Business Development Travel Director

Description:

Purpose of Job

Collinson offers a comprehensive suite of loyalty technology and commerce solutions, combined with Loyalty marketing and CRM services, all with customer data at the heart. We help our clients give their customers compelling reasons to engage, spend more and become loyal advocates, and we have done so for 30 years.

The Business Development Travel Director will lead our efforts in selling Collinson’s products and services to entities in the Travel and Tourism Industry, such as airports, airlines, online travel agencies, transportation & car rentals, hospitality and hotels, travel platform providers, and tourism associations. The position will leverage Collinson’s global experience serving leading travel brands to develop opportunities with new prospects, as well as cross-selling products and services to existing Collinson clients.

The Business Development Travel Director will be accountable for building an evolving, robust pipeline of qualified opportunities/leads across the US and Canada to nurture as direct clients, to secure new deals that generate incremental revenue from clients & prospects primarily operating within the travel & tourism sector. Internally, this will involve close collaboration with the cross-functional teams including loyalty, product and delivery, regional marketing, and account management teams.

Overview:

Responsible for creating and managing a robust pipeline of new client business with suitable urgency and rigour
around prospecting process.
While working in a matrix environment, define an effective Go To Market strategy and associated forecast for the
travel sector in full alignment with the leadership team.
Responsible for realizing new revenue through pipeline management, RFP/pitch success and large projects sold within 12 months
Raise profile, awareness, and clarity of Collinson’s Loyalty proposition in the market, while also representing other Collinson group solutions
Key Responsibilities

Lead Collinson’s US & Canada Business Development activities across Loyalty products and services through a consultative approach within the travel sector:

Develop sales plan, identifying key prospects; identify and target key decision makers and influencers across all prospect organizations.
Identify key sales cycles for major contracts/opportunities from RFPs within the travel sector.
Map and understand the competitor set – which is now diverse and fragmented (loyalty tech providers boutique
data shops, to traditional Loyalty providers like Merkel and AIMIA, as well as CRM agencies).
Develop effective and maintain constructive contact strategies with clients and prospects.
Champion the cross-selling of Collinson Loyalty products and services to existing clients in collaboration with regional
account management teams.
Represent Collinson at key industry and corporate events to develop the brand profile and sales pipeline.
Collaborate with key internal stakeholders throughout the new business process:

Liaise with Loyalty consulting and/or pre-sales subject-matter experts to develop effective win strategies to match client/prospect needs and challenges with relevant Collinson products and services.
Facilitate two-way interaction with research and marketing, sharing data on sector developments, news, prospect/competitor insight and activities.
Liaise with regional account teams to introduce Loyalty products and services to existing clients in a strategic and coordinated manner.
Manage responses to RFIs/RFPs including, ensuring the right casting and materials:

Work in tandem with the consulting and pre-sales team to ensure a smooth transition from sales into product demonstration, commercial negotiation, and sales closure.
Liaise with the relevant Proposition owners, financial analyst(s), brand/marketing, and IT, to develop RFP responses and commercial proposals.
Co-ordinate and deliver all content to deadlines ensuring quality of execution.
Ensure thorough evaluation of commercial models to deliver optimal profitability balanced with all forecasted sales
and program costs.
Effective and timely reporting standards and CRM utilization:

Adherence to Group new business processes (NBP), pipeline reporting requirements.
Fulfilment of all regular and ad-hoc reporting in line with requirements set by line-manager (and members of the
leadership team from time to time).
Timely updates of all prospecting information including all new/revised client/prospect contact status updates,
meeting minutes, actions, win strategies and NBP stages into Salesforce.
Provision of clear sales performance against targets/objectives set and initiatives in place.
Requirements

Proven consultative selling and negotiation skills, up to and including C-Level.
Deep understanding of the competitive landscape. Understand areas that competitors do not currently serve but there is customer and market demand.
Ability to identify and propose win-win business terms for both Clients and Collinson.
Ability to positively build relationships and influence internal constituents to efficiently execute and close sales.
Experience negotiating legal agreements and working with inside council to ensure needs of both the client and Collinson are met via the contracting process.
Ability to formulate and articulate the internal pro-forma process to ensure deal financial hurdles are met.
Agility to generate cold leads and develop warm leads credibly at all levels.
Understanding of the loyalty and benefits products in the travel sector, and the key players that focus on loyalty, rewards, and member benefits.
Demonstrable experience and accountability for creating/managing multi-million-dollar P&Ls.
Experience of selling consumer benefits, software as a service and/or marketing services would be distinctly advantageous.
Ability to lead by example; act decisively, able to manage challenging deadlines and requests effectively.
Use of own initiative, self-motivated, ability to hit the ground running.
Ability to recognize opportunities where other regional Collinson markets may benefit from introductions and/or
multi market opportunities.
Ability to travel as needed (estimated 25-50%).