Information Coach

Expanding on his idea of buyer enablement at the Intelisys AMP’d Newport Beach event, B2B sales researcher Brent Adamson pointed to the travel agent industry.

The travel broker industry frequently arises in channel discussions. Namely, the rise of booking sites like Expedia have functioned as arguments why marketplaces are an inevitable destination for most technology procurement. 

Adamson noted that the rise of the internet, along with various travel comparison sites that allowed customers to design vacations on their own, essentially destroyed the travel agent industry.

“Travel agents were almost literally wiped off the face of the earth as a profession in the late ’90s,” Adamson said.

But that wasn’t the end of things. Adamson said that 10-15 years later, travel agents made a comeback. He credited that comeback to the overwhelming proliferation of booking websites, and the information on those websites.

Once again, too much good information can be a bad thing.

“Have you tried to book a trip lately? It’s really really hard. There are 15 different sites for hotel and flight comparisons. You know what would be really great? If I could just pick up the phone and ask them, ‘What do you think I should do?’ Be your customer’s travel agent,” Adamson said.