Here are 6 Sales and Marketing tips from Becky Harris that we hope brighten your day and get those brain cells fired up.All feedback and comments welcome!
THE HIGHLIGHTS: If you only remember 4 things after reading this…or read no further 🙂 :
- Know your “WHY”, your purpose, the unique “contribution and impact you want to make in the industry and to the world.”
- Find the right kind of trade “buyers” for your business (tour operators, travel agents, travel designers and online platforms) to market to.
- Just “winning” a client is only the beginning of the journey – it’s about ongoing relationships
- Your marketing and sales activities are a perfect opportunity to listen to your market and find out what problems they need you to fix and how you can both innovate and be continually improving
Also to remind you before we start of the Becky Harris world of terminology… for the B2B travel industry world, I use Marketing to mean finding new clients and Sales to mean developing more sales and profits from existing client contacts.
1. Start with “WHY”
I have started both my latest blog posts with this tip as I feel it is so important. It has always been important for a company to know its Unique Selling Point (USP) and its Vision and Mission. Knowing your “WHY” goes beyond this and is even more important in this age of Customer Centric marketing, and consumer engagement.
If you don’t know why your company exists, your purpose, and why you are different, how can you find the right customers and easily persuade them that you are a perfect match for them?
In order to know who you should be targeting in your sales and marketing work you first need to be REALLY sure of who you/your company is and what your purpose is. Then you can ensure you live that in all that you do and through that, decision making becomes easier and you can also prioritise and find the absolute RIGHT clients for you to spend your sales and marketing budget on.
Simon Sinek first came up with this principle in his brilliant, “Start with Why” which demonstrates how knowing your “WHY” (your purpose, the unique contribution and impact you want to make in the industry and to the world) provides an inspiring and motivational culture and “a filter through which you can make decisions, every day, to act with purpose”.
2. Be Selective
Travel is a HUGE industry – now the largest industry in the world and encompasses all manner of different segmentations and niches. Not all of them will fit what you are offering and it would be a waste of time and money trying to attract them. Once you have a strong sense of who you are, what your purpose is and why you are different, you then need to set about finding the right type of clients who are most likely to want what you offer.
You can waste hours of time and a lot of money using what we call the “scattergun” effect whereby you blast out communications to all and sundry, attend expensive travel shows that may not cover the area that you specialize in or meet with anyone at those events and organize time-consuming roadshows visiting offices of companies just because they agreed to see you.
As well as wasting time and money with these activities the worst aspect of all is that you then often end up winning the wrong types of clients – yes, there is a wrong type. You subsequently waste even more time, energy and money trying to make these “wrong clients” happy on things like price and product, where you never will as you just don’t offer what they want. You also waste time and money doing quote after quote that never sells as you just can’t give them – and their customers – what they need.
“I think we should break up… It’s not you…It’s me”
At Travel Kinship we suggest ensuring that creating “buyer personas” based on your WHY and knowing your target markets intimately is the foundation of your sales and marketing strategy. Take time to think about what type of company and people are most likely to be a fit for what you are all about and what you offer.
Then set out a few basic criteria to help your sales and marketing teams – they don’t have to be set in stone, but they can help to provide guidance. Target the right buyers and be strong enough to say “No” to the wrong type of buyers. I remember how empowering and freeing it was the first time a said to a tour operator, “I don’t think we are the right kind of company for you.” and how much time, stress and money it saved us not having to work for them anymore.
Timing is Everything.
Also, remember that based on what your company offers certain buyers might, in theory, be perfect but for some reason, the timing might not be quite right. Think about the different stages of product development that typically happen for an outbound Tour operators or Travel Designer and how that fits with how you market to them based on where they are in that process.
0. “Wrong Clients” – they don’t and won’t ever want to do business with you or you with them.
1. “Right but as yet Unconvinced” – they don’t realise yet that you are actually perfect for them 🙂
2.“Right but not ready” – they know you are right for them but just are not ready to start selling you / your destination for differing business reasons
3: “Perfect Match!” – Right time, right place – those perfect matches at the perfect time!
It is important to keep in touch with all of the “right type” of companies but alter your marketing strategy and communications based on what stage they might be at. Think about the differences in how often they will want to be contacted, in what ways and what they might want or not want to hear about – build that into your marketing strategy. That is where Marketing Automation can often come in very handy.
