebody's coming back. Can I create an SOP or can I communicate with my ai? It's like, Hey, can you come up with some clever ideas of things that I can offer when someone's anniversary is coming up? And you could think about it.
[00:21:48] Luca: You could do that even in a conversation, in a chat with your software instead of like, I. We click around a bunch of like non-intuitive UI UXs that exist in all, uh, in all management softwares today, which I very much dislike, right? Like it's nothing worse than when you get a software that you cannot, you don't know how to use.
[00:22:06] Luca: And this happening, the more comprehensive the softwares are, the more complex are to use. Think about it now. You can have conversations with it. You can access any part of it by just having a conversation without knowing where the hidden button is or where the hidden setting is. Mm-hmm. And spending 30 minutes doing that and maybe not figure it out in the first place.
[00:22:28] Luca: And you can have a conversation say, how can I improve this in my operation? I can, can improve these guest experiences. And so ultimately what's going to happen is that you are gonna create a much better experience for, for your guest. Much better revenue retentions and, and, and, and people coming back to, to, to your brand.
[00:22:46] Luca: But it's also ultimately going to happen is that the people that are gonna do it faster, they're gonna be more, a lot more successful than others. Mm-hmm. And also, but simultaneously what's going to happen, the standards that's gonna go up, right? Then the expectations of guests are going to be like, to have a much better guest experience because more and more hosts are gonna be able to, to service that.
[00:23:08] Luca: That's why it's important to be on top of it as well.
[00:23:11] Liam: I completely agree with you. At the end of the day, people need to be taking this, this advantage and, and get getting this started as soon as possible. And that must be quite cool to be, uh, a co co-founder of a piece of software where so many hosts are gonna be using it in different ways to, uh, to help their guest's journey and, and to, um, do exactly what you've said.
[00:23:30] Liam: Where on that copilot to be able to tell it to do different things. And this is where. Um, seeing these new changes and these time saving changes where actually then people can think more about their business as a whole, as opposed to having to go, oh God, I need to remember this, or, this person's coming then, or, or, you know, all, all the stuff which hosts used to have to worry about before PMSs and especially before ai.
[00:23:54] Liam: And the fact that Journey's got that in, in one is, is, is amazing. So what would you say to host, to a listener to this? They're new to ai. What's the easiest way to really start to put some automation or some AI in into their business?
[00:24:12] Luca: I even before I. Talking about specific hospitality. Honestly, this is what something I told everybody in our company.
[00:24:20] Luca: Mm-hmm. And, and sometimes even our tech team. I'm not a technical founder, but I've been since the day one of this technology I've been experimenting even prior to, to charge GPT. I've been a truly believer into this, this tech. Technology and how much is going to change everything. And one thing that I tried to change and I have changed was the culture within our company.
[00:24:41] Luca: And, but first I had to change my own culture and I started utilizing, and I, and this is, uh, something that I tell everybody, if your spouse, if your boyfriend girlfriend is, are not jealous of your ai. You have an issue, you're not using it enough. Um, uh, I, I don't know if you, if you experimented with like, um, cha GPT vo voice mode, there's Yeah.
[00:25:02] Luca: When you turn it on, you can also turn on the camera and stuff like that. And I have, outside of Journey, I actually do even fund projects with it. Not someone who's ever built a pc. I literally built a gaming pc. Using, uh, using AI has zero experience. I was sharing my, my whole, everything that I was doing, and it helped me do it.
[00:25:23] Luca: And it was like, and literally I plugged it in, turned it on, and it worked, which is not, not something that I would've expected, but it helped me to do, guide me through every single step. Like same thing sometimes, uh. I dunno. I don't know what to cook. I just like send a photo of, or show the video of what I, what ingredients I have in the refrigerator.
[00:25:41] Luca: It's like I, me come up with something easy that's not gonna take me time. And it does. So why I'm saying this is because once you get used to it, to really the think, like you have to change your mindset. Mm-hmm. And how you, you think. About this technology. Once you get used to it, to use it even in the small things, not eventually, even if it's completely unrelated to hospitality, eventually you're gonna translate on how can I use this technology for my business?
[00:26:06] Luca: You'll have to first truly understand the power of it, and the more you use it, the more you go into understand. Because again, the biggest misconceptions when people first use it and they write the most basic prompt on charge pt, and they get the same, whatever results. But have you ever tried to give it a, a, a deep prompt with a lot of data, actually a lot of information have, like, have you tried to, to, to give like a bunch of documentation that says like, Hey, help me make sense of this.
[00:26:35] Luca: It's like we, we do that, we do that outside of like journey, even for our own organization. Even for, to help us plan what on, on our roadmap, on, on drafting out like new, new product releases have I thought of everything. We create our own GPTs for that. So you ha once you get used to that, then you're gonna see how to, to.
[00:26:55] Luca: Implement in hospitality and to answers the more, you know, direct questions in hospitality, obviously, you know, it's, it's to start experimenting with this technology Also, when your own operations with, with, uh, the few good softwares that are out there, not right now that they leverage this technology.
