Latest / Travel Agency in a Year / Day 231: When it feels like marketing your travel business is doing nothing
Transcript
- Rachel: Welcome to the Travel Agency New Year podcast. I'm your host, Rachel K, travel agency owner, helping travel advisors become the CEO. Travel advisor, not just a little side hustle crazy thing. Let's get this, let's get this going. Let's like make this a real deal. Okay. Today is day 231. When it feels like nothing's working, how to stay on target. This is the hardest part: staying consistent when it genuinely feels like nothing's working. None of it's working. Say leads are slowing down. man. There's a student of mine that went through this. She was like, record-breaking year, awesome. And then the next year she's like, I don't know what's going on. And it just took six months. She she kept that consistency, but she got. I mean she was still getting business, but it wasn't going like she did the year prior, you know what mean? And she still got like a ridiculously large like fifty or sixty room group. And then like it was like four groups all at once, but one of was like fifty or sixty rooms at a very expensive property. So I'm like, well, 'cause she didn't give up. Anyway, that's what this episode's about. She's a perfect example. Lead slow down, the instinct might be to assume something fundamental is wrong with you. The niche is wrong, the whole approach is wrong, and a pivot completely just a few weeks in. This almost doesn't really help at all actually and it often makes things worse because it resets the clock on the very consistency and repeated exposure that we've talked about all year in this podcast as the thing that actually builds the trust and the results over time. And boring is boring is boring, and boring is what makes money. The people who don't want to stick with boring don't make money. The unglamorous parts of running your travel agency. The steady content posting when it doesn't go viral and you don't get any comments, and maybe if you do, they're like, you're ugly, and that's all you're getting. Doesn't matter. The reliable service that doesn't generate a dramatic story. Every single time the boring, boring, boring are doing that's all of that's doing more of your long-term work than those things get credit for in the moment. A few weeks of quiet doesn't mean that your system is broken, or a few months, or a year. If it's just quieter. It's often just like the normal, slower rhythms of a service and relationship-based business. Especially one that's still building its reputation and its warmer audience over time. So rather than completely abandoning your niche entirely a few weeks into a slow thing, ple I see advisors do that. I will tell you, all the advisors who are like, Well, this niche isn't getting me leads, and they give up after three to four weeks, they're the ones not making any money. And at all. And the ones who do not market consistently are also the ones not making any money. Like those are the two biggest things I see with the advisors I help. They're doing one or the other or both. And it's like, that's all you gotta do. But it's boring. It's boring. I know. And like I think for me, this podcast, I I have to film 365 episodes, people, in a year, less than a year, because also I like to have days off and and I like to go do things. So this is I like filming it, but you know what's really boring for me? Having to edit. and get the transcripts for the episodes and create the thumbnail slides and scheduling it all out. And this business isn't big enough to where I can just outsource all of that. so I'm just doing it. But it's like helping me stay disciplined with all of this. And it's really taught me a lot about how I really need to get back into posting content for my travel agency. It's crazy. Anyway, all of that's doing more work long term than what filter you're using on social or whatever, what captions, what hashtags are trending. I don't even know if hashtags are a thing anymore. Okay, so Let's look at what to actually look at when you're struggling right in the struggle bus instead of pivoting your niche, pivoting the platforms you're marketing on. Let's just stick one stick with one and get to learn it really, really well. Like there are millions of people on every single platform. One is not inherently better than the other. You could be wrong in your ICAs and on there, but most likely your ICAs on all of almost all of them, right? So What do you need to look at? You need to look at the content you're posting. If you're in a real slump, you need to take a hard look at what you're posting. As though you were not you. And number one is your messaging. Is your content clearly communicating who you help, what you offer, and are you asking for them to do something? The call to action, the CTA. Or is it just vague and scattered? And like the same thing that everyone else has. Like the same so we all get those marketing assets. It could be photos or video of whatever product we want to offer. Are you just posting that up there and not even speaking or not even showing up on camera to talk about it? Cause that's just real vague. They don't know who you are and how you help. They just know that there's something going on in this like a marketing asset that was given to you. Sometimes what looks like the niche isn't working, quote unquote, is actually the message is not landing, which is much smaller and a much more targetable fix. So much easier to fix. You can even repurpose a lot of the idea of the content and just tweak the messaging a little bit. And now I'm try I'm saying this so you don't give up hope. Because what if you're like, but I had a whole freaking six months of content planned out? Okay. And you have it all scheduled. Okay, well you need to redo it and tweak it. And I would