Part 2 – Corporate Travel Personalisation...And What To Do (Or Not Do) About It

In case your normal Genie isn’t available, hopefully today’s Cafe will help see your future…!

Greetings, Cafe Patrons. It’s been a fun and interesting couple of weeks since the Cafe “re-opened” with a new look and a new approach, and I think all the travel shots are starting to take effect as the dialogue is moving along fast and furious. Thanks to all the regulars and new Patrons for their participation!

As mentioned last week, based on the predictions contained within a recent Amadeus study on trends in travel over the next 10 years, there may be a significant change in the way travel products are sold and packaged, especially by airlines and perhaps to a lesser extent, hotels. The idea that an entirely new level of personalised choice and flexibility is already taking shape in some instances, as a Cafe Patron rightly commented on the fact that Air New Zealand’s new 4-tier pricing is a live example of this today.

And although I certainly didn’t mean to try and scare anyone with my thoughts last week about getting ready for these changes now rather than waiting for later, I do think that those who sit on their hands may be in a for a rough go of it if they fail to think at least a bit about what the future of corporate travel might look like.
Over the past several months your Barista has consulted with both TMC’s as well as technology companies around future direction and capabilities, and with corporate buyers about how things may evolve for them within their travel programs. As this is travel, there is no shortage of ideas, concepts and technologies all professing to help make things better. Therefore, I’ve summarised what I see are several ways in which travel buyers and suppliers can think through (and in some cases, work together) to tackle head-on the challenges and opportunities the next 10 years in travel could bring:

1. Understand The Present to Better Predict The Future: when it comes to creating a travel program which engages travellers, drives productivity, and pays off through business results, those who fully understand the culture and objectives of their company are more likely to succeed. Similarly, if you don’t know what your company’s strategies are, and don’t apply them to your thinking about how the travel program will compliment those strategies, change will be hard to manage. Is your company shrinking or growing? Are you on an acquisition spree or are you an acquisition target? How long is your company’s horizon in terms of planning – 1 year? 3 years? 10 years? By thinking ahead to understand where your company is going, and in turn what your travellers may be expected to do in terms of travel patterns, expenditure, etc. you’ll have a better chance of anticipating the impact certain trends will have on your travel program.

2. Find Yourself Some Foot Soldiers: Given the various generations that exist across any organisation today, its important that to better gauge how your travellers will react to future program changes and options you get a good cross section of them engaged now. Ask them to be guinea pigs for new technologies, products or suppliers; incentivise them to participate by giving them “preferred access” to programs or ideas that make them feel special; have them first on the list to pilot test the latest and greatest. Then, when you’re ready to take some of your ideas up the food chain to the leadership, you’ve got your “troops” on your side to back up your ideas with their feedback and evidence.

3. Start Managing Upwards Now: to the latter half of point #2, even if you have the best idea in the world, the surest way to get it shot down quickly is to ill-time your engagement with leaders or stakeholders. As in don’t wait until it’s ready to roll to let them in on it! Although it may seem premature, it’s OK to start working some ideas into your current day thinking and presentations to the organisation to start litmus testing their initial reactions and gauge your potential supporters (and detractors, for that matter.) You may even be surprised by getting a green light to move forward sooner or quicker on a future initiative than you may have thought.

4. Engage Your Suppliers – and Disengage from Those That Don’t Engage: this may seem the most obvious, but it’s also the one potentially most important. As the Amadeus report indicates, most if not all suppliers are going to be looking at all sorts of new ways to package, position and sell the value of their products. From experience, I know that most good suppliers will incorporate a future or strategy component to regular business reviews with their partners and clients, so this may be occurring today in some form or another. However, don’t just let them present to you – why not present back to them? Tell them what YOU think your company’s program will look like 2-5-10 years from now, and see how they react. And in turn, if they try to get you overly excited about a new idea because there may not be an alternative for you to consider, challenge the excitement. And if you don’t like what you’re hearing or seeing, be ready to make a move if the supplier’s strategies don’t match with your thinking.

5. Always Be Thinking in Terms of ROI: at the end of the day, travel is an expense and companies like to control expenses. Great ideas in business always need to come down to some sort of bottom line, be it revenue generation, cost reduction, future investment in growth, or a profitable combination of all these factors and then some. No matter how you look at evolving the components of your travel program in the future, the core value of travel management is maximising benefit whilst minimising cost. So even if you think that soon your travellers will be demanding seats on Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic flights (“our new sales targets are over the moon – literally – so I need to fly there tomorrow!”) if you can’t find a way to justify them financially as a preferred supplier, you’re probably better off keeping things firmly on the ground.

As with all things crystal-ball related, the above list is not all-inclusive nor does it contain all the silver bullets to address the challenges ahead. However, there’s no time like the present to start thinking, experimenting, challenging current norms, and evaluating potential future successes. After all, if you don’t think ahead, do you know who will?

So Cafe Patrons, what do you think – what other angles have I missed in the above list? Let’s hear them all!

Part 1 of 2 - Corporate Travel Gets Personal



Peronalised Cabins?  I'll take this one thanks!
(Image courtesy http://www.elakiri.com/forum/showthread.php?t=611197 - a cool trip through the 8 most luxurious aircraft cabins in the world.)

Greetings, Cafe Patrons.
First of all, I just wanted to thank everyone for reading and commenting on last week's Blogalogue regarding consolidation in global corporate programs. We'll keep that topic alive and well, as just because we have a new topic to tackle this week doesn't mean you can't still weigh in on last week's.

