Travel, Business, Tech

Tips to start an online travel agency in 2020

Written by Qasim Hussain · 6 min read >

A travel business or agency is very easy to start online, but in this business there are already many competitors who are already established. To start a travel agency you need to cover different points strategically to compete with your competitors. A proper marketing plan will help you to boost your start with proper traditional and digital marketing strategies.

You can start or run your travel agency from home by investing from a very low level. To start a travel agency business online you don’t need to set up any office or need any kind of professional guide to start an online travel agency, you can manage your online business from your home. After getting response or success you can create a physical location for your travel agency business and set up a proper office by hiring professional staff.

There are many travel businesses who start their business just from home and later they got business of millions of dollars. After that they just start their business by hiring the professional staff with proper offices.

Here, we are going to discuss the tips to start an online travel agency in 2020 that will help you to boost your business online.

Tips to start an Online travel agency in 2020

Start Planning in Advance

If you are interested in setting up an online travel agency then you need to start overall business planning in advance means you need to plan your business from every point of view from start to end. Don’t try to start your online business in a hurry because this will create issues for your business setup related to budget and management.

If you want to start your travel agency from home then you need to find a host travel agency company. The host agency will help you to become an independent contractor. For such a type of business you need a straightforward business plan that will help you to start a travel agency.

On other hand if you want to start a travel agency company on your own then you need to follow a step by step approach and move up gradually from one stage to another stage, this process will be a very lengthy journey to develop your own travel agency.

Need to know your Niche well

There are many travel agencies and other businesses related to travel and tourism in a given locality. They just grab the market and many potential customers due to their aggressive marketing strategy and proper business plan. 

So, how you will grab the potential customers for your new travel business!

You have to do everything to stand your business between your competitors. For this, first you need to ensure what unique travel and tour services your competitors are giving to their customers then you need to plan your business and update your services and make them unique. In other words you need to know your niche well to compete in the market with your competitors.

Before starting a travel agency, do some market research about your competitors and other travel businesses, how they are serving to their customers and what kind of unique travel & tourism services they are providing.

For example, you can start a travel business which is for the newly married couples, where you can provide them travel services in form of honeymoon package which is a very unique plan that will help you to get potential customers plus you also need to think about a unique name for your travel business that will help you to stand your travel business in travel business market.

Use a host travel agency

When you are going to start anonline travel agency or a business, you should think about using a host travel agency or business. Most of the independent travel agents go for the host travel agencies and other travel agents who are experienced in travel agency business start their own acceridition with their own business plan.

If you are new in travel agency then you should go for the host travel agency it will help you to start a travel business with low cost investment and high commission. This will help you to get the experience about travel agency business and help you to understand workflow.

Finalize your funding resources

Another complicated point that you need to remember during the planning of a travel business is your funding resources.

From where you will get the funds for your travel business?.

Fund resources totally depend upon what type of travel agency or business that you want to run. If you want to start a travel agency on your own without a host travel business then you need a huge amount of money or loan from a bank.

But for an online travel agency you just need to invest on your online platforms like websites and marketing platforms (social media marketing platforms etc). You can easily run an online travel agency with low investment.

In both cases you need funding resources to start your travel agency and for marketing purposes to get potential customers for your business. In both cases for online and offline travel business you need a website to boost your business.

So, for the travel business you need to explore different funding resources like loans, venture capital funding etc to start the business.

Create a brand strategy

After you know your niche very well and after getting funding resources for your business. You need to start creating a brand image strategy for your travel agency that will explain your business in front of an online and offline audience so they can easily understand your travel business and convert into potential customers. Branding is all about how you make your customer feel about your brand or business and services that you are offering to your clients.

You should be able to give a specific reason to your customer to use your services that your travel agency offers and not only book a trip or tour from your website. 

In the USA most travel agencies give one day trial of a trip to their customers. This will attract the travellers to your business and convert them into potential customers.

In brand strategy, the logo of the company creates a strong brand image in front of the audience and a unique logo will let you know your customer about your travel business. Because your audience will see your logo everywhere on your website, marketing platforms, flyers and brochures etc, so your brand logo should be unique and impressive because a logo is a symbol of any company.

Hire Employees for your travel business

A travel business needs professional employees to provide the basic professional services.

These professionals are very important in your company because they will perform fundamental tasks that will help you to run your business smoothly. For example for your company’s website you need to hire a professional Travel Technology Partner or a Website developer & designer for the development of your company’s website.

You also need a graphic designer to create innovative designs for your company’s marketing material that will help you to boost your business.

Build Relationship with your Customers

Business is not built by just creating amazing marketing campaigns. You need to build a strong relationship with your customers by creating a trust between the customer and company. A strong relationship always builds with your customers by giving them good services and this will lead you to satisfied customers.

Always try to keep in touch with your customers by sending them new services or packages that your company offers through email, social media and by SMS service. Tell them how important they are for your company or business.

Encourage People/Customers to share content

As a travel agency you should engage your customers with your business. There is a way to ensure that your customer is engaged with your business.

Ask your customer to share their reviews/feedback or images of the tour on your website that will help you to boost your business and a positive impact on new customers or visitors of the website. You can also start a competition on your social media or website like you can ask your customers to start sharing the best picture of their tour and you will select the best picture and give them a prize. These strategies will help you to boost your business.

Create a blog on your website

Blog is a powerful platform from where you can reach out to new customers or visitors. You can create a blog on your website where you can discuss different issues of travel agencies that they are facing or issues faced by travelers. 

This will help you to reach new people or visitors for your business and people start visiting your website or blog having interest in travel & tourism.

With travel issues or travel agency issues you should provide solutions related to these problems then you can easily engage more customers for your company and convert them into your potential customers.

Try to make your blog more attractive creating infographics and videos because people love to watch videos and love to read information in infographics.

Optimize your travel business website

There are many websites related to any business including travel agencies. Your travel agency website also has many online competitors in the form of websites related to your business. People use different search engines to search online like Google, Yahoo and Bing and people will visit or click on those results, appear on the first page of the search engine result.

So, if your website does not appear in top search results then you will lose the traffic or customers.

So, therefore you need to optimize your website with those keywords that are used by the visitors to search the travel websites. To optimize your website you can hire a professional SEO expert or do it by yourself by learning SEO techniques (On-Page, Off-Page SEO).

Use Social Media Platform to boost your travel business

Social Media Platforms isn’t just a medium of communication with your friends and family, but a medium that you can use for your any business or travel business to market about your services that you are providing.

You can also advertise your services on these social media platforms like FacebookTwitter, and Instagram etc. You can start paid advertisement on these platforms from a very low budget to boost your company’s services.

You can use Social media platforms to show new services or packages and reduction in prices to your customers. You can share photos, video and other content on your social media accounts.

You can also invite people and your customers to give reviews for your business on your social media accounts that will help you to boost your business.

Conclusion

When you are going to plan an online travel business first you need to know about your Niche. Start research about the business which niche will attract the customers. You can use websites, social media platforms, and other tools to promote your business online. Engage your customer by implementing different strategies like reduction in prices, new packages and improvement in services.

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