Why Navan’s New AI-Powered Hotel Concierge Will Transform Travel Booking

Quick: What’s the one travel issue the Internet was supposed to solve — but still hasn’t?

That issue is personalization in booking trips — a solution that’s proved to be incredibly elusive. After all, a solution armed with a complete understanding of who the traveler is would make the booking process incredibly efficient. EAs, road warriors, and other frequent travelers get bogged down in the details of the search process, even when they know what they need to optimize their stay.

But for years, those booking travel have had to spend hours and search multiple sites to find the best match of location, price, brand, and policy. What’s frustrating is that the information to solve the problem exists, but there’s been no solution smart enough to replicate the experience you’d get if you were booking travel through a travel agent or an executive assistant.

Until now.

Today, Navan announced that our multi-tasking, generative AI-powered virtual assistant, Ava, has taken on an additional role: a hyper-personalized hotel concierge.

This new feature, Concierge by Ava, is not just any hotel concierge. Ava knows your travel patterns — possibly better than you do yourself. It can also analyze a wealth of other factors in real time, then serve up the most relevant options and make it easier than ever to book.

For example, when you ask, “Ava, book me a hotel in New York City for the week before Thanksgiving,” Ava scours your profile to learn your:

• Loyalty program memberships
• Favored hotel type
• Historically preferred amenities (breakfast, gym, pool, etc.)
• Preferred room size (square footage, bed size)

Then, employing the power of generative AI through a multimodal LLM approach, Ava gets to work. This smart new concierge combines those traveler preferences with public information, like the hotel’s distance from the office where the traveler is headed, as well as the property’s user reviews. Analyzing this information, Ava returns a carefully curated selection of hotels that — essential for the business traveler — fall within their company’s policy. Ava even ranks the hotels according to the user’s personal preferences.

Did we mention that this all happens in a matter of seconds? No more spending hours researching your perfect hotel. No more endless scrolling. No more clicking in for details. The time savings will be immediate and dramatic — and everyone involved in booking travel will benefit, from EAs and road warriors to leisure and blended travelers.

Ava’s new capabilities don’t stop there. Navan has integrated Ava directly into the booking flow of the web application, unlike other AI-powered tools that act as standalone chats. What does this integration mean? Well, when you ask Ava to book that hotel in NYC before Thanksgiving, Ava — who knows the dates of the holiday — fills in all of the search fields in the Navan app for you. It’s just one less step travelers have to undertake (and they can still adjust the dates as needed, of course).

In other words, Ava is not just smarter but has also broken out of the chat box. It’s the future not just for Navan, but for all web applications.

Check out Concierge by Ava in action on our YouTube channel.

With this latest application, Navan is solving the longstanding personalization issue — in dramatic fashion — thanks to our new hotel concierge that can recommend, display, book, and change hotel reservations.

Schlepping your bags to the room? That’s still on you.

Learn more about Ava and Navan: Book a demo today.