By Gary Lewis, managing director, The Travel Network Group
What a conference. Against the wonderful backdrop of Split, Croatia, the combination of great support from trade partners, fantastic industry speakers and solid practical business advice in the workshops meant the experience for delegates couldn’t have been better.
I will never forget the delegates pretending to be jockeys as we joined in the entertaining ‘Taming Tigers’ presentation from personal development guru Jim Lawless.
From the high-energy opening of the main plenary to the reception in the Diocletian’s Palace, and the gala dinner and awards under the stars by the beach, it couldn’t have gone any better.
I was proud to show delegates how The Travel Network Group’s team delivered on promises made last year in Lake Bled, Slovenia.
From the results of our investment in marketing, to the restructuring and recruiting for our membership team, the value we are adding to our members’ businesses couldn’t be clearer.
At our last conference I unveiled the group’s new strategy, which centres around four pillars: scale, opportunity, solutions and growth.
We have followed our strategy ruthlessly over the past 18 months and are starting to see it bear fruit.
The theme of the conference was ‘Obsession’ and it was echoed throughout the event in speeches by the likes of Jim – who trained obsessively to be a free diver and a jockey – to the tips and practical advice given at our workshops on social media, predictive technology and retail success.
I was delighted to show how the culture of our business works obsessively for our members. This is demonstrated by our company values, or ‘Steps’, which stands for supportive, target-focused, entrepreneurial and passionate.
Looking to the future, we are working with a data-specialist business to deliver more benefits to our members, and we can now offer a State of the Nation report, which gives them an insight into their business.
Through this and other initiatives we are helping drive customers into their shops and on to their websites, and offering tools to generate their own leads.
We have also joined the Institute of Customer Service, which will benchmark us against the industry, and represents how we are driving this new service for our customers and our members.
As well as the obsession, I saw a lot of passion at the conference, from our trade partners, delegates, my team and members.
The vibrancy, positivity and feedback we have received gives me and my team the confidence that we are heading in the right direction for our members and business partners.