Suppose you’re a small travel agency or solo advisor who wants to ramp up your business quickly and inexpensively. One of the best ways of doing this is to focus on forming affinity groups embedded within cruises or tours. The idea is to identify potential travelers with something in common and allow them to travel somewhere special with like-minded folk.
To name just a few possibilities, affinity groups can be organized among those with shared beliefs (political or religious), hobbies (photography or music) characteristics (singles or LGBTQ+), businesses (travel or entertainment), or contributors (alumni or Doctors Without Borders). They can also bring together people with characteristics that present unique challenges such as homeschoolers or 12-Step program members.
Cruise lines are very supportive of forming affinity groups. You tell them the kinds of accommodations you want to reserve and how many staterooms you think you can sell. Providing they have sufficient space available, they’ll assign your group a code number and name, then set a deadline when deposits are due. They will offer amenities such as shipboard credits, meeting spaces, cocktail parties, and “tour conductor credits” that can provide free passage for the “pied pipers” who help attract members to the group. In addition to these amenities, the organizers are permitted to offer other incentives, so long as they don’t discount the price.
From then on, advisors are on their own. If they have a large “book” of prospects or access to huge mailing lists, they can quickly fill up the reserved spaces on the cruise or escorted tour and handle the day-to-day problems with bookings that inevitably arise. What if they don’t have a strong following for the kinds of prospects they want to attract?
What’s needed is a means of connecting potential affinity group members with the offerings of group organizers. This must be done so that no guest’s privacy is violated, and the ethical practices of the cruise industry are maintained. For example:
- I identified a 15-day roundtrip cruise from Cape Town on one of the world’s finest ships with six port days offering “game drives” at wildlife preserves, stunning beaches, and exciting cities. The ship offered 12 dining locations for only 600 guests; fares were “all-inclusive.”
- I contacted the cruise line and requested them to set aside 15 balcony suites at today’s published prices. I named the group: “15-Night African Photo Safari & New Year’s Cruise”, and they provided me with a group number. From that point on, anyone who calls the cruise lines and uses that number to make a booking will become a member of my affinity group. Although I didn’t have to, I also put down a deposit on the cruise for my wife and me.
- I revised my website, CruisesAndCameras.com, to feature the cruise itinerary and prices, and developed a one-page flyer featuring a list of the amenities that group members will receive. They included a $300 shipboard credit, meetups on sea days, and free compact color photo printers that group members can keep.
- I published the flier on my Facebook page and a Facebook page with 80,000 members who are camera hobbyists and professionals. I also contacted my best clients. Then I waited for the clicks on my website to respond to questions and take orders.
What happened? Not a single click on the website and a few regretful notes from clients that they couldn’t go. Now, what do I do?
I know from all the staterooms available when I made my booking that the cruise line was also experiencing difficulties filling the ship for the cruise. What’s needed is a service that presently doesn’t exist:
- I need a way to drive people to my website and booking engine.
- The cruise line needs bookings without having to reduce their prices.
- Potential guests need to learn about affinity group offerings from companies like mine.
Presently, affinity group offers are maintained by cruise lines or tour companies. They are likely organized by group name, cruise ID, group organizer ID, and active dates. Why not expand these listings to include:
- A brief description of for whom the group is intended.
- The benefits and costs of membership.
- Is the group open to anyone paying a deposit, or does it require the organizer’s prior approval?
- Incentives for referring travel advisors.
A cruise line would gather these data as part of its affinity group approval procedures. When email blasts or mailings are sent out to prospective clients, the recipients would be invited to submit online the kinds of trips on which they would consider placing deposits in the next 90 days. These could include destination, costs, and affinity groups they would be interested in joining. By submitting these forms, they would provide written approval of being contacted by the cruise line when relevant offers are received.
Suppose a Los Angeles equestrian group offers a five-day stay at a luxury Patagonian horse ranch before a roundtrip cruise from Ushuaia that visits Antarctica. The organizer states that any travel agent can enroll clients into the group without prior approval. This means no one will care if the guests want to spend the five days at the ranch lounging around the pool enjoying Pisco Sours, or if they never ride a horse. They are helping the group by meeting the organizer’s obligation to book the minimum number of passengers needed to qualify for tour conductor credits and the other benefits of a group membership.
Tools such as these could ferret out cruises or tours that interest clients at a minimal cost. I could wake up in the middle night and search for photo tours offered by my favorite cruise lines in areas I hadn’t yet visited. If I could reduce my vacation costs with onboard credits, snag a portable color printer that I could use on all my future cruises, and meet fellow travel photo enthusiasts—that would be even better!
Dr. Steve Frankel and his wife have cruised on most of the Seabourn, Silversea, Crystal, Azamara, Oceania, Regent, and Windstar ships. Steve is the founder of Cruises & Cameras Travel Services, LLC. He has been recognized as a “2021 Top Travel Specialist” by Conde Nast Traveler magazine and a “Travel Expert Select “by the Signature Travel Network. His specialties are luxury small-ship cruises and COVID-19 safety measures, and has a doctorate in Educational Research with minors in Marketing and Quantitative Business Analysis. He’s also earned a Certificate in Epidemiology from Johns Hopkins University. Previously, he managed qualitative and quantitative research in the private & public sectors. He’s a member of the Los Angeles Press Club, and has written 13 books and hundreds of articles. His email address is steve@cruisesandcameras.com.
