Setting up a business to support the travel trade...
The story so far...
My background in tourism started off in 1998 selling advertising on visitor maps. Since 2003; the year I set up my consultancy business; b2me Tourism Marketing; I transcended advertising sales and slid (almost) seamlessly into representation on behalf of a wide variety of arts and cultural clients. This representation often took place at trade shows targeting the US travel agent and tour operator market as well as the Chinese, German, Canadian, Dutch, South Korean, Japanese and the UK domestic markets. Over the years I have attended dozens of similar trade events, both standing on trade booths and 'speed dating' in 7-9 minute encounters directly with buyers.
Like many of you reading this, I have handed out leaflets, produced pieces of print on behalf of clients and tried to get across what I believed would entice visitors through the door that I was attempting to open.
The success of the events could be measured in two ways - one more accurate than the other. The first would be the number of business cards received; and the second, the amount of business actually created.
Increasingly it became apparent that offering sweets/pens/anything you didn't want to take home with you, was equally likely to gain attention (especially on consumer days); and so I decided to take a slightly more pragmatic approach, and started to speak directly to product buyers about what they were really looking for from new suppliers. The answer not only surprised me; it also brought about a series of changes in my business that have influenced the development and launch of Travel Trade Ready.
It goes without saying that buyers are looking for new product - be it accommodation, attractions and increasingly first-hand experiences; however even more than that, buyers wanted to know that these new potential suppliers actually understood what the buyers needed.
This then became a sort of awakening for me. I began to realise that what buyers really wanted was not what I, and possibly what many of my compatriots had been giving them; but something much more succinct. My new mantra for a buyer requirement (and anyone that has been to one of my trade engagement workshops will know this already) is 'how much, how long, how many' - in other words what's in it for me? The other bugbear for buyers was new potential suppliers simply not understanding that regardless of how interesting/spectacular/unique etc. the product was - if it didn't fulfill the basic criteria of commission, trade voucher acceptance etc - it was simply of no use whatsoever to the travel trade.
Without wishing to dissect this further here (although I am happy to discuss this at length in a consultancy/workshop scenario) - it became apparent that the approach many suppliers were taking was in fact not correct. Travel Trade Ready was developed out of an understanding that my knowledge and experience could be distilled into a combination of adapting marketing material, sharing learned knowledge through workshops, and ultimately digitising the majority of the processes and analyses required for individual businesses to find out if they are 'travel trade ready' before they go out and meet buyers.
Of course, it isn't enough to say yes or no to that question. Those that aren't ready need advice and support which is why real life tour operators and other trade professionals have given up their time to record explainer videos so that they can be 'up-skilled' quickly and simply. These videos are immediately available on the Travel Trade Ready platform for any supplier business that does not quite reach the necessary level when taking their audit; and they can re-test for free as soon as they are confident of their understanding of what the travel trade needs from them and why. Marketing materials need to contain just the right amount of information and insight to provide the foot in the door that we all need, (I call it Instant Expert?), and search facilities need to exist to allow both buyers and suppliers to find each other - and even more importantly to know which trade events the buyers are attending.
The travel trade is also terrible at coming up with acronyms and phrases that just make no sense to the uninitiated. This isn't only true of this industry of course, but a good solid jargon buster is vital to help navigate oneself. Travel Trade Ready contains a comprehensive jargon buster covering around 20 of the most regularly used, but often confusing acronyms and phrases.
So, there you have it- the first Travel Trade Ready blog about my good idea that took the best part of 20 years to deliver.
I'll end this first missive with a rather nice quote from the Chief Executive of UKinbound and I very much hope you'll agree with his sentiment:
“Over 50% of all inbound tourism is booked through an intermediary, which shows how critical the Travel Trade is to the inbound visitor economy. Travel Trade Ready is an exciting innovation as it supports both buyers and suppliers equally. As a membership organisation, we know that our buyer members are constantly looking to engage with new suppliers, but that it can be frustrating when there is a lack of clear understanding of what is required.
“Ensuring that buyers are only engaging with trade ready suppliers on the Travel Trade Ready platform is going to make face to face meetings more efficient and effective for everyone; and providing immediate support for those suppliers that are not yet ready, can only be a good thing for our industry as a whole.”
Please do visit www.traveltradeready.net and if you would like to get in touch - please email me at [email protected] - I'd love to hear from you.