Seven Steps Travel Agents Should Take for a Prosperous New Year

Following is the latest in a series of columns by travel agent, entrepreneur and business strategist Tammy Levent.

It’s December, and that means there are a few things you should be doing to prepare for the new year. They might seem trivial or even unnecessary, but the list of ideas below could be the difference between a decent new year and an extremely prosperous one!

1. Do an assessment of all profits and losses. You should be keeping track of this monthly, but it is even more important at the end of the year. A thorough assessment will let you see where you fell short and where you were doing well. Did you spend too much on pay-per-click and not enough on pamphlets and business cards? Should you have done that bridal expo that could have yielded hundreds of leads, but chickened out for fear of costs or thinking you weren’t ready yet?

Look at each thing on which you spent time and money, and every place your business earned or lost money. Analyze it all. Then plan your budget for next year based on how much money you made this year.

2. Write out a list of realistic goals for the 2016. Do you want to grow your contacts list by 1,000 people? Do more interviews with the media? Double your salary or increase the number of employees working for you? Even if you aren’t sure how you will achieve it, write down everything you think you could achieve in the next year. While you are at it, write down a few goals you don’t anticipate being able to achieve. Who knows? You might surprise yourself!

3. If you wrote a list of goals for this year, take a look back at what you hoped to achieve vs. what you actually did accomplish. Pat yourself on the back for the items you did achieve. As for the ones you didn’t, add those to next year’s list! Think about why you succeeded and didn’t in the goals you chose for this year. Analyzing your successes and failures may help you come up with some innovative ideas to make bigger and better things happen next year.
 
4. Create a vision board to help solidify your goals. To get yourself in a mindset of abundance, begin thinking of your agency as a huge success. What would success in your business look like to you? Write it down, take or cut out pictures of it, and put it in a place you will see every day in your office.
 
5. Consider what in your office you can get rid of. De-cluttering is a great way to prepare for a new year because it triggers your mind to feel like it is a fresh start and therefore another opportunity to get further ahead in your business.
 
6. Reconsider your staffing needs. There is going to come a point where you will need assistance with handling all of your travel clients, working on your website, writing your blog, and more. What better time than the new year to grow your team? It’s also a great time to let go of dead weight. No one likes to talk about firing employees and/or contractors, but it is sometimes a necessary evil. If you have been putting it off, do it now!

7. Take a course. Are there classes you think will help you in your business? If so, start making plans now to take them in the new year. Scheduling things far in advance makes them more likely to become a reality—so schedule everything you want to do, even if you can’t afford it right now. The simple act of adding it to the calendar is your way of declaring to the universe that this is a priority in your life and in your business. When we think it, then we speak it, and then we can have it. Thoughts really do become things.

The truth is that education might just be the biggest key to a prosperous new year. You must be prepared in this ever-changing industry. It’s how you stay a step ahead of your competitors, it’s how you keep up to date on trends, and it’s how you grow and make more money. As an added benefit, the more you learn and grow, the more likely you are to renew and keep your passion as a travel agent.

I hope this list of ideas has helped you come up with things that you can do to have a prosperous new year. May your success be bigger than you ever dreamed of and may this year be your best one yet!