Jetset is targeting a record year in 2024 after completing the most significant overhaul of its booking platform since it was launched 17 years ago.
The trade-only operator created Jets in 2006 and revamped it this year, unveiling the new-look software in July after four months of work.
Jetset sales director Adrian Smyth said the operator received “some backlash” from agents in the weeks following the relaunch as certain features they liked had been altered or removed altogether.
“Shortly after unveiling the new product we had some agents asking us what we had done to Jets,” admitted Smyth, who added: “The system didn’t work for them in the way it used to and they made their feelings known.
“We had made assumptions on how agents used Jets based on the way it had been developed and on the way we had trained it, but in hindsight perhaps we hadn’t done enough research before starting the work.
“All of a sudden by moving X or taking away Y because we thought there was no longer a need for those functions, some agents weren’t too happy with the new look and the relaunch didn’t quite go as planned.”
Smyth said the percentage of bookings taken through Jets compared to the call centre dropped from 90% to 78% in the week following the relaunch, which put “huge strain” on the reservations team – but the level returned to 90% one month later after the in-house development team made changes based on feedback from agents.
“We take pride in the fact we have one audience, and we listen intently to them,” said Smyth. “After putting our hands up and admitting we didn’t get some things quite right, we spent two weeks speaking to as many agents as possible and doing our best to swiftly make things right again.
“We kept tweaking and tweaking until we were getting positive feedback from everyone we spoke to, and after about four weeks we were relieved to see the level of bookings through Jets had returned to 90%. Feedback on the new system is now even more positive than it used to be, especially with our homeworking agents.”
The purpose of the overhaul, which Jetset dubbed ‘The Big Reveal’, was to give Jets a more modern look and feel and to make it more efficient, allowing users to make more bookings.
The booking platform now also works exactly the same across all platforms, whether the agent is on their desktop, iPad or mobile phone, to appeal to homeworkers making bookings on the move.
Smyth said the revamped software will also enable the operator to launch a number of new trade tools to “make agents’ lives easier” – starting with a new product called Media Magic which gives agents the capability to create marketing materials that can be shared on social media to promote new offers.
Smyth is hopeful the improvements will allow the operator to surpass its record year, set in 2022, next year.
“Last year was our best ever in terms of sales and we’re going to get very close to it in 2023,” he said.
“We’ve got loads in the pipeline for next year in terms of new products which we’re really looking forward to, especially now that we’ve got the significantly improved Jets up and running and have addressed the teething problems.”
He added: “It was a challenging few weeks for the team in the initial stages after The Big Reveal, but now we’re looking forward to 2024, which we’re confident will be a record year for Jetset.”