Understanding Some Crucial Psychological Shifts
Let’s begin by examining a few business precepts for marketing your travel practice. We need to agree on these fundamental ideas to launch your business plan on a solid ground. We will first address five crucial psychological shifts we need to undertake in our thinking.
Why are these psychological shifts important? Consumers largely do not understand what you do as a travel professional. In fact, what we have to realize is there are times when even we mistake our own mission. Let’s begin by examining what we really do as travel professionals. |
In every profession, there is a group of people who do exceptionally well in the execution of their discipline. This is the top 20%, the ones earning the income they want, the ones with the free time they want. You read about them in trade magazines and even in consumer publications. They are hosted by trade shows to meet with suppliers and those suppliers respect their ability to pull off their business strategies. Their websites and Facebook page are littered with client testimonials. The difference between the top 20% of any profession and the balance of the population is often no more than a mindset, a way of thinking about their business. You are capable of whatever you want to achieve, but it is necessary to adopt some of the psychological shifts we are about to discuss. Intellectually, I don't think you will disagree. However, the trick is to develop muscle memory of integrating this discussion into your travel practice. You need to be able to think and act automatically, without hesitation.
Consider each of these little psychological shifts. Think about integrating them into your travel practice. As you start to implement them be hyper-conscious of the way that you're thinking about travel and seek to put each mindset to use.
Consider each of these little psychological shifts. Think about integrating them into your travel practice. As you start to implement them be hyper-conscious of the way that you're thinking about travel and seek to put each mindset to use.
Psychological Shift #1: You Don’t Sell Travel
You don't sell travel; you sell yourself! It seems so obvious but often our language and actions say otherwise. Your clients can get travel on the Internet, magazines, newspapers, the wholesale club, and other travel agents. They can even buy travel directly from suppliers.
Your clients do not need you to “buy travel.” Your clients need you to help them make intelligent buying decisions. Help your clients by intelligently being their travel coach and advisor. You are not sitting on the opposite side of the table handing your client travel product, like a seller of travel. You are instead on the same side of the table evaluating the possibilities, like a travel consultant.
The truly great thing about selling yourself is that you can't be found cheaper on the Internet. You are unique. For better or for worse, your company is going to walk and talk exactly like you do. To make the best of your personality, place it at the center of your company. |
Your website and all marketing collateral should be about you and the value you add to travel, the benefits your clients receive by working with you. Your website and marketing should not be about travel product or suppliers.
Simply sell yourself and the benefits of working with you.
Psychological Shift #2: Travel Transactions should happen in the context of a relationship
Living from transaction to transaction is a terrible way to make a living. There are those who would argue that there's no such thing as relationship sales. My thinking, however, is it's everything in a one-to-one business like travel consulting. You want to build relationships. You want to have clients who think of you as their travel consultant, you want them to take ownership of you.
Unfortunately, too many travel professionals live transaction to transaction. We SELL a cruise, then a FIT tour, and then off to HELP the client on a business trip. Those are fine transactions but the core of your travel practice needs to be relationships. Transactions should have a context of trust in planning travel together. You want your clients to come to you because they would not think of planning travel without you. In order to fully develop a relationship you have to create an atmosphere of trust. In a transaction you have to “close the sale.” In a traditional sales technique, the “close” is the penultimate step with a great deal of urgency and stress. In a relationship, the sale is often closed before the client even comes to your door because you are the person who handles their travel arrangements you are “their travel professional.” |
In order to have that absolute sense of trust, you have to become entirely client-centric. The client’s needs are at the center of everything you do. You strive to ask the client the proper questions about who, what, where, why and when of what this particular trip is all about. The more you know about the client, the better you can meet their needs.
As in every relationship, it takes two to tango. You also explain to the client something about yourself: Tell them who you are, what you do, how you do it and the benefits of working with you. Demystify travel for them. Translate the features of your travel practice into benefits. i.e., Don’t simply say you’ve been in the business for 10 years. Instead, your 10 years of experience means you know how to select the right tour operators and suppliers for your clients. Explain how your industry relationships and host agency or consortia are a collection of additional benefits for them.
Trust and good practice, plus a solid performance for your clients creates the relationship. Let’s make sure we understand the role of loyalty. We think of client loyalty as the client being loyal to us. Maybe we have that backwards! Instead we should be loyal first to the client and their needs. Then the client has reason to reciprocate loyalty. Transactions will still take place, but in the context of a relationship based on trust. The entire matter proceeds much more smoothly with less tension and with a certain confidence in the process.
