Al adds to the hype, triggering the "lying flat" tourism

This article explores how AI technology can bring changes to the tourism industry, introduces the application of AI in tourism planning, personalized services, etc., as well as the challenges it faces and future development prospects. I hope it will help you understand the application of AI in the tourism field.

This year's May Day, "micro-vacations" and "micro-travels" have become popular.

Compared with old tourist hotspots such as Sanya and Yunnan, people are beginning to look for niche travel destinations that are not as crowded as the others: data shows that more tourists are willing to travel to small cities. According to data from online travel platforms, during the May Day holiday this year, hotel booking orders in the county market increased by 68% year-on-year, and scenic spot ticket orders increased by 151% year-on-year, which is higher than the national market.

However, a considerable number of tourists discovered after completing the entire journey that the niche destinations they thought were actually not niche after all, and that their planned itineraries had to be temporarily changed due to problems. Minor incidents such as traffic jams during the trip would also lead to problems such as changing ticket reservations and changing taxi booking times.

It is worth noting that with the increase in AI big models, the tourism industry is ushering in a new wave of technology: digital tour guide Mulan, "one-click smart travel", AI assistant "Xiaoxi"... Although it is still far from "lying flat" tourism, it can already achieve partial function replacement to reduce the workload of consumers when screening relevant information and modifying itineraries in real time.

So perhaps travel enthusiasts can look forward to the next long holiday, when AI technology that can think of what people want will be able to do the travel homework and let you choose.

1. The more people there are, the more popular "lying flat" tourism becomes

Since accepting a friend's invitation to travel to Beihai half a month ago, Lin Yun, a mother born in the 1990s, has consciously looked up local travel guides whenever she has free time. "Although this is a group trip for several of our small families, it is not necessary to keep pace all the time, so it is important to do our own homework. It's a rare trip to travel far in a year, and it would be a pity not to have fun.

But Lin Yun, who held this idea, found that a lot of information she found online discouraged her. "I originally wanted to learn about Beihai's special attractions, but I didn't expect to see complaints as soon as I searched. For example, going to the island for sightseeing depends on whether the weather is good during the holidays, which is a bit unpredictable. Then, it is difficult to buy bus and ferry tickets during the May Day holiday, and there are many people. There are also people saying that you need to be well prepared, otherwise it is very easy for a complete novice who has never been there to fall into traps. In general, it is recommended that everyone go in the off-season."

"So before the trip even started, I was already prepared to ruin half of it." Lin Yun said that the most frightening thing about traveling is "crowded" and last-minute changes in plans. She was a little bored when she thought about not being able to enjoy the beautiful scenery on the island due to weather changes, or not being able to take good photos because there were too many people in the background, or having to screen recommended travel plans and accurately avoid spoilers. "The guides are so complicated, and every aspect needs to be planned well, otherwise you will spend a lot of money and still not have a good time."

Then, after weighing various considerations, a week before the holiday, Lin Yun decided to cancel her friend's trip to Beihai and choose to drive to Guizhou by herself. "It's mainly because it's close, and it's cumbersome to travel with children. Driving by yourself is more flexible. And attractions like Wujiang Village, which can buy package tickets, include tickets, shuttle buses, and performances, are really worry-free. However, we didn't watch some performances because we were not interested. After seeing so many scenery, we felt that it was just average, and it was indeed not as attractive as the natural scenery in Beihai. So later we went to places like Snail Tribe and Zunyi Guild Hall, and the family trip ended in such a sloppy way."

This May Day, Qiao Qiao, who was able to travel at a different time from the main group due to work reasons, was very obsessed with finding niche destinations before departure. "Nowadays, I can't enjoy the official holidays at all. I will more or less leave earlier or later." Therefore, Qiao Qiao, whose schedule did not match that of her boyfriend, had no choice but to travel alone. "I left for Urumqi on the evening of the 27th and arrived in Kashgar at noon on the 28th. After that, I had a three-day extreme special forces trip and experienced the snow-capped mountain hot springs in southern Xinjiang."

Qiao Qiao admitted that she was browsing travel guides online and was speechless when she saw that the tag "niche travel destinations" had more than 6 billion views. "So many people thought the same as I did! That's why I chose Xinjiang. At least it's vast and has fewer people, and the round-trip ticket is only more than 2,000 yuan per person, which is a reasonable price during the May Day holiday."

