Latest / Influencer Confidential / Top Mistakes Travel Influencers Make When Pitching Tourism Boards #243

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Top Mistakes Travel Influencers Make When Pitching Tourism Boards #243 · Influencer Confidential

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Influencer Confidential by Sidewalker Daily. My name is
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  Speaker 1: Nina Zeta and I will be your host. I love
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  Speaker 1: working with brands and influencers on all things business strategy.
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  Speaker 1: Are you ready to learn what it takes to work
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  Speaker 1: in this influencer industry and see behind the curtain? Well,
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  Speaker 1: let's jump in. I hate to break it to you
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  Speaker 1: and be the bearer of bad news, but if you
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  Speaker 1: keep making these same dumb mistakes, you are not going
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  Speaker 1: to work with a tourism board, a hotel or nothing
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  Speaker 1: in the travel space because these mistakes are stopping you
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  Speaker 1: from getting the job. Now, the first thing is tourism boards, y'all.
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  Speaker 1: Let me explain to you. This is a country. This
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  Speaker 1: is not a pair of sunglasses. Okay, if you are
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  Speaker 1: representing a country, let's just say I don't know the
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  Speaker 1: country of Guatemala. They probably have multiple PR agencies representing
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  Speaker 1: this country globally, right, It's not just one PR firm
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  Speaker 1: that is going to be representing one country. So think
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  Speaker 1: about it. You probably have the North American Agency of Record.
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  Speaker 1: You probably have a PR agency in Europe, maybe in
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  Speaker 1: Asia that represents the destination across the world. And you're like, wait,
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  Speaker 1: what do you mean PR agency? Wait? What? So when
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  Speaker 1: you're pitching tourism boards, you got to pitch to their
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  Speaker 1: PR agency because that is who represents them. They are
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  Speaker 1: getting paid to deal with media and to deal with
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  Speaker 1: the influencer requests that come through. So that's probably the
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  Speaker 1: biggest game changer is once you understand wait a second,
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  Speaker 1: I want to work with these tourism boards. I got
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  Speaker 1: to go to the source, not the country. You're going
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  Speaker 1: to the agency. And there's multiple agencies around the world.
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  Speaker 1: I'll tell you an example. I was working with the
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  Speaker 1: Tourism Board once there was a creator out in Europe.
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  Speaker 1: She was amazing millions of followers. I could not work
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  Speaker 1: with her. I could not accept her. Why because my
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  Speaker 1: division was North America. I could only work with North
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  Speaker 1: American talent and creators who have a strong North American influence.
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  Speaker 1: So even if she had a billion followers, it does
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  Speaker 1: not matter. She would have had to go through the
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  Speaker 1: European agency. Now, of course, in that pitch, I thought
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  Speaker 1: she was good enough, so I was able to make
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  Speaker 1: that reference. But sometimes agencies don't talk like you'll have
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  Speaker 1: the North American agency and then the European agency or
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  Speaker 1: the agency that represents the Latin American division, and those
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  Speaker 1: agencies are not talking, so then the creator gets ghosted
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  Speaker 1: and they don't know why. Well, this is why, because
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  Speaker 1: you are not reaching out to the correct agency when
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  Speaker 1: trying to pitch this partnership. So many people want to
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  Speaker 1: work with tourism boards, and I get it. There's like
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  Speaker 1: something that is just exciting and validating about working with
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  Speaker 1: a destination, especially if you love travel. But here's the thing.
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  Speaker 1: You cannot be pitching influence if you don't have it,
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  Speaker 1: and that's just the bottom truth. You can pitch content.
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  Speaker 1: You can pitch blog articles, you can pitch short form video,
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  Speaker 1: you can pitch UGC content. All of that content's great.
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  Speaker 1: Content doesn't require following. But if you're sending a pitch
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  Speaker 1: and you have two thousand followers and you're like, hey,
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  Speaker 1: tourism board, I want to post on my page, why
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  Speaker 1: would they want to work with you? And they can
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  Speaker 1: work with someone who has twenty thousand, one hundred thousand followers. Again,
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  Speaker 1: they may want to work with you, you know why for
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  Speaker 1: your content because that does not have a follower account limitation.
