Anything Special Happen to YOU This Year?
I've been doing a lot of thinking and reflecting this week while up in Pittsburgh about this past year. I can’t say it’s been an easy year, there have been many challenges this year, and after considerable reflection, I think “challenging” is a very appropriate word when describing my experience with YTB this year. To see and hear all the negativity concerning a company I admire, respect, and love the way I do, has been very difficult. Part of my struggle has been between my heart and my head. My heart tells me that I should be lashing out to defend all the negativity. My head and logic however tells me not only would lashing and mud slinging be of little use, but it’s not the proper way to fight ignorance. “Ignorance” is another choice word for me this year, and there is a difference between ignorance and stupidity. There are a lot of people whom I’ve come to know who are extremely intelligent, but merely uneducated about our particular business model. I also find that much of what YTB has done in a positive light has either been “ignored” or taken completely out of context.
Network Marketing or MLM in general has a stigma associated with it for a lot of people. There are plenty of broad and liberal strokes used to generalize MLM. For some, it’s visions of easy money. For others, it’s loosing thousands of dollars and being stuck with pile of product in your garage that you’ll never use. Others are convinced that in order to make it big, you have to hit up family and friends. Of course, they will all tell you “NO” because they all know someone who’s died in a cult like the “Peoples Temple” and don’t want to drink the Kool-Aid.
Any look or consideration of treating this model like any other traditional business is completely foreign to most.
That’s not to say that there have not been considerable advancements with YTB in technology, operations, and recognition that have really put YTB on the map this year. There are plenty of people out there who believe that the recognition we've received; especially in the last quarter of 2007 have been the wrong type of recognition. Recognition is recognition, and I have to site a quote in Travel Weekly back to the beginning of the year by Coach, when he commented about all the critics out there who think YTB is nothing but a card mill and/or pyramid scheme.
"You beat that by proving yourself. We just keep doing the right thing."
I've seen throughout this year, YTB doing the right thing. A press release was posted a few weeks ago commenting on some of the advancements we’ve made. Gone are the days when everyone was talking about YTB filing for bankruptcy, and we now have total revenue for the nine months ended September 30, 2007 of $95.9 million. (For those of us smart enough to invest in company stock by the way now have 3 times the amount of shares.) Gone are the days of having nobody except “our own” quoting how much travel we actually book thanks to Travel Weekly ranking us 35th largest travel agencies overall for 2006. Gone are the days of not making any impact in the industry after having YTB International President, J. Kim Sorensen, named by Travel Weekly as one of the 33 most influential people in the travel industry. Gone are the days of just a recruiting machine with our "sail-a-thon," booking more than 12,000 passengers in less than 24 hours. Gone are the days that we don’t have any training available for our RTA’s when we rolled out "YTB E-Campus", designed by Dr. Marc Mancini, one of the travel industry's most highly respected speakers, educators and consultants. I would also add gone are the days of YTB Rep’s and RTA’s running around unchecked and unaccountable with our membership to the DSA and a code of ethics.
Most who oppose our company will readily bring up a vendor or two that are now gone, namely, Royal Caribbean and industry Accreditation. To put those events into perspective, I think we might need to look ahead into 2008. While I don’t have any type of crystal ball in front of me, there have been policies, procedures, expansions, and technologies put in place that just may shed some new light on how poor that move really was back in October. YTB will require travel booking production before issuing a credentials card. (RTA or CLIA) YTB agrees that card mills (companies that sell credential cards with a minimum of any professional commitment or training,) are a problem in the travel industry, and standards must be upheld. Among those standards emphasized by YTB:
· A comprehensive, travel-specific education and training program to ensure the professionalism;
· Encourage travel suppliers to make industry perks available based on agent productivity;
· Avoid issuing agent ID cards that are designed to mislead travel suppliers;
· Incentivize agents to take additional training from associations and travel suppliers for further professional growth;
· Establish a policy that agents should not attempt to solicit or recruit at industry functions or FAM trips;
· Follow all compliance guidelines for direct sales of the Direct Selling Association;
· Focus on generating travel commissions through a significant volume of travel product sales;
I also have to wonder what the effects of our expansion into Canada and Caribbean Islands Q1 2008 will do to increase Travel Sales. YTB has double its production in both RTA web site sales from 60K to over 135K in 2007. YTB has already doubled our Travel Commission by the third quarter from $7 million in all of 2006 to $14 Million as of September, and doubled our gross sales from $226 to $550 million. (By the way, $550 Million should place YTB in the Top 20 overall for the Travel Weekly 2007 Power List.) And for those that are concerned about how YTB “gleans” numbers from suppliers to “validate” our sales numbers; that will be taken care of in March when our SAP NetWeaver® technology platform goes live as the software solution best able to support the company's growth strategy.
There have been many twists, turns, and surprises concerning YTB in 2007. I firmly believe that YTB shocked the Travel Industry with our ranking in Travel Weekly, while at the same time Royal Caribbean shocked us. Of course both events pale in comparison when you take into account that John Frenaye and Doug Bauknight consider each other friends. Yet, the world hasn’t stopped or come to an end as we move into 2008. YTB may never overcome ignorance and some who drink the pyramid and card mill Kool-Aid, and that’s their choice. We may also never be able to own up to the high standards of those who have come before in the Travel Industry, and that’s our choice. If there is one thing I’ve learned in my years with YTB (now finishing up my third year) it’s this. Everyone has their own perspective about who YTB is and what YTB does. My job isn’t to convince anyone, it’s only to inform and educate. The choices you as a critic or contributor make based on this information are yours.
One last word comes to mind concerning 2007 while we move into 2008 and that word is “resolve”. Now that YTB is on the map thanks to all the attention we’ve gotten from critics and contributors alike, 2008 should be another defining year because of YTB’s resolve to do keep doing the right things. I once heard a very wise man state something many years ago. I’ve run into him since several times and he keeps reminding me…
"If it aint true, don't say it.