[00:27:13] Liam: It's very cool, and, and you're absolutely right. That mindset, the first thing people need to do is get in the mindset that, that example I've not heard before, where you're, you're giving it, um, the ingredients you've got and it's, it's kind of doing that for you. It is literally gonna touch every part of our lives.
[00:27:27] Liam: And I mean, I, I use, uh, the voice mode and, and you can actually talk to chat GPT, like as a person. And I have had that exact comment from my behalf, which says, you spend more time talking to that thing than you do to, to me. And I'm. No, genuinely it is like having a, um, if somebody, you can bounce ideas off.
[00:27:45] Liam: I I, I do think the caveat to this is you've gotta be, you've gotta be a very aware that it's not a person. It doesn't really think it's just going off the prompt and it's, it is got no, um, you know, the, the, there's, I, I see posts on Reddit where people saying, Hey, it's my therapist and it knows. And I was like, well, you've just gotta be aware that when you're telling it a prompt, it's responding with the information you've got.
[00:28:05] Liam: But that's what it's great at doing, isn't it? It's great at sorting out. Stuff, which we just wouldn't be able to, um, uh, think about as quick as it can think about it. And that is really to, as long as you're putting the correct prompt in and you're putting the, the correct inputs, the amount that you can get out of it is just huge.
[00:28:23] Liam: And I think that that mindset thing is a great answer. I really do. So. Uh, what I'd like to do, Luca, is, is throw the microphone out. I know we, on this spotlight episode, we tend to keep these about car journeys length, but I know we haven't talked a whole lot about journey itself. Where can people, if I throw up the open the microphone, can you tell us a bit about journey and where people can come and find more information if they're eager to get their PMS and their AI side of things combined?
[00:28:50] Liam: Where do they need to go? What do they need to know?
[00:28:52] Luca: Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, honestly, if you want to get in touch with us. Uh, journey is spelled JUR and y.com. Um, you know, there's, we have, uh, a, a, a very active sales team that I'm sure if you sent, sent an inquire be they'd be very excited to, to show, to show you a demo of the product.
[00:29:12] Luca: Um, and, uh, but you can also. You know, I try to be a, I, I'm pretty busy, but I try to be as virtual as possible as well, uh, on, on my own, uh, uh, LinkedIn, uh, Luca Zambello, uh, if you, if you wanna search, search for me. And then obviously we, we have a journey, uh, channel also on LinkedIn, very active and, uh, and, uh, uh, Instagram as well.
[00:29:34] Luca: So. Those are, those are most active channels.
[00:29:37] Liam: That's cool. Well, Luca, thank you so much for, for sharing this. I know that I, for one, are gonna go check out Journey. I just enjoy these kind of conversations, which are about AI and what the future is doing and that ultimately as host, what I'm taking away from this is.
[00:29:52] Liam: Having the mindset of actually going and test it and using it, number one. Number two is to actually see where I can implement this in my business and to, to go and have the right tools. You know, go and check out Jenny, go and have a demo and then to really see what this space is gonna be. I mean, can you imagine the conversation we can have in 12 months from now considering what's already changed is, is gonna be amazing and that's a great way to, to end.
[00:30:15] Liam: Is there any final thoughts or, or what do you think the future of, uh, of this kind of industry is gonna be like?
[00:30:22] Luca: I mean, my,
[00:30:22] Liam: my final
[00:30:23] Luca: thought is honestly, don't, don't miss out on this. Right? Like there's, like you said, it is what an exciting time to be alive. Um, you know, don't, don't, don't be too skeptical and don't be, don't be to worry about it.
[00:30:36] Luca: Actually trying to embrace it. The people I know. For many people, changes are hard, but this, this is, this is a very exciting change and if you embrace it, you're gonna be very happy and very pleased, and your life is honestly going to be better. Um, for me it has been I be able to execute a lot more things than I wanted to, uh, but that I could, that I was even able to do before.
[00:31:00] Luca: So, um, it's very exciting.
[00:31:03] Liam: Amen to that. I really like that. And thank you again, Luca, for coming on on the Boostly podcast. Thank you too for listening to this on the Boostly podcast. Do share this with other hosts and people who will get the value out of this, and they can go and check out Journey. If you want to continue the conversation, you can go on Facebook.
[00:31:18] Liam: There's a free Facebook group called The Hospitality Community, and you can come and join the group. You can talk about this podcast or any other. Hospitality questions in there and to check out Journey and go and check out Luca. You can have a look at the links in and around, however you're either listening or watching this media.
[00:31:35] Liam: Thanks for watching. Thank you, Liam, for having me. No worries. Thanks Luca. See you again. Bye for now. See you having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast. Bruce Lee. Let Bruce Lee 'cause it's so hard on the tees, loosely making up those rhymes. Don't write it, just do it loosely.
