Cruise Planners is introducing a robust offering of 20 new tools and business enhancements for its travel agency franchise owners now and into 2022. That's what 600 Cruise Planners travel advisors and 100 travel suppliers learned at Saturday's opening session of the 2021 "Back to the Future" Cruise Planners Conference in Cancun, Mexico.
The five-day event at El Dorado Royale is the franchise agency group's first in-person conference since the pandemic began. “The power of Cruise Planners is strong,” Michelle Fee, CEO and owner, Cruise Planners, told advisors at the opening session. “We’re fighters. We aren’t going to stop innovating, marketing and helping our network grow into the future. There’s no turning back—there’s only looking ahead.”
Also describing her group’s travel advisors as “incredibly resilient,” she stressed, We’re ready to put the pandemic behind us and focus on the future of travel."
The new tools and projects are designed to improve travel advisors' efficiency, enhance agency leads, improve marketing reach, enhance service to clients, and help franchisees build their revenue.
Introducing the new options and perks (either in person or virtually) were Fee; Vicky Garcia, chief operating officer; co-owner, Brian Shultz, chief information officer; Theresa Scalzitti, chief sales officer; and Scott Koepf, senior vice president of strategic development.
So, here's a look at several of the biggest developments either here now or on the horizon for Cruise Planners agents
Automated Client Texting Communications
“Texting has changed the world and it really truly is the number one way we all communicate on a daily basis,” said Fee, pointing to recent research showing that 97 percent of adults text regularly and 78 percent wish that they could text a conversation with a business.
More than 90 percent of people read text messages within the first three minutes of receiving it, she adds. So, in a new Cruise Planners perk, advisors will be assisted with text communications sent automatically from the Cruise Planners home office for important client reminders such as deposit and final payment dates.
This new service will also give agencies the ability to send quotes and other information via texting, which is preferred by many clients. Fee acknowledged that she’s “blown away” by this statistic: “Text response rates are 200 percent higher than a phone call.”
Research also shows that people prefer texts for scheduling or confirming appointments. “So, coming soon, we will be sending automated text messages to clients for important information on behalf of our agents,” Fee noted.
New White-Label Web Sites
In another enhancement, Cruise Planners advisors will have access to customized, professional, co-branded websites (called White-Label websites) that allow them to cross-market for customized content with local businesses and organizations.
For example, a local Cruise Planners' agency might team up with a local business to provide exclusive travel services to a local business’ own employees—or an added-value service. Or, Scalzitti said this also could appeal for an agency who teams up with a local business, such as a fitness center or auto dealership, to provide travel perks to their members or customers as part of a loyalty program.
The overarching goal is to expose the agency’s services to hundreds or thousands of new prospects and to build brand loyalty for the partner’s business too.
Cruise Planners will be able to enhance that type of partnership by offering the other business a co-branded Web site.
Enhanced Social Media and Digital Services
“Obviously, we know that social media is a huge part of every successful advisor’s business,” said Scalzitti, “so we need to assure that our advisors have the tools to keep up with this ever changing landscape. We know it’s not easy for a home-based advisor who’s typically a one-person show.”
To that end, this past year the Cruise Planners joined with a new social media company and one that specializes in franchise networks. Scalzitti called that a perfect fit.
Currently, the first version of a social media program is free to franchisees with the headquarters’ home office posting for the advisor four times a week. A second, optional paid tier includes additional postings on Instagram and Google My Business, as well as a dashboard to edit and manage their posts, a calendar and more.
Now, however, Cruise Planners is introducing an even more perk-filled, new, third level of social media and digital footprint management. Called “CP Pro Elite," this optional paid program includes additional services such as daily Facebook postings, five-time-a -week postings to Instagram, plus two-times-per-week postings to Google My Business. In addition, advisors will be able to manage their reviews. Other perks include Facebook digital ad boosts (with home office running an ad on the agency’s behalf once per month), directory listings and reputation management.
“We know that by doing this we are going to be helping them target thousands of new customers every single month,” Scalzitti noted.
New Hotel Booking Engine
Cruise Planners advisors sell a lot of cruises, but they also sell all-inclusive resorts, tours and other kinds of vacations. Fee said that Cruise Planners will introduce a new hotel booking engine in early 2022, and called that "a game-changer for our agents."
Back in 2019, Cruise Planners had told advisors that it would launch a new hotel booking engine by partnering with a third party. “It was designed to provide savings for the customers and higher commission for the advisors,” said Fee. But COVID-19 derailed that plan as that third-party solution is no longer available. So, Cruise Planners opted to invest this year in a new product that's going to be directly integrated into its advisors’ back-end CMS tool. "What we’re working on currently is that we’re going to harness information from a bunch of different sources and present the best price in the market for the consumer to hundreds of thousands of hotels around the world,” said Fee.
It will be introduced first as a B2B tool (and then later become “customer facing”). It will incorporate American Express’ hotel programs, enhanced commissions, customer savings and much more. Advisors can expect rich content, photos, descriptions, points of interest and room details, presented in a streamlined interface.
