Become a Travel Agent

Home Based Travel Agents
Connect for Success
Joanie Ogg CTC MCC

Yesterday, as I was participating online in a digest for association executives, I realized yet again how very important communication is to home-based professionals of all types. In fact, I believe it is even more relevant to travel professionals than many other fields. Being home-based has so many benefits, yet one of the challenges for so many of us is finding a way to stay connected with our peers. Digests and online message boards can certainly allow us to learn, share, gain insights and acquaint ourselves with others in our field who often become great friends over time. It really can have a tremendous positive impact for those of us working from home.

In fact the theme for our 2004 NACTA Winter Conference taking place on December 1 in Ft. Lauderdale is Connect for Success! This event will be the day before Cruise A Thon begins and with more than 160 agents connecting at our event it is sure to be a successful day.

What makes it even more attractive is that we can access these communication vehicles from just about anywhere in the world as long as we are able to access our email and get connected. A couple years ago birth was given to the Cruise Agent Digest, which was later, renamed the NACTA Agent Digest. It is a NACTA member benefit and one that our members rate as one of their favorites. Non-Members can also subscribe for a small yearly fee. The NACTA Agent Digest, www.nactaagentdigest.com, offers an ongoing conversation between professional agents who need help from one another.  No matter where I might be traveling, I always feel connected to the NACTA members by reading our daily NACTA Agent Digest (aka NAD.) I may have missed late breaking industry stories but you can be sure I will be on top of the issues when I read the NACTA Agent Digest.  It may sound rather strange, but communicating this way also feels a void when traveling solo. Being able to share ideas and read interesting threads is not only educational but also great fun. Don’t laugh now…. I know I need to get a life.  However, the connectivity to members really does help me focus on the members’ needs and their aspirations for NACTA, their trade association. Perhaps it is the Party Line of yesteryear’s telephone system. 

The NACTA Agent Digest is moderated by myself and a few other NACTA members. These ladies volunteer their time as they too see the many benefits  from this great communication vehicle. I cannot imagine trying to do it without them so this is my formal thank you publicly to Nancy Norris of Portside Travel in Ohio and Terri Maldonado of CruiseGal.com in Arizona for their unending support and friendship.

While we are very fortunate with this digest to have the focus be on helping one another with travel questions and on industry issues that relate to selling travel, there are other digests that do not offer such productive conversation. Instead they tend to find the negative in about every issue in the industry and simply rant and rave about how unfair it all is for the travel community of agents. So when you are out there deciding on the type of digest you want to be a part of, remember your time is valuable and business should be the focus.

Having observed some relatively negative and unfocused threads on other agent digests, I wanted to be certain to focus NACTA’s digest on solutions and knowledge as well to create a community of respect and a focus on business growth. The. Our members work hard to reach their business goals and being able to reach out and ask a fellow member for a suggestion of a good property in Fiji for a family of four or to ask for other member’s thoughts on a new ship or itinerary is invaluable. The isolation of working alone at home screams for the need to connect in a positive and business focused environment such as a digest.

There is no question that the confidence that communication with our peers offers us is more than enough reason to find yourself a vehicle that best suits your business focus and to get talking online today and Connect for Success.

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