Sales Manager (Travel)

Ocean Holidays; Brentwood; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - 90,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Quarterly bonus scheme

Elite Club Trip participation

Familiarisation trips for destinations

Paid supplier training days

Private Health Care after probation

Flexible/remote/hybrid working

Employee Assistance Programme

Discount platform access

Job summary

Ocean Holidays is seeking an experienced Sales Manager to lead the Sales Management team and drive performance across our travel sales operation.

You will coach and develop agents, monitor KPIs, and work with the Head of Sales to align with commercial objectives. Strong travel sales experience and people leadership are essential. The role offers hybrid working with office attendance as required.

Qualifications

• Significant experience selling holidays or travel in a target-driven environment.
• Strong coaching and influencing skills with commercial focus.
• Proven experience managing or leading a sales team and achieving targets.

Responsibilities

• Take ownership of individual and team sales performance against KPIs and commercial objectives.
• Monitor sales, revenue, profit, conversion, and productivity using data to drive improvements.
• Lead day-to-day sales operation with clear priorities, direction and support.
• Develop and deliver sales initiatives and incentives to improve performance and engagement.

Job description

Ocean Holidays is looking for an experienced Sales Manager to join our Sales Management team and play a key role in delivering the performance of our sales operation.

This is a hands-on leadership role responsible for driving sales performance, managing and developing people, maintaining strong operational standards, and ensuring our sales agents have the direction, support and accountability needed to succeed.

Coaching will be an important part of the role. Through regular 1:1s, call reviews and practical sales coaching, you will help agents improve their capability and conversion. You will also take ownership of day-to-day team performance, using data and commercial judgement to identify opportunities, address underperformance and ensure individual, and business targets are achieved.

You will work closely with the Head of Sales and wider Sales Management team to keep the department running effectively and consistently in line with our commercial objectives. Previous travel sales experience is essential. You will need a strong understanding of telephone-based travel sales, the customer journey and what it takes to convert an enquiry into a booking.

What will you be doing?

Your responsibilities will cover the following key areas:

• Take ownership of individual and team sales performance against agreed KPIs, targets and commercial objectives.
• Monitor sales, revenue, profit, conversion, and productivity, using data to identify trends, opportunities and the actions needed to improve results.
• Work with agents to maximise sales opportunities, improve enquiry-to-booking conversion and maintain momentum throughout the day.
• Support the development and delivery of sales initiatives and incentives that improve performance and engagement.

Coaching & Development

• Deliver regular 1:1s, call reviews and practical sales coaching, using performance data to identify individual strengths and development needs.
• Agree clear development actions and follow up to check that learning is being applied and delivering measurable improvements.
• Adapt coaching to the individual, developing both experienced agents and those earlier in their sales careers.
• Lead the day-to-day sales operation, giving the team clear priorities, direction, and support.
• Monitor enquiry volumes, workloads and team capacity, adjusting priorities to protect sales opportunities and customer service.
• Keep the team informed and engaged through regular updates and clear, purposeful team briefs.
• Use performance and customer insight to improve sales processes, systems, and ways of working, collaborating with other departments to resolve issues and deliver improvements.
• Contribute to sales planning, forecasting and departmental priorities, taking ownership of agreed projects and areas of responsibility.

People Leadership & Accountability

• Lead and motivate sales agents, setting clear expectations around performance, behaviours, and personal accountability.
• Build strong working relationships, recognise success, and address underperformance promptly and fairly through honest conversations, support and appropriate informal or formal performance management.
• Support recruitment and onboarding, and manage probation, absence, and performance reviews in line with company processes.
• Create a positive, collaborative sales culture and role-model Ocean Holidays’ values and leadership behaviours.

Who should apply?

Travel sales experience is essential.

We are looking for someone with strong sales credibility who understands that successful sales management requires strong coaching and influencing skills, commercial focus, people leadership and operational management.

You should have:

• Significant experience selling holidays or travel within a target-driven environment, with a strong understanding of telephone selling and the enquiry-to-booking journey.
• Previous experience managing or leading a sales team, with a proven track record of achieving targets and improving team performance.
• Proven experience coaching salespeople at different levels and translating coaching into measurable improvements in behaviour and performance, with the ability to identify what is holding someone back and adapt your approach to their individual needs.
• Strong call-review and feedback skills, turning observations into practical development actions and following up to achieve lasting improvements in sales behaviours, confidence and conversion.
• Confidence using sales, conversion, quality, and commercial data to distinguish individual development needs from wider operational issues and prioritise the right action.
• The ability to set clear expectations, manage underperformance fairly and hold people accountable while maintaining supportive working relationships.
• A commercially focused mindset while maintaining excellent customer outcomes.
• Strong communication and organisation skills, with the judgement to balance daily sales priorities, customer needs, and longer-term team development.
• The ability to work independently when remote while remaining a visible, engaged member of the Sales Management team. Experience using Galileo would be advantageous.

