The Advantage Travel Partnership has recognised how important this January and February – the traditional peak period – is to its members and has launched a multi-channel marketing campaign, ‘Holidays are sooo 2022’ to support travel agents during this time.
The campaign will consist of both on- and offline activity with a big focus on aspirational content to help members engage customers and inspire them to book. This includes the largest point of sale pack that has ever been produced for an Advantage campaign, social media support, customer magazines, digital assets and B2B activity.
Point of Sale Pack
To encourage members to dress their stores for the January booking period, Advantage has created its largest ever point of sale pack, which contains a wide selection of banners covering different holiday types and destinations. These include a dedicated ‘Why Book with Us’ banner, showcasing the various benefits of booking with an independent travel agent, such as financial security and extensive travel knowledge.
Advantage will be running a competition to encourage its travel agent members to dress their store for the turn of year booking period. Members who take part in the competition can win a luxury food hamper to treat the staff in the store at the end of the peaks campaign.
Social Media Support
To ensure travel agent members can share their latest offers across their own social media channels, Advantage has created a wide range of banners suitable for Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to help promote holiday types and destinations with the ‘Holidays are sooo 2022’ badge. What’s more, the private members’ Hot Offers Facebook group will provide a forum of different up-to-the-minute tactical offers from Advantage’s supplier partners to put out to members. Members can then lift the relevant deals and share on their own social media feeds, enabling speed to market.
New ‘Journeys’ Customer Magazine
Within this magazine there will be plenty of reminders about the benefits of booking with a human travel agent. Personalised printed copies of the magazine will be sent to over 150 member branches who have opted in to receive it and will be used to door drop and acquire new customers, mailed to existing customers to encourage to book, and will be available on the racks in-store. Digital assets that can be used for both websites and on social media have also been created to specifically help promote the magazine to members’ customers.
B2B
In order to support members and expand their knowledge, Advantage has curated a range of communications for travel agents focused on product knowledge, flexible policy updates and commercial terms to ensure that they are equipped with the necessary tools to answer questions and enquiries from customers as the travel landscape continues to evolve. In addition, email, videos, social media, and various updates will be added to the members Turn of Year extranet hub for members to access at any time.
David Forder, head of marketing at Advantage commented, “We know how important this January and February booking period is to our members. With continued uncertainty around new variants and travel, the need to book with a trusted travel agent is clear, and we have pulled out all the stops to ensure all bases are covered for our leisure members, to help them generate enquiries and all-important bookings for 2022 and beyond.”
