Riviera develops new agent portal to cope with booming river cruise sales

River cruise and escorted-tours operator Riviera Travel is developing an agent portal as its agency sales “go from strength to strength”.

River cruise and escorted-tours operator Riviera Travel is developing an agent portal as its agency sales “go from strength to strength”.

Agency sales manager Joseph Grimley said river cruising had grown to account for about 20% of business since its introduction six years ago.

He said as the company had significantly expanded its offering since it began selling through agents in 2012, it would be expanding its extranet.

“Our agency sales team has grown to three people reporting into me, and we are now working with about 80% of independent agents in the UK,” said Grimley.

“We are delighted with the support agents have given us and we expect that to grow further. We continue to find new agents each week, as word spreads.”

Grimley said as part of the push to continue building ties with agents, Riviera would be replacing its rivieraexpert.com trade portal by the end of the year.

The current website offers bookings but doesn’t provide any training.

“We are looking at building a designated agent extranet – an all-singing, all-dancing portal for agents,” said Grimley.

“Although we already have online booking for agents, we want to create a one-stop-shop with the addition of training modules, which are currently available through Clia.

“There will be video clips of tours, lots of product information and the opportunity to download marketing material like posters.

“We are keen to do more regular webinars with agents too – it is an efficient way of speaking to them.”

The portal is located at rivieratravel.co.uk/agents