For years, the travel industry has been dominated by this “We offer everything under the sun, with an extra dose of sunshine,” mentality.
Travel agents have been encouraged by their host travel agencies to fall in line with this mindset and sell everything from bottom-dollar weekend cruises, to top-of-the-line month-long getaways. Which when you step back and look at this approach at a macro level, it is not only puzzling, it is simply poor business sense.
Go by any news stand and flip to the business section and you will find articles on the continuing decent of many industry-dominating big box stores. While there are a number of reasons for this, including technological advances and changing consumer shopping preferences, one undoubtedly cannot deny that overlooking the benefits of specialization has been a contributing factor.
Big box stores including Sears, Kmart, and most recently Toys “R” Us have all faced bankruptcy partially due to a core business model failure and a refusal to adapt in the face of shifting market demands.
The core belief behind big box stores inherently revolves around one-stop-shopping. Over time, and with ever-increasing purchasing options in the marketplace, generalization is a strategy that consumers are ever-increasingly less tolerant of.
A huge reason the marketplace is rejecting generalization boils down to one thing; customer service.
When a company offers an enormous variety of products, customer service inherently suffers due to the watered-down training that its employees receive in order to cover a mass amount of information in a relatively short on-boarding process.
A relatable example is the type of customer care one usually receives at Walmart. While the options are endless, unless one goes in knowing exactly what they are looking for, one could get lost in a sea of choices with little to no guidance on finding the product that is right for them because it would be impossible for employees to have specialized knowledge ranging on everything from butter to bicycle pumps.
In short, “jack of all trades, master at none” can lead to undesirable customer retention rates. Which is why it would be foolish for host travel agencies and their travel agents to believe that they would be excluded from the undeniable business truth that there is strength in specialization.
This paradigm shift from focusing on everything, to specializing in a few key areas has the potential to prove crucial for people seeking to sell travel in today’s market.
Specializing in one area such as a singular resort chain, or a specific type of vacation package has a number of benefits including smaller learning curves upon entry into the industry, a narrowed sales focus, and a higher perception of authority among prospective clients.
Typically, when someone becomes a travel agent their welcomed with a sea of informational material coming from a swarm resort chains and are expected to at least breeze over them. And while some information will be retained, most will be lost.
This is a problem that travel industry veteran, Burt Kramer recognized and has sought to change in his latest venture Luxevo Vactions. When he founded Luxevo Vacations, he structured the business to revolve around specialization and customer service, which has been a major factor in the development of the company’s culture.
Luxevo Vacations has gone as far as refusing to follow industry norms and call their representatives travel agents, but rather brand them as Travel Specialists.
“After spending over 15 years in the travel industry, we noticed that the travel agents who had a narrower focus on what they sold tended to do better. They were more knowledgeable, made more sales, and their client were more loyal to them. When we started Luxevo Vacations we wanted to set up our Travel Specialists for success by educating them, showing them the value of specialization, and providing them with the tools to be successful,” Burt told LXVN.
Luxevo Vacations Travel Specialists are also armed with the knowledge of what resort chains and tour companies have renowned customer service, so they don’t waste their time burning bridges with clients who get sent to resorts that aren’t everything they say they are.
Luxevo Vacations is seeking to revolutionize the travel industry with a culture that is customer-service based and specialization driven. In a marketplace where customer service is significant, and specialization is demanded, Luxevo Vacations may just have the key to standing out.
