Greg Plifka, Managing Director at Allianz Companions Hong Kong, lately shared his insights with us on how firms are leveraging modern options to reshape buyer expectations and experiences.
Plifka, a distinguished insurance coverage skilled with 18 years of in depth expertise within the Asia-Pacific area, specialises in embedded insurance coverage options the place related insurance coverage covers could be provided alongside the enterprise associate’s core product inside their present buyer journey.
Underneath his management, Allianz Companions cemented its place as a number one insurance coverage supplier for modern options to the automotive, journey/airline, retail, and monetary service industries in Hong Kong.
On the identical time, Plifka’s give attention to constructing easy, digital insurance coverage packages and fostering a customer-centric tradition led to the creation of quite a few long-standing partnerships, making him and a key contributor to the corporate’s continued success.
As a decide on the TDM Journey Commerce Excellence Awards Hong Kong 2025, he delved into how journey suppliers can improve their choices by partnering with trade gamers and the way expertise developments remodeled the trade to create unique and localised experiences.
Together with your intensive expertise, may you elaborate on how modern options form buyer experiences within the journey, leisure, and hospitality sectors?
Following the pandemic, we’re persevering with to see a digital transformation of journey and tourism, pushed by technological adjustments and developments which have redefined buyer expectations. Travellers of in the present day need options and companies which are only a click on away, offering seamless journey experiences.
Two key areas the place modern options are taking part in a giant half are personalisation and fixing what we name ‘journey pressure’, finally enhancing buyer experiences and boosting loyalty. On the subject of personalisation, it’s about synthetic intelligence (AI) and knowledge analytics. For instance, offering airline or hospitality employees with visitor particulars and preferences at their fingertips in order that they will present options or provides primarily based on these distinctive wants.
Journey pressure is what all travellers face all through their journey – from planning, researching, reserving, going and even when having fun with the journey itself. What we’ve witnessed is that, particularly after the pandemic, there’s a variety of uncertainty – from vacation spot option to unexpected circumstances like cancelled flights, misplaced baggage, and even well being emergencies while abroad. What travellers need is for journey suppliers to scale back this pressure, and modern instruments could be a part of the answer. For instance, one of many instruments Allianz Companions provides is Allyz, a one-stop-shop digital platform which offers journey recommendation and experience together with built-in companies. Options embrace vacation spot itineraries and real-time flight and security data.
In your opinion, what are probably the most vital challenges presently going through firms within the journey and hospitality industries, and the way can they deal with these challenges successfully?
Shoppers of in the present day have gotten extra demanding, anticipating environment friendly and intuitive experiences that ship on the spot gratification. This immediacy has led to higher competitors amongst journey suppliers for loyalty, prompting firms to give attention to eliminating friction via expertise while sustaining a human contact in journey companies.
For the reason that pandemic, individuals have additionally develop into warier earlier than travelling with issues comparable to getting sick or caught in a rustic resulting from sudden lockdowns, including to journey pressure. Trade gamers have to ease these anxieties and supply peace of thoughts.
To assist mitigate traveller issues, journey suppliers can associate with ecosystem companions comparable to journey insurers, as the correct insurance policies can deal with a few of these anxieties and reassure travellers from the beginning. Insurers like Allianz Companions present worth via insurance policies that help shoppers throughout unexpected circumstances comparable to flight disruptions and cancellations. We provide prospects 24/7 help with help groups throughout greater than 70 nations, offering high-tech and human-touch experiences. On the subject of our product improvement, prospects are on the centre of every part we do, and we use their suggestions and the most recent market knowledge to form our product improvement.
Given your confirmed monitor file, how do you suppose sturdy B2B2C partnerships contribute to the development and success of companies within the trade?
Partnerships throughout the journey ecosystem are key to making sure seamlessness, which travellers of in the present day are demanding. Trade gamers have to work throughout silos in order that collectively we might help travellers have memorable experiences that can maintain them coming again. What’s necessary is that manufacturers are leveraging partnerships which are complementary to one another, the place they’ve like-minded approaches to innovation, and the place they will proceed to collaborate to seek out methods so as to add worth to the shopper.
As an trade, the extra we will do for travellers to make their lives simpler and supply options in a well timed method alongside the way in which, the extra loyal they’ll develop into. For instance, firms that associate with journey insurance coverage suppliers to reinforce buyer care can differentiate themselves by providing peace of thoughts all through your complete journey expertise, eliminating travel-related issues together with disruptions and unexpected circumstances, comparable to flight delays, private emergencies, or baggage points.
