Increasing sales of your Travel company requires a through Marketing and Sales Strategy is a process. Here are some tips of how to increase sales in a travel agency or a tour operator business.
Travelomatix is a next generation travel booking platform for travel agencies and tour operators.
1. Have a unique offering Differentiate yourself from your competitors. Be unique and listen to your customers. Take feedback and inputs from your customers and work on improving. Offer a service or a customisation that they can’t find anywhere else.
Have an Integrated software
It helps to be tied up with Global Distribution Systems. Providing your customers with a complete easy and safe is a good way to be competitive is having the best possible rates on a worldwide range of high quality transfer services, car rentals, attraction tickets and excursions.
3.Offer a value added service
The best way to increase your revenue per customer is by adding a complementary offer to the experience like a complimentary lunch or a dinner. Know what your customers want and give them.Combine different products into a unique experience. For example, create a package and try to offer a better price by combining hotel, flight and activity. Value added services will satisfy your customers and make them come back to you.
4.Social Media
It is very important for you to have social media presence.From exploring destinations to booking trips and sharing journeys, social media activities have become integral to today’s digital travelers. 73% of people acquire vacation ideas from platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
Social media helps us create a brand, understand your customer needs and helps the growth of your business in many ways.
Travelomatix is an award-winning travel technology platform, enabling the travel agencies, tour operators and holiday companies to leverage the key benefits of OTA platform. Travelomatix as a brand, is identified by improved ROI for customers while leveraging using the “Travelomatix technology” and superb client servicing, leading to customer retention and customer base expansion.
Travel and tourism is one of the largest and fastest growing global service industries. The growth in travel expenditure was driven by changing lifestyles and higher disposable incomes. The Sharing Economy is a socio-economic ecosystem based on sharing human, physical and intellectual resources. It includes the shared creation, production, distribution, trade and consumption of goods and services by different people and organizations.
Travelomatix is an award winning travel technology platform, enabling the travel agencies, tour operators and holiday companies to leverage the key benefits of OTA platform. Travelomatix as a brand, is identified by improved ROI for customers while leveraging using the “travelomatix technology” and superb client servicing, leading to customer retention and customer base expansion.
The development of the internet and, as a consequence, the creation of online platforms
has made sharing easier than ever.Sharing Economy provides easy access to a wide range of services that are of higher quality and more affordable than those provided by traditional business counterparts.
Sharing economy is re-connecting modern humanity, providing income to those without jobs (even in developing countries), and is changing the face of travel as we know it. Also known as the collaborative economy, the sharing economy emerges from the idea that people can save and/or earn money by renting, lending, selling, or exchanging unused or underused items/services.
In 2018, innovative travel companies, apps and products will change travel as we know it. Eco-friendly initiatives and sustainable travel will be a top industry trend. With the United Nations declaring 2017 the International Year of Sustainable Tourism, you can expect industry wide efforts to reduce carbon emissions. But the upcoming year is about more than just responsible travel. From inventive tools that allow you to snap high-quality travel photos or map out your trip with an artificial intelligence platform to evolving alternative accommodation platforms, there are plenty of groundbreaking changes on the horizon.
Travel Booking Engine System
Here are some of the Travel Trends for the coming year:
Virtual Reality
VR allows the possibility of giving holidaymakers the chance to ‘try before you buy’ in a way that has previously been impossible. You try on clothes to see how they look before taking your credit card out, but you have to take a travel company’s word for it that their beach resort really does offer ‘pristine white beaches’. In future, you’ll be able to look around the resort, see your room and check out just how big the pool is.
Vanishing Destinations Destinations at risk of disappearing will also see a rise in tourist traffic. There’s an urgency to see places before they are completely changed, places such as the Arctic and Antarctic as popular destinations affected by climate change. Another top destination is the Great Barrier Reef in Australia for adventure travelers yearning to see the coral before it’s gone or completely changed.
Go Green With a rising consumer and industry interest in ecotourism, hotels, tour operators and outfitters will incorporate responsible practices and encourage travelers to plan low-impact getaways.Traveling shorter distances is an easy way to reduce your carbon footprint. Another way to bring sustainability to the forefront of your travels is to choose hotels and restaurants that are eco-minded in their practices. And perhaps one of the most immediate ways to help is by choosing to visit destinations that will benefit the most from your tourist dollars is pointing to destinations like Nepal as a place that’s benefited from tourism money getting funneled into the local economy.
