The data speaks the truth.

By Steve Banks

In my 37 years in the sector, there is a moment I genuinely still get a kick from. Either in a review or having done a piece of analysis (old habits die hard!) I genuinely still get a buzz when a client reconsiders something they thought they already understood about their own travel programme and says, “I didn’t realise that.” That moment is when a good travel management company delivers.

In my humble opinion, everyone can book travel, many can contract and procure travel, but a significantly lower proportion are good at the management of travel, and I mean that with the utmost respect to my peers in the sector.

The most important asset a travel management company has on behalf of their clients is data, and lots of it. For me, account management in business travel is not about being a friendly point of contact. Done properly, it is an analytical discipline and a consultative approach wrapped in a relationship. And companies that get this, and I mean multiple stakeholders, not just the contract owner, are booking and travelling smarter, spending less, and know more about their travel behaviour allowing them to treat their travellers better and more appropriately, than those who use their travel management company as just a booking agent.

Connecting data and insight

Every trip generates an extraordinary volume of data; average booking lead times, preferred supplier uptake, out of policy bookings, refund volumes, class of travel, ticket or room type as well as bespoke data such as cost centres, job numbers, and project codes, sometimes unique to a particular industry sector. For example, for our film and TV production clients, they would be lost if we didn’t reconcile everything back to a specific production number. So in my experience, the data is almost never the problem. The problem is that without someone who knows how to interrogate it, both the account manager who knows their stuff in this sector, and knows their client’s business well enough to make it mean something, it just sits there underutilised.

Keeping my hand in (!), I recently reviewed a mid size telecommunications firm whose travellers were booking predominantly low cost carrier and or single provider routes with little alternative to switch sell. On the surface, it looked pretty good, the data indicated on every line that what had been booked was ‘in policy.’ But was it, and was the policy driving the behaviour or the behaviour driving the policy. Well at face value it was true, but digging deeper, the data told a different story on what could be achieved; savings could be made by booking earlier, perhaps considering a different fare type without all the bells and whistles often provided with the best intentions for the busy business traveller (…. or a shopping basket uplift if I’m cynical). And I’m sure a significant proportion of the bookings made in closer proximity to travel were for internal meetings, ones that had been in the calendar for weeks. The travellers just hadn’t been prompted to book ahead or consider best practise.

Personalisation isn’t just a buzzword it reflects the strategic reasoning behind a company’s travel choices

I am a firm believer that technology amplifies good account management and behaviour, but it cannot replace it. The best travel management platforms in the world still require a human being who understands the context behind the numbers, the supplier restrictions or objectives, and that local knowledge. Booking travel as a ‘future event,’ none of us can say with 100% conviction that this is what we’ve found, this is what it means specifically for you in the future, and here’s what you should do every time. That requires trust and give and take, built over time. It requires knowing the client’s business, their pressures, the job function of the traveller, their culture, and their priorities well enough to filter the noise and focus on what matters to that trip or generic approach to travel.

It also requires intellectual honesty and transparency. Good analysis sometimes surfaces uncomfortable findings; a department that ‘goes rogue’ and consistently ignores policy, a preferred hotel that is no longer competitive, a route or hotel room where the negotiated rate is worse than spot pricing, the C suite that are an exception to the policy but now driving the largest out of policy spend. A good account manager brings those findings forward to challenge the status quo as we’re judged on value not comfortable reporting.

What to expect from truly personalised account management

If your account manager is sending you a monthly report and waiting to hear from you, that is not account management, that is administration of a task. What you should expect is proactive analysis, clear and honest recommendations, and a genuine understanding of your travel programme as a function of your wider business.

It’s a bold statement, but with every interaction, you should walk away having learned something you didn’t know before, because that is where the real value of a travel management partnership lives.