If it aint right, don't do it" ~ Coach
Thank you all who have been reading this year…I’ve truly enjoyed being able to share with all of you and it’s been a real honor to have so many from both sides of the fence both visit and comment.
Network Marketing or MLM in general has a stigma associated with it for a lot of people. There are plenty of broad and liberal strokes used to generalize MLM. For some, it’s visions of easy money. For others, it’s loosing thousands of dollars and being stuck with pile of product in your garage that you’ll never use. Others are convinced that in order to make it big, you have to hit up family and friends. Of course, they will all tell you “NO” because they all know someone who’s died in a cult like the “Peoples Temple” and don’t want to drink the Kool-Aid.Any look or consideration of treating this model like any other traditional business is completely foreign to most.
That’s not to say that there have not been considerable advancements with YTB in technology, operations, and recognition that have really put YTB on the map this year. There are plenty of people out there who believe that the recognition we've received; especially in the last quarter of 2007 have been the wrong type of recognition. Recognition is recognition, and I have to site a quote in Travel Weekly back to the beginning of the year by Coach, when he commented about all the critics out there who think YTB is nothing but a card mill and/or pyramid scheme.
"You beat that by proving yourself. We just keep doing the right thing."
I've seen throughout this year, YTB doing the right thing. A press release was posted a few weeks ago commenting on some of the advancements we’ve made. Gone are the days when everyone was talking about YTB filing for bankruptcy, and we now have total revenue for the nine months ended September 30, 2007 of $95.9 million. (For those of us smart enough to invest in company stock by the way now have 3 times the amount of shares.) Gone are the days of having nobody except “our own” quoting how much travel we actually book thanks to Travel Weekly ranking us 35th largest travel agencies overall for 2006. Gone are the days of not making any impact in the industry after having YTB International President, J. Kim Sorensen, named by Travel Weekly as one of the 33 most influential people in the travel industry. Gone are the days of just a recruiting machine with our "sail-a-thon," booking more than 12,000 passengers in less than 24 hours. Gone are the days that we don’t have any training available for our RTA’s when we rolled out "YTB E-Campus", designed by Dr. Marc Mancini, one of the travel industry's most highly respected speakers, educators and consultants. I would also add gone are the days of YTB Rep’s and RTA’s running around unchecked and unaccountable with our membership to the DSA and a code of ethics.
Most who oppose our company will readily bring up a vendor or two that are now gone, namely, Royal Caribbean and industry Accreditation. To put those events into perspective, I think we might need to look ahead into 2008. While I don’t have any type of crystal ball in front of me, there have been policies, procedures, expansions, and technologies put in place that just may shed some new light on how poor that move really was back in October. YTB will require travel booking production before issuing a credentials card. (RTA or CLIA) YTB agrees that card mills (companies that sell credential cards with a minimum of any professional commitment or training,) are a problem in the travel industry, and standards must be upheld. Among those standards emphasized by YTB:
· A comprehensive, travel-specific education and training program to ensure the professionalism;
· Encourage travel suppliers to make industry perks available based on agent productivity;
· Avoid issuing agent ID cards that are designed to mislead travel suppliers;
· Incentivize agents to take additional training from associations and travel suppliers for further professional growth;
· Establish a policy that agents should not attempt to solicit or recruit at industry functions or FAM trips;
· Follow all compliance guidelines for direct sales of the Direct Selling Association;
· Focus on generating travel commissions through a significant volume of travel product sales;
I also have to wonder what the effects of our expansion into Canada and Caribbean Islands Q1 2008 will do to increase Travel Sales. YTB has double its production in both RTA web site sales from 60K to over 135K in 2007. YTB has already doubled our Travel Commission by the third quarter from $7 million in all of 2006 to $14 Million as of September, and doubled our gross sales from $226 to $550 million. (By the way, $550 Million should place YTB in the Top 20 overall for the Travel Weekly 2007 Power List.) And for those that are concerned about how YTB “gleans” numbers from suppliers to “validate” our sales numbers; that will be taken care of in March when our SAP NetWeaver® technology platform goes live as the software solution best able to support the company's growth strategy.
There have been many twists, turns, and surprises concerning YTB in 2007. I firmly believe that YTB shocked the Travel Industry with our ranking in Travel Weekly, while at the same time Royal Caribbean shocked us. Of course both events pale in comparison when you take into account that John Frenaye and Doug Bauknight consider each other friends. Yet, the world hasn’t stopped or come to an end as we move into 2008. YTB may never overcome ignorance and some who drink the pyramid and card mill Kool-Aid, and that’s their choice. We may also never be able to own up to the high standards of those who have come before in the Travel Industry, and that’s our choice. If there is one thing I’ve learned in my years with YTB (now finishing up my third year) it’s this. Everyone has their own perspective about who YTB is and what YTB does. My job isn’t to convince anyone, it’s only to inform and educate. The choices you as a critic or contributor make based on this information are yours.
One last word comes to mind concerning 2007 while we move into 2008 and that word is “resolve”. Now that YTB is on the map thanks to all the attention we’ve gotten from critics and contributors alike, 2008 should be another defining year because of YTB’s resolve to do keep doing the right things. I once heard a very wise man state something many years ago. I’ve run into him since several times and he keeps reminding me…
"If it aint true, don't say it.
If it aint right, don't do it" ~ Coach
Thank you all who have been reading this year…I’ve truly enjoyed being able to share with all of you and it’s been a real honor to have so many from both sides of the fence both visit and comment.
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Doug & Ronda Bauknight
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Labels: Coach, John Frenaye, Kim Sorensen, Travel MLM, Travel Weekly, YTB Travel Network
