Inbound Travel consultant

What is an Inbound Travel Consultant?

An Inbound Travel Consultant deals with overseas travel agencies arranging land content for passengers coming into any place. The majority of the arrangements are completed over the phone or email. Other languages are often an advantage in this area as they will be dealing with various overseas operators who sometimes speak limited English. German, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Japanese are the most common languages used by travelers.

What does and Inbound Travel Consultant do?

They handle either groups or independent travelers that are coming from overseas.

The main role is to put together a package holiday which includes booking accommodation and site-seeing tours as well as travel transfer methods between the different places travelers may visit. Due to the long distances overseas visitors have to come, it is common for them to see a number of different states on one visit. It is the responsibility of the inbound travel consultant to arrange their entire trip around the holiday place. They deal with the customer's travel agent overseas, via phone or email- this is where appropriate language skills come in handy.

What does it take to be successful?

Excellent geographical knowledge of that place and its tourism attractions and destinations. Good attention to detail, good written English skills and appropriate foreign language skills will be an advantage. The most important qualities are communication, teamwork and customer service skills. Whatever the location, position or technical skills, to make it in travel and tourism you need to enjoy challenges and have the ability to work well with people.  It is important to appreciate that people around the world have different ways of doing things. Working in the travel and tourism industry, you will come to learn a lot about people. To find out what it takes to work in this very people-focused industry, we asked many people in the industry. These are some of the qualities they identified:

Maturity and people skills

The ability to think on your feet

Good selling skills

The ability to create a rapport with people of different ages and different cultures

A sense of humor

An outgoing personality

A strong customer service ethic and a desire to help people

Good computer skills

Good organizational skills

Good communication and listening skills

Confidence

Leadership

An empathetic attitude that encourages others to place their trust in you

Health and fitness

A practical nature and commonsense

Good general knowledge

Problem-solving skills

Enjoyment of the outdoors

The ability to work in a team

A good memory for people's names

Strong attention to detail, because a little mistake could mean a major disaster.

The list covers many things, including interpersonal skills, personality and outlook on life. These skills and an appreciation for the demands of travelling will help you enjoy a successful and fulfilling travel and tourism career.

Now you have decided that the Travel and Tourism industry is an industry you would like to join, the next question is how?

There are many ways to join the industry but before you race off to enroll in a course, look at the various sectors and jobs and narrow your selection to those jobs that appeal to you.  Ask as many people as possible friends, family, the local travel agency, teachers and career counselors what they know about the travel industry; read about the industry in the media; the travel industry media; careers websites – nothing beats researching first.  Some jobs in travel require specific level qualifications. Some roles recognize prior experience or skills gained in other industries e.g. customer service, accounting, I.T., having traveled extensively, an in-depth knowledge of one region of the world.

Whatever jobs appeal to you, remember the travel industry offers the opportunity to up skill and move around. Be realistic that it may take time to be the CEO, so look at entry level jobs, but keep your eye on where you want to eventually specialize.