CFA Voyages Performance

actions to consciously mislead their competition or confuse their competition. However, some actions by the company that were observed could be viewed as misleading the competition by signaling extra competency in a particular area so to create a strong front to their competitors. An example of this is their proclamation on their website to be one of the top leaders in the tourism industry and have become part of the Chinese Outboard Tourism as well as a member of the International Air Transport Association. This does not go as far as misleading the competition by signaling one direction and moving in a different direction, however it does signal to the competitors that Sinorama is a formidable company who would not be easy to contend with.

Therefore Sinorama has a total overall score of a medium-high performance for all four dimensions. This is a strong score in determining their potential to be successful to survive in hypercompetition. Also, through observation of their website and social media accounts, they show a strong presence online. They have been able to adapt fairly quickly to utilizing tools available online to promote themselves. They have also been able to show flexibility in sourcing new travel products through the internet as well as shown success in accessing new customers through online distribution channels. Therefore they are considered to have high performance in adapting to online presence and using effective online strategies.

7.2 CFA Voyages Performance

CFA Voyages showed low to medium performances for each of the four dimensions. In the first dimension, they showed low performance in seeking out new advantages and shedding old advantages that have become too costly. The problem seems to reside in the recent years when

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they have had attempted to focus both on strengthening their online presence and maintaining a strong foothold in their store fronts and traditional ways of conducting business. This company has been moving conservatively in many aspects pertaining to the internet. They have had held advantages before the 2000s through traditional business models and business channels. They had experienced steady growth until around the 2000s when they started to falter and seemingly not able to gain momentum in adapting to creating a strong internet presence. Thus, while the company clings to the advantage they had built over a decade’s time since establishment, competitors are indirectly chipping away at their advantage by being faster at finding new opportunities for advantages online and grabbing customer attention as well as fulfilling new customer demands.

CFA Voyages showed medium performance levels in the second dimension: making small moves rather than big moves to gain temporary advantages. The small moves that appear to be in action by CFA are the updating of their packaged tours regularly and diversifying their product mix to attract new customers. They have also kept up with promoting with social media periodically.

They have also conducted internal changes that accumulate to help improve customer service efficiency. The small changes help the company quickly re-train their employees and gain temporary advantages faster with well trained employees in customer service. Examples of small movements within the organization are the introduction of re-training the existing employees and training of new employees about telephone etiquette when speaking with clients and the implementation of transparent ranking system of the sales team to foster motivation for employees to perform better. The telephone etiquette helped the company quickly boost their

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professional impression and trust among their customers. The ranking system of the sales team motivated their employees to work harder to and to perform procedures more smoothly and quickly.

The third dimension, being unpredictable, was also somewhat of a challenge for CFA Voyages.

They scored a medium performance level in this dimension. Their management dictates their goals every year which is also determined by what type of contracts they can gain from suppliers.

This adds an element of unpredictability with their goals and how they are to obtain their goals.

Their management seems to have a semi-unstructured way of setting goals and choosing which products to promote. This lack of structure can be viewed as unpredictability or irrationality to their competitors and at times could confuse competitors. For example, as CFA Voyages have a multitude of products from bus tours within France or parts of Europe to packaged tours in different parts of Thailand as well as other regions of Asia. Their focus on which package to push would determine which package they were able to gain most margin on due to deals that certain suppliers would provide them. If Thai Airways wins out with the lower costing package, CFA Voyages would push this promotion and set goals to sell more of this product. Competitors would not be able to tell which direction the company will take. However, the term that CFA generally accepts with suppliers lasts a year; this could be too long of a time period giving competitors time to observe company strategy and find ways to disrupt the advantage before the year is up.

CFA Voyages seemed to also falter with the fourth dimension, taking action to mislead their competition. There was one clear incident where they did signal to competitors a location of

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where they would open a new store front for intimidation purposes. However, this seems to be a one off incident and the company does not consciously use this approach to gain advantages among their competitors. Therefore they have low performance in this dimension.

With low and medium performances in each of the four dimensions, CFA Voyages receives a low-medium overall score reflecting their struggles in survival in the hypercompetitive environment they are facing currently. They have already shown signs of stagnation and lack of seeking innovation for new opportunities would only hinder their progress as the technological age creates a fast paced changing environment. Observing their website and social media accounts, they do keep information up to date with these accounts to properly inform customers.

However, they have adapted to these online tools of promotion later in the game. This caused them to lose time and advantage within the playing field. Thus, they have a low performance in adapting to an online presence and adapting to using online tools to implement effective strategies.