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Americans logged 694 MILLION business trips in 2008. That’s a lot of missed flights, late check-ins, and time away from family and friends. Believe it or not, 694 million business-related trips represented a decrease of 12% from 2007, and with the economic woes of the past few years, that trend is continuing. The days of traveling for large conferences (think global sales kickoff in Vegas) are also increasingly scrutinized, and as a result, were down 14.5% in 2008. Fast-forward a bit, and you know that today’s economy and travel experiences are met with fewer flights available, at increased costs, with heightened security processes, making for a stressful and unproductive “travel experience.” But wait…there’s more! Nearly a quarter of a billion of the above business trips were conducted by Sales and Management positions within the US. For sales people, this means time away from being productive…even time offline while your competitors hammer away at your leads and customers.
Imagine the impact of saving 2-3% of that expenditure and investing in R&D, or employee benefits, or customer-service programs! It’s time to rethink business travel…
There is incredible value in being face-to-face with customers, but physically being there comes at a cost as described above. With real-time collaboration capabilities provided by ConnectSolutions, millions of meeting minutes are delivered everyday from the comfort of offices, homes, or vacation spots we’ll pretend we’re not at. These virtual meetings and events provide extremely effective face-to-face experiences without the travel, and without the hassle.
Many organizations are spending 5% or more of their gross revenue in business travel. Imagine the impact of saving 2-3% of that expenditure and investing in R&D, or employee benefits, or customer-service programs! It’s time to rethink business travel…
For a great resource on travel expenditures and statistics, please take a look at Business Travel Market Metrics by IHS Global Insight (http://global.ihs.com/), which was the source for the above stats.
