3 articles
Every guesthouse operator I know eventually asks the same question: “Should I be using WhatsApp for guest messaging?” For a lot of markets, sure. For guests staying in Japan — including a large share of the domestic and Asian traffic that fills the shoulder season — the answer is almost always LINE, with Korean guests being the main exception, since they typically default to KakaoTalk instead.
Running a guesthouse in Tokyo means fielding messages in four languages before breakfast. After a few years of trial and error, I’ve come to believe that which platform you use matters almost as much as what you say — maybe more, because if a guest can’t reach you on their preferred channel, it doesn’t matter how good your reply would have been.
Running a guesthouse in Japan means fielding the same questions over and over, in multiple languages, at all hours. What time is check-in? Where’s the nearest convenience store? How do I get to the property from the station? Can I leave my luggage after checkout? These aren’t complicated questions — but when they arrive at 2 AM in Mandarin and you’re asleep, the guest experience suffers. And in a business built on reviews, a slow reply is a costly one.
We built an AI-powered chatbot for our guesthouse because we were drowning in repetitive messages across too many channels, in too many languages, with too few staff. Here’s what we learned — and what guests actually want to know.