I let AI pick my hotel

I just booked my first hotel with AI. And it was a fascinating experience.

It's no secret that discoverability is changing as we speak. LLMs have stepped in as trusted partners that can find, recommend, and even book a stay for you. OTAs are terrified, and they should be. 

Why go through a booking site that lacks the personal touch and doesn't know you the way your AI does?

So I decided to be the guinea pig and booked a hotel through Odessia, a new AI agent that tailors the search to exactly what you're looking for.

Before we dive into the process, a couple of notes on Odessia.

The company was founded by Francis Davidson, the co-founder and former CEO of Sonder. If you know the Sonder story, you know it didn't have a happy ending. But every ending is a new beginning, and based on my first experience with the product, I'm hopeful for Davidson and his team. Odessia is backed by Sequoia.

I'm at HITEC this week, a hospitality conference for industry professionals, running Monday through Thursday. If you are there, let me know; I'd love to meet in person!

It struck me as the perfect excuse to test a tool I'd been curious about and actually book a stay. (And to be clear: this newsletter isn't sponsored. It's just me exploring and sharing with you.)

So here it is:

Beautiful landing page. The logo reminds me a little of the Starbucks siren.

I love the soft beige background, my eyes rest on it, and the cards make me want to drop everything and travel.

Click one of the cards and you land on a new page where you can slice each destination by category:

As you type in where you want to go, a new screen appears, a map on the right, a chat assistant on the left, and you're prompted to choose your dates. You select the number of travelers, then add any extra filters.

From there, suggestions show up on the bottom left and the matching hotels appear on the map to the right.

Click any one of them and you can explore that hotel in more detail.

Then I told it I'd be at the conference most of the day and would only have a little time early in the mornings or in the evenings to explore. 

I tried to add a transportation while booking on mobile, and it didn't work. But the tool is new and far from mature. They even mention upfront that there may be glitches, so that's more than okay.

When I hit continue to book, I had the option to pay by card or finance the trip. I paid within their environment, and got my confirmation.

On the way to the conference I was wondering: would the hotel actually have my reservation? 

When I arrived, they found it right away, honestly faster than they sometimes find a regular OTA reservation. And I checked into a perfect hotel that had everything I needed and then some.

So my impression of the tool? Good+. I loved it: convenient and fast. I was pleasantly surprised.

Our next step? Figuring out how to show up on Odessia or similar tools and reach our ideal guest.

Let me know if you try it. I'd love to hear what you think.

I'm so excited about this conference. So many interesting people, conversations about AI, new tools, marketing, and stories from the field.

You can probably guess what next week's newsletter will be about: the gems I dig up at the conference. But I have no idea yet what they'll be.

Till next week, dear readers.