Analytics strategies to improve corporate travel management

Transcription

1 Analytics strategies to improve corporate travel management

2 Innovative travel management companies (TMCs) are finding ways to apply analytics to improve and enhance the corporate customer experience. While analytics can be a great tool to streamline internal operations, analytics can also be used to offer new services to corporate travel customers, increase customer loyalty and even generate new business. With the insights gained from smarter use of travel data, TMCs can help their corporate customers find hidden savings they never hoped to recover, optimize their supplier negotiations, and manage rogue travel. TMCs are also developing advisory services to help corporate travel managers manage travel far more effectively and improve the travel experience of their employees. Are you responsible for supporting corporate travel managers? Here are five ideas and strategies about how you can use analytics to make their jobs easier and improve your customers experience. 1. Improve the airline RFP experience and results Using analytics effectively, TMCs can offer corporate travel customers deep insights into airline spending patterns and prepare for productive negotiations. By looking at common city pairs and comparing with internal information about current and future travel needs, corporate travel managers can identify opportunities to move traffic to lower-cost carriers on key routes and support their airline negotiations. Travel managers can then focus on internal communication and compliance strategies to ensure the targeted savings are realized. EXL s travel analytics team has helped corporate travel managers save 12% or more by using analytics to negotiate their managed airline programs. 2. Identify and manage ancillary charges Fees for luggage, better seats, and other kinds of ancillary charges can drive up total airline spend by 20% or more, with little visibility in travel management systems. 1 ExlService Holdings, Inc

3 To see the full picture, savvy analytics teams are aggregating booking and supplier data with credit card data, then matching ancillary charges with airline tickets. The results can be eye opening, and offer corporate travel managers a key to controlling airline spend in a time when ancillary charges are rapidly growing in volume and complexity. 3. Benchmark travel spend Internal analysis is crucial, but for a true understanding of their spending patterns, corporate travel managers must benchmark themselves against their peers. TMCs can leverage their own data sources to show corporate clients how their spend currently measures up against similar companies. One corporate travel manager was able to get executive support for a policy change simply by pointing out that 45% of their hotel spend was at upscale hotels, while the average TMC customer had 50% of their spend at moderate hotels. 2 ExlService Holdings, Inc TMCs can also help travel managers predict how policy changes will impact travel behavior and costs going forward. Effective use of predictive analytics can save companies from making investments in technology and process changes that may not result in significant savings for their company, and focus instead on changes that will drive real business impact. 4. Provide new services to help corporate travel managers optimize their spend With today s analytical tools, it is relatively easy to provide travel managers with dashboards and reports that enable businesses to quickly recognize utilization and cost trends. However, TMCs are in the position to offer more sophisticated analytics services that also help clients to proactively identify opportunities to adjust their travel programs on an ongoing basis. Working with historic post-travel data, EXL s analytics team has helped a leading One corporate travel manager was able to get executive support for a policy change simply by pointing out that 45% of their hotel spend was at upscale hotels, while the average TMC customer had 50% of their spend at moderate hotels. TMC to identify the key levers within a company s travel spending, such as seasonal differences, supplier preferences, and shifting geographic or compliance patterns among certain employee groups or the organization as a whole. Travel managers can then optimize their travel program on a quarterly or even monthly basis.

4 5. Get ready for Managed Travel 2.0 Travelers are already able to consolidate and view all travel plans, regardless of where the booking was created. Millennial employees expect to manage their own travel and utilize new mobileenabled travel services such as Uber or ifly Pro, as well as supplier mobile apps. Although the data is often buried in disparate and unusual sources, data scientists with expertise in travel data can aggregate and analyze it to support corporate travel managers now. Analytics can help corporate travel managers focused on controlling costs to find open or rogue travel and rein it in where necessary. Other corporate travel managers may want to leverage new services to improve their employees travel experiences with faster connections, or rescheduling missed flights or changing hotel reservations on the fly. TMCs can help their corporate travel managers move forward on this path, whatever their specific business goals. 3 ExlService Holdings, Inc

5 Several TMCs and OTAs are now offering analytics-based advisory services to their corporate clients as a premium service, increasing both their own revenue and providing innovative solutions to their end clients. EXL can help TMCs provide a host of services wrapped around travel patterns and behaviors, designing bestin-class policies and monitoring compliance. These services can make the corporate travel manager s job much easier, and improve their ability to meet internal performance measures. 4 ExlService Holdings, Inc CASE STUDY Improving corporate travel managers ability to manage global hotel spend with an analytics-based approach CHALLENGE A leading travel management company was often asked to provide ad hoc reporting on hotel spending for corporate customers looking to reduce hotel spend. One large global account with frequent travel in the Middle East and Africa consistently challenged the TMC to uncover savings. APPROACH EXL s travel analytics team recognized the frequent requests from the TMC were related to the limitations of the preferred hotel property database and current reporting approach. The team s deep expertise with analytics in the travel domain enabled them to first conceptualize, then design and develop a custom analytics tool to meet the TMC s account s specific requirements. By analyzing data from different sources, including the client s suppliers and credit card data, EXL was able to identify more than 200 properties that were not included in the TMC s hotel database. Large amounts of thirdparty data required scrubbing and validation, as well as sophisticated data analysis techniques to ensure accuracy. The results were used to develop a customized database to include their clients negotiated hotels on an ongoing basis - a big win for one global account as well as several other key corporate clients. RESULTS Enabled the TMC s client to include local hotels in hotel RFP negotiations, increasing leverage and savings Enabled the TMC to offer innovative add-on services to another 5 major corporate travel accounts in year 1 Generated revenues 4 times the cost of product development in year 1

6 EXL (NASDAQ: EXLS) is a leading business process solutions company that looks deeper to drive business impact through integrated services and industry knowledge. EXL provides operations management, decision analytics and technology platforms to organizations in insurance, healthcare, banking and financial services, utilities, travel, and transportation and logistics, among others. We work as a strategic partner to help our clients streamline business operations, improve corporate finance, manage compliance, create new channels for growth and better adapt to change. Headquartered in New York and in business since 1999, EXL has more than 21,000 professionals in locations throughout the U.S., Europe and Asia. EXLservice.com GLOBAL HEADQUARTERS 280 Park Avenue, 38th Floor, New York, NY T: F: UK SALES OFFICE 6 York Street, London, W1U 6PJ, United Kingdom T: F: INVESTOR RELATIONS Charles Murphy, CFA ExlService Holdings, Inc. Phone: ir@exlservice.com United States United Kingdom Czech Republic Romania Bulgaria India Philippines Malaysia