Richelle joined Goway Travel in 2014 and has held several positions during her tenure. She was promoted to General Manager of Goway’s Idyllic Islands division last year which oversees travel to exciting destinations such as Tahiti, Fiji, Maldives, Greece and the Seychelles.

A veteran in the industry, Richelle brings over 20 years of experience driving sales, overseeing successful marketing campaigns, and creating once-in–a-lifetime itineraries.

She fell in love with travel to the South Pacific early on and has spent most of her career promoting travel to Australia, New Zealand and the beautiful islands of the South Pacific.

Richelle lives with her husband in Toronto, Ontario and spends her free time travelling the world and immersing herself with the local culture. Read the rest of this entry »

When it comes to a world tour, it means to go and explore. There are a number of tours which exist and you will need to understand what each one of them really means. There is the hosted, independent, and escorted tour. The independent tour means that you are traveling on your own. This is where the travel company only takes the initiative to book your hotel and then seating on your own for any train or boat rides. When you land in the country you are going to, you will have to find your way to the hotel and make arrangements of what and where you want to go and see on your own. Read the rest of this entry »

With so much going on in the world, it has become more difficult to focus on the task at hand. Multitasking seems to have become a survival skill. But here is where I disagree: Multitasking is a shortcut to disaster.

You can’t allow your attention span to drift away from what you are doing at the moment. Becoming distracted is often considered normal. You simply can’t be considered normal in this regard.

If your primary responsibility is to help people, then it is in your best interest to pay attention to the people you are trying to help. Reality teaches us, as well as my personal experience, that your mind will wander at times. If you have a short attention span (like I do), knowing that you do is 99% of the battle. Read the rest of this entry »

When a 178-year old company goes belly up it is no fun for anyone! Six hundred thousand travelers were stranded around the globe as the Thomas Cook Group ceased operations on September 22, 2019. And while this was a nightmare for the British government who repatriated 150,000 residents at no cost to the travelers, many others were not so lucky. But the collapse of the world’s oldest travel brand was not the only casualty. Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

Biting the hand that feeds you makes no sense. It never has and never will. Although this reminder originated with pet dogs in mind, it also holds true when dealing with a sometimes-challenging customer base.

Treating your customers, any customer, as the enemy is less than intelligent. In fact, it is stupid, dumb and moronic, and shows a serious lack of understanding. Don’t fall prey to such behavior.

As bizarre as it sounds, the “me against you” selling mentality, more often than not, represents a common selling scenario. Read the rest of this entry »

You’ve probably heard of the company founded by Torstein Hagen in 1997, which earned a Guinness World Record for christening the most ships ever in a single day, a whopping 16. In fact, Viking has more river cruise vessels operating in Europe than any other company, with more than 50 in the fleet.

Established in 1997, Viking River Cruises acquired KD River Cruises in 2000. The California-based company now operates a remarkable fleet of more than 60 river cruise vessels throughout Europe, Russia & the Ukraine, China and Southeast Asia, and Africa. And, that doesn’t include Viking’s award-winning ocean-going vessels Read the rest of this entry »

If you’re seriously into gardening, the odds are that you might visited the annual RHS Chelsea Flower Show in London, but what you may not know is that between April and September, they organise 7 more wonder-filled gardening events in the UK. Four of them take place in April and May with four more spread across June, July and September. Five of them are in the London area with another on the edge of the Cotswolds and another in Cardiff. The Chatsworth and Tatton Park events are both in the northwest of England and, while it’s very easy to include them in a circular tour that starts and finishes in London, you can do your customers a big favour by booking them onto one of the growing number of non-stop flights Read the rest of this entry »

Budapest is a treasure of Eastern Europe, an architectural wonder of baroque and neoclassical. Located on the famous Danube River, its beauty is from a time that memorializes eras of classical music and Roman roots. The sights, the food, and nightlife combine into a fantastic foray into the “Paris of the East.” Read the rest of this entry »

Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. The old saw reminds us to “walk a mile in another person’s shoes before making a judgment call.”

This particular mistake, I am afraid, is common to the majority of sales professionals. They spend too much time self-absorbed… dreaming about their next sale or acquisition. Their time would be better spent trying to identify the current feelings of their prospects. Read the rest of this entry »

You must give the communication skill called “listening” more than just lip service. You have to actually hear what the other person is saying and make every effort to understand what is being said.

