The hotel phone system industry has certainly been changing and growing in recent years. In fact, in a lot of ways, it's almost unrecognizable from what it was just a few short decades ago. Gone are the days of providing communications systems that could easily be interrupted and connections that could sometimes be questionable or unreliable. Now we’re living in an era where robust communications are king, and to borrow a popular phrase, “we’re loving it!”
As a hotel owner or manager, it is important that you stay abreast of current goings-on in the hotel phone system industry. To give you a leg up on your competition, let's take a quick look at some of the most important things that you should be watching. There’s a lot happening right now, but we’ve narrowed it down to five.
Cisco’s Acquisition of BroadSoft Changes the Status Quo
Anyone who deals with networking hardware is most likely very familiar with Cisco’s line of products. They have been an industry leader for quite a long time and hotels have been utilizing them nearly since their inception in one way or another. And now, with their acquisition of BroadSoft, a company that specializes in allowing businesses to utilize their own existing platform for unified communication services, Cisco is poised to modernize telephony with Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS). This means that Cisco users will be able to choose from going to the cloud, remaining on-premise, or taking a hybrid approach.
The Cloud Is Disrupting the Hospitality Industry
The simple truth is that the cloud has changed the hospitality industry in ways that most people had never even considered just a decade or so before. Hotel managers and owners can now grow their hotels and integrate new technologies without the need for expensive hardware and software. And with the advent of edge computing over cloud computing, we can expect that hotels will continue changing the way they do business for many years to come.
Mobile Devices Are More Integrated Than Ever
It's rare to find someone these days who doesn't own some kind of mobile device. In fact, most people own two or three, even minor children. Mobile devices have become so integrated into our lives that they have transformed the way companies do business, and that includes hospitality locations such as hotels. Mobility has added a more efficient way to manage employees and tend to the needs of your guests, and it's safe to say that mobile is here to stay.
Automation Is Sweeping the Industry
While a hotel staff is indispensable and will never be replaced, the hospitality industry is certainly enjoying the increase in automation that's available to hotel owners and managers. By automating certain procedures, such as checking guests in and out, scheduling wake up times, and ordering movies for the room, employees are free to give guests more personalized service when it's needed.
Hosted Solutions Are Becoming More Commonplace
If there's one trend that certainly has been evolving in recent years, it's that hotels across the nation are turning to a Hosted Solution for their communications needs. Despite even entry level workers in your hotel’s staff being more accustomed to technology than those in the past, allowing a group of professionals to oversee a hotel's communications system is a logical way to go, and more hotels than ever before are picking up on that fact.
Would you like to learn more about where VoIP fits in with today's technology climate? Reach out to the experts at Phonesuite and we'll make sure that your hotel is prepared for the future.