What Fee loves about the B2B hotel booking engine is that “it will clearly show the agent the amount of commission earned but it will also calculate the amount of savings for customers.” And because Cruise Planners is an American Express representative, it will be able to sell those American Express specialty rates. So, when applicable, those will also show up.
“The problem today is that those are in separate tools,” Fee said, but with the new system, “we’ll now have it as the one-stop shop” and it will replace the existing Cruise Planners’ hotel booking tool in the advisors’ CRM."
Enhanced Sales Opportunities Tool
Launched earlier this year, the new sales opportunities too is now being combined with the popular Task Manager, which can help Cruise Planners’ advisors more easily track the sales stage of their leads. Advisors already using Task Manager tool have created more than 125,000 tasks
According to Fee, the combined tool can help advisors work smarter: "It allows our advisors to stay on top of their business and never miss a task as related to a client booking.”
A related development is that the Task Manager tool is also being fully integrated into the advisor’s mobile app which will allow them to quote, sell and service from anywhere
Enhancements Galore
“Cruise Planners’ conventions never disappoint,” said Vicki Freed, senior vice president, trade, sales support and service, Royal Caribbean International, pointing to the first day’s fun, engaging productions, videos and “best of all, their exciting new innovation announcements.” She said the trade group “certainly did not stop during the pandemic and they will go into the future stronger than ever.”
During the conference's opening session, Shari Wallack, president of Buy the Sea, also offered an inspiring keynote speech. Her memoir, “From Hell to Challah,” was published during the pandemic, and her desire is that travel advisors can grow, learn, and benefit from her story about struggle and perseverance.
Cruise Planners leaders also reflected on the success of several new programs introduced in 2020 during the pandemic. For example, 12 events of a “Where2Next” virtual travel series have brought advisors more than $20 million in total sales.
In addition, the line’s All-Inclusive Resort Tool now brings hundreds of resorts into one easy-to-search and filter location within Cruise Planners’ proprietary booking tool, CP Maxx.
More New Tools
For 2021 and 2022, Cruise Planners’ advisors also can build their businesses back with such new tools and enhancements as these:
SOAR Dashboard Analysis: Cruise Planners is introducing a detailed business analytics dashboard for advisors. It offers 120 different metrics that analyze the business. Plus, the analytics gives advisors a heightened focus on setting and tracking business goals.
Landing Page Templates: This new tool can assist advisors in easily creating professional landing pages on their Web sites for promoting a group offering, other promotions, blogs and more.
Enhanced Website Customization Options: Advisors will gain the ability to further customize the home page of their website. That will allow them to better showcase any of their unique attributes, services and travel specialties.
Automated Marketing Program: Look for a new marketing program that encompasses emails, push notifications and more.
Dedicated Supplier Landing Pages: Cruise Planners is adding robust landing pages on all its consumer websites for its top suppliers. The goal is to showcase supplier videos, exclusive offers, featured itineraries and more.
Enhanced Trigger Emails: Agencies can expect new, cleaner and more concise messaging in the group’s “trigger” emails.
Shore Excursion Marketing Email Triggers: Cruise Planners is introducing automated emails for onshore excursion sales, which it says can lead to a 40 percent higher conversion rate.
Client Lead Form & Contact Sharing: Now, automated advisor contact sharing has been built into the client lead form.
Care Team: Cruise Planners is introducing a Care Team concept. This one-stop customer service for franchisees includes home office resources and staff response via phone, email and chat communications.
Destination Content Provider: Cruise Planners will provide advisors with expert destination content for more than 9,000 destinations. That will be available for use in agency Web sites, customer marketing tools and more.
CP Destination Hub: Agencies can tap into a new central place for all destination content including community sourced information from the Cruise Planners network; that includes hotel, restaurant, transfer and activity recommendations
Sherpa Travel Restrictions Interactive Map: Cruise Planners is offering advisors an interactive map with real-time travel restriction information. It's displayed on consumer-facing Web sites as well as the Cruise Planners’ own advisor CRM to assist advisors and their clients in staying up-to-date on the ever-changing travel restrictions by country
Romance Travel Specialist Program: Cruise Planners’ travel advisors can earn this new designation after they complete a robust wedding and honeymoon training program.
New 2022 Events
In addition to its enhancements and new tools, Cruise Planners will offer 12 in-person events for 2022. Those will include: Bootcamps (five); Elite Events (two); CP Tech Days (three); Land and Luxury Event and 2022 Annual Conference.
In addition, Cruise Planners will conduct six STAR University training events for new franchisees.
“The future is bright with Cruise Planners,” Fee said about already-booked and potential sales for 2022 and beyond. "Cruise Planners, together with strong supplier partnerships, will help rebuild the travel industry and propel us into the future.”
The conference in the Yucatan continues this week. For more information on Cruise Planners, visit www.cruiseplanners.com.
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