7 replies to this topic

[WreckWench]

I posted the following and got a response from a member. My question is what do you all think and how could we implement this? Not sure we can do all the suggestions made i.e fill out their forms (guess we could log in as them and do their ins online for them but ti will be tough)

 

Per Kamala:

 

Posted 28 September 2020 - 04:30 PM

Some clients need or want someone to spoon feed them important info via email directly or text or possibly facebook and 'distill the most important info for them'.

 

I am not sure exactly how to do this but certainly people seem to want it. The Oct trip has a very high level exec who needs someone to provide a more personal touch and ensure he gets the info needed.

 

The Aug CZM trip had a repeat member who said..."Oh I never read your trip updates as they are all the same"

 

Another one said..."I delete all your emails because after so many trips ...nothing changes".

 

Except when it does change....and I need to reach them. And I have no way of knowing they have chosen to not read or simply delete emails.

 

So my thought is to offer a high touch personalized concierge service for those who are extremely busy, prefer a more personalized interaction and/or want a simplified summary of updates whereby they can then click or choose to read more online. This would also work for high level trip changes such as last minute covid changes or trip changes etc.

 

We could offer a set fee for this service AND they can receive specialized interaction via text, email, fb (not sure on this one as I do not live on FB so a bit reticent to offer it) etc.

 

It would be WONDERFUL to have someone help with this service. They could let members know that the trip leader for their upcoming trip put out updates on missing documents (and tell them if they are on the list or not), as well as tipping, covid requirements and local island info. If they wish further details they can click HERE or follow the following steps to access the details.

 

What do people think? And how much should we charge for this 'high touch time consuming trip  service?   $100 per trip?  $150?

 

If we offer it and set it all up it may work as an incentive for people to do their own checking so as to not pay for this service. We may need to have people sign as part of the sign up a statement that says they will either sign up for the concierge service or check the trip updates themselves via the site ensuring they reach out out to us to be sure they know how to do it AND they agree to buy dive insurance for this trip and all SD trips as well  as either purchase a trip/travel ins policy that covers this trip or the whole year and/or they agree to self insure and/or they already have one. We used to do the latter and NO ONE missed having trip ins. Sadly we got away from it and now many fail to get it and it bit them in the butt with covid.

 

Thoughts?

Suggestions?

Ideas?

 

 

Per Roro:

 

Posted 28 October 2020 - 02:22 PM

Offer 3 levels: 

1 Basic - as is now. person signs up and pays for trip, gets their own flights, insurance, transfers, etc. they're responsible for following PM

2 Agent - trip price includes travel agent fee + cost of for someone to book air, insurance, transfers, add-on, extra nights, tips, etc. Done by application with pertinent info and invoiced separately - their own unique link to pay. They also follow PM

3 Concierge - same as above, higher fee, personal texts messages sent as needed with pertinent info, links for forms, etc. 1/day at most.   

 

Costs: 

1. Premium Membership

2. 1 + $50 to $100 (what's your time worth? I believe you charge $35 to book flight, you can probably get DiveAssure to give you a set price per trip to tack on, then its tabulating it all in an invoice)

3. 1 + $250, if they want that much service, they're willing to pay for it.

 

 

Per Kamala:

 

Posted 28 October 2020 - 02:33 PM

Great input Roro!  I am following your ideas and tracking on it. I think its a great layout. The dive ins will be tricky UNLESS we offer a group plan but that's hard because so many people do their own plans. But other than that one thing...I think your thoughts are really really good.

 

And if that $250 was paid to someone on our team...(lord knows I do not want the job) then it could be used to subsidize THEIR diving and everyone wins!!

 

Any more thoughts on the original question?
Thoughts on my follow up input?

 

 

[Blue151]

Overall I think it is a good idea as updates can confuse some people who don't have/make the time to read them.  And yes, seasoned SD people probably read the PM less than new people because they basically know what is going on, so they miss the changes.  

 

If people pay for it, it will likely take a lot of work of the TC who has to coordinate changes with these difficult people who don't pay attention.... but what to you do with those people who You/Brad/Butch deal with as the TC who still demand the level of service (because they don't pay attention) and don't pay for it?

 

Would the $250 be paid every year when they pay for their Premier membership?

 

If it is annual:

- It is easier on the Member to pay annually, but when will the "SD Concierge Coordinator (SDCC)" get involved?  Does the Concierge service start before/after they book?  Do they have to book first and then hand it over to someone?

- You are making the commitment to give them this level of service for the whole year no matter how many trips they take or how many volunteers you have to do it.  You could run into a place where you don't have enough people to really provide a good service even though you have already committed to it.  Who picks up the slack?

- How do you pay the the "SDCC" ?  Do you give them a portion of the $250?  Is this based on complexity of the trip?  Much harder to coordinate Raja than Roatan.... 

- If you give them the full $250, then would they be on the hook for that person for the whole year?  Some people take 10 trips, some take 1 - again, complexity and work load could be very different.  What happens if  your volunteer takes the $250, does 1 trip, and then stop helping for the other 5 trips the member may make in a year?  How do you pay the next "SDCC" for that member?