In keeping with the thought-provoking approach in the new look Cafe, I turned my attention this week to a hefty tome just released by Amadeus, in conjunction with Oxford Economics. The report, titled "The Travel Gold Rush 2020" is quite an interesting read, as it attempts to project trends and changes in the travel industry over the coming decade. I always find these reports fascinating to read through, as they invariably fall into a blatant promotion for whatever product/service the sponsoring organisation is fostering, or it's a thoughtful and useful review which just happens to be sponsored by an organisation who has parallel interests. Thankfully this one falls into the latter.

Although more oriented towards leisure and online travel, there was a very interesting theme throughout the report which has potential significant implications for corporate travel. And that is the idea that in the near future, air travel especially will see traditional classes (ie - First, Business, Economy, etc.) be replaced by "virtual classes." According to the report, "The future of the aircraft cabin is set to go through significant changes as customers are able to share their preferences with airlines and the airlines will be expected to meet their individual needs leading to the decline of traditional travel classes." The report later goes on to say that "In reality, what is likely is that traditional airline class structures will break down and there will be a multiplicity of travel classes in the near future."

Although I'm not altogether surprised by this prediction, from a corporate buying perspective it could prove worrisome. On the former, I'm not surprised by it as the individualisation of traveller needs and related product offerings is just a sign of the times. The "I want it now" generation coming up through the ranks demands smart phones with an infinite number of configurations to make it their own, websites and social networks with robust profile tools to allow for maximum individualisation, and an almost daily launch of travel websites devoted to allowing you to "book your travel your way."

On the latter, corporate buyers already faced with ancillary fee charges, travel application download costs, and new pricing schemes like dynamic hotel pricing are now faced with travellers who may (if you believe the Amadeus/Oxford predictions) ask for the airlines to create their own cabin class. How much will THAT privilege cost, I wonder? And will it be in policy?

Regardless of whether you believe this "personal cabin" will be a reality or not, if you are a buyer of corporate travel the message here is that if you're not already thinking about managing the growing personalisation of your company's travellers - you'd better start. And next week I'll have some suggestions on how to do this in Part 2 of this blog.

In the meantime - what do you think? Do you think travellers are headed down a no-going-back road to individual freedom of choice for business travel, or will the company win out as they do today via standardised program design? Not to worry - the Barista still makes all his shots of travel advice to order....

The Future of Travel is Here...and it's Quite Futuristic

Last week I had the privilege to attend one of the largest corporate travel conferences in Australia, BTTB 2010 in Sydney. An annual confab bringing together buyers and suppliers of corporate travel services, BTTB has always tried to find topics to put on their agenda that are interesting and provocative.

One of this year's more interesting items on the program was called the "Mobile Shoot-Out" where vendors of travel technology including Amadeus, Sabre, Serko and ConTgo did a few nifty tricks with various new products, but one of them stood out as quite an interesting take on where corporate travel is going.

The guys at Serko have come up with an application which allows a corporation to be able to triangulate (using location-based mobile technology) a traveller's location pretty much down to the square foot he or she is standing on, and view that location on a map. The theory is that the corporation's security manager or HR director or whoever is in charge of traveller safety would then be able to evaluate whether or not the traveller may be in a so-called "hot zone" and then send messages to the mobile device of the traveller. This would all be under the premise that in an emergency the company could provide the traveller assistance and/or directions out of the hot zone.

Hello, George Orwell, you say? Perhaps, but I'm not as much concerned about the technology (which is quite cool in and of itself.) It's more about what it will be like for corporate travellers in the future with respect to what they will have to give up in exchange for what their company will provide them.

Are you comfortable with not only providing your mobile number to your company and your Travel Management Company but also now perhaps your technology provider? This would of course be in exchange for the peace of mind that come a terrorist attack or another ash cloud descending on your location, that your mobile will swiftly and surely start buzzing with useful information on how to deal with the situation. A good trade, having someone literally watching over you while you travel in exchange for them knowing exactly where you are standing/sleeping/sitting at all times?

The other aspect of this technology, of course, is although it may allow certain company execs to sleep better at night believing that the company's "duty of care" is now fully in place, how long will it be that these "find me and help me" services will be enough? Will the expectation - whether from the travellers or perhaps even the law in some countries - go even higher to ensure traveller safety? Will it still be enough to know where travellers are and send them messages to help out, or will companies now be expected to have their own SWAT-like search-and-rescue teams on standby to physically swoop in and get the traveller out of harms way?

Sounds a bit far-fetched, but I'm sure the Orwellians out there will say it's only a matter of time. Regardless, it's obvious that the future of traveller location and safety services is literally just around the corner...or is that danger lurking perhaps? Can anyone see around corners yet?

EXTRA SHOT FOR THE DAY

One other interesting "trend" heard at BTTB last week was hoteliers "being forced" to pass along credit card surcharges to companies wishing to pay for their hotel bills with plastic. Will we hear no end to the seemingly endless belief across so many companies today that no one is allowed to make money anymore except themselves?

If you want to accept credit cards, you need to pay for their services. It's secure, it's convenient, and it's what business travellers want to use. I don't carry $200 in cash around with me to pay for my room, and I don't want your hotel chain's direct-connect payment plan, as I am very happy with my current payment plan. That would be a credit card, by the way. You want to surcharge me? Fine, I will go to another hotel that doesn't.

Sounds like hoteliers are taking a page out of the airline book and try to fawn off costs of doing business as "extraneous services charges" or some other spun terminology. If you want to sell your product in a market-type environment (read: GDS) so you can attract the most potential buyers to your door, then you need to allow the market to make money off that. If you don't want to pay credit card companies to manage and process your cash flow for you, then don't take the cards. Simple. Then those hotels that do take cards and don't pass along the costs to me will get my business. Also simple.

What's next - a water surcharge for flushing the toilet? No wait, strike that - I should probably keep my mouth shut...don't want to give anyone any ideas....