Travel Advisor Success Story: Ryan Spear, Spear Travel Group

3 weeks ago 3

Success Stories focus on veteran travel advisors and how they achieved success. Here’s a look at Ryan Spear, president of Spear Travel Group, an affiliate of Travel Experts.

How did you get your start as a travel advisor?

My entry into travel came through my college education and former career experience. I studied hospitality management at Penn State University and after graduation started working for Marriott International in New York City. After a couple of years, I transferred to The Ritz-Carlton, where I learned hotel operations and eventually landed in a sales role.

After years of working with travel advisors and meeting planners booking their hotel rooms, I finally said, ‘I can do that.’ I wanted the freedom, the unlimited potential and to be in business for myself. In 2018, 16 years into a corporate hotel career, I took a gamble on myself, my relationships and launched my business.

How did you build your business over the years?

I had a good amount of client relationships from my time at The Ritz-Carlton, so I started there. My initial focus was on corporate and group meeting planners, but I realized that most of those events had already been planned for the rest of the year, and it was going to be a longer sales cycle.

I quickly learned that you meet many more people that are going on vacation than those planning meetings. By joining local networking groups, chambers of commerce and attending plenty of events with business cards in hand, I started building a base of clients. Referral marketing, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn proved beneficial in expanding awareness of my services and helping to convert new clients.

After some time passed, several of my former corporate clients began using our services, and then referrals came from that side of the business.

We also attended conferences as exhibitors to get the word out and launched an email campaign to solicit more clients. Some slogans from my hotel sales days have stayed in my head, which continue to drive our focus – ‘Always Be Selling’ and ‘Continue to Fill the Funnel’ – the sales funnel, that is!

What characteristics make you a successful advisor?

My hospitality education, five-star service training and overall personality of having fun and living life to its fullest all factor into my success as an advisor. One of the most important things is to listen to your clients and ask the right questions. They will often provide you with the answers and feedback you need to ensure that whatever trip you are planning is exactly what they were envisioning. I try to put myself in the client’s shoes so that I can feel confident that my answers, suggestions and communications are such that if I received them, I would feel heard and understood.

We strive to deliver five-star service and to do so, we need to have our clients’ best interests in mind and ensure we have travel partners that do the same. Our strong relationships with suppliers often unlock value for our clients that they could not get on their own. Of course, we must be extremely detailed and diligent when planning travel. Consistency and quality are keys to retaining clients and getting referrals.

What have been your greatest challenges?

Navigating the myriad ways to book travel for clients is a challenge. Any given trip can have 10 different ways to book it, and then you must double-check your offerings with what is being offered to the client directly as a consumer.

The goal is always to unlock value for our clients, and some partners make that very easy, while others don’t. Over time we have grown to learn where we can provide significant value and which partners to work with and which to avoid. However, the booking landscape continues to evolve, so I don’t see this challenge going away. Rather, we’ll continue to adapt to best serve our clients.

What have your greatest accomplishments been?

As a business, we have been able to grow consistently without compromising service levels, our work/life balance or our profitability. I have been able to engage with friends and colleagues from my former hotel days and have even recruited a few over to the ‘bright side’ of the travel industry.

In 2024, we surpassed $10 million in travel bookings, which was a pie in the sky goal back when I started in 2018 –so that was quite an accomplishment.

What tips can you provide advisors new to the industry?

I always tell new advisors to give themselves ample time to get grounded, establish a solid base of knowledge and not to expect a windfall right away. It’s better in the long run to start slower and gain experience then to be overwhelmed and make early mistakes.

Take a long-term approach to decisions, keep the client’s needs first (in most cases) and always strive for the balance you need to stay energized and engaged in your business. Too many advisors get burned out and don’t realize there are ways to service your clients outside of just yourself. Find and use mentors who have been successful for many years and enjoy the perks of a career in travel!

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