In This Issue

• Message from Mai
• CCRA Attends Global Business Travel Association
• CCRA Hosted a VIP Sales Workshop
• CCRA and GlobalStar Introduce HotelStar Reservation Portal
• Tourism Cares Awards Professional Development Internships

Message from Mai

As the summer comes to a close and we head into Fall, now is the time to rev up your sales efforts to peak performance. Start by completing the 2012 CCRA Negotiated Rate Program RFP and put your rates and inventory in front of 22,000 travel agencies and over 50,000 agents.

When you choose to participate with CCRA, not only are your rates distributed to all four GDS, your rates also become available to the thousands of independent travel agents registered to use our booking portal, CCRAtravel.com.

We also urge you to supplement your travel agent marketing strategy by taking advantage of the numerous marketing opportunities that CCRA makes available. We have a variety of marketing programs and packages to get your name in front of these powerful decision makers. Email sales@ccra.com for more information on various packages and marketing tools designed to help increase your sales.

Also, we feel sure you will find this issue of Check-in full of ideas and opportunities that can help you and your hotel be more successful.

Please remember: the RFP deadline is September 12, 2011! Don't wait! Sign up today to get in front of our thousands of agents, and take advantage of these programs only available through CCRA RFP tool.

Sincerely,

Mai Meyaart
Vice President and Managing Director

CCRA Attends Global Business Travel Association

This month CCRA Travel Solutions attended the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA) 2011 Convention in Denver, Colorado. GBTA kicked off a record breaking convention with over 1,200 travel buyers and nearly 6,000 total attendees total, making this one of the largest GBTA Conventions in history and one of the largest gatherings of travel professionals in the world. Some of the event highlights included keynote speakers: former Secretary of Treasury, Henry M. Paulson, Jr.; past president and CEO of eBay, Meg Whitman, and Sean Penn.

CCRA had the privilege of meeting with fifty suppliers including all the World's leading hotel chains. The convention's main message was "globalization" which dovetailed perfectly with CCRA's announcement of our new partnership with GlobalStar and it's 3,000 international agencies.

Every supplier we met with has plans to expand their portfolio in the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) markets. Many hotel chains are looking at participating in fewer hotel programs, and CCRA continues to be the top consortia program producer for the largest hotel chains in the world.

As the demand for hotel inventory around the globe continues to grow*, hotel chains and individual hotels must make the best decisions about how to reach the professional travel planners from emerging markets. CCRA has moved aggressively into this arena and will continue to promote our hotel partners to our ever growing international audience.

Independent hotels interested in participating with CCRA and reaching a global audience, should complete the 2012 RFP through Lanyon or by clicking here.

CCRA Hosted a VIP Sales Workshop

CCRA recently hosted a VIP Sales Workshop for its hotel partners located throughout central Florida. This invitation-only seminar took place at The Caribe Royal Hotel in Orlando, Florida. Each of the attendees returned home with an arsenal of cutting-edge sales ideas, promotions and best practices designed to rapidly drive profits, eliminate unnecessary discounting and boost RevPAR.

In addition, every hotel was provided with a sample copy of CCRA's newest sales intelligence report, CCRx. Each of the attendees was taught how CCRx can identify the specific travel agencies that book the competition, but not their hotel. Next, they learned how to use the same report to identify how much revenue their current agency clients were also booking at the competition.

Bill Todd, co-author (with Stephen Covey) of Speaking of Success, unveiled a powerful set of social media tactics designed to empower hotels to identify and romance away their competitors' most lucrative accounts.

Vicky Dunn, author of Hotel Sales in the 21st Century, delivered an authoritative action plan for sales success that tied together the joint efforts of the sales department, the general manager and all front-line hotel employees.

Each attendee was also offered a complimentary copy of Vicky Dunn and Bill Todd's new e-books, plus access to a private online reference library of sales training videos, audio recordings and marketing whitepapers.

Check out our recap video by clicking here.

Bill Todd is one of 2010's most sought after sales motivational speakers and trainers.
He is the co-author with Stephen Covey of Speaking of Success. Todd has served as vice president of sales and industry marketing for Choice Hotels International, and was vice president of sales and marketing for Marriott International's Corporate Lodging Division.
BTodd@BTodd.com | www.BTodd.com | 301.633.5856

CCRA and GlobalStar Introduce HotelStar Reservation Portal

Also at this year's GBTA annual convention, CCRA and GlobalStar Travel Management officially unveiled GlobalStar's new, branded hotel reservations system, "HotelStar".

HotelStar, powered by CCRA, is a private label, proprietary reservation portal that extends the CCRA hotel inventory to agents at over 3,300 agencies worldwide.

Readers may recall that in May 2011, GlobalStar appointed CCRA as the preferred GDS hotel supplier for its global partner network as well as for the development of the HotelStar product. CCRA's Negotiated Hotel Rate Program has already become the preferred GDS hotel program for GlobalStar agents - linking an estimated 3,300+ office locations across the globe to the CCRA negotiated rate in the GDS.

Now HotelStar offers all the functionality of CCRAtravel.com to international agents looking for the best rates and availability from GDS, Internet and Net Rate suppliers – all on a single platform.

HotelStar is just the next step in the ongoing relationship between CCRA, which is rapidly positioning itself as a global distribution leader, and GlobalStar, one of the premiere travel agency affiliations in the world.

For our hotel partners, this relationship means access to an entire new audience of global travel buyers as CCRA extends its marketing reach across the globe.

Tourism Cares Awards Professional Development Internships
Supporting aspiring professionals in travel and tourism

Tourism Cares, the tourism industry's premier charitable organization for preservation, conservation, restoration and education is pleased to award $2,000 in Professional Development Internships.

The internships are funded by Luxury Travel Advisor magazine, and are offered to applicants who intend to enter the travel and tourism industry and seek to intern at a luxury travel agency. The award funds may be used to support the internship and related expenses.

Tourism Cares is pleased to announce the following 2011 Professional Development Internship recipients: Tiffany Kassem and Emily Schneider

"Luxury Travel Advisor is proud to be a donor to the professional development internships in partnership with Tourism Cares," stated John McMahon, Vice President/Group Publisher of the Questex Travel + Hospitality Group. He added, "We believe in encouraging and offering opportunities for young professionals or those looking for a career change in the travel field to promote positive future growth in the industry."

Read full article here.

Interested students or professionals are encouraged to check the Tourism Cares website for details on the 2012 offerings and application information at www.tourismcares.org/scholarships early next year.