The Importance of a Communications Strategy for your Incentive Travel Trip

communications strategies are created with the intention to build trust, engage employees and manage expectation. However, when planning an incentive travel trip, a communication strategy is commonly overlooked; the focus being on the budget, planning and eligibility. Internal communication should not be neglected; if you want buy in from your employees you essentially have to market the incentive travel trip to your 'internal customers'.

Easy Dispersal of information 

Internal customers, otherwise known as employees, need to have every bit of relevant information at their disposal. Creating a communications strategy enables easy dispersal of information. Incentive travel programs include a huge amount of information, from flight details and dietary information, to itineraries and e-tickets. It is important that all this information be communicated correctly. Registration apps are an effective method of dispersing information to a large group of people; they are easily customisable, accessible and eco friendly. 

Standardised method of communicating

A communication strategy creates a standardised method of communicating with your internal customers. Planning an incentive travel trip is no mean feat; it takes a lot of organisation and cooperation. Having a communication strategy takes the control away from the customer – this is vital when organising and incentive travel trip. The customer should not dictate how best to communicate, because if everyone was to choose how to communicate, there would be so many lines of dialect. The organisers should communicate the information through one standard channel, reducing confusion.

Build excitement 

Leading up to the incentive travel trip it’s important that employees are excited. Implementing a successful communications strategy prior to the trip will increase staff morale and motivation. Creating a motivated atmosphere in the lead up to the incentive trip will encourage productivity and therefore output. You could send out information packs to the customers detailing their trip, create a WhatsApp group to keep everyone informed or send pictures from the destination to get the customers excited.

post event communication

Having a communication strategy is important prior to the incentive trip but incentive planners often neglect the post-event communication strategy. It is critical not to ostracise the customers that do not win a place on the trip, ensure that they feel included; it will perhaps motivate them to try harder to earn a place on the trip next time. Equally, the communications strategy should keep momentum going ahead of the next incentive travel trip. Do not let the excitement diminish; make sure that there are reminders of the trip to incentivise employees to continue to work hard in order to win a space on the next trip.

Implementing a communications strategy for your incentive travel trip is just as important as any other aspect of planning the trip. Without effective communication, customer excitement levels may not be as high, mistakes can be made and information not correctly distributed. Planning and incentive trip is a big task and takes a huge amount of planning. A communication strategy enables things to run far more smoothly.

To make sure your incentive travel trip runs even more smoothly, download our free incentive travel checklist and avoid any last minute panic.