 

 

 

What about paying for Concierge level service for a particular trip instead of for the whole year?  This could replace the $35 "book your flight" fairly easily (obviously at a higher cost) but would provide the Concierge level of service instead.

- Member would have to book first and could add the Concierge service (No different than it is today).  Although this might put some some people off who don't even want to deal with the site.  You could possibly provide the service if they contacted you ahead of time before they start at the booking process.  Works for new Exec members as well as existing members who don't like to deal with the system, just assign a SDCC when they indicate they want to go.

 

- You could control how much Concierge service you provide.  Worst case, if you were tight on volunteers or didn't have a "SDCC" at the time you don't have to offer it to everyone.  For all those die hard SD members who you know will use it, you could offer through a OTP or something. 

- You could also change the price if you want for each trip.  Again, much harder to coordinate Raja than Roatan.... 

- You could pay your SDCC at trip completion to make sure they actually earned the pay and didn't dissert you member half way through.

- This provides you a scalable solution where a SDCC could control how much money they want to make based on their current time commitment instead of making a promise for a whole year.

- It also provides a scalable service to your members, I probably wouldn't pay $250 per year, but I might pay for just Raja if it was less. 

- One disadvantage for you members - if someone went on a lot of trips they wouldn't be able to take advantage of a "Volume Discount" (i.e. 10 trips for $250, vs. 10 trips for at least $350 per year if every trip  stayed at the $35 "book your flight" price) - If you really wanted to do this, enable the SDCC to include the credit/figure it out, but you still have the problem of how to pay your SDCC if you offer a bunch of refunds/credits.  

[Cmdr. Clownfish]

This all gets back to the argument that I have made for 10+ yrs now but has consistently fallen on deaf ears.  People don't want to read the content.  It is written like an essay and there is too much of it.  When I took over for Thailand I did not follow that process and the people universally loved the change.  I gave them bullet points with just enough to get the point across.  At this point in the game, marketing is not necessary so do not waste their time with it.  I proved KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) works.  The members have spoken and agree.  I wish you would listen Kamala.

 

There is another easier option. You are good in person but your writing sucks and pisses everyone off so they just ignore it. If you don't believe me yet just see the discussion above. You can upgrade the booking service for some manual stuff and then use SHORT videos to describe the pertinent information.  5 paragraphs that nobody will read can many times be condensed to about 5 interesting seconds on video and people will watch it over and over.  People like videos but they hate reading and just wont do it today.  They can listen to the video while doing something else, you can't do that with reading.  Post them on Vimeo and Facebook.  Send the notices on Facebook and by Twitter.  No hand holding and little extra effort required.  This is the way things are done today.  That is where the consumer market is at.  That is why Instagram and TikTok have beaten the snot out of Facebook.  Videos are fun, reading is work.

 

There is plenty of free video editing software out there to make it snazzier but to get started all you need is the recording software.  Try OBS Studio and your laptop webcam as a test.  It is free and powerful.  I use OBS and it is great but it is a bear used for professional work.  There may be easier to use webcam only options that may be better for internal testing.  Send some samples out to a few members and see what what they say.  After a few AB tests your problems will probably be solved.  To start, you can upload them to webfaction for free and send out an html link.  You currently use only about 1% of your allocated bandwidth so that would work fine for testing and maybe even production. 

 

Once understood you can will probably find alot more uses for the videos and tweets.

[WreckWench]

Thank you both for great insight and ideas...especially tactical ones that help with implementation.

 

It is worthy to note that the format Scott created for the Thailand trip is the same one we use today and THAT is complemented as well as copied by competitors I might add so is still working as intended.   

 

What is in question is the pre trip updates that we send via PM. And while most people do NOT complain because they skim the titles and read what they want....some people never figure out we are sending them (bad email, spam etc) or they don't bother.

 

Part of the challenge is learning our system of communication such as how to recognize a trip update = WreckWench replied to a personal conversation vs Trip Update for Coz Nov 21-28 2020 DO NOT DELETE is hard for people. Its also hard to figure out how we use the forums to manage our trips (although 100% better since Scott organized the trip details into different topics) etc.  And how to NOT reply to the TRIP PM when the system says "to reply to this message click here" at the bottom of every pm sent out.

 

So initially my thoughts were to streamline the pre trip updates and of course offer a service to the few clients who consider time more valuable than money or just like to pay for convenience. And YES we are getting more of them but also losing them because we have not made it easy enough for them.

 

Scott I like the idea of videos. What content do you suggest is most suited for that?

 

Pam you have very solid ideas for the actual service if we offer it. I agree that its better to be on a per trip basis vs an annual subscription. And even if we make it really expensive for the service I do need someone willing to do this hand holding. I CAN NOT DO IT NOR WILL I except for the first 1-2 to set up the process.  The thought is to pay the volunteer 100% of the fee for doing this for those members who choose the service. Your ideas on the SDCC are great! What I'm not certain about is the idea of including flight booking, and getting insurance, filling out forms etc. The insurance must be done by the person and the air we already chg for. I guess we could log in as them and interview them on the phone and fill it out for them for a fee.

