As part of his “Inside the Venture” Master Thesis, Philipp Epstein worked on the digitalization of his family’s business venture, the hotel Romina. He stated that smaller, private hotels have a more personal relationship with their clients in comparison to big chain-hotels, but they are at a big disadvantage when it comes to the digital customer journey. The aim of his project was to develop a digital marketing concept and increasing the stakeholder value of the private hotel. Therefore, he conducted multiple customer interviews and market research to find the right digital products, that would optimize the management of the hotel and increase customer satisfaction.
In the academic part of his thesis, he focused on the automation bias for layman users of digital health applications. He reviewed the relevant literature and collaborated with the startup NALA.care in order to conduct an experiment on the topic. Based on the statistical data from the experiment and on qualitative interviews, Philipp took stated a positive relationship. He suggested adding automation bias and mitigation strategies in the design framework for digital health applications. The thesis was finalized in September 2020.