A blend of business and pleasure travel Today’s work pattern and culture is different from what it used to be. Today, work typically has a looser structure. This makes it easier for business travelers to indulge in activities that count as pleasure and take time out to experience the work location as a leisure tourist would. Business travellers who are increasingly becoming millennials are blurring the distinction between business and leisure travel, and in 2017, it’s expected to be even more so as fun increasingly becomes an integral of work.
OTAs worldwide record a surge in their clientele as internet becomes more available worldwide and cheaper too. This wave that has been growing for the past few years will also benefit from the crashing prices of smartphones and is expected to continue into 2017 as millennials who are the major travelers are also very tech savvy.
Travelomatix is an award winning travel technology platform, enabling the travel agencies, tour operators and holiday companies to leverage the key benefits of OTA platform. Travelomatix as a brand, is identified by improved ROI for customers while leveraging using the “travelomatix technology” and superb client servicing, leading to customer retention and customer base expansion.
Rise in the demand for authentic local experiences and activity packed tours Before now, travel outside of business focused more on relaxation and change of scenery. Where the older generation would mostly travel for these reasons, millennials are more inclined to travel with the goal of having immersive and interactive experiences, learning something new while travelling in Peru, living the life of the locals in Mexico, exploring Lagos, and having more action packed trips outside of mere sightseeing. This trend was prominent in the past year, and is expected to continue strongly into 2017 as the millennial generation which is adventure driven continues to dominate world travel.
Artificial Intelligence Tools Are Improving and Expanding Travel sites have long been toying with the idea of implementing real-time messaging platforms and personalized automation technology. Today, you can use Google’s AI personal assistance or Siri to book your travel plans. That has the potential to really change how people search for travel on the booking site. In the past, companies were geared toward desktop and mobile search.With artificial intelligence through voice-activated platforms, the lines are getting redrawn.
Augmented Reality for Tourism has tremendous potential to take your experience to the next level. Digital content like 3D animations, video, audio, images, charts, signals & indicators etc. can superimposed on devices. Based on a specific set of parameters like time, location, person and fiducial (trigger), a cloud based infrastructure etc. Augmented Reality Tourism Apps can generate relevant content to handheld devices. Augmented reality is where the real future Travel Technology lies.Travel industry trends are always changing as technology drives new opportunities. This can give rise to new business ideas and create new revenue streams for Travel Technology companies.The global travel industry, and the way in which consumers experience it, is changing so dramatically that it requires a fundamental change to the way in which travel is sold and how the traveller is served.
The tourism industry is all about selling the experience of travel. Hotel operators want their guests to feel welcome and at home. Restaurants want to attract travelers who are interested in experiencing a new culture or flavor. Tour and activity operators want to offer unique experiences that can’t be had in any parts of the world. In this regard, virtual reality and augmented reality has the opportunity to change the entire game. This technology allows travellers to experience a particular place or activity prior to ever making their booking. They can decide for themselves, with nearly utmost certainty, if that option is the best choice for their upcoming trip.
Tour and activity operators can consider using augmented reality in the following ways:
Offer virtual tours of the places that you visit and the things that you do on your tours and activities. Give people a chance to preview the experience they are about to book.
Offer navigational tools that help people get around their chosen destination. This can be an added resource that helps you develop a reputation as a local guide rather than just a tour company.
Offer augmented-reality apps that can provide translation services for your international travellers. This can help everyone feel comfortable and confident while on one of your tours.
Technology continues to change the way that tour and activity operators do business, and it’s important to always stay one step ahead of the game such as Travelomatix. Travelomatix is an award winning travel technology platform, enabling the travel agencies, tour operators and holiday companies to leverage the key benefits of OTA platform.
Travelomatix as a brand, is identified by improved ROI for customers while leveraging using the “travelomatix technology” and superb client servicing, leading to customer retention and customer base expansion. http://travelomatix.com/
Smartphones are playing a key role in the travel consumer journey. Research shows that 40% of travel site visits come from mobile. SMS might seem at outdated but it does provide penetration, at a low cost to your agency or tour company. 96% of SMS messages are read and most of them are read in the first 3 minutes from sending.
Travelomatix is an award winning travel technology platform, enabling the travel agencies, tour operators and holiday companies to leverage the key benefits of OTA platform. Travelomatix as a brand, is identified by improved ROI for customers while leveraging using the “travelomatix technology” and superb client servicing, leading to customer retention and customer base expansion.
