Last week I wrote a column on email marketing with ideas for growing your list.  A travel consultant yesterday asked for additional ideas, something she could put into use immediately. I can appreciate the desire to move from the idea stage to the action stage! So below is a list of some different tactics you might consider for growing your emails list.

Any contact you have with a potential customer is an opportunity to grow your list. Remember to keep it permission based and strive for content that is both entertaining and useful. Ask the people who sign up for your list about the kinds of travel in which they are interested and the information they would most like to see covered in your emails and communications.

But first, this word of warning: a list of tactics is no substitute for a strategy. Read the rest of this entry »

Once your email is out the door you wait for the sales to happen. Sometimes they do, and that’s a very good thing. But sales are not the only feedback you receive from your email broadcasts. Knowing how to decipher the metrics each email generates is critical to understanding how to fine-tune your successive email broadcasts.

No matter how good your list, some subscribers will hit the “unsubscribe” link in your email. If your list is any size at all, it will be a rare email that gets no unsubscribes. However, if the number of unsubscribes spikes on any given effort, try to determine why. In what way did the particular email differ from others? Subject matter? Time or day sent? Read the rest of this entry »

Thus far we have emphasized the importance of brand recognition, the subject line and good content to the success of your emails. But no matter how creative your email design, without a solid list of opt-in subscribers, your message will not bring a strong response.

It is hard to put a direct value on each subscriber to your newsletter, but suffice it to say that your readership represents a pool of clients, both existing and potential, to which you can market in an extremely cost-effective manner. Building a strong list of subscribers should be a goal on which you continually work. Patience is the key as it takes time to accumulate a stable base of subscribers, but the end result is a very valuable asset for your agency. Read the rest of this entry »

When we first launched TRO, we surveyed what the other media was providing travel agents. From our perspective, most of the “news” being provided were supplier and destination press releases.  Essentially, the same articles were appearing in every magazine and newsletter. There was no room, or need, for another outlet for supplier “news”.  We wanted to be different. TRO wanted to produce information that travel agents could actually put to use in their travel practice immediately. Read the rest of this entry »

Clients have short memories.  That includes the client who has just returned home from the trip you arranged on their behalf. Unless you find a way to stay “top of mind”,  clients can easily be distracted by the next pretty travel opportunity that walks their way.  With every newspaper travel section, television commercials and consumer magazines filled with travel advertising, your clients will see lots of different avenues to fulfill their travel desires. You want them to think of you when they think of travel, but until you have them properly trained, it is easy for them to be distracted elsewhere. Read the rest of this entry »

A newsletter is one of the best vehicles for building long term relationships with your existing customers and for marketing to potential clients. A newsletter reinforces your company brand and gives you many opportunities to market both strategically and tactically. Newsletters educate, inform, but most importantly, engage your clients, helping to retain them over the long-term.

Satisfied subscribers to a company newsletter are more likely to choose your company when making a purchasing decision. A travel agency newsletter with a readership of dozens, even hundreds, of readers is a very serious and valuable asset for your company. It gives you a marketing channel by which you can reach out and touch the clients closest to you at a minimal expense. Read the rest of this entry »