I’m pissed!

Hi everyone, crazy busy, where did the time go!

I lost my temper this morning and wrote a letter to Travel Hot News  responding to an article about ‘The World Travel Internet Conference’ held in the Turks last week.

I’d like to share…

Internet “a great equalizer for the little guys” in travel!

What Floyd Hall and his colleagues addressed in the conference your article refers to, is an old tune and in my opinion, still accurate. The elephant in the room that no one wants to discuss is the fact that the majority of agencies in North America have been given every opportunity to get up-to-date with technology and have refused. Apathy, denial and a stubborn ‘entitlement’ attitude from agents (created by the old CRS’s) impedes progress.

I have spent the last 16 years of my career trying to change this so I think I’ve earned the right to tell this group (and they know who they are) “get on with it or you’ll be out of business”. Simple as that! There is no lack of tools, products and services available to the travel industry to turn things around.

I recently read a (feeble) article quoting someone at ACTA addressing the need to do something to attract a “young pool of talent” to the travel business. Well let’s see, here’s a couple of stats that will be sure to have every teenager panting to get into travel school:

1.      48.60% of the visits by travel agents to my website from mid-august to mid-September were on dial-up!
2.      23.2% or respondents to a ‘Canadian Retail Industry Survey’ that Travelwatch ran 3 weeks ago replied that they either ‘Do not have’ or are ‘working on’ collecting client email addresses.

That ought to scare the pants off Expedia and Travelocity! Behave everyone,best
Frank

Segment Shmegment!

So you got your brand spanking new database, know how to drive it?

Last week I wrote about how to get your client list up-to-date and promised to address those of you without a list. This is not rocket science. Simply be polite, professional, ask for an email and explain what you will be doing with it. That’s right, what you are going to do with it! Have you thought about it? Have you got a plan?

I won’t go into how to select the right software, drop me a note on that if you like. But I will discuss how to properly use your database and its segmentation capabilities. Segmentation is a valuable customer management tool, excellent market research tool and if you have a nice fat budget for top-of-the line software and staff, it can be a valuable marketing tool. However, to the typical travel retailer, the following scenario is much too common…

You receive a “Free air and Free Golf” special from a supplier; you rush to your new dB program and fire an email off to all golfers. Mrs. Brown told you she was a golfer and that she liked museums but she also told you she’s a teacher and can only get time off in the summer. You forgot, or didn’t have the time to check each customer file individually and now she’s opted-out of your list because it’s the 4th golf special you sent this winter. Your noble targeting effort turned into a typical unproductive shotgun broadcast! Don’t be too upset, most of your colleagues market that way so my guess is that she belongs to about 5 or 6 travel agency database lists and has absolutely no loyalty to any agent.

Until, she comes across an agency that understands that email contact is all about acquiring and nurturing client loyalty. Making sure that the client knows why they do business with you and why you’re their travel agent (for more on this, refer to my article Bob’s MY Travel Agent). Soft-sell, non-product, interesting, but most important, REGULAR messages work much better than alienating customers because of faulty segmentation. Over time, Mrs. Brown will belong to such a list and probably one more to keep you honest but most important; she will always give you the opportunity to compete on the booking when she’s ready to travel.

By regularly emailing your customers with the right message, you generate business by being top-of-mind when that particular customer wants to travel. You won’t be as dependant on the sporadic shotgun approach and therefore able to select your clients more carefully for that golf special. I guarantee you increased loyalty from the former and increased response from the latter.

Clear as mud?

BTW…I launched the 10 question survey and within the first few days I had about 150 answers! Thanks everyone, for your effort and help. Some of you on my blog list did not get the survey…SORRY! I’ll get it to you as soon as I can.

Behave,

Frank