Travel agents need to be more proactive in uncovering and responding to the needs of their clients, according to a consumer futurist.
Speaking at the 2019 TravelManagers Conference in Perth on Friday, Amanda Stevens told attendees that when it comes to connecting with customers, it’s often the questions they ask that are far more powerful than the answers they give.
“As humans, we’re only ever in one of two states: we’re either interested or we’re interesting. We can never be both,” she said.
“Curiosity is the key to growing customer engagement. Curiosity is the key to growing your business.”
Stevens encouraged agents to be more proactive in finding out what their clients need and what else they could offer them, noting that often these types of questions aren’t being asked as part of the sales process due to time pressure.
“But also, more importantly, we [as marketers and salespeople] don’t ask those questions because it often takes us outside our comfort zone, and when we’re outside our comfort zone, we’re fearful of rejection,” she said.
“I guarantee you that the fear of rejection is the number one thing holding your business back now, compared to where it could be.
“We need to get over ourselves, we need to face the fear of the rejection and do it anyway knowing that it’s actually not about better incremental income for us – it’s actually about better outcomes for our customers.”
