SNOWMASS VILLAGE, Colo. – September 22, 2008 - Today at Instant Software’s RezFest 2008, Dave Berkus, one of the most regarded professionals and visionaries in the hospitality and technology industries, delivered a keynote address with information that everyone in the Vacation Rental industry should be aware of: ten critical trends in technology and how property management companies in the Vacation Rental industry should prepare for the rapidly evolving future.
Mr. Berkus’ keynote address touched upon ten trends that all companies need to be focused on in order to stay ahead of their competition and survive in the new era of information:
- The growing scope of the Internet – with over 1.3 billion internet users worldwide, and growing, how can you capture share of this expanding marketplace?
- The “paradise of choice” – 69% of consumers research online before a purchase, 62% look online for peer reviews, and 39% compare prices across suppliers. What is your enterprise doing to respond to this new empowerment of the purchaser?
- The audience as the network – traditional information owners such as travel agents have been disintermediated by consumers able to search, compare, seek advice, and book directly. How are you tapping into this game-changing market opportunity?
- Increasing computer power drives changes in human behavior – technology enhancements continue to drive productivity, but more than ever, they are allowing us to share experiences, communicate, preserve memories, access entertainment, learn and use information to innovate, and solve problems. What products or services could you add within your enterprise that you could not deliver yesterday?
- Mobile computing is changing our lives – information and communications are available to us anywhere. Have you and your company taken advantage of mobility as a corporate strategy?
- Consumers expect HDTV and convergence as they travel – 80% of vacation rental travelers from North America have digital TV’s in their homes, and 90% have regular access to the internet. Travelers are more increasingly expecting the same level of consumer technology in their travel accommodations as at home. What is your company doing to exceed the expectations of your newly-sophisticated consumers?
- Web 2.0 enters the mainstream – Podcasts, blogs, social networking, media sharing, video blogs, and Internet syndication have all become primary social tools for interaction and communication. How can you better communicate with your stakeholders using new tools and channels?
- Web 3.0 and 4.0 – the future of the internet will enable more semantic searching capabilities such as photos that match the same subject and style, and technologies that will bring about “smart agent” webs that will reason and learn as humans do to automate decision making for tactical decisions such as travel planning. To prepare for this, does your marketing message evoke ‘meaning,’ not just words?
- Everything turns green – energy issues and environmental concerns are impacting the way people travel. What initiatives have your company undertaken to ensure the betterment of the environment?
- The Chief Information Officer becomes a business strategist – The CIO determines how to invest capital more effectively to reduce costs, improve productivity, and achieve corporate objectives. How are you adapting to this new reality?
Dave Berkus is today an early stage venture capitalist with an eye toward investing in new technologies resulting in his investment in over 68 technology companies since 1993. He is chairman of several hospitality technology companies and a board member or consultant for many more. Founder of Computerized Lodging Systems (CLS), Dave is a member of the HFTP Technology Hall of Fame and is credited with the creation of early PMS innovations, early development in yield management for hospitality, the first “one button” night audit, bringing open systems into hospitality, and many more innovations from 1975 to 1993. He was named “Director of the Year” in 2000 by the Forum for Corporate Directors for his work on over forty boards of directors over the years.
“A rallying cry for new strategic planning at all levels of our company as well as for our customers attending the conference,” exclaimed Dave Hopcroft, CEO of Instant Software, “Dave Berkus’ ‘Ten Dominant Trends’ was a well received keynote at our users conference that led to many promises to bring his message of the need for change-planning back to our various companies for action.”
RezFest is Instant Software’s annual conference regarded as the premier conference for the Vacation Rental industry. The RezFest Conference is built upon years of success as the best attended, most informative and friendliest networking conference. 2008 marks the 4th Annual RezFest and nearly 20 years of User Forums. Instant Software brings together clients of it’s market leading solutions, First Resort, Entech, PropertyPlus, V12.NET and ISILINK, for three days of education, resources and networking covering Industry Trends, Channel Partners, and Best Practices.
In addition to industry-level education, RezFest offers a full schedule of classes, hands-on labs, roundtable discussions and presentation panels on each of the Instant Software products. Attendance is exclusively available for Instant Software clients and partners. If you are interested to learn more about RezFest 2008 or Instant Software, or see how you can attend future Instant Software events, please visit InstantSoftware.com or call 866 PHONE ISI (866-746-6347).
About Instant Software
Instant Software Inc. (ISI), is the nation’s leading provider of vacation rental management software, real-time online reservation and distribution systems and related services. The Instant Software product portfolio includes First Resort™, PropertyPlus™, Entech™, V12.NET™ and ISILink™. ISI has installed software at more than 2200 property management companies and vacation rental resorts throughout North and Central America and the Caribbean. The company, which was the first in the vacation rental industry to bring real-time online booking, serves more than 250,000 vacation rentals and provides more software solutions for more companies than any other in the USA.
For more information, please contact:
Scott Gerber
Vice President of Marketing
Instant Software, Inc.
866-746-6347
sgerber@instantsoftware.com