Start A Travel Consulting Business - Business Ideas
Travel consultants offer clients advice on all things related to travel, including destinations, airfare, accommodations, and activities. Be it flights or even cruises, you can bridge the gap between customer and service provider with a travel consulting business.
You can actually start a travel-related consulting business without being an expert in the travel industry. The U.S. travel and tourism industry generated $1.9 trillion in economic output; supporting 9.5 million American jobs and accounting for 2.9% of the U.S. GDP. At 14.5% of international travel spending globally.
Traveling the world is a dream that a lot of people have. Starting a travel consulting business is an awesome way to create a passive income, travel the world, and help others at the same time. Travel consulting is one of your best ways to start a business on the side to earn more money.
Starting a travel consulting business requires a great deal of effort, dedication, and most importantly passion.
If you're interested in how to sell travel consulting, or selling travel consulting online, you can use this page as a guide for everything you'll need to know.
Want to learn more? You can check out our full guide on how to start a travel consulting business ➜
Key Stats
Startup Costs
| Min Startup Costs | Max Startup Costs | |
|---|---|---|
| Office Space Expenses | $0 | $7,000 |
| Employee & Freelancer Expenses | $151 | $352 |
| Website Costs | $223 | $7,215 |
| Business Formation Fees | $5,600 | $20,400 |
| Software Expenses | $162 | $3,094 |
| Advertising & Marketing Costs | $0 | $2,800 |
| Training & Education Expenses | $0 | $1,000 |
| Specific Industry Expenses | $0 | $300 |
| Total Startup Costs | $6,136 | $42,161 |
Case Studies
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$500K/mo
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$1.5M/mo
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$233K/mo
Successful Businesses
| Business | URL | Rank | |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Yanolja | yanolja.com | #29,607 |
|
Rayna Tours | raynatours.com | #115,993 |
|
Flight Expert Bangladesh | flightexpert.com | #167,424 |
|
KHM Travel Group | khmtravel.com | #298,058 |
|
The Travel Institute | thetravelinstitute.com | #485,035 |
|
TravelAssist | travelassist.us.com | #557,699 |
|
KesselRun Corporate Travel Solutions | kesselrunconsulting.com | #609,224 |
|
ClaimCompass | claimcompass.eu | #1,128,076 |
|
LBF Travel | lbftravel.com | #1,486,880 |
|
Lugos Travel | lugostravel.com | #2,306,576 |
|
RoundAbout Travel | roundabouttravel.com.au/ | #2,599,037 |
Pros & Cons
| Pros | Description |
|---|---|
| Flexibility | You can put as much time into the business as you'd like. If you like the work and have some initial experience, you can start small and manage all aspects of the business on your own. |
| Ability to start your business from home | It's not necessary to have a physical storefront or office space to get your business started. You can do everything from the comfort of your own home, at least in the beginning! |
| Meaningful business connections | You never know who you will meet as a travel consulting business. This could be the start of an incredible business opportunity! |
| High customer retention rates | Once a customer invests in your product, they've invested their time and energy to utilize your product/service which is highly valuable to them. Typically, your product or service becomes indispensable to your customer. |
| Pick & choose the clients you work with | Travel Consulting Businesses have the ability to choose the clients they work with. You have the freedom to work with only a few loyal clients or with hundreds of clients! |
| Control of workload | With starting a travel consulting business, you have the unique ability to choose how little or how much you want to work. You also have the freedom to decide which projects you want to work on, and can turn down the ones that do not interest you. |
| Cons | Description |
|---|---|
| Motivation of employees | If you plan to have a sales/content team on board, finding creative ways to motivate them can be a challenge. It's important that you're able to offer great incentives and a good work environment for your employees. |
| Longer Sales Process | A travel consulting business can be a big time and money investment for your customer, so it's important you plan and predict a longer conversion funnel and stay in communication with potential customers. |
| Security Issues | With any Saas business, data loss and security issues may arise throughout your process of building your product. It's critical that you understand exactly what you're responsible for and how to avoid potential issues down the road. |
| Low margins | The gross margins for your travel consulting business are typically around 10%, which can make it more challenging to incur new expenses and maintain profitability. |
| Taxes | As a travel consulting business, you typically pay self-employment taxes which can be quite high. It's important to understand what you will be paying in taxes each year so you can determine if the work you're taking on is worth it. |
| Niche Market | A niche business is not necessarily a bad thing, in fact, it can be the key to your success. However, it can be more challenging and time consuming to find the perfect niche market and target audience. |
Marketing Ideas
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1
Affiliate Program
Affiliate marketing is a great way to bring in a new revenue stream, especially when you don't sell products or services.
Simply put, an affiliate program is an agreement where a business pays another business or influencer ("the affiliate") a commission for sending traffic and/or sales their way.
The affiliate typically gets a unique link where clicks and conversions can be tracked.
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2
Direct Sales
Direct sales strategy implies a direct contact between a seller and a consumer without the involvement of any third party. Direct selling is popular in sectors where sellers communicate with their clientele personally. The sales technique occurs at non-store locations which include at home, work, or online.
For direct selling to succeed, hire a few (or many) salespeople to support the sales conversion process. It's critical that you assign them specific roles and responsibilities to nurture the client and provide excellent support.
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3
Word of mouth
Word of mouth is when a consumers reflects their interest in a company’s product or service in their daily dialogues.
Therefore, word of mouth advertising is essentially a free advertising triggered by the customers experience.
According to Nielsen, 92% of people trust recommendations from friends and family.
Therefore, in today’s hyper-connected world, a single recommendation through a word of mouth can have a huge impact to your business.
Hey! 👋 I'm Pat Walls, the founder of Starter Story.
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