TORONTO — Transat Distribution Canada says it wants to grow its Agent@home program and is offering an added incentive to agents who join.

Travel agents and home-based agents who want to move over to TDC’s Agent@Home program can also sign up for the TDC Sales Academy, taking place April 27 – May 4, 2018 at the all-inclusive Melia Caribe Tropical in Punta Cana.

Registration for the Academy opens in mid-November.

Agents will receive intensive sales training from special guest speaker Michael Vickers, along with dedicated training on Sun Destinations, Europe, Cruise and Luxury products from over 20 preferred partners and professional coaches, according to TDC.

The format includes hands-on business building workshops, site inspections of Transat’s key hotels and resorts and special events. Home-based agents get the opportunity to network with other TDC colleagues as well as with top suppliers.

“They will have access to state-of-the-art training from professional coaches and our top suppliers,” said Susan Bowman, Exec VP Marketing, TDC. “At TDC, we know that education is an integral part of our travel professional’s success. Understanding all of our products thoroughly enables them to better serve their customers and exceed their expectations.”

The TDC Agent@home program offers advantages for agents looking to go home based including the exclusive ability to offer and redeem Air Miles Reward Miles, as well as best-in-class marketing and systems support, she added.

The 2017 Sales Academy attracted 150 delegates, a mix of junior and senior travel agents from across Canada who worked with preferred suppliers and training coaches for an intense, boot-camp- type training for a week.

Transat Travel home-based agent Wayne Arsenault said the Academy was an opportunity to learn, meet new people, network with other agents, suppliers and corporate employees.

“There were people from across Canada, from all walks of life, ages and years of experience. For me as a newer agent, I found this invaluable as there were so many points of view and a great variety of business backgrounds all sharing our ideas,” said Arsenault. “The participation from Michael Vickers sharing his techniques with us was irreplaceable, providing many unique ideas to touch clients. His lessons were straightforward and quite profound, I learned a lot about how to interact with clients from his sessions.”

Arsenault has his own takeaways from the week-long training:

• Listen for cues. “You will be able to customize according to the client’s buying style. Ask, so that you know you have listened and heard what you think you heard.”
• Use social media for maximum reach and presence
• Know what is available, keep up- to- date, there is something for each client.
• Be unique/different in how you interact with your client.

The content for TDC’s training academies is determined by feedback the company receives from its network of 450 agencies and 3,650 travel consultants across Canada. For more details see transatagentathome.com.