What does success look like?

Success means leading a team that delivers strong commercial results and excellent customer outcomes, while helping agents become more confident, capable and consistent.

We will look for:

• Strong commercial results: achievement of agreed sales, revenue, profit, conversion, and productivity targets, with clear ownership of actions where performance is behind target.
• Coaching that makes a difference: measurable, sustained improvements in agents’ sales skills and call quality, with learning applied beyond the coaching session.
• Progress across different experience levels: newer agents building capability and experienced agents improving their performance, supported by clear development actions and regular follow-up to help them apply their learning independently.
• Effective performance management: concerns identified early and addressed fairly, with clear expectations and accountability for improvement.
• Consistent customer and operational standards: an organised, responsive sales operation that protects opportunities, maintains service quality and compliance, and responds quickly to changing business needs.
• A positive team culture: agents who welcome feedback, take ownership of their development and share successful approaches with colleagues. Your quarterly bonus will be linked to agreed performance measures.

Hybrid Working

We offer flexibility and the opportunity to work remotely, making this role suitable for experienced travel professionals who may not be based close to our office.

While the role offers significant remote-working flexibility, you will be required to attend the office when requested for sales leadership, coaching, training, meetings, team development, and other business requirements. We therefore need someone who can offer reasonable flexibility around office attendance.

Our sales operation is open seven days a week. The role is 40 hours per week, with some weekend working required.

About Us

Ocean Holidays was founded in 2004 by two sets of brothers: Daniel and David Ox and George and Harry Hastings, who are still very much active in the business today.

They set out selling holidays with no website, just a handful of staff and Teletext as their only form of marketing. From these humble beginnings, Ocean Holidays was created, and the company now consists of three unique and distinct travel brands.

Ocean Florida, the largest direct to consumer Florida specialist of its kind in Europe; personalised travel management company, Winged Boots which leads in luxury leisure followed by business travel; and Ocean Beds, the largest worldwide provider of Florida vacation home rentals to the global travel trade.

With Headquarters in Shenfield, and another in Davenport, Florida. Ocean Holidays continues to innovate and evolve within the travel industry.

In January 2023 Ocean Holidays were awarded the inaugural Employer of the Year award at the Travel Weekly Globes, followed by the Travel for All Award in January 2024, for its industry-leading accessibility programme.

As one of the UK’s largest owner managed travel companies, Ocean Holidays continue to provide an environment where its people can thrive, and where growth and great culture go hand-in-hand.

There are many benefits that you can expect in return for your dedication and your commitment to making our customer’s dreams come true:

• Quarterly bonus scheme for overachievement against KPIs
• Opportunity to qualify for the annual all-inclusive Elite Club Trip for the top 5 performers
• Opportunities to take part in familiarisation trips to build destination knowledge
• Paid supplier training days and development opportunities
• Private Health Care after probation passed -WPA - discounted gym membership at Nuffield Fitness & Wellbeing Gyms and Fitness First, Spabreaks.com and Your golf travel and more
• Flexible/remote/hybrid working to promote our culture of supporting work/life balance.
• Employee Assistance Programme which provides confidential information, advice, and support 24 hours a day. This includes advice on health, relationships, money, career, retirement, and many other areas of support.
• Access to free professional financial advice
• Enhanced family-friendly policies
• Long service awards
• Honest, transparent, and two-way communication via regular newsletters and regular virtual and in-person Town Halls
• Eye test costs covered and contribution towards glasses
• Life Insurance
• Additional annual leave days based on length of service
• Christmas saving scheme.
• Your birthday off every year
• 2 x ‘Do the Right Thing’ days (dedicated charity days)
• Access to Reward Gateway Employee discount platform that gives easy access to savings at hundreds of retailers
• Access to Smart Tech after passing probation

Who we are?

We’re a team of passionate, award-winning travel specialists from a wide mix of backgrounds, excited about delivering the best customer experience possible through our 3 niche travel brands.

Our company culture promotes growth, inclusion and diversity and we’re continuously striving to ensure Ocean Holidays is the best place to work!

Customer experience is at the forefront of everything we do, and we pride ourselves in being able to consistently deliver some of the best service in the UK.

Our commitment to equal opportunities

For us, diversity is a business imperative – one that must be embedded into every aspect of how we operate in order to drive success. Simply put, we believe an encouraging and inclusive environment makes sound business sense.

We are a customer experience-driven business, and a diverse workplace means that we not only build a healthy culture of diversity and tolerance but can also serve our clients with empathy and understanding.

Conscious inclusion encompasses social, cultural and cognitive differences and cultivates an ethos of belonging, connection and shared purpose. It is the integration of this philosophy that allows us to create meaningful experiences for our employees, drive better business practices with our vendors and clients, and ultimately lead with purpose.