CLIA Training Seminar Descriptions

Each training seminar described below is three hours and provides 15 credits towards CLIA's Certification requirements, as well as 3 CEU's for The Travel Institute's and CITC's programs. Successful completion of any of these seminars may be used towards the Cruise Counsellor Certification or the CLIA ID Card.

BUILDING A SMART BUSINESS PLAN

At the core of any successful business is a well thought-out business plan. In this seminar you'll find out about the key ingredients that can make your business powerful and persuasive. You'll learn about the supporting documents you'll need; the elements that should go into your financial statement; and criteria for selecting the consortium, chain or other organization that's right for you.

CHOOSING CHAMPIONS: HOW TO FIND, TRAIN, MOTIVATE AND KEEP YOUR EMPLOYEES

Designed for agency owners and managers but also valuable to front line salespeople, this seminar shows how to survive and thrive in today's challenging employment market. You'll learn the best ways to get, train and keep new employees, as well as how to reward staff to keep them happy and productive.

CREATING A CRUISE MARKETING PLAN

Successful businesses know a marketing plan is an absolute essential. This seminar will identify the essential components of a successful yet simple marketing plan and show you how all these pieces fit into the marketing puzzle. You'll learn how to write a mission statement, do a SWOT analysis, arrive at the right promotional mix and translate it all into your roadmap to success.

CRUISE VACATIONS - AN INTRODUCTION

In some ways, selling cruises is a lot like selling just about anything. But in important and fundamental ways, it's very, very different. This seminar will provide you with a comprehensive overview of the cruise product and how to sell it. You'll learn about why people take cruises, what the cruise experience is really like, which destinations and itineraries cruise lines favor, the specialized terms the industry uses, how to successfully make a booking and just about everything else you need to become a success.

CRUISING-KNOWING THE WORLD YOU SELL

Now that you need it, don't you wish you had learned more about geography while in school? Well, here it is, CLIA's crash-course on cruise geography. In this highly participatory workshop, we'll take you on a journey to the destinations, ports and itineraries you need to know – and how to sell them.

CRUISING-THE ULTIMATE INCENTIVE

Incentive travel is a huge part of the travel industry. Yet most agents know very little about it – and about the opportunities incentive travel represents. Who are the best prospects for incentive travel? What would they expect from a cruise experience? How are incentive groups different from "regular" groups? In this seminar you'll learn the fundamentals of incentive travel and gain an understanding of the strategies and techniques you need to succeed in this highly specialized field.

CUSTOMER RELATIONS MANAGEMENT: MADE EASY

CRM, or Customer Relationship Management, has become an essential tool for any modern business to succeed. In this seminar you'll learn dozens of strategies – technological and otherwise – to help you understand and profit from your customers, as well as build, reinforce and nurture the relationship you have with them.

DELIVERING GREAT CUSTOMER SERVICE

Great service is the cornerstone of success for any retail business. But providing it is a challenge in today's fast-pace, high-expectation travel marketplace. In this seminar, you'll explore the five emotional factors that drive your clients' service needs, the 10 standards of excellence that the best service-providers follow and the leading technologies that can support and enhance your ability to provide superior service.

DIRECT MAIL THAT SELLS

Many predicted that e-marketing would make direct mail obsolete. They were wrong. In fact, direct mail is as popular as it ever was. During this seminar, you'll learn how to apply basic writing principles, write copy that sells and create a profitable direct mail campaign. You'll discover the six essential steps to writing anything, the seven "C"s of powerful communication, how to get and keep the reader's attention, when and what to mail and how to track and measure the success of your direct mail campaign

EFFECTIVE PRESENTATION SKILLS

Are there "secrets" to making a persuasive presentation? Absolutely. And in this seminar, we're going to tell you what they are. You'll learn how to tailor your presentation to each audience, structure your topic, prevent attention-drift, pace your delivery for maximum effect and apply dozens of other techniques, with professionalism, confidence and conviction.

GETTING CONNECTED: A PRIMER ON SOCIAL MEDIA NETWORKING

Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter. Not too long ago, these names would have been meaningless to you. Today they represent a fresh, significant way to communicate, network and sell. In this seminar you'll explore the strengths and weaknesses of each major social networking site, become familiar with the "etiquette" of social media and explore the seemingly endless applications of social media to the travel marketplace.

GROUP SALES MADE EASY

Several studies have shown that the most successful travel agents are those who operate several group departures per year. This seminar will show you how to find high-potential groups, develop leads, analyze group needs, price correctly, choreograph your promotions, work with group leaders and operate a successful cruise group departure.

LOCAL PUBLIC RELATIONS TECHNIQUES: HOW TO MAXIMIZE YOUR AGENCY'S VISIBILITY

Wouldn't it be great if you could promote yourself and/or your business without spending a cent? It can be done. And the way to do it is through public relations. In this seminar, you'll discover dozens of very low- or no-cost public relations techniques that will generate publicity, establish your expertise and build your business and success.

MANAGING YOUR TIME EFFECTIVELY

Email, voice-mail, so many articles to read, social media to check, passwords to change – yes, life has become very, very complicated. If that's the way you feel, this seminar will help. We'll share with you eight insights to streamline your service skills, four systems to better prioritize your work, six proven strategies to overcome procrastination and how to become more productive in all your business and personal efforts.

NEGOTIATING TO WIN

Want to feel more confident when you negotiate with suppliers – and with just about everyone else? This seminar will present concepts that you can apply to almost any negotiating situation. You'll learn how to establish common goals, understand competitive and collaborative negotiations, define strategies, break an impasse and apply such strangely-named – but highly effective – techniques as lowball/highball, growing the pie, sleight-of-hand and slice the salami.