 

My initial thought is a laundry list of services and they choose what they want with possibly a 'all included pkg' price.

 

We can ask what kinds of updates they want and they can choose. what they want. ALL is free and picking specific updates would incur a charge.

 

• General Updates & Tips: Covid, missing forms, legal requirements etc
• Pre trip tips: packing,
• Country specific tips:  currency, voltage concerns, customs,
• SD specific tips: medical envelope, rooming, dive buddies, problem resolution
• Arrival Tips: Customs issues, how to get to hotel etc
• Hotel/Diving Tips: Orientation times, getting gear to dive shop, etc
• Post Trip Tips: How to stay in touch with everyone, how to share pictures, etc.

We could ask them how they want to receive the updates. Via our PM is free and via other options incurs a fee.

 

• Text info or a text to tell you to check your email.
• FB info or a FB message to check your email.
• Emailing ONLY the info you want and not all of it as we currently do.

 

We can ask them how often they want the updates and when for a fee.

 

• As needed:  We only send when its critical.
• Once a week: We send all updates weekly if any
• Twice a week:  We send all updates twice weekly if any
• Daily:  We send updates daily if any
• As generated:  We send updates as we create them.

 

• 8-5pm (unless emergency updates)
• After 5pm (unless emergency updates)
• Before 8 am (unless emergency updates)
• NEVER during ____ times

I see it as a list of services they pay for and maybe a VIP pkg that includes all if that makes sense. So the individual prices would be more than the total. So each option could be $25-$50 each which could easily add up to a fairly high 'set pkg price' But our time is money too. If we have to pay someone to do very laborious things to save them time then they should pay for it. AND I have 2 high end clients willing to help beta the options and/or service when we get that far.

 

NOTE: If they learn our system and do the process the way it is now then that is included in the trip price. And if we get the process steamlined a bit more then I think most will do the FREE option.  But by offering the ala carte option we cater to those who really do consider time more valuable than money and/or give us a way to ENSURE that our regular members check the updates if they opt for free option so we are off the hook.  It truly killed me to have someone say to me...I figured you'd tell me if it was REALLY important as if the changing and evolving circumstances were not stressful enough I had to remember who needed me to call them to ensure they got the message privately.   That was the straw that broke the camels back. And once this is set up I want a new form they fill out AND a line in the T&C's that says they will learn our system for trip updates and communications that is included in the trip price or they will choose a premium upcharge conscierge service for customized communications and they agree they understand this as part of booking this trip and they will choose one of the options given so that we are confident they are getting necessary and needed trip updates. (Sort of like how I solved the trip insurance issue which now with covid I need to do again but will be a new topic)

 

If add'l thoughts on HOW to do this come to mind...PLEASE keep providing them. I will be updating the way we do the pre trip messages to streamline the content and avoid as much duplication if possible. Then I or a volunteer can send them out on a loosely prescribed schedule ie. 6 months out... 3 months out.. 1 month out etc.   And finally we could certainly complement the content with videos if we knew which would be most suited and useful. And finally I want to offer this streamlined process of HOW TO GET TRIP UPDATES to our members so that they can more readily understand the  process we use and participate in a way they are comfortable with.

 

THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR INSIGHT!!!  I really want to make improvements in this area so keep the specific ideas coming if you have more!

[Cmdr. Clownfish]

I was referring to the pretrip communication that I did differently than you.  They liked the way I did it and hate the way you do it.

 

Assuming people will take the time to learn the system is a bad assumption and you are wrong to act like they will.  They will do that for utilities or something like that were they have no choice but they have a choice.  If they have to think about it then it is too complex.

 

The content for the videos would be everything in the trip PM and anything critical in the forums.  If they have to read it then just tell then.  

[WreckWench]

I was referring to the pretrip communication that I did differently than you.  They liked the way I did it and hate the way you do it.

 

Assuming people will take the time to learn the system is a bad assumption and you are wrong to act like they will.  They will do that for utilities or something like that were they have no choice but they have a choice.  If they have to think about it then it is too complex.

 

The content for the videos would be everything in the trip PM and anything critical in the forums.  If they have to read it then just tell then.  

Ok. What did they love about the way you did it?

[Cmdr. Clownfish]

 

I was referring to the pretrip communication that I did differently than you.  They liked the way I did it and hate the way you do it.

 

Assuming people will take the time to learn the system is a bad assumption and you are wrong to act like they will.  They will do that for utilities or something like that were they have no choice but they have a choice.  If they have to think about it then it is too complex.

 

The content for the videos would be everything in the trip PM and anything critical in the forums.  If they have to read it then just tell then.  

Ok. What did they love about the way you did it?

 

It was short and sweet.  They only got the information they needed and didn't have to dig through a ton of worthless marketing.  I would boil down an entire paragraph of yours that scrolled off the screen to one sentence.   As evidenced by the original request, they don't want their time wasted by a ton of fluff.

[WreckWench]

Ok I will check your Thailand trip PM for ideas.