Travel agents have come in for a barrage of criticism for a lack of creativity — but is this fair and why aren’t agents thinking out of the box?
Tourism boards have been expressing frustration at a lack of innovation employed by the travel trade when it comes to selling travel.
According to Karim Mekachera, Middle East director, Atout France there is scant enthusiasm on the part of agents to attempt to veer away from ‘tried-and-tested’ destinations.
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And on top of that, a lack of creativity in selling strategies. “Our potential is not exploited as it should be,” says Mekachera.
“Here you can find some brochures with the same pictures in them for three or four years. Shouldn’t they be renewed sometimes? We give them all the tools; we give them access to a photo library of 5,000 pictures. [The trade] must be more creative.”
‘Little innovation’
And unfortunately, it appears that Atout France is not the only one with grievances about the trade’s lack of creativity, and this does appear to be a somewhat common sentiment which is echoed across the board.
Nazar Musa, managing partner at Gulf Reps believes that Gulf agents are lagging well behind their partners in Europe and the US in the way they sell travel — particularly when it comes to technological innovation and “decision influencing”.
“Regional agencies are selling travel in the same way they have been for many years. There has been little innovation in the region and you’d be hard pressed to find even an agency with a bookable website, let alone any of the types of innovation that is currently seen in Europe or the States,” he says.
Musa is disappointed with travel agencies’ failure to latch on to the benefits of selling ancillary products — such as car hire, insurance, transfers, tours, even attraction and theatre tickets — as these can generate significant income for an agency and are the kinds of products that will “supplement commissions that are no longer available from airlines and are reducing from hotels.”
Musa adds it’s high-time travel agents moved on from creating packages by “adding hotels to flights to areas clients want to go” and moved into becoming “decision influencers”.
“It’s something regional agencies tend not to do.
“The issue is clearly training or moreover a lack of it. If an agent hasn’t got the knowledge or freedom to recommend then this will not happen.
“In my opinion there needs to be a double approach — a focus on increasing the methods of booking (online, mobile, etc) and a focus on offering products consumers want, that will also generate an income for the agency,” he says.
Not interested in training?
So does it all come down to a lack of training? Are travel agents in the region just not given enough training options to offer clients every possiibility out there?
Well perhaps it’s not that simple. Mekachera points out that the tourism board has made major investment into “helping agents to discover the product”. “We have organised many fam trips to the destination.
We give them all the tools, and we invite them on a regular basis,” but despite this he says the impact has been limited.
Jacqueline Campbell, managing director of The Travel Collection, also reports a “lack of interest” from the trade when it comes to many of the training opportunities on offer.
“I feel that through the workshops, sales meetings and presentations the travel industry provides to agents, their interest in participating is to me a sign that they are not interested in creative selling,” she said.
“It could be a time factor or a lack of ability to travel to experience what they are selling,” she adds.
Campbell is keen to point out that travel agents’ level of initiative “varies quite a lot” throughout the GCC, depending on how demanding clients are, but in general she agrees that agents “could definitely be more creative in the way they sell.”
She highlights the huge potential market for well-being travel products, such as weight management and detox — rarely promoted by agents here in the Gulf, which remains a largely untapped market.
“Agents could sell more individual style — such as adventure travel to destinations such as Vietnam or South America and places ‘not as hot’ as others,” she suggests.
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