Naver launches AI-based hotel recommendations service

South Korea’s web portal giant Naver Corp. has launched a beta service for For You, which recommends hotels using artificial intelligence (AI).

Industry sources on Wednesday said the company recently launched For You in Naver’s travel product section.

This means the section now has five categories spanning For You, airfare, hotels, tickets and tour packages, and events and benefits.

For You’s tailored suggestions for hotels are based on a user’s behavioral history and those for hotel products come from statistics. The service churns out sophisticated proposals through the deep learning algorithm of Naver’s AI platform Clova and machine learning technology using collaborative filtering, which recommends services by categorizing users based on their interests.

AI recommends hotels seen by a user and those with many views, heightened user interest over the last six hours, reservations made over the last seven days and high number of clicks compared to exposure.

For You also suggests popular hotels over the past 30 days including those by families with at least one child as well as those with good reviews of swimming pools and reservations made quickly. Hotels popular with the same gender and demographic as the user also make the recommended list.

After assessment of the operating status of the beta service, Naver plans to convert For You into an official section.

Write to Ju-Hyun Lee at deep@hankyung.com