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  Speaker 1: So just know what to pitch a lot of times again,
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  Speaker 1: creators are pitching influence when they don't have it. A
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  Speaker 1: fun little thing that you can do regardless of your
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  Speaker 1: following size. And this is an old school sidewalker technique.
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  Speaker 1: I have not said this in a minute. Is test
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  Speaker 1: your influence. You want to pitch influence? All right, let's
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  Speaker 1: see do you have it? Do you got it? Go
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  Speaker 1: out there, post a video, ask people to click on
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  Speaker 1: a link. How many people are clicking on the link
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  Speaker 1: that you're asking them to click on. I have creators
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  Speaker 1: who are small, but they have highly engaged audiences. Their
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  Speaker 1: content is you know, highly highly highly engaged. So I
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  Speaker 1: would say, you know what, well, you tested your influence.
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  Speaker 1: You saw the clicks, you saw the shares, you saw
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  Speaker 1: that people are reactive. Okay, then we can put together
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  Speaker 1: maybe a nice little case study and use that to
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  Speaker 1: pitch influence. But if you go out there and create
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  Speaker 1: content and no one's clicking, why would the tours and
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  Speaker 1: board want to pay you to post on your page?
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  Speaker 1: Maybe they could pay you for that same content so
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  Speaker 1: that they can post on their page, so that they
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  Speaker 1: can have different talent and different faces and ages and
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  Speaker 1: races and genders and all of that. Okay, that makes
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  Speaker 1: sense but don't pitch influence if you don't have it. Now,
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  Speaker 1: if you want to pitch to tourism boards and you're
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  Speaker 1: ready to get in the arena and get out there,
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  Speaker 1: we have a free training that we host that talks
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  Speaker 1: all about brand deals, how to outreach media kits, I
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  Speaker 1: share an email example, and much much more. So if
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  Speaker 1: you're interested in that, make sure you click the link
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  Speaker 1: below to join us at our next training. This happens
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  Speaker 1: literally all the time, especially with creators that are not
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  Speaker 1: in travel. So let's just say you're a fashion girlie
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  Speaker 1: or a fitness creator or I don't know, and the
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  Speaker 1: music niche or whatever, and you're like, you know what,
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  Speaker 1: I want to pitch travel? I am all about that.
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  Speaker 1: I love pitching outside your niche. But here's the thing.
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  Speaker 1: If you are in the fashion niche and you're sending
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  Speaker 1: a tours board or a hotel or travel brand your
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  Speaker 1: fashion media kit, they're not gonna want to work with you.
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  Speaker 1: They're seeing all your fashion stuff. Why would they want
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  Speaker 1: to work with a fashion creator? Now, if you send
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  Speaker 1: them a media kit that looks tailored to them, custom
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  Speaker 1: visual has a travel feel to it that works. How
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  Speaker 1: many of us have different resumes. Right, we don't just
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  Speaker 1: have one resume, we have multiple resumes. Well, you as
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  Speaker 1: a creator need to have multiple media kits. And if
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  Speaker 1: you were pitching travel and your media kit is not travel,
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  Speaker 1: that may be one of the big reasons you were
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  Speaker 1: not getting responded to because you're not able to show
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  Speaker 1: that travel brand why they should want to work with you. Now,
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  Speaker 1: if you're ready to get in the arena and actually
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  Speaker 1: pitch the tourism board, send them your media kit. Get
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  Speaker 1: really serious about doing this. I have an odd demand
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  Speaker 1: training that is available for you guys, So you can
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  Speaker 1: go ahead and click the link below to watch this
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  Speaker 1: training right away and get you one step closer to
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  Speaker 1: working with your dream tourism board. So I mentioned this
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  Speaker 1: whole thing tests your influence. I actually have a free
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  Speaker 1: worksheet for you that you can download and go through
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  Speaker 1: this process. You can print it out, fill it out
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  Speaker 1: and test your influence. It's going to walk you through
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  Speaker 1: how to do this activity so that you can feel
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  Speaker 1: good about yourself when you are in fact deciding to
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  Speaker 1: pitch your influence. This is a freebie. It's in our
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  Speaker 1: resource library and I'm going to go ahead and link
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  Speaker 1: it below so that you can download it and do
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  Speaker 1: this activity. So here's the thing with tourism boards, TEARSM
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  Speaker 1: boards are government agencies. Things take slower. Think the post office. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: you're not going to get a trip overnight. You're not
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  Speaker 1: going to be able to work with a tourism board
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  Speaker 1: in a couple of days. Right, There is a longer
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  Speaker 1: lee time. So if you are pitching a destination, don't
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  Speaker 1: show up two weeks before, three weeks before and hope
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  Speaker 1: for something. Now. I am team shoot your shot regardless.
