Turning vacation search into a personalized conversation.
Homes & Villas by Marriott Bonvoy paired better discovery with richer insight into traveler intent.
searches
users saving properties doubled
months vs. 1 year GenAI rollout
Publicis Sapient partnered with Homes & Villas by Marriott Bonvoy to revolutionize the way travelers find their ideal vacation home. Leveraging Microsoft's generative AI, they have developed an innovative search tool that uses natural language processing to match travelers with the perfect home and destination based on their preferences and emotional needs.
Finding the right vacation home can be a daunting and time-consuming task. Travelers often have to sift through countless listings, trying to match their preferences with available properties. Marriott wanted to create a more intuitive and efficient way for consumers to find the perfect vacation home.
Publicis Sapient and Homes & Villas by Marriott Bonvoy collaborated to conceive, design, build and test a transformative search product. This tool leverages the GPT Large Language Models (LLM) within Azure OpenAI Service to understand natural language search queries and offer a curated list of properties from the over 150,000 available vacation rentals on the Homes & Villas by Marriott Bonvoy platform.
Travelers can include as little or as much detail as they’d like in their search, and the tool will suggest destinations and identify specific properties that meet the criteria entered in the search bar. The results also include useful information like weather and things to do at the location based on the criteria.
"
Building on our deep focus in understanding how customers think intuitively about finding the right vacation home, combined with the power of generative AI, changes the game in search for vacation rentals. The long-term collaboration with Publicis Sapient has been instrumental in innovating and building the Homes and Villas by Marriott Bonvoy platform. Together, we are revolutionizing search enabling our guests to find the hidden gems within our over 150,000 curated homes and villas worldwide.
"— Peggy Fang Roe
Executive Vice President and Chief Customer Officer at Marriott International
Homes & Villas by Marriott Bonvoy redefined how travelers discover vacation homes by moving beyond filters and locations to intent, emotion and natural language. The generative AI–powered experience turns search into a conversation—helping guests uncover hidden-gem destinations while giving Marriott deeper insight into how travelers think about their next stay.
This shift didn’t just improve discovery—it accelerated engagement, informed future marketing and created a scalable foundation for rolling out generative AI across additional Marriott brands.
The impact was clear and measurable:
Together, these results show how Marriott is setting a new standard for travel discovery—using generative AI to deepen personalization, accelerate innovation and strengthen guest relationships.
Publicis Sapient won the Bronze Stevie® Award in Technology Breakthrough of the Year—Artificial Intelligence at the 2024 American Business Awards. The Stevie Awards celebrate innovation and leadership in tech. Our work with Homes & Villas by Marriott Bonvoy’s platform shows how generative AI can elevate the guest experience through personalized, smarter vacation planning—setting a new standard in hospitality.