To flourish in today’s travel industry, travel agents must embrace the mobile marketing revolution and put it to good use. Smartphone usage in the has been increasing day by day.
Smartphone activities include reading the news, making reservations, shopping, social interaction, and entertainment. Everything is mobile. Each of those smartphone-related activities can be accomplished at home or on the run. In terms of the travel industry, mobile devices can now display all scheduling options, reservation confirmations, online booking, and even serve as e-tickets at many airports. Today’s travellers will most likely use a mobile device to search for travel agency help. This traveller may be checking websites, social media comments, and apps that can provide them information and recommendations regarding excellent service travel agents. A well-designed, interactive web page is a good start, but you need to stretch your marketing resources farther, building a social media presence that integrates across computer and mobile devices. Your mobile marketing outreach may include text messaging, location-based social media, quick response (QR) codes and “agency-branded” apps that link your clients to their travel accounts to check on delays, cancellations, make changes, and communicate with you. Mobile tools for agents’ use are important, too. Apps for travel agents like the Travelport Mobile Agent work on iPhone, iTouch, iPad, and Android mobile devices to give agents quick and complete access to GDS content (tap the app and sign into the GDS account). The impact of mobile on the travel industry is felt not only in the increased speed and convenience of accessing vital travel information; it also is being felt in amazing interactive applications like augmented reality, gamification, and in-transit access to entertainment systems that make travelling more fully experiential and enriching. To make the most of mobile marketing, the travel agent must determine which services to emphasize in a marketing campaign and begin developing mobility connections that will provide the greatest services to their client base. Mobile technology takes “full service” to new levels, from quick flights booking to travel enrichment applications. Clients want fast access across the mobile technology spectrum to all the information pertinent to their travel from e-ticketing to arrival/departure updates, travel advisories, and fast and easy check-in capabilities. Help clients easily find and work with you – via mobile technology.
Travel agency is a business that is designed to help travelers in the arrangement for trips, tickets, hotel reservations, flight tickets, creating itineraries for tour or cruise packages and providing information about specific destinations and other travel arrangements.
To start a travel agency business, it is helpful to have a working knowledge of travel agent software, customer service experience and experience in traveling to different parts of the world.
Decide whether you want to become an independent Travel consultant or start your own agency. It is always good to be integrated with a good Travel Technology company like Travelomatix. If you have a good Travel Technology company with you, your start-up costs will be minimal because computer software which is needed to book flights with airlines and branding is taken care of by the Travel Technology company. Your start up costs will be a phone, computer and software, Internet service and marketing materials needed to run the business. You will also be responsible for building a client list.
2. Make a business Plan
Planning is a very important phase for your Travel Agency. Decide what services you want to provide who your target customer are and your financial plan.
Travel services include transportation arrangements (air, train, boat, car), hotel and resort reservations, cruise packages and specialized tour packages such as eco-tours or city-based tours. You may also want to specialize exclusively in family travel, senior travel, corporate travel or academic travel to set your business apart from other travel agencies.
Travelomatix is an award-winningtravel technology platform, enabling the travel agencies, tour operators and holiday companies to leverage the key benefits of OTA platform. Travelomatix as a brand, is identified by improved ROI for customers while leveraging using the “Travelomatix technology” and superb client servicing, leading to customer retention and customer base expansion.
It is very important to have a good website for your company.Create a website that includes a description of travel services, contact information and online booking options. Invest in a good Travel Technology like Travelomatix that process client bookings and payment from your website, track online marketing campaigns and captures email addresses. Include testimonials of satisfied clients on your website. Update your website often by providing interesting content that clients will find useful when planning a vacation or traveling for business. Now that you are done with all the basic requirements, go ahead and build your clients to have a successful Travel Agency.
Increasing sales of your Travel company requires a through Marketing and Sales Strategy and is a process. Here are some tips of how to increase sale in a travel agency or a tour operator business.
Be unique and listen to your customers. Take feedback and inputs from your customers and work on improving. Offer a service or a customization that they can’t find anywhere else.
2. Have an Integrated software
It helps to be tied up with Global Distribution Systems. Providing your customers with a complete easy and safe is a good way to be competitive is having the best possible rates on a worldwide range of high quality transfer services, car rentals, attraction tickets and excursions.
