Extract from the BoursoramaTV interview with Célia Tichadelle on the development of the digital agency Travel Insight and how it stands out in its sector and its social networking missions for tourism professionals.

Mastering the art of travel on social networks is the promise of Travel Insight, a digital agency co-founded by Célia Tichadelle when she graduated from business school.
Social networks were developing at breakneck speed, but the tourism sector was lagging far behind, hence the need to help them stand out and promote their destinations.
Travel Insight will be at IFTM Top Resa, with the Influencer Village from October 1 to 4, 2019.

Was entrepreneurship something you always wanted to do, right after school?

The desire to set up my own business came to me during my studies atESCAET, a business school specializing in tourism.
I originally wanted to be a flight attendant, so I went to Tunon.
My Master’s year was a real revelation.
The desire to set up my own business started with my travel blog, which I was running at the time as a freelance alongside my studies.
I was starting to get a lot of clients asking me to manage their social networks, and I realized that the tourism industry needed to develop their digital communications.
At the end of my studies, I teamed up with Stanislas Lucien, also an ESCAET student, and together we launched Travel Insight in early 2016.

What is a digital tourism agency?

By definition, a digital agency is a company offering services for the creation of digital content: websites, mobile applications, services linked to social networks, web advertising, digital tourism training and natural search engine optimization. However, we have the specificity of specializing in tourism and travel.

Why tourism?

Tourism is a great passion of mine.
I’ve always loved traveling, and since I was very young I’ve been lucky enough to be able to discover many destinations with my parents.
Working in this sector was an obvious choice.

How powerful are social networks in tourism?

The emergence of social networks and their arrival in our daily lives has revolutionized our consumer habits.
Tourism is no exception.
Social networks influence our behavior, our decisions and our consumption.
The same applies to travel.
As proof, “#travel” is the third most-used hashtag on Instagram.

When you work in tourism, you’re in the business of selling dreams, and travel social networks are a great communication channel for getting customers to dream about a destination, for example.
Facebook, Instagram and Youtube enable tourism players to easily reach their customers at relatively low cost compared to the cost of paper brochures of the time, which are still used today.

In terms of power, today 40% of travelers, especially Millennials, choose their vacation destination based on its “Instagrammability”.
And 70% of them have already chosen a destination with the help of an Instagram photo.
Today, tourism brands have an obligation to be present on travel social networks.

How is tourism lagging behind in the digital age?

In the travel industry, there are two main strands: the BtoC strand, which is starting to make headway, as it focuses on price, and the other BtoB strand, particularly in the business travel sector, which is much further behind.
Some players still don’t understand the value of social networks, for example, and many are totally absent without any social media strategy.
Compared with other sectors, tourism is lagging far behind in terms of digital communication.

What are your responsibilities at Travel Insight?

We manage our tourism customers’ social networks, advertising campaigns and community management.
We create editorial and audiovisual content and optimize its distribution to reach the right people on the right channel.
We also develop websites, create graphics, brand names and logos… We also offer a tailor-made influencer relations service .

Who are your customers?

Destinations, hotel groups, tour operators, carriers, travel agencies, airports… We have both B2C and B2B customers specializing in leisure and business travel.

What can influencers do for you and how do you choose them?

Influencers enable us to reach a highly targeted audience in a very short space of time.
They also enable us to create differentiating, highly personalized content for our customers.
We choose them based on the quality of their work in terms of photos, videos and editorial content, but above all what we look at is the engagement they have on their social networks, and of course the number of visitors to their blog if they have one.
What interests us is not necessarily the number of followers, but the comments and reactions to their posts.

How do you measure the effectiveness of your actions?

On social networks, all our campaigns are tracked, enabling us to know the number of people reached and to go even further, right up to the act of purchase.
With influencers, we tend to talk about return on engagement, rather than ROI, i.e. the engagement they’ve generated through their community.
It all depends on what you’re selling. For a travel agency, for example, we’ll measure our actions through awareness, sales and quote requests.

Can you tell us more about the Influencer Village?

Last year, we created the Influencers’ Village at IFTM.
The IFTM is the world’s largest trade show for tourism professionals, which has been held every year between September and October for the past 40 years.
Last year was a first, because influencers didn’t have a dedicated space at the show before, and that was a real gap.
This year, we have selected over 40 influencers with different themes, who will take turns in the village every day.
Brands can book appointments with them in advance on our website, and come and meet them to plan future operations.

We’re able to stand out for our knowledge and passion for this industry, but also for organizing events like the village.
The fact that we’re a young, dynamic team on a human scale also helps.
There are 10 of us at the agency today.
We also regularly organize the apéros des professionnels du tourisme, which brings together just over 60 professionals for an evening.