Cruise Planners Announces New Virtual Associate Training Program
Cruise Planners, an American Express Travel Representative, is making it easy for franchise owners to grow their businesses by introducing a new virtual associate training program.
The newly-launched program helps franchise owners confidently recruit new associates to join their growing franchise businesses by offering travel agent mentorship, flexibility to work from home and a new training platform to onboard associates with ease and professionalism.
“Our goal is to help our franchise owners grow their business exponentially and we know associates are a great way to extend their sales force,” said Vicky Garcia, COO and co-owner of Cruise Planners, an American Express Travel Representative. “The added flexibility with the new virtual associate training program allows for faster onboarding with interactive and engaging e-learning content which is completely mobile-friendly and accessible 24/7.”
As small business owners, Cruise Planners franchisees have the ability to run their business with associates as extensions of their salesforce working alongside, yet independently, as a full-service travel agent. Associates will benefit from virtual training over the course of 12 days, which includes multiple live check-in sessions to ensure all associates fully understand each topic. This new approach to learning is appealing to both associates and franchise owners since it offers greater flexibility to take the courses anytime, anywhere.
Cruise Planners top-producing franchise owners who have associates are the most successful in the business model since they are able to increase their overall sales. Based on that data, Cruise Planners recently rolled out this new virtual associate training program with that in mind so more franchisees can bring on new associates through this well-received program.
“As a Franchise Owner, giving my new associates an option to train “virtually” allows them to get a great training right away from the convenience of their own home office so they can start selling,” said JJ Kuykendall, Cruise Planners franchise owner based in Oak Ridge North, Texas. “With the virtual training program, I can track my associates’ progress and see their test results, allowing me to manage my business as efficiently as possible.”
Franchise owners get support in growing their franchisees through the industry’s best technology, strategic marketing, hands-on business development coaching and in-person and virtual training opportunities.
“By introducing the new associate training program, it provides associates the opportunity to quickly onboard within the travel industry to start selling under the mentorship of a franchise owner, which truly is a win-win,” Garcia said. “When associates join Cruise Planners, they have the benefit of being under someone already established in the travel industry and can focus on selling travel instead of running a business.”
One of the biggest hurdles to bringing on associates is the commitment – both time and money – so this new program helps franchise owners easily bring the right people to train on Cruise Planners’ proprietary technology, tools and marketing programs. This is valuable because the training is tailored to the associate – since their needs are different than someone who is investing in full franchise ownership.
Cruise Planners, a leader in training and technology, has invested in industry-leading training technology in the form of a new online/virtual training platform and a team dedicated to building the industry’s most effective and award-winning training programs. The virtual associate training program is online, flexible and optimized for tablet, smart phones and personal computers with dynamic timing elements, so it is self-paced while also holding the associates accountable.
“Everything we do is designed to make it easier and more efficient for our travel agents – whether franchise owners or associates – to be as successful as possible,” Garcia said. “We are confident this new training program, combined with all the other great training tools we offer, will continue to skyrocket our agents to success.”
