Last week roomsXML, in conjunction with the Sultanate of Oman Ministry of tourism, ran road show events. However, rather than the typical hard sell we opted to give something back to travel agents on the basis of “ if we help you grow your business that will help us grow ours”.

We were lucky to have not only fantastic venues, but excellent speakers and tremendous support from the travel agents who attended.

So the event – I introduce speakers, Mona spoke of Oman and then Prakash Bang and Martin Bailey providing two very different but equally valuable perspectives on business development and marketing.  We would then prompt the crowd for comments or questions including this one from Trevor Jones at Hawthorn Travel:

“ Who do we market to… The male or female?”

Given that neither myself nor Martin had a direct answer we could back up, we discussed the timing for marketing. In Australia (of course acknowledging different religious groups may have different variations on this theme) the times when families get extended quality time together is over Christmas and Easter.

Therefore agents should target their marketing to ensure there is plenty of content before these times about options and calls to action straight afterwards to get people booking.

Much to our surprise, it was Robyn Lawley from WOW travel (who it should be said had only had two glasses of champagne) chipped in with

“ You market to the female. … if she doesn't get what she wants… He doesn't get what he wants.”  I responded with

“ Are you suggesting that “no sex” sells?”

Her response, overwhelmingly greeted with huge laughs and many, many nodding heads in the crowd was that

“ Absolutely, if she is not happy the barn door closes!”

Whilst delivered with great humour, it's one of the most insightful marketing comments that men have been exposed to for quite some time.

Now obviously there was a lot of deeper voices in the room grumbling and saying “ this is not so…” But it's incredibly valuable information when putting together the timing and delivery of the key messages to support your business growth in the new year.