Topics of niche travel destinations are highly discussed

"If I were alone, I would basically take public transportation or taxis to travel. I would calculate the time for Baisha Lake, Panlong Ancient Road, Muztagh Ata, and Stone City Golden Grass Beach in advance, so eating would be more random. Small variables such as traffic jams and queues along the way were all acceptable." Qiao Qiao said that the only thing she had to worry about during this trip was the temporary changes in the itinerary. "Unfortunately, Kashgar was only slightly less crowded. When I saw some places were crowded, I wanted to go straight to the next destination. I can only say that everyone's desire to travel is a bit too strong.

In fact, it is not difficult to see from the sharing of Lin Yun and Qiao Qiao that today's consumers already have more detailed and high-quality demands in travel: for example, they need a truly niche tourist destination, how to book better air tickets and hotels at a lower price, make the round-trip airport transfer process more convenient and efficient, and make reasonable plans for itineraries with various variables added temporarily... In general, it is a more personalized travel plan than the common travel agency route planning.

"As long as we input various limiting conditions, we can automatically consider factors such as ticket rush, price, crowd flow, and traffic jams, and then make itinerary arrangements with one click. Then as tourists, we only need to make YES or NO choices for these plans, which would be perfect." Just as Qiao Qiao imagined, "I hope that we can travel in a 'lying-down' way in the future."

2. AI will do the travel homework

In fact, some of the travel tasks that make "Jojos" feel at a loss can indeed be handed over to others.

Since the big model has fully empowered all walks of life, the outside world has seen more feasibility in the industry, and the tourism industry is no exception . For example, Ctrip released the first vertical big model for the tourism industry, "Ctrip Wendao", on July 17 last year.

It is reported that the functions of "Ctrip Ask" include providing travel recommendations for users when their needs are not yet determined; when users put forward ideas, they can recommend travel destinations, hotels, attractions, itinerary planning and real-time discounts from dimensions such as region and theme. However, according to relevant media reports, the large model of "Ctrip Ask" is not yet perfect and is still in internal testing.

On April 11, Tongcheng Travel's big model "Chengxin" successfully passed the registration of generative artificial intelligence services by the Cyberspace Administration of China, which also means that Tongcheng Travel's big model is about to enter the large-scale commercial stage.

It is understood that the "Chengxin" model has powerful language processing and deep learning capabilities, and can provide tourists with intelligent itinerary planning, intelligent tour guides, intelligent customer service and other services. In addition, the "Chengxin" model has completed the preliminary learning training and development work in some domestic tourist cities, and plans to officially put the first city-level tourism model into use in 2024.

Excluding the above-mentioned tourism vertical model that has not yet been commercialized, judging from the practical application of AI technology in the tourism field, it can be said that a collective pilot demonstration has been launched during the May Day holiday this year .

Take the "One-Click Smart Travel" app, which was launched in more than 20 important and special 5A scenic spots in early April, as an example. As the app was used and recommended by some users during the Qingming Festival, more tourists learned about this new app during this May Day holiday.

"When you enter the scenic spot map, you can find all the information and functions about food, accommodation, attractions, service areas, and shopping spots. You just need to follow the map without thinking." A tourist from Mount Emei said that she had accidentally seen the information about "One-click Smart Travel" and happened to experience it on this trip. "It is equivalent to integrating everything you need. For example, in the past, you had to search for tickets, guides, restaurants, and hotels on different platforms. Now you only need to open Amap. The overall function is quite comprehensive."

On the eve of the May Day holiday, more AI applications were successfully launched on the consumer side.

On April 25, Hua Mulan, a digital human jointly created by Datong City and JD Cloud for Datong Tourism, officially joined Datong Tourism. It can not only transform into a caring smart tour guide, but also tailor personalized travel routes and travel plans according to tourists' personal preferences and needs.

After the app was launched, many users praised its amazing performance. "Hua Mulan can explain the historical and cultural knowledge of Yungang Grottoes and other places in fluent Chinese and English, and guide us to explore and experience the splendor of the Northern Wei Dynasty thousands of years ago. She is a knowledgeable and talented guide."