As in every relationship, it takes two to tango. You also explain to the client something about yourself: Tell them who you are, what you do, how you do it and the benefits of working with you. Demystify travel for them. Translate the features of your travel practice into benefits. i.e., Don’t simply say you’ve been in the business for 10 years. Instead, your 10 years of experience means you know how to select the right tour operators and suppliers for your clients. Explain how your industry relationships and host agency or consortia are a collection of additional benefits for them.
Trust and good practice, plus a solid performance for your clients creates the relationship. Let’s make sure we understand the role of loyalty. We think of client loyalty as the client being loyal to us. Maybe we have that backwards! Instead we should be loyal first to the client and their needs. Then the client has reason to reciprocate loyalty. Transactions will still take place, but in the context of a relationship based on trust. The entire matter proceeds much more smoothly with less tension and with a certain confidence in the process.
Psychological Shift #3: Value is not the same as cost
Value is not the same as cost. Repeat over and over! Print out this picture and post it somewhere in your office. Your clients are going to naturally think in terms of cost and price. That's not surprising; they are civilians. You are the professional in the relationship. Clients will drive to the bottom line first thing every time. You, as the professional, however, must steer them back to value.
Value is important to the equation because that's really what your client cares about. They may talk in terms of cost and price, but they don’t mean it. Even when they say “I just want to get there as cheaply as possible” they don’t really mean it. If so, they would walk to Cancun instead of flying. Statements like this betray a client’s fear of paying too much. Without the advantage of the relationship you are going to form with them they are afraid of spending too much for their vacation and not getting what they most want out of it. You, trusted travel counselor, come to the rescue! Explain to them the difference between cost and value. |
Cost: is what you pay for something.
Value: is what you receive for what you pay in relationship to the cost.
Value: is what you receive for what you pay in relationship to the cost.
In that framework, I daresay that cost doesn't even really matter to your clients. They say it does, but what they really mean is "value."
Example:
An example I often use is when you go to Whole Foods and you pay $100 for groceries you're not upset you paid $100, you are upset that it all fits in one bag. If you got 10 bags of groceries for your $100 you would be ecstatic. It is not what you pay that matters, it is what you get in return. |
Another Example:
If cost were really all that mattered to consumers, I suggest Starbucks could never sell a cup of coffee for $5.00. I contend Starbucks is not selling coffee, in the same way you are not selling travel. They are selling a coffee experience, their own value-add to a cup of coffee. Sound familiar? |
The best way to express value is to speak to the side of your client’s brain that understands emotion and romance. We often make the mistake of speaking first of all to the rational side, the numbers and logistics. The romantic side of the brain is all about value. Try to cultivate the art of being a story teller. You don’t have to be Mark Twain to tell a good story. Let me give you a very simple example.
When my son was 17 and I was about 43 he and I went to Tanzania and together we climbed Kilimanjaro. We got most of the way up when he became very, very ill. We literally had to carry him off of that mountain and it was a grueling trip down. After he recuperated a bit we went on Safari and saw elephants, wild boar, the most amazing lions and the Maasai. We bonded together in a way that day-to-day life seldom allows us to bond with our children. I don’t remember what I paid for that trip because I have the memories and that is what is important.
Now as I tell that story, can you feel the emotion? I'm hoping you can. Because what I am trying to convey is how to be authentic in your storytelling. Tell a story about your own travels or tell a story about a client's travels but tell it speaking to your client’s romantic side. Romanticize the experience. Price and logistics can come later. You can tell your story well if you are authentic in your relationships with your client.
Even if you are an introvert, you can still relate to people about travel! Most everyone loves travel and loves to talk about travel. In your exchange of information about travel emphasize the memories, the experience, the way the air smells and even the way a temple bell sounds.
Do it well and your clients will understand VALUE.
When my son was 17 and I was about 43 he and I went to Tanzania and together we climbed Kilimanjaro. We got most of the way up when he became very, very ill. We literally had to carry him off of that mountain and it was a grueling trip down. After he recuperated a bit we went on Safari and saw elephants, wild boar, the most amazing lions and the Maasai. We bonded together in a way that day-to-day life seldom allows us to bond with our children. I don’t remember what I paid for that trip because I have the memories and that is what is important.
