Marcus Murphy, chief executive and co-founder of The Five Percent, said the bond between travel sellers and their clients had to mirror the way in which people strike up emotionally intimate relationships with others if they wished to stand out.

"We are trying to create business intimacy and we’re trying to let people know there are specific steps that have to be followed,” he told WTM London’s Marketing Summit.

Murphy said the first steps towards achieving business intimacy were awareness, targeting prospective customers through social media and advertising campaigns, and then engagement, such as signing someone up as a subscriber.

"The second date is the subscription,” said Murphy. “I need your information – first name, last name and email address.”

It’s at that point, said Murphy, that people start to become converts, whereby they’re willing to devote time and money to a brand, and start to become excited about what it does, what it stands for, and what its core values are.

Murphy said the next step was a personal interaction, such as a phone call. "Once they get off the phone, they need to feel like you’re the best person in the world," he said, adding that even a brief positive experience – a small trip of excursion – was enough to convince people a brand is worth investing more in in future.

Subsequent phases, Murphy added, including turning customers into advocates and promoters of a brand, stressing businesses should look to put this flow in place now to be ready for growth in 2024.

Murphy made his comments during WTM London’s Marketing Trends You Can’t Afford To Ignore: What’s working, what’s not, and tactics to supercharge your marketing session.