Travel agencies worldwide are beginning to realise the importance of having well-trained and knowledgeable staff as the role of the agent has now truly evolved — from booking agent to consultant.
And both the customers and the suppliers have driven this evolution.
Clients are demanding more bang for their buck and most suppliers would do anything to cut out the ‘middle man’ unless they add true value.
As a result, agents must be well-trained, knowledgeable and service-orientated if they are to keep both parties loyal and happy.
And with commission payments all but abolished, agents must provide a service that is worth charging for, says Renuka Natu, head, marketing and promotions, Kuoni Academy & Kuoni Centre of Excellence. “The biggest challenge is the competition faced by the travel agents with the internet. Almost every service – be it air tickets; hotels, sightseeing, restaurant reservations and overseas mediclaim policies are available on the internet at equivalent or, at times, cheaper prices. This was not the case even five years ago.
The best way for an agent to deal with this competition is to offer value added services which differentiate between high tech and high touch.”
Travel agencies are now compelled to look at alternative revenue streams and enhance their scope of services by charging professional service fees. Corporate customers who are the mainstay of travel trade in 2010 will be conscious of their travel spend as they attempt to make the most of better deals and services for optimum gains from their travel agency partners. Experts say now is the time for travel agencies to train their staff in order to maximise yields and generate new sales.“Having a better trained and more efficient workforce will be critical in their ability to deliver higher efficiency and better service,” says Kapil Chanana, chief marketing officer, UEI Global Education.
India’s agencies are beginning to sit up and listen to the advice of trainers like UEI and Kuoni as they look to improve the scope of their services and their agents’ knowledge, with the intention of gaining the upper hand over their competitors.
As a result, the emphasis on industry training in India is definitely showing signs of improvement, say industry experts.
Many national tourism offices find that customers have grown up and know what they want. They also know what level of product expertise they can expect from a good agent — good destination knowledge will provide the travel agent with a clear competitive advantage within the trade.
Ensuring customers return because of the focused and knowledgeable service provided is now more essential than ever. Ashish Kesharwani, chief learning officer, UEI Global Education, says: “Agents have to start looking at new ways to add value to their customers. Offering value additions, such as better packages, added features and better service are going to be the determinants of survival and prosperity. A traveller can today book a room, get best rates and create his own package. So travel agents need to do more.”
A well-educated agent is open to new techniques and is skilled to face new market challenges; their performance reflects the level of change and adaptation that is essential for job responsibilities. With the number of travellers shrinking day after day, travel agencies are now aware that promotional tickets aren’t the only answer.
Staff interaction with customers, telephone skills and cross-culture awareness are now considered to be effective marketing tools, which if executed well, can attract new travellers, as well as ensuring loyal customers feel valued and remain loyal. “The travel industry is the most people-oriented, of all industries, and understanding your customer and establishing a human connection is the starting point to building a long-term business in this field,” Chanana says.
Understanding locations
Agencies are receiving more opportunities every year to learn about key destinations from the growing number of national tourist offices visiting the region to promote their respective destinations.
Dubai-based Emirates Holidays senior vice president John Felix says: “National tourist offices are continuously improving the quality and availability of training opportunities for travel trade professionals.
“They conduct regular road shows, presentations, familiarisation trips, and provide online learning modules.”
Felix adds that since 1994, Emirates Holidays has hosted approximately 400 travel agent partners a year, from across its distribution network, to a two day in-depth leisure refresher workshop.
The company works closely with other national tourist offices and destination partners in order to raise both awareness of the region’s destination and help spread the flow of knowledge across the travel world.
Austrian organisation has run a similar educational programme since 2008. The Austrian National Tourist Office, for instance, established a destination education programme, the Austrian Certified Travel Specialist (ACTS), in 2008. In a bit over a year it has had more than 500 agents graduate as Austrian Certified Travel Specialists after finishing the seven basic destination courses.
Graduates of the course receive benefits from ANTO through acquiring ACTS status, including access to online brochures, picture material and an encyclopaedia on Austria. Agencies also receive a stream of benefits including an online listing of ACTS Agencies on the tourist office’s website, as well as direct booking requests from ANTO.
“The key to a successful travel agent is his knowledge of any destination, ultimately what each travel agent is selling is the same, however what makes the difference is his product knowledge and his service orientation. If he has to grow and retain his customer base, he has to keep himself abreast with all the new destinations, as the customer would want to visit a different destination every year.
The travel agent has to be capable of selling it to him with sound product knowledge. The various educational programmes conducted by the tourism boards are met with a lot of success as travel agents attend these in large numbers,” says Natu.
Technological gains
A good way of stimulating enthusiasm in travel agents to train is to ensure they view training as an opportunity and believe it to be important to their jobs and relevant to their organisation.
“The main thing required is the Airline Computer Reservation System, which is taught thoroughly to all the Kuoni Academy students. We conduct trainings for the travel agents as well.
Travel Agents prefer to do the IATA-UFTAA courses with us and they also do the Destination Training programs at the Academy which are initiated by the Tourism Boards,” says Natu.
Experts believe in instilling such enthusiasm from the start and advise anyone looking to enter the travel trade to get some basic training before they apply for a job.
Most essential is that prospective agents familiarise themselves with the relevant technologies such as the GDS.
“The most common platforms used by travel agents are Amadeus and Gallileo. Other technologies such as home grown portals etravelvalue, custom portals for bigger agents etc. are also catching on fast,” says Chanana.
Ashish Kesharwani’s top 10 travel trade training tips
1. Train for results – Each trainer should be trained specifically for that destination. Link training sessions to on-the-job applications to ensure what is learned gets implemented in the job.
2. Train the trainer – Get one of your stronger experts to train other staff members. These can be called mentors or guides and you end up creating a pool of trainers, one for each region.
3. Product orientation – Get supplier product training converted into regular learning programmes to ensure everyone receives product knowledge. An idea is to put in place a quiz or a test to ensure that learners are assessed. Gather material for each destination.
4. Learn more to earn more – Use staff incentives to pursue academic growth to ensure achievement orientation. This can be done for knowledge-based training. Staff can be graded on skill sets.
5. Destination specialist – Work closely with tourism boards to get a complete orientation on major destinations that agencies need to promote. This would ensure staff are fully aware of all the major issues regarding a destination — such as climate, culture, major sight-seeing places, visa requirements, and things to do and not to do in each of these destinations.
6. Create understudies – It is best to use people from a destination to promote it. The government or tourism boards should make training mandatory. Certification for people from the region can definitely add value.
7. Learn from cases – Study cases that are available in media or through any other avenues so can assess how to do things differently.
8. Learn from your peers – Agents should regularly work with each other, switching specialisations so that they can learn from each other.
9. Learn from the competition – Every fortnight, assess the competition. Analyse their successes, failures, new products, new offers and staff news. Look at why a destination has been successful and see if you can implement their strategy.
10. Create specialists – Apart from standards like culture and heritage, agents can specialise in health tourism or learn to handle groups or MICE. As the focus shifts from traditional activities, these would make them employable in a changing world.
