CapitaLand’s wholly-owned lodging business unit, The Ascott Limited (Ascott) has launched discoverasr.com, unifying its separate brand websites on one single global online travel booking platform.
discoverasr.com provides guests with one-stop access to Ascott’s more than 400 serviced apartments, coliving spaces, and hotels with a total of about 77,000 units, across more than 130 cities in over 30 countries. This includes more than 10,000 units across 61 properties under TAUZIA Hotel Management2 (TAUZIA), which are available for the first time on Ascott’s online booking platform.
The new discoverasr.com features Ascott’s 14 award-winning lodging brands, namely Ascott The Residence, The Crest Collection, Somerset, Quest, Citadines, lyf, Préférence, Vertu, Harris, Citadines Connect, Fox, Yello, Fox Lite, and POP!. With a cleaner and more intuitive user experience, guests can easily find their home away from home with Ascott as they discover their next travel destination. Members of Ascott’s loyalty programme, Ascott Star Rewards (ASR) can now filter search for ASR participating properties, a highly requested feature amongst ASR members. The new feature enables ASR members to quickly identify and book the best deals at ASR participating properties to maximise their membership privileges. ASR members can also easily redeem their ASR points to offset the total cost of their stay.
Guests will also be able to take advantage of about 70 ongoing promotions in the ‘Featured Offers’ section to save on their next stay. The ‘City Destination’ feature will also help guests to plan their next trip. To help guests in selecting their accommodation of choice, they can now view guest reviews on the property. Guests will also be able to make reservations with add-ons such as breakfast and airport transfers to customise their stay. For more information on the new features on discoverasr.com, please watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bf_c7okxhjs.
Ms Tan Bee Leng, Managing Director, Brand & Marketing, The Ascott Limited, said: “As part of Ascott’s ongoing digital transformation to support our fast-expanding business and to improve our guest experience, we are leveraging Ascott Star Rewards to unify our brands on one single global online travel booking platform. The addition of the TAUZIA room inventory onto discoverasr.com and the conversion of the members from TAUZIA’s loyalty programme to ASR members are major boosts to our digital transformation journey. We look forward to reaping greater marketing synergies, onboarding new properties more easily and widening our online and loyalty offerings as we continue to grow our portfolio. discoverasr.com and ASR are two of our most important direct-to-customer touchpoints, set to strategically position Ascott to capture market share not only when travel rebounds, but also beyond.”
Ascott to give away first-ever collectible series of non-fungible tokens in its ‘The Traveller’s Discovery’ campaign
To celebrate the launch of discoverasr.com, Ascott will kickstart its ‘The Traveller’s Discovery’ campaign to reward ASR members. This is the first time Ascott is issuing non-fungible tokens (NFTs), which are cryptographic assets on blockchain that provide proof of ownership and scarcity for digital content. NFTs have gained tremendous popularity in recent months, amid headlines about digital artworks breaking records at auctions and surging sales volumes.
For ‘The Traveller’s Discovery’ campaign, 11 NFTs have been minted and the collectible series features exclusive artworks of Ascott’s Cubby mascot, each in a different destination. The NFTs will not be for sale but will instead be uploaded to OpenSea – one of the world’s first and largest NFT marketplaces for rare digital items and crypto collectibles, to be given out as prizes in a weekly lucky draw. ASR members can accumulate their chances to win the NFTs by participating in a series of 14 virtual mini-games featuring popular destinations around the world. Through the games, ASR members can also earn up to 1,400 ASR points.
The campaign will also feature a weekly flash sale where ASR members can save up to 55% off their stays and receive an additional ASR eVoucher for 30% off their next stay when they spend at least S$300. ‘The Traveller’s Discovery’ campaign will take place from 12 Jul till 24 Sep 20213. For more information on the campaign, games and NFTs, please refer to the Annex, visit: https://www.discoverasr.com/the-travellers-discovery or watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTlnOHx_LGg.
Ms Tan added: “Ascott is excited to celebrate the launch of discoverasr.com by dropping our first-ever NFT collectible series as prizes for our online mini games. These 11 unique NFTs are created exclusively for our ASR members to mark this momentous milestone in Ascott’s digital transformation journey. ‘The Traveller’s Discovery’ campaign seeks to not only engage our loyal ASR members, but also to attract new digitally-savvy fans to Ascott’s extensive portfolio of lodging brands. Defining global living is core to Ascott’s DNA, and we will continually look to innovate and trailblaze. We remain focused on constantly improving and augmenting our physical products as well as online offerings, to empower our guests with the freedom to live, work and play globally as they travel unbound with us.”
Corporate partners show strong support by offering special ASR privileges
With the launch of discoverasr.com, corporate partners such as credit card companies, have also stepped up to show their support of this new online booking platform. JCB is working with Ascott in anticipation of the post-pandemic phase to offer their cardholders special ASR privileges. From now to 14 May 2022, JCB cardmembers can enjoy 20% off Best Flexible Rates at participating ASR properties when they book directly at discoverasr.com by entering the
promotional code ‘GJCB20’. Cardmembers will also receive a complimentary ASR status upgrade to the Silver tier (worth S$1,000), which allows them to earn additional 20% ASR points with every booking. For more information, please visit: https://www.discoverasr.com/en/member/partner/jcb.
Ascott Star Rewards expands to incorporate TAUZIA’s loyalty programme
In addition to the integration of TAUZIA’s hotels onto the new discoverasr.com, the My TAUZIA Privilege (MTP) loyalty programme will also be part of ASR. Existing MTP members can sign up for an ASR membership and receive a 25% discount eVoucher when they link their MTP account to their new ASR account. MTP Friendly and Unique tier members will also be matched to ASR’s Silver and Platinum tier respectively. MTP members can exchange their MTP points to ASR points and receive 2,000 ASR bonus points when they complete their first exchange. Members will start earning ASR points thereafter. The MTP programme will end by 31 Dec 2021.
The Discover ASR mobile app was also launched in Oct 2020 to provide ASR members with greater conveniences and flexibility. The app has received over 177,000 downloads since its launch. Through the mobile app, ASR members can search for deals, manage their membership and redeem ASR points, perform mobile check-in and check-out, and make contactless payments. The app’s latest features include allowing guests to customise their stay by sharing their pre-arrival and in-stay requests; earn ASR points if they opt out of housekeeping service as part of Ascott’s Go Green initiative; and share feedback on their stay through a pulse survey in the mobile app. The app’s features will be progressively rolled out to more properties. Guests staying at Ascott’s lyf-branded properties have access to the in-app social wall and private messaging features which allow them to interact with fellow guests or communicate privately with the coliving property’s lyf Guards.
