Travel agents around the world are flocking to sign up for CTC’s education tool
2012-10-18 — /travelprnews.com/ — Canada, your number’s up…and up and up. The Canadian Tourism Commission (CTC)’s state-of-the-art tool for the travel trade around the world now has more than 10,000 fully certified agents, and there is no sign of the education momentum slowing.
The Canada Specialist Program (CSP) enables tour operators and travel agents to sell Canada more effectively, especially from CTC’s key international markets. It’s anything but a boring classroom lecture: instead, photo carousels that feature extraordinary Canadian travel experiences bring the program to vivid lifealongside an interactive map that features downloadable driving itineraries.
The word about CSP is spreading. Travellers see the program logo as a benchmark of trust when they are planning their trips.
CSP comes in eight user-friendly training modules: Introduction, British Columbia/Alberta, Manitoba/Saskatchewan, Ontario/Quebec, Atlantic Provinces, Canada’s North, Winter Experiences and Aboriginal Experiences. Once qualified, agents can get their hands on a bulging shelf of goodies to help them give Canada a competitive edge, including FAM (familiarization) trips, discounts, partnership funding for promotions, a listing on CTC’s consumer website and window-display materials. CTC’s travel-trade managers also pitch in to help; they regularly post travel news and events info.
The UK is the CTC market with the most qualified agents, followed by Germany, China, India and Australia.
“A travel agency thrives on having unique information that visitors can’t find anywhere else,” says Charles McKee, CTC vice-president, International. “The Canada Specialist Program provides this intelligence in an easy-to-use format that gives travel agents a competitive edge for Canada as well as allowing them to offer a high degree of customer satisfaction.”
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Travel agents around the world are flocking to sign up for CTC’s education tool