Not listening to what others are saying is a mistake. Nobody cares about what you want or think, unless it ties directly to what your customer is interested in. I don’t know how to make this complicated or drawn out. Once you get the customer speaking freely and comfortably about their ideas, wants, needs and desires, you’re bound to witness a sale unfold before your very eyes. Read the rest of this entry »

Costa Rica is already known as one of the premiere spots for its forests and beaches. But to the very south of the country is a remote peninsula that has maintained its untamed ways. Miles and miles of pure rainforest meet empty beaches. The water is the blue of serenity, while surfable waves crash near the shores. The Osa Peninsula is where nature still reigns supreme, and the Tico (a colloquial term for a native of Costa Rica) life of old carries on as it always has. Read the rest of this entry »

If you want to get to the top of this profession, you have to stop worrying about yourself and start thinking about helping others. Sounds absurdly simple. It isn’t.

Your primary goal is to stop selling and to start helping others.

When you appear to be selling, more often than not you come across looking push and even a bit aggressive or manipulative. Nobody I know enjoys being “sold.” You? Read the rest of this entry »

If you have been reading my column for the last three weeks you are now familiar with the fifteen marketing mistakes lurking around every corner.

It is now time to introduce you to the ten Sales Mistakes I want you to avoid making at all costs.

Mistake #1 often resembles the old “bait and switch” sales tactic. The outdated sales reputation of having gift of gab no longer has a place in business today. There’s no need for memorizing and rehearsing come backs and proactive sales pitches. After taking the time to understand one’s particular buying motives, your one and only recourse is to simply recommend what you feel is best for the buyer. Read the rest of this entry »

I have made the trip around the sun 57 times; and at this point, very few things shock me. I have made that same trip around the sun 21 times as a travel professional; and as in life, few things shock me. That is until I read the Travel Agent Income Report for 2019 from Host Agency Reviews.

Steph Lee, Mary Stein and the rest of the team do an outstanding job across the board. If you are with a host, or are considering a host—this is mandatory reading. If you are serious about travel—it’s still mandatory reading. Anyhow, I like things simple. I like books with short words, big fonts, and lot of images. So the Host Agency Reviews infographic was perfect for me. So what shocked me? Read the rest of this entry »

We are a “deal” obsessed culture, and the “lowest price” mentality seems to be predominant everywhere. As business people, however, it behooves us to think cautiously about any business strategy focusing on price as a way of attracting attention to our services.  Not only are we training our clients to hone in on exactly the wrong issues, we also deeply damage the integrity of our own brands in the process.

Here’s the problem:  At its best, travel planning has an enormous emotional component. But when price becomes the centerpiece of the exercise, the emotional keystones take a back seat to logic and math.

Our clients really want value, but they instinctively think in terms of “price.” As the professional in the relationship, you must watch for this dangerous shift in perspective and guide the client back to thinking in terms of value. Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

This is Marketing Mistake #15 of 15. Everything worthwhile takes longer than first imagined. I didn’t make this up. It simply is the way the world spins; and people will not buy when the time is right for you. They will buy when the time is right for them.

When will that be? Who knows? Read the rest of this entry »

Europe has more navigable rivers than any other region in the world, and arguably more diverse cultures along its river banks than almost any other region. Cruising the entire length of the Rhine, Main and Danube rivers alone—made possible thanks to the Main–Danube Canal—exposes travelers to 10 countries. Along the way are charming villages, fabled cities, fairy-tale castles, vineyards and more—all accessible from your floating hotel. However, this is far from the only inland artery. Germany also boasts the Moselle, Neckar and Elbe rivers, while France showcases the Loire, Seine, Saône and Rhône, and these are but two countries. Then there are rivers that even intrepid travelers may have never heard of Read the rest of this entry »

This is the second to last reminder in our mistake avoidance campaign. I told you they could not be confused as rocket science. They all will serve you well as game-changing reminders when you find yourself slipping into a mediocre, sloppy, lazy frame of mind.

Today’s reminder warns us of the danger of treating each marketing tactic as an end to itself. You see every piece of the business puzzle has a next step… or should have.

Here is a simple example, and I hope it will make sense to you. Read the rest of this entry »

A while back, my family decided we should all go to the casino for an afternoon of fun, and maybe even a little profit. Now, I am not a big gambler; but, I figured, it costs at least a hundred bucks to see a movie these days. So, I was fine with a few hours.

One of the players at our blackjack table kept repeating these words, “Go big or go home.” As a businessperson, I am used to taking calculated risks; but I have to admit we gambled big with the future of our travel agency. Read the rest of this entry »