POWER SELLING TECHNIQUES

Great salespeople have one thing in common: They always want to improve, to know more. This seminar goes beyond the basics. It'll show you how to implement the "forgotten" steps of sales and apply "super skills" that can make your job easier and that can produce some remarkably powerful results.

PRINCIPLES OF PROFESSIONAL SELLING

The ability to sell effectively and well is absolutely essential to cruise sales. This seminar will help you do precisely that. You'll learn the best way to qualify a client and identify motives, recommend cruises with confidence, effectively dispel any concerns that prospective passengers may have and apply these techniques toward closing more cruise sales

PSYCHOLOGY OF SELLING

In many ways, a travel agent is like a psychologist. You need to analyze a person's needs, attitudes and expectations – and suggest possible solutions. This seminar will show you how to read your customers and sell from their perspective, uncover hidden client needs and customize your sales techniques to different types of personalities. Finally, you'll learn the 10 fundamentals to building and maintaining an all-important element to your success: client loyalty.

SELLING TO SPECIAL INTERESTS – NICHE MARKETS

Most of us know how to sell to that mass-market client. But what about customers with highly specialized interests? Is there a place in cruising for them? The answer, of course, is yes. In this interactive seminar you'll learn dozens of strategies to help you reach and satisfy niche clients. You'll see how both mainstream and specialized cruise products can satisfy their needs. And you'll explore the profile of six common niche client types and precisely what they want from a vacation travel experience.

SPECIALTY CRUISING

Niche, small ship, special interest – no matter what label you use, this once-minor segment of the cruise industry has become a major success. In this seminar you'll explore the remarkable diversity within specialty cruising, the precise kinds of clients who find this sort of travel appealing, the hot buttons they respond to and the kinds of destinations they prefer. Above all, you'll learn practical and profitable ways to fully integrate specialty cruising into your existing sales and marketing efforts.

WHO ARE YOU? AN EXPLORATION OF YOUR ABILITIES, SKILLS AND STRENGTHS

Almost everyone has heard the old, wise saying "Know Thyself." But is this relevant to our modern world? Absolutely. Knowing your strengths, overcoming your weaknesses and applying the lessons you learn from self-discovery are essential not just to personal fulfillment but also to your business success. In this unique seminar, we'll take you through a series of exercises that will assess your professional skills and provide insights on how to excel in all that you do.

40 BEST PRACTICES FOR TRAVEL AGENT SUCCESS

To create this seminar, we sifted through the hundreds of tactics, strategies and practices we recommend in all our CLIA seminars, videos and other training tools and selected what we feel are the 40 best ideas we’ve ever shared with you. Come find out what they are – and how to make them work for you.

MINI MODULES: These are highlighted 90-minute versions of select CLIA Seminars and provide 10 credits toward ACC and MCC Certification requirements.

BETTER LISTENING SKILLS FOR BETTER BUSINESS

Ever found yourself listening to a client and suddenly realize you have no idea what they've just said? Or read something and, at the end, discovered that you recall nothing? Don't think it's just you. It's happening to everyone. In this essential seminar you'll find out what behaviors you must avoid to protect your ability to concentrate and you'll learn dozens of proven, practical strategies to reinforce your ability to recall, pay attention and really listen.

BUILDING CLIENT LOYALTY

No business can grow and prosper without repeat business. This program will show you how to generate loyalty among your customers. You'll learn how to uncover hidden client needs, apply quality service and implement 10 fundamentals to building and maintaining client loyalty.

CLEVER WAYS TO CLOSE THE SALE

Everyone wants to close more sales. But how can you take your closing skills to a higher level? This CLIA seminar will clarify the mindset you need to make closing something you do for clients, not to them. And it will reveal dozens of closing strategies – some tried and true, others very much "out of the box" – that can make you a genuine close-that-sale expert.

PROFESSIONAL SELLING SKILLS

Want to sharpen your sales skills? This seminar will enable you to do just that. You'll learn the most effective ways to implement the five essential steps of the sale, qualify a client, overcome the most common barriers to the cruise sale, add value to every sale and employ strategies to get and keep the business.

RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT

Success at selling travel is more than a series of impersonal routines. Increasingly, it has more to do with the one-on-one relationships you create with your clients. CRM (Customer Relations Management), has made it even more feasible. In this seminar, you'll discover the 18 ways CRM can benefit your sales, service and marketing efforts. You'll find out how to extract valuable data, insights and trends from your database. You'll also learn what stages you must follow to implement a CRM system and how to use CRM to enhance that all-important asset: customer loyalty.

SELLING SUCCESSFULLY ACROSS CULTURES

They may be your clients, your colleagues or your suppliers – and they grew up in an entirely different culture from yours. In this global village we live in, your ability to work with people from different cultural backgrounds has become a clear-cut asset and a highly sought-after skill. In this 90-minute seminar you'll explore the subtle, fascinating and often surprising values, behaviors and practices that loom large in any cross-cultural situation and, once you become aware of them, will give you an edge in our multicultural workplace.

SPECIAL INTEREST MARKETING

Most of us know how to sell to that mass-market client, but what about customers with highly specialized interests? Is there a place in cruising for them? In this interactive seminar you'll learn dozens of strategies to help you reach and satisfy niche clients. You'll learn how both mainstream and specialized cruise products can satisfy their specialized needs.

UNDERSTANDING GROUPS

This program demonstrates how to develop group business as a profit center. You'll learn proven strategies to identify groups, define their characteristics, tap sources for lead development, tailor your product to the group's needs, work with group leaders and close the sale.