Digital tour guide Hua Mulan

In addition, there is the first large-scale model application AI assistant "Xiao Xi" of the civil aviation airport, which was launched on the 25th. It includes three AI scenes: "Xiao Xi Office", "Xiao Xi Questions" and "Xiao Xi Q&A", which can provide functions such as creation generation, intelligent reports, and knowledge Q&A; the "AI Macau Intelligent Customer Service" launched on April 26 has tourism-related knowledge such as Macau's history and culture, tourist attractions, entertainment and leisure, tourist routes and entry and exit, and can respond to questions in multiple languages ​​and texts; and the "Smart Yingxian Wooden Pagoda" was launched on the same day as the "AI Macau Intelligent Customer Service". As a replicable cultural heritage protection solution, in the context of the Yingxian Wooden Pagoda Scenic Area having suspended tower visits, it simulates the tower climbing experience with the help of VR equipment, and can explain the people and things related to the Yingxian Wooden Pagoda to the experiencers layer by layer, and provide digital tour services... And these applications have brought a different user experience to the tourists covered during the May Day holiday.

It is not difficult to see from the above that, thanks to the addition of AI technology, while the richness of tourists' travel experience has been improved, it has also injected new impetus into the development of the tourism industry .

3. What difficulties will be encountered in large-scale promotion?

Of course, judging by the current speed of technology implementation, it is far slower than tourists imagine.

"The core impact of AI big models is the enhancement of information dissemination speed and efficiency," said Peng Lun, general manager of Google China's travel industry. "AI's stimulation and promotion of the tourism industry is reflected in the fact that AI can accurately grasp user needs with the help of a large amount of data and plan user journeys. At the same time, it can also grasp the travel needs of users in various dimensions, which greatly improves the speed of information dissemination and the efficiency of information acquisition."

In other words, the impact of the big model on the tourism industry is mainly reflected in two aspects: first, it can enhance consumers' ability to obtain language services, itinerary information, etc., thereby screening out unfamiliar travel destinations. Second, it can provide more personalized guidance, allowing consumers to find some truly niche places that truly meet their needs .

Ni Shenghua, Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Fliggy, believes that the tourism industry places great emphasis on manpower and cost, as well as knowledge accumulation. "It is very difficult to form a reasonable plan with the help of professional tourism knowledge and understanding of tourist attractions. At the same time, the industry seeks to replace user refund, change, consultation and other service processes in a lower-cost way. The big model makes it possible. This 'possibility' is to help people make business decisions."

“If the recommendations are more accurate, hot spots are found, price depressions are found, and individual needs are met, demand and supply will definitely be better matched.” It is reported that in order to solve the problem of general AIGC, Ctrip manually verifies the common theme recommendations of hotels, attractions, and itineraries based on intelligent algorithms, and thus formed the "Ctrip Reputation List" and "Ctrip Special Price List", but it is impossible for AI assistants to completely replace consumers' decisions, especially for leisure travel needs.

When Ctrip officially announced "Ctrip Wendao", it said that it was not only building a big model, but also using the big model to integrate real-time data and established algorithms. Liang Jianzhang, founder and chairman of the board of directors of Ctrip, said, "The application of AI in vertical fields has just begun, and there is still a lot of work to be done."

Liang Jianzhang at the launch of the "Ask the Way" on Ctrip. Image source: Ctrip

From the perspective of consumers, the application of AI technology must be “foolproof” , so that it can serve as the basis for what Qiao Qiao calls “lying flat” travel. After all, only such a large model can fully penetrate the industry and tap its commercial value.

From a technical perspective, Wang Yuan, Vice President of NetEase, Executive Director of Hangzhou Research Institute, and Chairman of the Internet Technology Committee, said about the next development of the big model, "First, before traveling, the big model should play a better role in the travel itinerary planning process. It is necessary to combine the big model's stronger ability to understand needs and stronger problem-solving ability to better serve in pre-trip planning. Secondly, the actions taken before traveling, such as ticket booking, will pose greater challenges to the big model, and the big model needs to give some suggestions, which requires higher accuracy and credibility, as well as the ability to flexibly handle information changes."

In addition to the development limitations of the technology itself, the large-scale application of tourism models must also pass a review. In accordance with the requirements of the "Interim Measures for the Management of Generative Artificial Intelligence Services", in order to promote the innovative development and standardized application of generative artificial intelligence services, the Internet Information Office will carry out the filing of generative artificial intelligence services in an orderly manner.

As Sun Tianxu, vice president of Ctrip, said in an interview with Interface, the Chinese market has certain restrictions on the launch of large-scale model products. With the continuous updating of relevant national regulations and standards, "Ctrip Wendao" will also be launched on a large scale into the market.

In any case, as AI technology becomes increasingly popular in tourism, a trip that allows people to truly "lie down" the entire time may begin during the next long holiday .

Author: Meng Huiyuan; Editor: Li Ji

WeChat public account: Zinc Scale (ID: znkedu)