like to argue this is why I don't I think you need to review any Content assets that are provided to us because I know there's some people like classic vacations used to do this. They'd send a monthly spreadsheet content calendar with pictures and the hashtags and they did all the research for you. And I liked it for like two months just to have something like on my Facebook business page. but then I realized how many other people are posting the exact same thing. So if you are getting content from something like that. Tweak it to fit your brand voice. Don't just copy pasta. Okay, number two. Service. Is there a gap in how you're delivering what? What you're marketing. Like is your response time slower? Is your booking process more complicated? Is the client experience not what you promise in your marketing? This is why I say be clear on how you help and who you serve and the process behind it and then you market everything. Like get that stuff kind of it doesn't have to be perfect, but get that stuff laid out and then when you market That trust is broken if they sign on to work with you because of your marketing message and your service does not align with your marketing messaging. So that could be costing you conversions. that could be costing you repay bookings, it could be costing you canceled trips and revenue. Then that's separate from leads coming in at all. You might have great marketing messaging, but your service could suck, honestly. And once you break someone's trust with a service based business, they're not gonna come back. like you can mess up a burger because they'll you can make that again real quick. You can't mess up a wedding or honeymoon. Or a trip around the world like a big European trip. You can't mess that up because then your trust trust is broken. And you can't like no. It's different with service based businesses. So this all connects to like the pipeline and the booking strategy that we did probably two months ago. as well. So adjusting either or both of these is a far more precise and sustainable fix than throwing an entire niche out or business direction because of a rough few weeks. And then paying someone to completely redo all the copy on your website because that's not your niche anymore. And redoing all your funnels, well guess what? You just spent like five months making zero leads, generating z goose egg revenue, so you can have the same exact problem because it's your messaging and your service aren't aligned. Something about that is probably what is off. and you don't like doing the boring stuff and you don't want to look at yourself. And I'm sorry to sound like a meanie bobini, but also you can't survive as any business owner if you aren't willing to take a look and take accountability for how you operate things. Okay. And it can feel like the world's against you. You might be listening to this episode and be like, Rachel, you're such a bitch right now. Why are you? I'm trying to get you to stop pouting and playing the victim here. Stick with something. Do it. It's not hard. so slow month, canceled trips, discouraging, like Comparison trap to someone else's stories or highlight reel on their social and how great everything's going for them. Let's return to that stewardship mindset. This isn't all about you, this isn't all about your validation, and it's gonna have ups and downs. Just like if you were a farmer, you're gonna have seasons where there's gonna be a drought, and you're gonna have seasons where you're gonna have an abundance of a harvest. That's why you learn how to pickle so you can keep some stuff aside and can stuff as a farmer. But anyway. You are tending something, is what I'm saying. That you have been trusted with this travel agency very faithfully, one season at a time. A rough few weeks, a rough few months, even a rough year is information to respond to thoughtfully, not proof that everyone and everything everything else needs to be torn down and started over. Maybe your soil just needs a tillin and some fertilizer. Maybe that's it. Maybe you need a little bit better pest control. Like if this were a farm you were tending, like if you were a serf and the lord of the estate or whatever is like, not a serf, we're not gonna go that far back. Well let's do Downt Abbey times. So like Lord Grantham is like, yeah, you can totally rent this house, but and can you grow this for me? Or take care of these pigs. Well these pigs are getting sick. I need help. I can't afford this. He's gonna help you out and it's not gonna be great, but he's still gonna be like, good job for doing it. And that's what you need to do with your travel agency. You're gonna have bad seasons. You're gonna have ups and downs completely out of your control. That doesn't mean tear everything down and start all over. Okay, this is that stretch. Days 221 to 231. This covers week well I really need to get better at not doing 10 to 15 days at a time. but this covers if you're in the success circle right around week 33. Evaluating, launching new offers, tracking the impact, letting go of comparison, focusing or focusing on the business instead of chasing trends, launching things imperfectly. Just watch my podcast, by the way. Like I cannot not show up for you all and I can't have the my hair and makeup done at this point in time for the next I don't know. I don't know, honestly. Two three months minimum. Anyway, and building a full picture of how your marketing actually works. Consistency, especially the boring kind, is still the thing most likely to carry you through. Just like eating breakfast, just like brushing your teeth. You want to keep your teeth, you brush and floss them. Consistently. Not when you feel like it. It's the same thing. All right. That was Travel Agency in the Year. Day 231. Have a wonderful day. I will see you tomorrow.