Personalized Advice for Great Travel Agents

There seems to have been a huge proliferation of travel technologies, online travel tools and specialized travel agents in the recent past. The travel industry is changing at a rapid pace and more and more travelers are now looking forward to enjoying highly personalized travel services. Things like pre-fixed tours, SIC departures and standard itineraries just don’t excite the modern day traveler. With the advent of Smartphones and apps, there’s always something directing travelers towards the nearest restaurant, the hottest beach, the best attraction or the most exciting museum. Thus, one of the main things that the modern day traveler expects from travel agents is that the travel agent should always act as a travel advisor and not merely an agent.

This makes it extremely important for travel agencies across the world to offer a high level of personalization and a superior level of service to each client. The advent of modern travel technologies also allows innovative travel agents to make the most of these online technologies and offer their clientele with niche services. This leads to the question, “how does the travel agency offer highly personalized travel services to its clients without becoming too personal or asking too many personal questions?”

The simplest way to achieve this goal is to understand the profile of each client. A vast majority of the niche travel agents prefer to stick to a few questions that allow them to understand the client’s needs and preferences as well as likes and dislikes. With this information in hand, it becomes very easy for travel agencies with the right online technologies and expertise to offer the right advice, provide a where-to-eat list, offer to-do lists and also give recommendations, making sure that each list has been customized according to the client’s requirement.

Another thing that modern day travel agents must do is that they should upgrade themselves and update themselves with the latest communication technologies. Keeping in touch with the client using their favorite medium of communication such as e-mail, Skype, Whatsapp, Viber or phone calls can also work wonders to help travel agencies create niche services and expand their clientele.

Since most online travel agents currently lack this level of sophistication, the physical travel agencies are actually managing to make the most of such services and ensure that their business doesn’t take a hit due to the growth and development of OTAs and the ease of booking flights and hotels. Given the dominance of a few OTAs in the travel industry, even the smallest add-on can work wonders in helping travel agencies to grab a larger share of the market for themselves.

Ultimately, the secret to success for travel agents functioning in the modern day travel industry is to  understand that the offline world can still adhere to demands like “I wish to fly for less than 10 hours at a stretch, I wish to go to a place that has amazing water sports and fantastic beaches and I wish to mix up my accomodation to enjoy a few nights of luxury without increasing the budget”. The online world still hasn’t managed to devise a way of catering to such demands and this is where travel agent services have an option of flourishing.