Being in the travel business isn’t an easy job. The market has too many players competing for the same geographical locations. But why are some startups more successful than the others? They’ve steered clear of these five common errors or just recovered real quick. Here are some common mistakes your travel startup should avoid.
Contents
Don’t Be Clueless:
It’s important to have a clear set of goals in terms of who you want to serve, what you’re doing and why you believe in your startup. Most entrepreneurs have a vague idea of starting a company and take the plunge without thinking the decision through. Here are two things you need to be absolutely sure of:
- Your expertise/specialty.
- The message you want your startup to portray.
Having a good idea of the above two can not just help you shape your travel startup roadmap better but also find the right kind of investors for your venture.
Writing Off Market Research:
Having a “know-it-all” attitude when it comes to understanding the market you are operating in can be a huge mistake. Do not ignore market research. Also, do not enter/exit a market without understanding the current trends and getting data-backed insights from experts. Keep abreast of all knowledge of the market you cater to and strategize accordingly.
Spending Too Much or Too Little:
Most travel startups either cheap out or go all in on the marketing budget without really evaluating how much return they are going to get on the spend. The general rule of “you get what you give” applies directly to your travel startup. Take a look at this guide on how to build a brand for your startup to understand how you can go about spreading the word about your startup and planning your marketing budgets.
Doing it All Alone:
When you’re in business, there are no enemies. Everyone is a peer or a partner. Building strategic partnerships in the industry can help you go a long way and improve your startup’s runway. Reach out to communities and build a solid business and personal support system to keep you afloat.
Ignoring Feedback
Getting complacent about your travel startup is the last thing you want to do. As an entrepreneur, you’ve got to constantly keep learning and taking feedback – both from peers, investors, and customers. Hear out everything they have to say and filter out what can work for you. Differentiate between a good problem and a bad problem. Choose what problems you want to solve and stay focussed.
Not Taking Risks
Bad ideas and great ideas look the same in its initial stages. Don’t be afraid to take the risks you should be taking. For example, most travel startups are dead scared about charging a convenience fee to their customers for offering the convenience of their services. They live in fear that customers would just abandon them for their customers. But that’s far from what reality is.
You can always run controlled experiments before launching it as a full-fledged, Pan-site feature. Launch that feature you always wanted to or collaborate with that partner that looks like a make-or-break deal. Taking calculated risks is your road to scale.
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2 comments
Thank you so much for this great article this helped me a lot. A few years back I started my traveling startup alone but it was my big mistake as it wasn’t a good idea but after few months me and my friend Anil we started working together as above its mention “doing it all alone” its not good to do it alone if you don’t have any knowledge of any one part of the business. then the problem came was renting the place for business, the rent was way more than our budget, so we came with the solution of becoming the member of coworking space (this will help you a lot). and know we are well-settled business
thanks for the information