By Richard Earls, publisher, Travel Research Online (TRO) and The Travel Institute’s Professional Educators Program (PEP) member.
Consumers largely do not understand what you do as a travel professional. What we have to realize is there are times when even we mistake our mission. Let’s begin by examining what we do as travel professionals.
In every profession, there is a group of people who do exceptionally well in the execution of their discipline. This is the top 20%, the ones earning the income they want, the ones with the free time they want. You read about them in trade magazines and even in consumer publications. They are hosted by trade shows to meet with suppliers and those suppliers respect their ability to pull off their business strategies. Their websites and Facebook pages are littered with client testimonials. The difference between the top 20% of any profession and the balance of the population is often no more than a mindset, a way of thinking about their business. You are capable of whatever you want to achieve, but it is necessary to adopt some of the psychological shifts we are about to discuss. Intellectually, I don’t think you will disagree. However, the trick is to develop muscle memory for integrating this discussion into your travel practice. You need to be able to think and act automatically without hesitation.
1. Psychological Shift #1: You don’t sell travel
You don’t sell travel; you sell yourself! It seems so obvious, but often, our language and actions say otherwise. Your clients can buy travel on the Internet, in magazines, newspapers, the wholesale club, and other travel agents. They can even buy travel directly from suppliers. Your clients do not need you to “buy travel.” Your clients need you to help them make intelligent buying decisions. Help your clients by intelligently being their travel coach and advisor. You are not sitting on the opposite side of the table handing your client travel product, like a seller of travel. You are instead on the same side of the table evaluating the possibilities, like a travel consultant. The truly great thing about selling yourself is that you can’t be found cheaper on the Internet. You are unique. For better or for worse, your company is going to walk and talk exactly like you do. To make the best of your personality, place it at the center of your company. Your website and all marketing collateral should be about you and the value you add to travel, the benefits your clients receive by working with you. Your website and marketing should not be about travel products or suppliers. Simply sell yourself and the benefits of working with you.
2. Psychological Shift #2: Travel transactions should happen in the context of a relationship
Living from transaction to transaction is a terrible way to make a living unless it is accomplished in the context of a relationship. You want to have clients who think of you as their travel consultant, you want them to take ownership of you. Unfortunately, too many travel professionals live transaction to transaction.
We SELL a cruise, then a FIT tour, and then off to HELP the client on a business trip. Those are fine transactions, but the core of your travel practice needs to be relationships. You want your clients to come to you because they would not think of planning travel without you. To fully develop a relationship you have to create an atmosphere of trust. In a transaction, you have to “close the sale.” In a traditional sales technique, the “close” is the penultimate step with a great deal of urgency and stress. In a relationship, the sale is often closed before the client even comes to your door because you are the person who handles their travel arrangements; you are “their travel professional.” The client’s needs are at the center of everything you do. You strive to ask the client the proper questions about who, what, where, why, and when of what this particular trip is all about. The more you know about the clients and the trips they are requesting, the better you can meet their needs. As in every relationship, it takes two to tango. You also explain to the client something about yourself: Tell them who you are, what you do, how you do it, and the benefits of working with you. Demystify travel for them. Translate the features of your travel practice into benefits. e.g., don’t simply say you’ve been in the business for 10 years. Instead, your 10 years of experience means you know how to select the right tour operators and suppliers for your clients. Explain how your industry relationships and host agency or consortia are a collection of additional benefits for them. We think of client loyalty as the client being loyal to us. Maybe we have that backward! Instead, we should be loyal first to the client and their needs. Then the client has reason to reciprocate loyalty. Transactions will still take place but in the context of a relationship based on trust.
3. Psychological Shift #3: Value is not the same as cost
Value is not the same as cost. Your clients are going to naturally think in terms of cost and price. That’s not surprising; they are civilians. You are the professional in the relationship. Clients will drive to the bottom line first thing every time. You, as the professional, however, must steer them back to value. Value is important to the equation because that’s really what your clients care about. They may talk in terms of cost and price, but they don’t mean it. Even when they say “I just want to get there as cheaply as possible,” they don’t mean it. If so, they would walk to Cancun instead of flying. Statements like this betray a client’s fear of paying too much. Without the advantage of the relationship you are going to form with them, they are afraid of spending too much for their vacation and not getting what they most want out of it. You, a trusted travel counselor, come to the rescue! Explain to them the difference between cost and value.
Cost: is what you pay for something.
Value: is what you receive for what you pay.
In that framework, I daresay that cost doesn’t even really matter to your clients. They say it does, but what they really mean is “value.” An example I often use is when you go to Whole Foods and you pay $100 for groceries, you’re not upset you paid $100; you are upset that it all fits in one bag. If you got 10 bags of groceries for your $100 you would be ecstatic. It is not what you pay that matters, it is what you get in return.
4. Psychological Shift #4: Your passion is important, but the client’s passions are essential
We hear about passion all the time. People get into the travel business. They love travel because they are passionate about travel. But here we have another small psychological hurdle to overcome. You must be equally passionate about your client’s travels. Your passion for travel will get you into this business, but it won’t keep you there! Only your passion for helping others travel well will serve you in terms of working with clients. Tapping into your clients’ passion for travel means being client-centric, i.e., putting the client at the heart of the relationship. Remember, your clients are interested in themselves. Until you show your clients how they benefit from the features you and travel offer, they will not fully understand your presentation. So if your clients say they want to travel with family, then talk about their kids or spouse and talk about the opportunity for building memories. Reach into your clients’ passions for travel or for those activities for which they travel. That’s not manipulation but is an authentic sales technique. You are romancing the clients to capture critical information to ensure they have the trip they want, desire, and deserve.
5. Psychological Shift #5: Train your clients
Finally, train your clients! As a professional, you are in charge of the tenor of the relationship. Remember, your clients don’t understand what you do. Your clients think you sell travel. This misapprehension will cause them to shop you around unless you explain how you work and what you expect from them. From the beginning of your relationship with a client, explain what you do. Explain how you work and research in the context of the benefits they receive working with you. Explain your training, your niche markets and expertise, your relationship with suppliers, peers, your consortia, and your host agency. Empower your clients. Be authentic with them. Be confident. Your mission is to coach them into making good purchasing decisions. You know they are going to be researching right alongside you, so encourage them to bring anything they find, absolutely anything. Then you can evaluate it together. Educate and demystify travel for them. They will value the way you put them and their needs at the center of the relationship. Training your client from the outset in this manner educates the client on your role and the client’s responsibility, properly setting expectations. Make sure your explanation is client-centric, speaking to the benefits the client receives from working with a travel professional.
Consider each of these little psychological shifts. Think about integrating them into your travel practice. As you start to implement them, be hyper-conscious of the way you’re thinking about travel and seek to put each mindset to use.
