Today we’re excited to announce Alexa for Hospitality, a new experience offered by invitation to hoteliers that brings the simplicity and convenience of Alexa to hotels, vacation rentals, and other hospitality locations. This introduces new opportunities for you to build skills that help guests enjoy their stay even more.

Using the Amazon Echo in their room, guests can now ask Alexa for hotel information, contact the hotel to request guest services, play music in their room, and more. For hotels, Alexa for Hospitality helps deepen guest engagement through seamless voice-first experiences that offer new ways for guests to access services and amenities during their stay. Hospitality providers can request an invitation to Alexa for Hospitality beginning today. Marriott International will introduce the new Alexa experience across select properties in Marriott Hotels, Westin Hotels & Resorts, St. Regis Hotels & Resorts, Aloft Hotels, and Autograph Collection Hotels starting this summer. Hoteliers and property managers can visit www.amazon.com/alexaforhospitality to learn more about Alexa for Hospitality and request an invite.

How Guests Will Experience Alexa for Hospitality, and Your Skills

Using an Amazon Echo in their room, guests can control and adjust compatible in-room devices like lights, thermostats, blinds, and TVs to their individual preferences or ask Alexa to play music from popular services including iHeartRadio and TuneIn. Many exciting Alexa for Hospitality features — such as music and smart home — are available out-of-the-box, though hospitality providers may also choose to develop custom skills to further customize the guest experience. For example, guests could ask Alexa for information like the Wi-Fi password or fitness center location, request hotel services like room service or housekeeping, call the concierge, and more.

Additionally, hoteliers and property managers have the option to enable skills from the Alexa Skills Store on the devices they manage so that their customers can check airport wait times, play games, get in a quick guided workout, play white noise to help them fall asleep, and more.

Skill Developers and Solution Providers Can Help Deliver Memorable Guest Experiences

Alexa for Hospitality is a new guest experience that has been built to easily – and securely – integrate into a hotel’s property to bolster staff support and guest experience. Hoteliers and property managers can work with third party hospitality technology integrators and solution providers to address specific needs for their property. Hotels can also create custom skills that help promote unique experiences for their guests like checking the hours for the pool, asking for a restaurant recommendation or reservation, booking a massage, requesting help to fix a broken TV, checking out, and more. This opens up new opportunities for Alexa skill developers to build skills that help guests enjoy their stay even more.

Alexa for Hospitality works with a range of trusted hospitality solution providers creating custom experiences that work seamlessly with Alexa to enhance guest services. Features developed by DigiValet, Intelity, Nuvola, and Volara allow guests to make requests like “Alexa, order wine,” “Alexa, book a spa appointment,” and can provide relevant suggestions that help guests navigate hotel services, like asking, “…by the way, would you like to book your next stay?”; with requests routed to property management, point of sale, and guest request systems like Opera, Micros, HotSOS and others for fulfillment. Alexa for Hospitality also supports skill integration with many popular guest room entertainment providers including World Cinema and GuestTek, and in-room control of connected devices using Crestron and Inncom by Honeywell, reducing or eliminating the need to retrofit or upgrade existing property technology.

Get Started with Alexa for Hospitality

For more information, visit www.amazon.com/alexaforhospitality. We can’t wait to see what you build.