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  Speaker 1: Like I'll tell creators, listen, you never know. You may
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  Speaker 1: as well. But if you're doing this professionally, you want
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  Speaker 1: to give enough lee time to the partner to respond
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  Speaker 1: to you. You have to follow up with them. You're
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  Speaker 1: probably gonna have to get on a call, plan out
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  Speaker 1: your itinerary. I mean, there's so many little moving parts.
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  Speaker 1: These things take time. All my inner circle students know
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  Speaker 1: because I have a lot of travel creators in there.
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  Speaker 1: I actually have one who just got a nineteen thousand
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  Speaker 1: dollars job with a tourism board. It was her first
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  Speaker 1: tourism board partnership. We are so pumped for her. And
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  Speaker 1: she mentioned that, you know, the lead time for this
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  Speaker 1: it probably took her three to six months to wrap up.
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  Speaker 1: She ended up meeting the toursm board people at like
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  Speaker 1: a local event in Canada. They went to dinner and
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  Speaker 1: then she met the PR person. So again, these things
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  Speaker 1: take time. Give yourself lead time so you don't feel
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  Speaker 1: choked out and rushed. There's nothing worse than feeling rushed
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  Speaker 1: in a pitch. Same thing goes for seasonality. You know,
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  Speaker 1: the tourism boards have high seasons and low seasons. Think
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  Speaker 1: about it. What you know we think of a country
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  Speaker 1: like Jamaica, their high season is winter because you got
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  Speaker 1: all the snowbirds come in to you know, a hot,
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  Speaker 1: beautiful climate. They want to be there in December, January, February.
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  Speaker 1: These are busy seasons. So do you think you should
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  Speaker 1: be pitching them at their busiest time? Probably not right.
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  Speaker 1: You could be the best creator in the world, someone
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  Speaker 1: everyone wants to work with. Hey, if there's no vacancy,
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  Speaker 1: there's no vacancy. I remember being on the hotel side
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  Speaker 1: and having this amazing creator. She pitched us on holiday
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  Speaker 1: on July fourth or something. It was the biggest time
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  Speaker 1: for this hotel. I was like, oh my gosh, I
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  Speaker 1: wish we could work with her. There's nothing we can do.
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  Speaker 1: So think about holidays, think about seasonality. These are all
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  Speaker 1: things that are affecting they yes or no. And if
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  Speaker 1: you are not following up, the money is in the
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  Speaker 1: follow up, you are missing out. I am talking two
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  Speaker 1: to three follow ups, even getting on LinkedIn and following
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  Speaker 1: up again. Don't be afraid you are not bothering them.
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  Speaker 1: You're actually helping these pr people do their job. So
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  Speaker 1: don't be afraid to follow up, and don't be afraid
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  Speaker 1: to put yourself out there. I hope that you learned
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  Speaker 1: from these mistakes so that you can get your emails read,
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  Speaker 1: that you can get your pitches read, and that you
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  Speaker 1: can get closer to working with these tourism boards. You
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  Speaker 1: have what it takes, but don't let these mistakes hold
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  Speaker 1: you back so that you can actually get out there,
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  Speaker 1: put yourself in, and start getting some yeses to your pitches.
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  Speaker 1: I hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you did, make
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  Speaker 1: sure to rate, review, and subscribe to our show and
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: visit Sidewalkerdaily dot com for more resources on all things
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  Speaker 1: influencer marketing and social media. Until next time,