Become a Home Based Travel Agent

Do You Find That Price
Is the Most Important Issue With Your Clients?
By Geoff Millar

Unfortunately, we as an industry have promoted the whole price issue becoming the most important thing in a sale. If you think about it, in prior years agencies were store-front businesses that all sold the same products to a somewhat captive audience, your local neighborhood, as did other local businesses. So, what they were selling were the same travel products, but to a more captive audience. This has all changed with the advent of the Internet and related technology.

I now as a client, through the Internet, can purchase an all inclusive vacation package from any of 15,000 travel agents across the country and on the Internet, yet a lot of agents are still selling and promoting travel products first. I look at a lot of agent websites. and see nothing but specials, prices and booking engines, nothing about the agent or agency so, the client sees no difference between any of the agents or agencies. Therefore by default, price becomes either the main issue or the only issue.

What agents need to be selling and promoting, when speaking with clients or in their marketing material, before they even mention a travel product is themselves, why should I (the client) buy from you VS the other 15,000 other agents out there that they can purchase the same product from you? In today's travel world, you as an agent or agency are the most important product, not the travel product, they can purchase the travel product from any travel agent.

Another point is that the public is conditioned to look at price as the most important thing. Look at the Auto Insurance ads on TV. Yes, they talk about service, but when it comes down to the main selling point of the ad it is always price. Their closing point is always "You can save $400 a year over XYZ company by switching your insurance to us". Other TV and on-line ads all say the same thing, "you can get the same product from us for less than anyone else".

We are slowly becoming a price driven society and the big on-line companies recognize this and take advantage of it. Whether we like it or not, they do operate from a legitimate business model.

I am not saying that if you sell yourself that price will not be an issue, but it will not be the only issue or the main issue and you will set yourself apart from the other 15.000 travel agents . Also remember there is a big difference between price and value.

I Just had an example of this while I was compiling this piece. A new client called looking for a Sandals Emerald Bay vacation package. After selling her that we were the Sandals specialists, knew Sandals inside and out, went over what she was looking for, and gave her some suggestions. She informed us that she was working with her local travel agent. I asked her nicely why she did not just book it through them. She told me that her travel agent told her that she did not have time for her until this weekend and that after talking with me it became very clear that I knew much more about the Sandals product than her travel agent did. I asked her for some specifics, since I knew I was writing this article. She said, one point was that she had discussed with me the ability to use her signature points and I had told her that we did this all the time and went over the procedure. She told me that her travel agent did not even know what signature points were. I closed the sale for $10,000 plus some extras in about 1 hour and the issue of price never came up. I gave her a price and she gave me a credit card.

Separate yourself from the crowd!