The Travel Professional Community, which was created in 2008 by industry veterans Joanie and Tom Ogg, continues to grow. The website, which the Oggs describe as “the water cooler” for home-based travel agents, recently passed the 9,000-member mark.
The milestone shows the importance of a place for home-based travel agents to share information and connect with their peers, Joanie Ogg said in an interview.
“Just about every topic that comes up, they get on and talk about,” she said. “We’re now hosting a weekly chat on Tuesdays, and we’ve had 70 people participating, talking about things like developing niche markets. It’s the kind of thing that agents are craving.”
The site has more than 10,000 active discussion threads in which agents exchange tips, resources and information about business practices, training, job opportunities, supplier relations, marketing ideas and customer issues.
From the start, Tom Ogg said, the goal was to create a place online where professional home-based agents could meet and connect. The site has clearly hit a nerve, he said, and he believes it’s because of the professionalism of its members.
“We vet every single member so that there are no card-mill agents,” he said. “We have very strict standards. We don’t allow any flaming, arguing or soliciting. We wanted to create a safe place for home-based agents to discuss their issues and share ideas.”
About 65% to 70% of the website’s members are associated with host agencies, 15% are independent and the rest are ARC-appointed agents with traditional storefront businesses. Agents new to the industry are not accepted. Neither are executives or staffers from host agencies.
Lately, hot topics have included the Costa Concordia disaster and its impact on cruise sales, the move by agents to focus on all-inclusive resorts and the shift to specialization and niche markets.
The Oggs have a long association with home-based agents. They acquired the National Association of Commissioned Travel Agents in 1996 and sold it to ASTA in 2000.
Joanie, a 35-year industry veteran and the former owner of both traditional brick-and-mortar agencies and a host agency, now works as an industry consultant and operates www.homebasedtravelagent.com.
The couple, who split their time between homes in San Diego and Mexico’s Riviera Nayarit, are working with two industry veterans on Travel Professional Community, Sandy Elson and Nancy Norris. All have long experience in operating agent discussion forums.
“Having done this for 35 years, you know what works and what doesn’t,” Tom said. “Some discussions tend to deteriorate into arguments, and that’s something we will not tolerate. If there is unprofessional behavior, members are suspended. Everyone understands and gets with the program.”
The Oggs accept advertising on the site, but they say they are not running Travel Professional Community as a money-making venture. Membership is free, and they only take ads from suppliers that they know and trust.
They are considering expanding the site into new areas, however, such as offering seminars or fam trips. But it’s too soon to say, Joanie said. “We kind of vacillate about where to go with this. We are having fun with it, watching it grow and having people enjoy it. It’s our way of giving back to the industry.”
Visit the Travel Professional Community website at http://hbtanetwork.ning.com.