MTA executive Don Beattie has revealed the most common traits of high performing home-based travel advisors, from investing in their own education to continually marketing their business and offering highly personalised service.
“Some unsuccessful people will say, ‘I don’t have time to work on my education and development’,” Beattie explained in an interview for Travel Daily’s new virtual event, Home Ex.
“The problem is, that’s what’s going to give you the key to get new customers.”
According to Beattie, MTA has focused on offering plenty of education opportunities for its agent network over the last 10 to 15 years.
“MTA is so invested in educating local advisors that we have a team of 18 travel agents who support those people by doing their bookings while they’re away on famils,” he said.
“I think education is everything.”
Successful home-based agents are also continually marketing their own business, Beattie added.
“The funny thing about marketing is most people will say, ‘When should I market? When I’ve got the time.’ Wrong answer. If you’ve got time, you haven’t got business,” Beattie warned.
And most importantly, high-performing advisors take the time to offer personalised service, going beyond “knowing their customer’s date of birth or dog’s name”, he added.
Instead, it’s about having a deep understanding of a customer’s interests and desires and having the ability to inspire them even further.
“For example, if I was a skier, somebody might come to me and say, ‘I know you’ve done skiing, but have you tried snowboarding on fresh snow?’” Beattie explained.
“I’d like them to stretch me a little bit as a customer. I don’t want to be pigeonholed into my age group that looks at [particular] things.”
Home Ex is now live and features a program filled with inspiring and practical content tackling the challenges and opportunities for home-based travel advisors.
Other speakers include industry legend Wendy Wu; iTravel CEO Steve Labroski; 1000 Mile Travel Group CEO Nicola Veltman; Home Travel Company’s Robyn Sinfield and Mike and Mandy Dwyer from Main Beach Travel; and plenty more.
Attendees can also browse the virtual exhibition hall, featuring stands from a diverse range of suppliers including Royal Caribbean, Expedia, CVFR, Journey Beyond, Oceania and more.
To watch Beattie’s interview for Home-Ex, you can register for free HERE.