At Travel Kinship we like apply this principle to our sales strategy work as well. Where we see “Right Marketing” as targeting the right type of Tour Operators, Travel Agents, Travel Designers and Online Portals for new business, we see “Right Sales” as developing activities that make you as effective as possible in developing more sales and increasing profitability through more efficient and effective operations with your existing “right clients”…. and getting rid of any “wrong clients” that you may still be in contact with.
CONCENTRATE ON STRATEGICALLY KEY CLIENTS – NOT JUST YOUR BEST SELLERS – WHERE CAN YOU MAKE MOST IMPROVEMENT & IMPACT?
At Travel Kinship we have a whole area of work that we can offer clients on what we call our Client Development Plans aimed at improving sales, conversion and profitability with your clients in a strategic way.
We believe that for developing sales effectively it is key to concentrate on:
- the clients that really need, and can benefit from, your attention – not just the best sellers
- only concentrate on a few at a time – so that you don’t spread your resources too thin
- get tough on getting rid of clients that are just wrong for your business.
We find that the learning gained from working with just a few clients then creates lasting changes within your organization that benefit the whole sales process and thus has a positive, sustainable impact on all your clients.
3. Listen – Solve problems don’t push products – Be “customer-centric”
Don’t forget that your marketing and sales activities are a perfect opportunity to listen to your market, find out what issues and trends they are currently facing and work out how your company is going to help solve those problems for them. You need to use your marketing communications to engage (potential) customers into real, or “digital” conversations and LISTEN. Uncover what problems they have and then solve them – perfectly.
At Travel Kinship we coach travel suppliers ahead of a travel show, road show office visit or just a pre-arranged online meeting to do much more listening than talking.
Get the buyer to talk first. Ask lots of open questions like, “so tell me about your company, how it is different and what type of customers you have” and “what kind of travel experiences do you find sell best across your destinations” and “what is it that your best DMCs/Hotels do that sets them apart?” and then as quickly as possible move into, “what are you finding are the key issues and problems for your company now and looking into the future?”
Not only is this an incredible way to find out a huge amount of essential, valuable information about a (possible) client very quickly, it builds trust... it is proven that people like and trust you more if they do most of the talking and you demonstrate how interested you are in THEM by just listening. Of course, this is the best way to also check that they are the “right client” for you. 🙂
When it comes time for you to talk you can then align everything you say about your company, your ethos, systems and service, destinations and products etc to how you can help them with their issues and help support them in delighting their customers.
Be honest. If you don’t yet offer something that they need, tell them that, but then initiate a discussion with them about how you would like to work with them to get it going and work out together what the best way to do that could be. Who wouldn’t buy that?
Listen to your market – what problems do they need you to fix? Then go ahead and fix them – perfectly.
This is also why digital marketing research, social listening and feedback systems are essential for your business. These are other powerful ways for you to listen to existing and prospective clients, learn about what they need and ensure you are delivering.
4. Make it easy to sell you.
Just because you have “won” a client – a buyer has told you that they would like to start working with you – it is just the beginning of the journey. You now need to work with them to ensure that they have everything they need to make it as easy as possible to sell you. This means all the necessary information as well as the confidence and trust to sell you and send their valuable clients into your care.
The easier you can make it for a company to start selling you – the quicker you will get onto their website and into their promotional materials and the more confident their sales team will be to suggest your destination and product to their customers.
Listen to the client and be as flexible as possible. Each client has a unique situation and clientele and may need changes to make to certain aspects of the way you work. Be open to flexibility, change and negotiation.
At Travel Kinship as part of our sales and marketing support, the kind of information that we typically help suppliers to create, compile and distribute professionally include:
- Copy and high resolution, professional images (Min 1MB) for their website and marketing materials
- Create specific example itineraries, products and travel themes for the specific client
- Detailed product information and FAQs to make it easier for sales teams to get up to speed
- Clear rate books and explanations of any taxes and commission structures
- Clear discussion on booking, payment and cancellation conditions
- Sales and product team training – in person or webinars – recorded if possible ready for new staff
- FAM trips
You can store and share information, images and video using (free) online software such as WeTransfer and Dropbox to send large image files. For webinars, you can use free software such as google hangout, skype, zoom, etc…
You can also use a graphic design company like us www.roundcreative.co.uk or paid systems such as Wetu to help you produce a more professional looking “digital brochure” which fits your brand image and can be easily and cheaply distributed online.