In actual fact, our prospects have advised us that coupling journey insurance coverage with their core merchandise or choices resulted in higher conversions of their core product.
What position do you imagine technological transformations play in influencing the journey trade?
Expertise has revolutionised journey and made many features of the journey way more handy, comparable to empowering travellers to plan and guide their total journeys from the consolation of their properties or on the go, managing flights, transport, lodging and itinerary choices.
This additionally makes communication extra on the spot, and travellers can simply contact service suppliers to troubleshoot any points proper as they crop up. This additionally means, nonetheless, that buyer help should be extra available to are inclined to world travellers who could have issues and are available from completely different time zones, as they’ll demand responses immediately or inside minutes, with restricted ready time.
Expertise may assist form the trade by serving to to bridge gaps by way of labour shortages and improve journey experiences. In a 2023 examine by Deloitte, half of the resorts and 99 p.c of airport managers surveyed stated that they undertake new applied sciences to handle employees shortages they expertise. It additionally discovered that 74 p.c of airport respondents and 57 p.c of lodge common managers anticipate automation to spice up visitor experiences and finally their backside traces. Thankfully, instruments like AI might help to hurry up responsiveness and servicing by assembly prospects proper the place they’re.
With extra seamless communication and higher connectivity on-line, journey experiences develop into a two-way avenue. Technological transformation has supplied travellers with a voice to share overtly about their experiences for different shoppers to learn, so there’s much more transparency and openness internationally now. What’s crucial is that as phrases can unfold rapidly through platforms like social media, trade gamers should keep conscious of what prospects and travellers are saying, to allow them to act simply as rapidly on suggestions and issues.
Trying forward, what future traits in journey and hospitality do you suppose will current the best alternatives for progress and innovation?
Sustainability is more and more prime of thoughts for the journey trade, together with travellers who anticipate journey suppliers to handle it. Shoppers have gotten more and more eco-conscious and open to firms that provide eco-friendly options. For instance, airways can supply cleaner gas through Sustainable Aviation Gas (SAF) or give vacationers different choices to buy carbon offsets. In the meantime, resorts may give attention to native produce to help surrounding communities and reduce their carbon footprint. With shoppers being extra aware of the affect their actions have on the setting, the trade has alternatives to reply with options that meet shoppers’ eco-conscious wants.
Their selections are additionally fuelled by wanting genuine and distinctive experiences, pushed by post-pandemic attitudes. Travellers are more and more transferring away from typical tourism, looking for extra personally significant locations and offbeat experiences.
Round 49 p.c of worldwide travellers search immersion in native cultures and merchandise, and so they need personalised experiences and actions. To fulfill this demand, journey suppliers can curate extra native experiences via collaborations with different trade companions. For instance, resorts can associate with tour operators and nationwide parks to design unique packages.
With distant working right here to remain for the foreseeable future, one other alternative is focussing on digital nomads because the quantity is predicted to extend. These people journey freely and work remotely from internationally, seeing themselves extra as momentary residents than vacationers. Distant staff could not essentially be particular person travellers, and so they could convey their relations like their companions and youngsters. Hospitality gamers may have a look at digital nomad packages, which could be coupled with curated luxurious or wellness experiences for these staff to unwind on their days off.
As a decide on the TDM Journey Commerce Excellence Awards Hong Kong 2025, what are the first standards you’ll use to judge the nominees?
A key criterion for me could be how nominees want to redefine trade requirements and elevate buyer experiences. Travelling can current surprising challenges for vacationers and journey suppliers who’re capable of cut back journey pressure go a good distance in enhancing the expertise of travellers, turning them into returning company. With enhanced buyer care, travellers usually tend to have peace of thoughts via their journey expertise in order that they will give attention to having an unforgettable journey.
Innovation and the usage of expertise is one other space to contemplate, as expertise will current infinite alternatives for nominees to ship high-quality experiences. Examples of expertise making a distinction in tourism embrace prolonged actuality (XR) and AI getting used to create novel experiences, utilizing data-driven insights to handle crowd management and guarantee a optimistic customer expertise and utilizing digital twins to reinforce occasions. These examples all return to mitigating traveller issues, guaranteeing that they’ve a easy and optimistic expertise while on their journeys.