Travel Leaders Network: Travel advisor prosperity continues: Travel Weekly

NEW YORK — Travel Leaders Network (TLN) wrapped up 2024 with a 17% increase in sales over 2023, a new high-water mark for the consortium. And 2025 looks like it will surpass 2024, says president John Lovell.

“The golden age of travel advisors, it’s alive and well,” Lovell said during a TLN media briefing here Tuesday.

Indeed, at the same event last year, TLN executives first called it a “golden age” for advisors. On Tuesday, Lovell said that was just the beginning for the prosperous time period advisors are enjoying.

“I think ’25 is going to be the best year in history for us, and I think from a leisure travel perspective, it continues to grow and grow,” Lovell added.

All segments enjoyed year-over-year increases in 2024, according to Lovell. Land sales were up 9.7% and cruise sales were up a whopping 25.1%. 

Lovell noted that the publicly traded cruise lines finished 2024 up about 15.6% in revenue, meaning TLN’s sales outpaced them. He called that evidence consumers are “coming back in droves” to travel advisors.

He also offered a glimpse into how land and cruise segments are performing in 2025. Cruise is up 18%, with contemporary cruises up 12%, luxury up 26%, premium up 16% and river up 33%. Land is up 9% overall, with touring and FIT up 23%, fun-and-sun up 1.5% and theme parks up 8%.

“So, where does it all stop? I don’t think anybody really knows,” Lovell said. “Ever since Covid, we just continue to grow and grow and grow, and people continue to want to have great vacation experiences. They’re willing to pay for it, and things are looking really good.”

TLN has nearly 6,000 travel agencies in North America under its umbrella. It had a number of additions in 2024, according COO Lindsay Pearlman.

TLN added 315 U.S. affiliates last year, with projected preferred supplier sales of $417.3 million and projected overall sales of $637 million.

The network added 41 sales affiliates in Canada. They represent preferred-supplier sales of $23.2 million and total sales of $128.4 million.

Last year, TLN added four associates to (associates operate under TLN’s franchise membership option): Skyland World Travel, Worldtek Travel, Enterprise Events Group and Fox Travel, with an estimated total revenue of $218 million.

TLN credits Agent Profiler

Lovell called TLN’s success in 2024 “phenomenal,” noting the consortium exceeded its recruitment and retention goals and delivered strong sales for preferred suppliers. Lovell believes TLN’s Agent Profiler program was a big part of its success.

Agent Profiler enables advisors to create profiles about themselves that are housed on travelleaders.com. The profiles usually rank high in web searches thanks to the sheer number of them, as well as the volume of unique content they hold. Agents are encouraged to make multiple profiles for themselves, showcasing different specialties.

Stephen McGillivray, parent company Internova Travel Group’s chief partner marketing officer, offered a look at the program’s performance in 2024. 

In total, Agent Profiler delivered 300,000 leads to advisors, up 17% year over year. That resulted in 68,750 bookings worth $733 million, with $110 million in earned commission. 

There are 18,364 profiles online, up 36% from the year prior. In total, 1,491 were designated SuperAgents, up 55% from the year prior.

SuperAgent designation was introduced in 2022. To qualify, advisors had to have 15 customer reviews on their profile, four total biographies, one photo album, one travel story and one map. Super Agents rank higher in searches compared to other agents.

This year, TLN is introducing a new facet of the SuperAgent program, said Cory Voss, TLN’s chief information officer — tiers based on additional performance metrics.

“We’ve seen tremendous growth and tremendous adoption through SuperAgent over the past couple of years, and now we’re taking it to the next level,” Voss said.

In addition to SuperAgent, advisors can qualify for SuperAgent Gold or SuperAgent Diamond.

The qualifications to be labeled a SuperAgent remain the same. But to be elevated to Gold or Diamond status, advisors have to meet performance metric criteria in the areas of close rate, response time and rating and review quality. 

When advisors attain the higher levels, McGillivray said, they will sort even higher in search results. 

CRM project

TLN is moving toward becoming CRM-agnostic, McGillivray said, a response to the burgeoning number of customer relationship management solutions available for travel advisors.

While TLN’s members historically mostly used solutions offered by ClientBase and Tres, he said, they aren’t the right solution for every advisor. So, TLN is working to accept data from other CRMs. The first, launching this month, will be VacationCRM. Next up, TLN will work to integrate with Tess.

“This is good for the member and it’s good for us,” McGillivray said, noting it will help TLN better market to members’ clients.