Some DMCs build this kind of information into a password protected “Client Area” in the back of their website and some even have this system link to their live system for online prices, availability and information. Again we can help with this through our sister company Round Creative
5. Build the relationship – Make it Win-Win
I can’t stress enough that “winning” a client is only the beginning of the journey. It is the exciting start of a long-term, two-way relationship that requires loving attention on an ongoing basis and a dedication to finding win-win solutions.
The more a client trusts you, likes and understands your products, values how well you look after their customers when they are in your care, likes working with you and knows that whatever problems occur – you are going to work with them to get the best outcome for the customers, the more they are going to do their best to try and sell you.
At Travel Kinship call our work with clients in this area “Client Development Plans.” The aim is to continually improve the sales and conversion rates of both sides and create a relationship of continual improvement and closer collaboration on efficient, effective processes, product development and customer satisfaction.
It is more important than ever in the B2B travel industry to “shorten the supply chain” and “increase value added” to combat against the rising tide of direct internet-based sales. To do this effectively takes building close, collaborative working relationships and developing win-win solutions.
Make it Win-Win
Some of the ways Travel Kinship works on Client Development Plans with clients to help them create value and develop deep, long-lasting relationships with their trade clients include:
- Setting up robust measurement and reporting systems to see key performance metrics
- Study past performance to select key clients to work with
- Develop improvement strategies for each key client to work on ways to improve conversion rates through better service, product design, pricing, sales techniques, product knowledge or whatever we uncover the root cause issues to be.
- Regular sales and product team training which is tailored to the specific Tour Operator / Travel Agent client company
- Regular news updates and suggested social media posts /campaigns, blog and magazine articles to provide them with ideas for their own PR
- Combating the idea of “overrides” with investment in joint sales, PR and marketing ventures where the money is only used to develop and grow sales to the supplier in question.
- Regular face to face meetings at travel shows, office visits on roadshows, and even online video conferencing – focusing on moving business forward and not just having a catch-up chat.
- Ensuring a feedback system is in place and a regular review carried out linked to a continual improvement process
- Sales & Product team training of the DMC or Lodge/Hotel Staff
- Pick up the phone – encouraging/training all in-country staff to pick up the phone and actually call the buyer staff to discuss a sale or issue rather than just email back and forth
- Offer FAM trips as cheaply as you can – always designed with the client in mind and continually improve based on their feedback – offer FAM trips to a Tour Operators top Travel Agents with a proven track record.
- Offer Press trips through trade – verified
- Special offer annual plan
6. Data is Queen
To really improve your sales and marketing you need to ensure that you are collecting, analyzing and utilizing your sales and marketing in the best possible way – both quantitative and qualitative.
Financial data on how much you are selling and to who, sales conversion rate data on how often an enquiry actually converts to a sale, travel show feedback, consumer feedback during and after travelling, website performance analytics, ROI, social media engagement etc
Take time to think what data is really useful to report on and what may not be necessary – especially if time and resource are tight. Those of you who know me will know that my favourite sales metric is conversion rate which goes hand in hand with profitability. It often gets forgotten about.. .especially when a company is growing and sales totals are looking good.
Remember – if your conversion rate is low, even if your sales are high, you are wasting a large amount of time and effort and becoming much less profitable.
We will do more on this subject but for now, I just want to draw your attention to the importance of having systems to record and report performance data. My tips to get started would be:
- Report on your sales and conversion rates by client, country and type e.g Tour Operator, Travel Agent (Direct)
- If your current systems don’t allow you to pull the above data…. start setting up systems than can.
- Ensure you have Google Analytics set up correctly and start reporting on your website performance
We will continue to delve more into these and more issues but for now, I do hope that you found this article of interest. Please leave your comments and feedback below or email me on becky@travelkinship.com and let me know what other subjects you would like to hear about.
Contact me to find out how Travel Kinship and our sister company Round Creative can help you grow your sales and develop your marketing, profitability, product development and business reputation.
Becky Harris,
Travel Kinship
