Disclosure: I've served ProcureApp as an unpaid advisor. Procurement folks hate undiscounted spend. They'll love ProcureApp. Why? Because it detects when a buyer (think traveler) has wandered onto a non-approved supplier's website. When that happens, a friendly message pops up.
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"Pardon me, old chap. Couldn't help noticing that you're on Brand.com's site. Not really an approved supplier, are they? Tsk, tsk. Why don't we take a nice stroll over to our approved travel site, and do our shopping and booking over there, shall we?"
Beautiful. A timely message displayed to a traveler at a critical step in the path of non-compliance. Complete with a link to the preferred site.
Not loving the affected British slant? No problem, old chap – you can customize the message's text to your liking (The British example is my doing, not ProcureApp's.)
Maybe you prefer "Book here and you're fired." Oh, come on – I know a few of you would want that one.
Messaging is not limited to cases where a traveler lands on Brand.com's home page. ProcueApp can deliver customized messaging and preferred links, and even insert corporate purchasing codes – at just about any point in the shopping/booking process.
On a car rental site: "I say, would you mind if I inserted our company ID here? We'll get a better price, you know. And do be a good lad and decline all the insurance options."
Phil Hammer, the force behind ProcureApp, sees wide potential for helping buyers/travelers do the right thing. It's point of process messaging designed to re-direct behavior. "We're still discovering new ways that procurement managers want to deploy this," he says. Some buyers are keen to simply track non-compliant purchases; others want active diversion as far upstream as possible.
There is precedent for this technique in the travel industry. Heather Young, travel manager at Capital One, gave a presentation at a GBTA event last summer in which she described a similar home-grown method. "It's very effective, and very easy to implement," she said, if memory serves.
Clever messaging at key points in the procurement process. Jolly good show, that!
Scott Gillespie is the author of Gillespie's Guide to Travel + Procurement. These thoughts are excerpted with permission from his blog.