Terms

"It was really important that we had a means that our community could connect to one another," Katalina begins. "Some individuals will refer to their community' to refer to their Instagram followers; perhaps it's the two-way communication between the person who created the content and the people they are interacting with however it's not conversations between one user and one. We wanted to make it easier for members speaking to one another because that's community-building fundamentally, it's the way people feel connected to one another."

Not only travel fans were becoming part of the ECT community. Industry experts were becoming members and actively providing information to people around them, creating a friendly and knowledgeable community. Katalina and the ECT Team wanted formalize the contributions of these experts to show their gratitude for all of the helpful information to be shared.

"We were looking to make these experts, who know our values and are basically the El Caminos of these countries, more involved with our organization," Katalina starts. "We made badges for them and also gave them profiles with a blue circle around the photo, and a yellow check mark in order to prove they are destination experts. When you post a question concerning Greece and Christina responds, you'll know this is an expert who spent a decade or more within the country."

Community members had questions to answer, as well as genuine, certified professional travel agents were engaging. The online community was serving its purpose perfectly -- perhaps even better than had been anticipated. Then, the miracle happened: lockdowns were lifted. The online ECT community was transitioning back to an offline realm, and it was time for the company to transition from survival mode back to developing to the future. "During the pandemic , we were fire-tested, and we were able to stand up," Katalina explains.

The pandemic and its resulting worldwide slowdown allowed to the ECT group to consider thinking more about how to best provide for its women travellers. "We knew that we had done something unique, but we never had the time or resources to consider the company we had built. We realized how valuable it is, for a travel-related company generally," she continues. "As the world began to expand it became apparent that there was a lot more we could do with membership in real life. We could serve the community by expressing what they needed from us, when they started to venture out into the world."

Big ambition

What is El Camino Travel going to offer its clients everything they require now the world is about to go back to routine? "The big vision is to be the pre-eminent single-stop destination for women to think, plan, book, experience and then share their travel experiences," Katalina asserts.

ECT started off with around 100 members in August 2020 The number has increased to approximately 700. In addition, the ECT team has grown to 6 and a half full-time employees. In the US women of the millennial generation are the fastest-growing segment within the travel industry, but Katalina feels that no one of the major operators are serving this segment. "For some of the bigger businesses, nobody is at the top of the executive table saying"hey, women have an enormous amount of money yet they're not feeling safe while traveling. What are we able to do to more effectively serve them?" she says.

Katalina recounts that, from a recent study of 5000 female travelers, the number one thing wanted from travel companies by most (85%) of those who participated was simply to feel safe while travelling. "These women don't ask for bodyguards" Katalina says "They only want to be confident that they have the intel with the right resources, connections and resources for making informed choices. This is what helps them feel secure and confident. This is what we're addressing in the present with our small-group travel experiences, as they enable travelers to fully immerse themselves and not have to sacrifice the overall quality of their trip experience because of their gender."

Ultimately, Katalina wants El Camino Travel to become the best resource available to women who travel. "TripAdvisor and Google are focused on the quantity of information over quality. There's many poor-quality data available and we'd like to do the completely different," she continues. "It's about knowing that there's an online community to lean on in a way that I don't have to rely on anyone else, when I go out exploring this world."

Travel concierge

How does the ability to rely on the community show up? Katalina tells me that, whenever someone asks a question in the ECT forum, the community manager jumps in "with the white glove concierge service" and provides all links to threads that might already exist, and then as many as five other users of the community will reply. "Rather than the 200 responses you would get in a free Facebook group you'll get better suggestions that are a reflection of our style of travel," Katalina says. "People are paying for El Camino because they think, 'That's who I am as a traveler. They are more knowledgeable than anybody other'. The goal is to bring people together."

This begs the question what is the best way to ensure the quality, does ECT has maybe an upper limit of number of members? "We are asked every times, "How do you going to keep the quality up and maintain the quality?'" Katalina responds, adding "Tech will contribute to that, for sure. We've already begun monitoring data and evaluating the options." She adds the team is currently looking at ways to ensure that users aren't bombarded with low data. The team already moderates the forum and picks a few questions that they will answer. They also stops the responses after the number of responses is a set amount.

"At this moment, the benefit of membership is the fact that you receive an extremely well-curated guide to travel each month, put together by our expert destination guides So maybe we'll roll up more content that is curated, as people are able to believe in the company," she continues. "We want to make sure we're able to handle increasing numbers of people, and can still provide the content and the connections they're looking for, but without experiencing the same issues that occur as groups grow."

It is noted that many of ECT community members want to get in touch with one another, especially when they travel and many have remote workgroups at the moment. "You'll get messages saying, 'Hey, who's currently in Mexico for the next few months? I'm working remotely in Oaxaca!'" she explains. "We're looking into tech to make it easy for people to meet whenever they're travelling to similar places on the same time."

Alongside the advancements in technology, the primary plan of ECT is to embrace the post-lockdown world and get selling trips again. The company began selling group travel excursions in June 2021. today, a major portion of its business is selling those trips, offering memberships -- and combining the two with discounts to members.

Sharing is not selling.

It is our conclusion that, contrary to what we would expect it is the method that does not sell travel- but simply talking about it on the ECT forum -- is ultimately helping many of the experts from ECT's travel department in gaining clients. "The forum is a great way for people to demonstrate thought leadership and expertise and a lot of members of those in the El Camino Travel community have gained clients from the answers to their questions," Kataliana explains.

Katalina quickly realized they was a great concept and sought ways to increase and improve the experts' list for destination. "We talked to our present team, 'Who do you think should be an expert?' And they suggested people to us," she continues. "I interviewed them and inform them about the forum and make them feel excited. It's a new distribution channel that is free of any algorithmic hurdles of Facebook and Instagram, and gives an opportunity to sit in on their ideal audience."

The experts recognized clear advantages. "When you meet with potential travelers, you must demonstrate your knowledge in demonstrating why would someone book a trip with you. Forums allow them to present their knowledge in an natural, genuine way which doesn't come off as salesy," she says.

"Travel experts love to talk about travel. We enjoy sharing details. We have another chance to be helpful," Katalina muses. Being helpful is a great method to promote travel. as the industry has begun to rebound, we as the ECT team has had the opportunity to do more beyond simply speaking about traveling. "Since lockdown lifted, we've started planning trips together with our expert destination specialists. We've been to Morocco and to Guatemala, in Greece in Greece, and Georgia. It's been pretty cool!" she smiles.