Travel Planners International (TPI), a Florida-based host
agency with more than 3,000 independent agents, launched a consumer-focused website and social media
campaign as part of a drive to attract younger clients and travel agents.
“It's come from a need to attract and connect to new
travelers,” said Ken Gagliano, TPI president, in an interview with Travel
Weekly's Home-Based Agent Eletter. “Our suppliers are telling us to get the new
traveler, and we need new blood in the industry. To attract new agents, you
have to market completely differently.”
The new website and social media campaign has two parts: to
draw millennial-age travelers to TPI travel agents and to attract that same
demographic to a career as a travel agent. Currently, the average age of TPI
agents is 51, according to Gagliano.
“That's good because experience is awesome, but we need the
next generation of agents,” Gagliano said. “We want to put our recruiting
efforts into agents who are 25 years old.”
TPI has contracted with The Work Creative, a Lake Mary,
Fla.-based marketing and consulting firm, to help run the social media campaign
to draw younger travelers.
The company also has hired Melissa Bell, a social media
marketing specialist formerly with the Orlando-based Think Agency, as new
manager of marketing and communications. Bell oversees a new team assigned to
Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook and other social media as well as email
marketing, print and online advertising and website messages.
The first step of the TPI rebranding, which includes its new
logo, was unveiled in January with a redesigned website. It features a “find a
travel agent” feature that links to TPI agents and is clearly designed for
consumers.
The previous TPI website only catered to those looking for a
host agency, Gagliano said. The host agency opportunity is still promoted, but it's
secondary.
“We're going after younger clients and driving them to our
suppliers and, at the same time, exposing them to the opportunity to become a
travel agent,” he said. “We know there are a lot of young people who would love
to be a travel agent but don't know the opportunity exists."
TPI's independent agents participate in the new website's
“find a travel agent” feature as part of their membership package. For added
fees, they can participate at higher levels that give them more exposure to
consumers through promotions and marketing that match them to clients, Gagliano
said.
Also as part of the new program, TPI started Onward
Traveler, a weekly email travel newsletter with destination and travel product
news that consumers sign up to receive. It's promoted through the #theonwardtraveler
social media hashtag.
TPI is a member of Ensemble Travel Group, a consortium that
also features an agent search feature on its website. The TPI website and
search feature is different in that it is clearly aimed at consumers and is
“more robust” in pointing consumers to TPI agents based on specialty and
geographic location, Gagliano said.
“Millennials by
nature want someone to do the work for them,” he said. “They want a unique
experience and something that not anyone else has done. A travel agent can do
both those things for them. It's a no-brainer; they just need to be introduced
to a travel agent.”