Explore NZ offers a range of marine adventures, including dolphin spotting tours, a sailing school, diving and trips on Round the World and America’s Cup yachts in Auckland and Paihia. In the intensely competitive tourism industry, being able to turn technology to your advantage can spur your business on to success.
When your business depends on the ocean – the winds and waves, the dolphins and the yachts, having to worry about missing calls coming into your office is the last thing you want. William Goodfellow, owner of Explore NZ sailing adventure company, turned to Vodafone to give his business competitive advantage, reduce costs while improving communications between his staff in Auckland and Paihia and stay on top of his work when travelling.
In the six years we’ve been operating, our business has expanded rapidly, says Goodfellow. “We’re always looking to offer our customers new experiences – and to offer the best possible experience to them. When you’re relying on notoriously unreliable things like sailing conditions and the location of pods of dolphins or whales, being able to communicate securely and rapidly is a huge bonus.”
Vodafone Business Consultant at Digital Mobile, Nicky Jones introduced a complete mobile solution for Explore NZ:
Mobile phones for Explore NZ staff
talkZone Zero, which means there is no per minute charge for calls between Explore NZ’s offices.
I-mate JasJar for Explore NZ owner William Goodfellow to make voice and video calls, receive and send emails, browse the internet, view and edit Microsoft documents and take pictures when not in the office.
Using mobile technology for competitive advantage
Goodfellow highlights the security of mobile communication as a huge bonus for Explore NZ. “Typically boat operators use VHF to communicate to shore. Anybody can hear your communication, so even if your crew spots pods of dolphins or whales first, your competitors can quickly find out and get their boats out there too. With mobile communication its secure and other operators can’t listen in, so we can focus on providing great unique experiences to our customers that our competitors can’t match.”
Cutting costs and talking more
Explore NZ’s 60 staff are spread between its three offices; one in Auckland and two in Paihia. “Our staff were constantly talking – on toll calls – organising bookings for customers and communicating information about our various yachts,” says Goodfellow. “Thanks to talkZoneZero, all our calls between Paihia and Auckland within our Explore NZ group are now free where they used to be 29c a minute. That alone is a great cost saving to our business.”
Empowering staff
By equipping its staff with mobile phones, Explore NZ has been able to improve both work/life balance for its staff and improve customer service. “In tourism, you never know when your customers are going to call. They can get in touch at any time but it wasn’t practical or fair to expect our staff to be in the office to answer those calls. By having those calls routed to mobile after hours, we know we’re not going to miss out on bookings – but our staff can continue living their lives. The great thing about being mobile is we know the calls will get through to the right person first time.”
The right tools for the job
I spend maybe half of my working day actually in the office, says Goodfellow. “For me, it just doesn’t make sense to be relying on fixed communication – be it a landline or a desktop PC. I used to rely heavily on my laptop when travelling around New Zealand and world. When the i-mate JasJar was released, I was stoked.”
The JasJar is like miniature tablet PC or laptop – with added communications functionality. In a laptop-like form, with a 180 degree rotating screen, this palm top device combines the best of 3G mobile telephony with computing.
I use it for all sorts of things, says Goodfellow. “I travel at least four times a year to the United Kingdom, the USA and Australia. Being able to keep in touch with my team and on top of my emails is great. I even use it for things like proofing ads, which means things keep going even when I’m away.
“I’d never want to go back to relying only on my laptop. My JasJar actually got wet on a recent trip – it turns out they’re not waterproof – and I had to lug my laptop around until my replacement arrived,” says Goodfellow.
Goodfellow’s experience of losing his first JasJar to water damage has reinforced the value of phoneInsure. “Like any insurance, phoneInsure is not something you really value until you need it,” says Goodfellow. “When you’re using a range of devices in business-critical situations, you need back-up if the unthinkable happens. Now we’ve got phoneInsure on all our devices!”
All of Explore NZ’s skippers use rugged Nokia 5140i mobile phones, which are very durable and have great battery life. “When moving from boat to shore, it can be hard getting to a charger. Making sure our skippers have reliable devices that are going to stand up to a few knocks is crucial to keeping them in touch with the rest of the Explore NZ team.”
Staying one step ahead
Explore NZ’s Vodafone Business Consultant, Nicky Jones of Digital Mobile, keeps in touch with new ways it can improve its operations.
“Explore NZ is planning an office move in the next couple of months,” says Jones. “When they do we’re looking at setting up a PBX with a fixed cellular terminal to allow calls to be diverted out to the mobiles (at no charge). We’re also looking at enhancing the calling abilities of Explore NZ’s information kiosk in the Viaduct by putting in a GSM deskphone. The GSM deskphone essentially looks like a landline phone, but uses a sim card on the Vodafone network.”
In a highly competitive industry such as tourism, business tools that help reduce costs, improve the customer experience and offer competitive advantage are in hot demand. Vodafone has delivered great value to Explore NZ, helping it improve its business.
“Our business is mobile – we’re moving people – and we need mobile support to do it. The team at Vodafone – in particular our Vodafone Business Consultant at Digital Mobile, Nicky Jones, has been great in finding solutions that work for our business,” says Goodfellow.
