Northstar

18 | www.travelweekly-asia.com TRAVEL AGENTS Keeping an active channel for sales enquiries in an 'always on' world, and understanding travellers beyond the arbitrary markers of age, gender and nationality – these remain some of the key challenges travel agents identified in reaching new customers with more targeted and relevant travel offerings. In recent years, the Singapore government has been making serious efforts to scale up travel agent capabilities through technology, its latest being the technology 'Green Lane' initiative Travel agents go the distance with technology Singapore travel agents buddy up with technology solutions providers to develop new tech tools to improve retailing, product and operational capabilities. By Naomi Neoh launched last November as part of the Travel Agent Roadmap, a partnership between Singapore Tourism Board (STB) and the National Association of Travel Agents Singapore. These initiatives target the travel trade at an industry level to enable them to transform their businesses through the quicker adoption of technology solutions, which have been pre-qualified for funding approval. The eventual goal: To roll out these solutions as readymade such as fielding basic pre-trip FAQ- type enquiries and factual on-trip enquiries needed to be mechanised. "No one really understood what a customised travel planning services does," Lim quipped. Cue chatbots, which are among the new wave of simple convenience tools that aim to help consumers take the shortcuts in getting information rather than parse website content for specific enquiries. To develop a chatbot for its website and Facebook, Quotient TravelPlanners partnered with Zumata, a data company focused primarily on the travel industry. "It's an adventure - we know how delicate the process of bridging a personalised service with a chatbot is," said Lim. "With the experience of OTAs, people are very familiar with self-service and talking to chatbots, and that's what we want to steer away from." Instead, its chatbot Travelbuddy functions as a store assistant to help customers navigate through the maze of travel packages on its website based on a set of questions and parameters – a process Lim likens to going to a shoe shop and having various style, size and colour options on offer. Best part? The agency can now redeploy its staff to handle more meaningful tasks instead of having to man the live chat to field standard questions from customers. Using data to personalise travel Travel agency and tour operator Chan Brothers Travel may already be a familiar household name, having been in the industry for over 50 years, but even they are not lost on the importance of keeping up with times with technology. "We want to shift the global axis of travel innovations and disruptive ideas to Asia. It is better for us to disrupt our own business rather than having others disrupt us," said Anthony Chan, managing director, Chan Brothers Group. With the consumer shift towards private tours and bespoke travel programmes, Chan Brothers Lim Hui Juan, director and founder, Quotient TravelPlanner TravelBuddy can respond to basic factual queries and pull up travel itineraries on demand. "We want to shift the global axis of travel innovations and disruptive ideas to Asia. It is better for us to disrupt our own business rather than having others disrupt us," – Anthony Chan, managing director, Chan Brothers Group. options that can be adapted to any travel agent's business. Solution prototypes will be unveiled this month, according to STB. Here, we speak to travel agents that have been paired up with three data and technology companies to find out how aspects of their businesses have improved: Addressing simple FAQs without additional manpower Bespoke travel company Quotient TravelPlanner opened its doors 10 years ago specialising in customised holidays for its primarily Singapore- based leisure clients. In the course of doing business, director and founder Lim Hui Juan observed that repetitive tasks

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