If you are running a travel agency, then you can probably vouch for the fact that managing a FIT (Frequent Independent Travel) is way more job than organizing a guided tour. While creating a fixed departure tour package is not easy per se, accommodating unique traveling requirements of an individual (or small group of < 10) and managing the self-booked itinerary calls for meticulous planning and detailed execution.
If your travel business is getting a huge deluge of FIT requests coming in, it is probably becoming cumbersome for you to attend to every Lead in a timely manner and create a memorable experience for them. This, of course, can translate into lost as well as failed business opportunities.
So, the question is, how to manage every nitty gritty of self-planned itineraries of your FIT clients? How to ensure that each and every request of your FIT clients is executed to perfection?
Well, a specialized CRM for travel agency can be the answer!
The best thing is, you are possibly using a travel agency CRM right now (in this case, you don’t have to invest in any new tool at all)! In case you are still managing your business on a spread-sheet (which of course lacks the powerful features of a CRM and is difficult to share), it is high time to get a specialized travel agency CRM to better manage your business and increase your revenue.
But the question is how exactly a tailor-made CRM for travel agency can help you plan and execute FITs with more peace of mind?
Here’s some pro-tips on how you can leverage the power of the travel agency CRM for planning and executing FITs with 100% perfection.
As per a study conducted by Insidesales.com, 50% of buyers choose vendors who response first.
This fact alone makes it crucial for your business to minimize the response time for every lead, and more so for FIT leads. For, when you are all excited to create a vacation itinerary on your own, you want response and you want them fast!
So, here’s how a specially built CRM for travel agency can help you respond to and nurture the FIT leads:
#1. A powerful CRM lets you capture all your raw leads (from various sources) in one place. But the best CRM for travel agency walks the extra mile and sort the leads for specific Fixed Departure Tours and generic inquiry. In most cases, the generic inquiries are for FITs!
When you know the interest of each lead, the first-response call can be much informative, which in turn can go a long way in converting the lead into a customer.
#2. While there may not be much measurable data on whether FIT requires more nurturing than Fixed Departure Tours, there is no denying the fact that you have to engage in a much-detailed communication with your FIT customers.
A customized CRM for travel agency facilitates in-depth communication in form of scheduling follow-up tasks, viz – calls, emails, and events (setting up meetings and storing them in an intuitive calendar). For your FIT customers, you can track all this communication in your CRM, so that there is no confusion about the finalized details.
A huge amount of time is wasted by agencies to get complete details of the customer (such as Passport details, Date of Birth, etc.) once the trip is finalized. Storing these details in one place and keeping them handy all the time (well, there’s no telling where the itinerary will take you) is crucial for most FITs, especially the cross-border ones.
A cloud-based travel agency CRM lets you store all the essential details on cloud and lets you access them though your laptop or mobile device anytime, anywhere.
So, no matter how remote a place your customer is planning to visit, you’ll never be out of your water!
A typical scenario which travel agencies face is coordinating with various vendors for availing different services (such as lodging, transportation, sight-seeing, etc.) for their customer.
Travel Agency CRM addresses this concern by creating a vendor database in the system and managing all their contacts. The CRM can then send reservation requests via automated email, track their responses and record the payments made to the vendors.
In the case of FITs where you may have to engage multiple vendors as per the customer’s requirements, this vendor management module comes real handy for calculating commissions and generating quotations.
Creating a quote for FIT travel is a pain!
You have to take into account every expense, starting from traveling expense till hotel and activity booking, as per the preference of the customer. Moreover, you may have to include any number of special requests from the customer in the quotation as well.
Thus, creating a FIT quotation involves counting all these expenditures, calculating commission for various vendors and calculating your profit. When done manually, this complex calculation takes a lot of time and not to mention possess the capacity of giving you a severe headache!
The best travel agency CRM automatically calculates all these factors (based on finalized rates from various vendors) and generates detailed FIT quotation quickly, sans any effort on your part!
When it comes to travel business, referrals and reviews are crucial for driving sales!
So, when the trip is over and the customer is happy, you can use the travel agency CRM to leverage this mood by sending testimonial requests.
The best CRM for travel agency lets you send testimonial forms in just one click from inside the CRM. Once your customer submits the form, it automatically gets stored inside the CRM.
By getting testimonials in a hassle-free way, you are not only managing your existing customers to perfection but also driving future sales.
While the main functionality of a CRM is to manage the sales funnel, a customized travel agency CRM can do much more for your travel business.
Putting your CRM to maximum work and leveraging its power to create FITs to perfection is easier than it looks.
For getting your very own CRM for travel agency or to know more cool tips on how to use your tailored CRM for growing the business, get in touch with our travel agency CRM experts here!