3. Partner Programs
The best way to reach out to more people and increase your sales is by having business relationships with partners. Business partners can help you reach new markets, new customers, get new ideas and so many more! Design a program that will create a value for your business as well as the Partners.
4. Offer a value added service
The best way to increase your revenue per customer is by adding a complementary offer to the experience like a complimentary lunch or a dinner. Know what your customers want and give them. Combine different products into a unique experience. For example, create a package and try to offer a better price by combining hotel, flight and activity. Value added services will satisfy your customers and make them come back to you.
5.Social Media
It is very important for you to have social media presence. From exploring destinations to booking trips and sharing journeys, social media activities have become integral to today’s digital travelers. 73% of people acquire vacation ideas from platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
Social media helps us create a brand, understand your customer needs and helps the growth of your business in many ways.
Often unsure of what is actually needed, people end up carrying a lot more gadgets and technology than they should. Here are a few things you actually need.
Though this is an obvious option. A smart phone will generally meet all your requirements during your travel. They can translate speech, signage, convert currencies, and the list goes on. You could also use your cellular card if you have international roaming or you could get a local cellular card and use it. Irrespective of the cellular card you can stay connected using your wifi on your smartphone. Make sure you install useful travel applications on your smartphones for your travel.
The smartphones also come handy when you want to click an instant selfie or capture something wonderful you see on your travel.
Talking about selfies, we can’t miss Selfie Sticks. The Selfie Sticks help you with some awesome photography by fitting in yourself and your background perfectly in a frame.
Laptops
Many people are able to travel the world using just a smartphone or an iPad for their source of internet. Especially if you’re travelling for work laptop is a must. Even for leisure travel, laptop can come handy for you if have to co-ordinate for some work. This happens sometimes though you’re on a vacation. Also, you could watch movies and play music if you’re in a budget hotel or an outdoor camp. It is important that the laptop is small, lightweight and compact
E Reader
For the love of reading, carry an E reader. Long flights, waiting at the airport and long queues at the immigration. There is a lot of waiting during travel where reading can help you kill time. Also, if you’re a voracious reader this is a must. Let me sum it up for you by stating three reasons to carry an e reader:
You save space rather than carrying many people. You can download as many books you want on an e reader.
E power consume very less power. You can go on for days without charging it.
They are lightweight and perfect for travel.
Tablets If you’re not a laptop person, it’s okay. Tablets are faster,lighter, useful and they’re cheaper too. For entertainment, web browsing, photo and video storage and most other travel tasks, a tablet is a good choice. You can do almost anything on a tablet and it is the most recommended gadget to carry. With a tablet, you have a smartphone, a laptop and an e Reader.
Camera
Think about all the times you travel, whether it’s for business or leisure. Maybe you’re going home to reconnect with the friends and family.
In any event, chances are high that you’d like pictures to commemorate the occasion. There’s an equal chance that you instinctively reach for your smartphone anytime you feel a photo-op coming on. But is it really the best option to gather your friends and family to smile at an object you use to take trivial selfies and candid photos of people sleeping on the subway? It’s time to think about a getting a camera made for travelers.
The size, weight and the ability to take quality photos is what initially drew us to this camera. When travelling, having items in your backpack that weigh very little is a high priority.
Drones
Drones are changing the game for artistic photography and videography. With the latest products offering the best features like 4K HD technology, you can now get amazing aerial shots of your travels or take photos on angles that are not possible with a regular camera or smartphone. If you are a photography enthusiast, this would make your travel more exciting.
Before taking your drone abroad, make sure to read up on the latest (ever-evolving) local laws regarding possession and usage. Because drone technology is so new and law enforcement around the world have growing concerns with issues of surveillance and aviation safety, the rules continue to change. Taking necessary precaution might mean leaving your drone at home or simply applying for permission ahead of time will save you the stress of handing over your equipment at customs.
Headphones
A nice pair of headphones or earbuds is a great travel accessory. Having music really helps make flights more enjoyable. Noise cancellation headphones enchant you with wonderful sound, everywhere: in planes, trains, busses, waiting hall as these places tend to be noisy, your travel headphones should be able to attenuate outside noise effectively.
Portable Hard Drives
We have thousands of photos and videos from our numerous trips around the world. Rather than jam-packing our laptops with these files or trying to upload them to the Cloud or a drop box with slow internet, carry external hard drives. Not only are these hard drives useful for storage and backup of our precious memories, but you can also carry movies, tv shows, documentaries and music albums.
