About Trade Directories.
What is a trade directory?
A Tourism Industry Trade Directory – also known as a Product Guide, Travel Planner and Trade Planner is a business to business publication used for:
- Industry promotion
- Product and destination education
- Creating opportunities for product suppliers by
- Reinforcing existing relationships, or
- Making new ones.
Why do we need them?
The key to effectiveness of a trade directory is the connectivity they build between product suppliers (advertisers) and readers (retailers, wholesalers, tour operators, and ITO’s) by leveraging a strong brand or publisher (e.g. Tourism Queensland, the Australian Federation of Travel Agents) who are active in their respective markets. This aligns advertisers to the publisher and improves advertising reach through a publication that is respected, targeted and anticipated by readers.
Who uses them?
Trade Directories produced by Sampsons Direct are used by the domestic and international travel trades to:
- Gather product and destination information
- For sourcing new product ideas
- Planning itineraries
- Reference and education for presentations and staff training, and
- Marketing and promotional tools for publishers and advertisers.
Trade directories are used, read and referred to by different trade sectors depending on the publication distribution focus. Broadly speaking, the distribution channel is segmented into wholesalers (international and domestic), inbound tour operators, tour operators and retailers.
Directories are mostly produced for specific areas of tourism to engage and build opportunities in inbound tourism, outbound tourism, and domestic tourism:
Inbound: the sector that deals with predominantly international tour groups coming to Australia on organised tour itineraries. Directories produced for this market are used by international wholesalers, selected retailers and in Australia by Inbound Tour Operators (ITO’s)
Outbound: the sector that deals with FIT’s (Fully Independent Travellers or Free Independent Travellers) and groups who are travelling from Australia to overseas destinations. Directories produced for this market are used by travel agents, Travel Management Companies (TMC’s) and wholesalers who will source product to sell to retail consumers (FIT’s) or groups traveling on planned or incentive tours.
Domestic: the sector that promotes domestic travel to Australians. Directories produced for this market are used by travel agents, domestic wholesalers who deal direct to consumers, and TMC’s who specialise in corporate and incentive travel.
