Digital Technologies in Managing Guests Experience in Hostels

In the master's thesis it is planned to study the customer experience of hostel’s guests. Hotel industry has long attracted the attention of researchers, but only in the nearest future, interest has shifted to the study of the customer experience of guests. In this work, emphasis will be given to the relatively less-studied factors affecting the customer experience, digital-technology. The aim of the study was to identify the impact of digital-technology on the customer experience of hostel’s guests. To begin with, desk research was conducted by american colleagues to form a list of attributes that affect the customer experience of guests of the hostel. Then this list was completed by the practice of using modern technologies in the foreign and Russian hostels. A survey of the target audience of hostels was conducted to evaluate the importance and satisfaction with various attributes of the hostel. As a result, the classification of digital-technology according to consumers’ opinion was obtained. Then a survey of hostels’ workers hostels in Moscow were conducted in order to assess the feasibility of the integration of digital - technology and expertise need to implement them. Differences were found in the perception of digital-technology among the target audience of the hostel and the hostel workers at the stage of booking and living in hostel. It was also conducted in-depth interviews with representative of digital-agency to develop a recommendation for the use of selected digital-technologies managing consumer experience of hostel’s guests. As a result, the classification of digital-technology for several types of the hostel and the target audience was developed to enhance the consumer experience of hostel guests. The paper presents the evaluation of the profitability of these implementations and put suggestions for further research.