Developments in digital language assistants are going to impact the tourism industry in a number of ways as these technologies continue to improve, said Stefan Niemeyer, the head of neusta eTourism, a Bremen-based travel consultancy.  

Niemeyer expects that travel assistance will become more and more voice operated as apps like Google Trips integrate digital voice technologies into their services.

"Voice commands will determine the customer journey going forward," said Niemeyer. "Tourists can book and plan trips with Siri or Amazon's Alexa, which can use data from former searches to tailor future suggestions for customers."

Niemeyer said these technologies will eventually be able to recognize people's moods and suggest activities based on those feelings.

"They can recommend activities based on what you did the night before," said Niemeyer. "So if Siri knows you were out late partying, it might recommend going to the sauna or a movie."

This offer companies new avenues to connect with customers, who would have relied on a hotel conierge in the past, he said. 

Some hotels, like Wynn Hotels in Vegas, are already experimenting with voice-operated technologies by installing devices in hotel rooms and enabling guests to control the music or room temperatures by voice command, said Niemeyer. 

Travel websites will have to adjust to voice-optimization, which could eventually supplant search engine optimization (SEO) as a means of looking up information, he added. 

"Businesses will need to make sure their websites can be understood linguistically," said Niemeyer. "Structural data like location, opening hours â€" that are always asked and always on a website â€" websites need to make these linguisitically optimized."

These technologies are still in their infant phase, said Niemeyer.

"But companies need to act now and be ready for this technology when it is all grown up," he said. "They need to start experimenting now and find of ways to take advantage of what's coming.

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