Plug Adapters
Plug adapters are just the metal plug ends that let your home country’s plugs fit the foreign plugs. There are quite a few multi-adapters that have 4 or 5 country’s plugs all on one unit. This will help you charge your smartphones, Laptops, tablets, Cameras and all the electronics you carry conveniently.
These are some of the useful Gadgets to carry during travel. Figure what are most convenient and appropriate for you and carry them for a better travel experience.
Travel agency is a business that is designed to help travelers in the arrangement for trips, tickets, hotel reservations, flight tickets, creating itineraries for tour or cruise packages and providing information about specific destinations and other travel arrangements.
To start a travel agency business, it is helpful to have a working knowledge of travel agent software, customer service experience and experience in traveling to different parts of the world.
Decide whether you want to become an independent Travel consultant or start your own agency. It is always good to be integrated with a good Travel Technology company like Travelomatix. If you have a good Travel Technology company with you, your start-up costs will be minimal because computer software which is needed to book flights with airlines and branding is taken care of by the Travel Technology company. Your start up costs will be a phone, computer and software, Internet service and marketing materials needed to run the business. You will also be responsible for building a client list.
2. Make a business Plan
Planning is a very important phase for your Travel Agency. Decide what services you want to provide who your target customer are and your financial plan.
Travel services include transportation arrangements (air, train, boat, car), hotel and resort reservations, cruise packages and specialized tour packages such as eco-tours or city-based tours. You may also want to specialize exclusively in family travel, senior travel, corporate travel or academic travel to set your business apart from other travel agencies.
3. Website
It is very important to have a good website for your company.Create a website that includes a description of travel services, contact information and online booking options. Invest in a good Travel Technology like Travelomatix that process client bookings and payment from your website, track online marketing campaigns and captures email addresses. Include testimonials of satisfied clients on your website. Update your website often by providing interesting content that clients will find useful when planning a vacation or traveling for business.
Now that you are done with all the basic requirements, go ahead and build your clients to have a successful Travel Agency.
The revolution of Social Media led to many changes in how every industry does marketing. From exploring destinations to booking trips and sharing journeys, social media activities have become integral to today’s digital travelers. 73% of people acquire vacation ideas from platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. In fact, more than half of people say Twitter helped them in considering travel brands.
1.The Perfect Place to Know the likes of your client:
Social media page is the best way to get to know somebody. You can understand what their requirements are based on what they like, the pages they follow and what they post.
2. Engaging your clients:
You must also keep in mind the interactive aspect of the social media platforms.
There are a number of ways to engage your client like – Join travel forums, engage in discussions with your target audience and Reply to their queries.
It will help you communicate with them more effectively. This will help you design your trip plans according to the requirements of your target audience. The result: more number of travel enthusiasts will respond to your travel plans.
3.Segment
The most avid among vacation-goers are millennials, who are reportedly the biggest spenders on travels. What’s unique about this generation is that they rarely seek help from professional travel services. Only 10% of millennials say they used travel agents in 2014. Who do they listen to? Social media stars! If you want to grab these clients and influence their travel decisions, social media is the place to do it.
4. Branding
You can use Social media to create your brand as a trustworthy brand and create a proper online reputation by getting your existing customers to share their experiences on your social channels and posting reviews of your customers on your social media profiles. Share some travel ideas, offer helpful travel tips and offer your customers with unique reads to keep them interested. Having the right content will help you attract more customers.
5.Photographs and Videos Creating highly engaging videos and capturing photographs will help take your company’s image to the next level.
You may hire professional photographers to take impeccable pictures of your offerings and even create exciting videos that redefine travel goals.
6.You Have Huge, Devoted Social Audience This method of marketing will not only convert the viewers to your customers but also save you big bucks. Spending a hefty amount of advertising dollars will catch eyeballs, but it won’t necessarily translate into purchase intents. People nowadays, especially millennials, are increasingly skeptical about misleading and exaggerating advertisements. 7.Social Media influences consumer behavior patterns
As much as 52% of the Facebook users admitted that photos posted by their friends helped the design their travel plans. With the large number of registered users sharing their experiences and pictures from different trips, it is becoming the perfect platform for prospective travelers to research for their travel destination.
From destination picks to restaurant choices, influencers guide their fans to exciting journeys in life. With a few delightful captions and creatively-executed visuals, they are able to turn otherwise generic stuff into the latest trends.
Travel Booking Software 