Now as I tell that story, can you feel the emotion? I'm hoping you can. Because what I am trying to convey is how to be authentic in your storytelling. Tell a story about your own travels or tell a story about a client's travels but tell it speaking to your client’s romantic side. Romanticize the experience. Price and logistics can come later. You can tell your story well if you are authentic in your relationships with your client.
Even if you are an introvert, you can still relate to people about travel! Most everyone loves travel and loves to talk about travel. In your exchange of information about travel emphasize the memories, the experience, the way the air smells and even the way a temple bell sounds.
Do it well and your clients will understand VALUE.
Psychological Shift #4: Your Passion is Important, but the client’s passions are essential
We hear about passion all the time. People get into the travel business because they love travel, because they are passionate about travel. But here we have another small psychological hurdle to overcome. You must be equally passionate about your client’s travels.
Your own passion for travel will get you into this business but it won't keep you there! Only your passion for helping others travel well will serve you in terms of working with clients. Tapping into your clients’ passion for travel means being client-centric, putting the client at the heart of the relationship. Remember, your clients are interested in themselves. Until you show your clients how they benefit from the features you and travel offer, they will not fully understand your presentation. So if your client says they want to travel with family, then talk about their kids or spouse, and talk about the opportunity for building memories. Reach into your clients passion for travel or for those activities for which they travel. |
You must be passionate about:
That's not manipulation or sales. You are romancing the client in order to capture critical information to ensure that they have the trip they really want, desire and deserve.
- wanting to help others travel well
- experience all that travel has to offer
- the community of travel
That's not manipulation or sales. You are romancing the client in order to capture critical information to ensure that they have the trip they really want, desire and deserve.
Psychological Shift #5: Train Your Clients
Finally, train your clients! As a professional, you are in charge of the tenor of the relationship. Remember, your clients don't understand what you do. Your clients think you sell travel. This misapprehension will cause them to shop you around unless you explain how you work and what you expect to them.
From the beginning of your relationship with a client, explain what you do. Explain how you work and research in the context of the benefits that they receive working with you. Explain your training, your niche markets and expertise, your relationship with suppliers, peers, your consortia, and host agency. Empower your clients. Be authentic with them. Be confident. Explain you don’t sell travel. Your mission is to coach them into making good purchasing decisions. You know they are going to be researching right alongside you so encourage them to bring anything they find, absolutely anything. Then you can evaluate it together. Educate and demystify travel for them. They will value the way you put them and their needs in the center of the relationship. Training your client from the outset in this manner educates the client on your role and the client's responsibility, properly setting expectations. Make sure your explanation is client-centric, speaking to the benefits the client receives working with a travel professional. |
Then ask for something in return:
Mr. Client,
I want you to know when I go to this type of effort for a client I ask only one thing. After all of our research and effort, you allow me to book your travel. This is my job, my profession. My job is to assist you in making intelligent buying decisions, and booking travel is how I get paid. If you can agree to that then our relationship is off to a brilliant start and I will work day and night to be your travel advocate. I’m there for you for the entirety of the trip and beyond. The only thing I ask in the context of this relationship is that you book your travel with me. I expect that as part of our relationship and I will do my best to find great values for you a trip. Do we have a deal?
We will return to these points again as the basis of sound travel marketing, travel sales and travel customer service.
Mr. Client,
I want you to know when I go to this type of effort for a client I ask only one thing. After all of our research and effort, you allow me to book your travel. This is my job, my profession. My job is to assist you in making intelligent buying decisions, and booking travel is how I get paid. If you can agree to that then our relationship is off to a brilliant start and I will work day and night to be your travel advocate. I’m there for you for the entirety of the trip and beyond. The only thing I ask in the context of this relationship is that you book your travel with me. I expect that as part of our relationship and I will do my best to find great values for you a trip. Do we have a deal?
We will return to these points again as the basis of sound travel marketing, travel sales and travel customer service.
Here is a video illustrating the points I have made in this lesson.
(You can get a copy of this video for yourself at www.Travelresearchonline.com and then using the Where2TravelNext menu option)
Exercise:
Write a one paragraph summary of each of the Psychological Shifts. Include your evaluation of the merits of the requested shift. Is it valid? It is worthwhile integrating into your travel practice and marketing? Is there anything problematic about the Psychological Shift as stated?
Write a one paragraph summary of each of the Psychological Shifts. Include your evaluation of the merits of the requested shift. Is it valid? It is worthwhile integrating into your travel practice and marketing? Is there anything problematic about the Psychological Shift as stated?