Learn How to Promote Your Travel Agency With These Fresh New Strategies

2022 UPDATE: This video was originally recorded PC (Pre-COVID), but the general strategies can still absolutely work today! Just like with pretty much everything AC (After-COVID), you just need to get creative… 

This video is about public speaking, and in many the doors are wide open to these types of opportunities, but depending on where you live, and your personal situation/health/beliefs/etc, you may not be ready for in-person public speaking events like we used to do them – but what about on-line virtual events, or outdoor-socially-distanced events, or smaller, more intimate gatherings? 

So as you’re watching (or reading) this think about how you can apply these strategies to what your current life situation looks like. 

 

If you’re looking for a fresh new strategy to promote your travel agency and get IDEAL clients, you’re going to LOVE this.

I made you a short video walking you through two variations of a highly effective strategy for getting new ideal clients to book travel with you. The best part is that this strategy is FREE and in some cases, you can even get paid to do it!

Yes, you read that right. You can get paid a fee to promote your travel agency. Intrigued? Watch the video and find out how this proven strategy works.

This video is mostly about in-person marketing, but as you watch it, think about how you can apply these strategies creatively here in 2022 (zoom meetings, webinars, outdoor events, etc.).

After you’ve watched the video, click the Send to Messenger below and we’ll send you your FREE guide giving you 100 IDEAS of places you can implement these strategies! 🎁🎁🎁

 

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

If you’re wondering how to promote your travel agency or looking for a new fresh strategy for landing IDEAL clients, you’re in right place because I have one effective strategy to share with you that may be a good fit for you.

There is one caveat to this strategy… you have to enjoy public speaking, or least not loathe it. If public speaking is NOT you’re thing, that’s totally cool – this strategy is not for you, but there are plenty of other ways to promote your travel agency that don’t entail public speaking and at the end of this video I’ll give you a second strategy that doesn’t entail public speaking.

When I started my first business which was an organizing and productivity business, I used this one strategy I’m sharing with you today to get enough clients to quit my day job. I’ve taught this strategy to several travel agents like you who also used it land a lot of new IDEAL clients – and you can too!

Below this video you can download a list of over 100 different places you could speak at to promote your travel agency. Choose places where your ideal clients are. For example, I spoke at a lot of law firms and investment firms in my area because they were filled with busy people who are high income earners – those were my ideal clients.

I contacted the HR department and arranged to come in to do 30-minute brown bag workshops over the lunch hour. In the beginning I did them for free, but after I got good at it and the companies shared with me how much they appreciated me coming in to speak, I started charging $75 per talk. And sometimes the companies would cater in lunch for their staff instead of asking the employees to bring their own lunch.

At every talk I gave I invited all of the attendees to sign up for my email list — And I of course enticed them a freebie. Usually 90% or more of attendees joined my email list. The next day I sent them all a follow-up email thanking them for coming and offered them a free consultation – and of course sent them the freebie I promised them.

I landed 1-3 new clients every time I gave a talk, and the attendees that didn’t hire me right away often would stay on my email list, get my newsletters, and months later they would hire me and/or send me a referral.

I gave 1-2 talks a week for a couple years, and a long time after I stopped giving talks, I continued to get clients from the talks I had given years before.

After 6 months of giving talks, I created a “speaking circuit” where I would speak regularly at the places that yielded great results for me. So instead of contacting new places to speak at, I had a regular schedule set up with a list of companies and other organizations.

I spoke twice a year at most places on my circuit, and quarterly at some of the bigger places. Each time I spoke, I pretty much gave the same talk so I got really good at and it became super easy for me to give – no prep work needed.

That strategy worked fine because different people from each company or organization would attend each talk, and when I had repeat attendees, they didn’t seem to even notice that the talk was pretty much the same because it had been 6 months or a year since they’d heard it.

If you’re in the Travel Expert Marketing Academy, in Module 23 we give you a step-by-step guide to hosting highly effective talks, phone scripts and pre-written emails to use to land speaking gigs, done-for-you forms and sign up sheets, a results tracking spreadsheet, pro tips on what to wear and say, and some ninja tricks for making your speaking gigs highly profitable for you.

Consider teaming up with other agents in your area who specialize in a totally different niche and set of destinations as you. You could do talks together which is fun to do and then you’re able to split the work of setting up the talks.

I have a second strategy for promoting your travel agency that doesn’t require public speaking.

At some of the companies I spoke at, I also organized an annual “health fair” on site at the company. I contacted different businesses in the area such as a day spa, chiropractor, yoga studio, travel agent, and so on. They each paid me a small “booth fee” to participate in the fair. I charged each business around $150 to participate in the fair and I’d usually have at least 10 businesses at each health fair – and it was almost always the same 10-12 businesses so we got to know each other well and had a lot of fun doing health fairs together.

I organized everything, had flyers designed for the HR department to post all around the office, and composed emails for the HR department to send out to the staff inviting them to Health Fair Day.

Then on Health Fair Day we’d all come set up tables with our displays in a large conference room and give out freebies, demonstrations, samples, and schedule free consultations. We’d play music, do some prize giveaways and hand out dark chocolates to make it extra fun.

This strategy allows you to promote your travel agency AND make some money on the coordinating the health fair. The companies loved it because it didn’t cost them any money, didn’t take up much time, and it was a nice fun benefit for their employees – it helped build moral in the company.

The businesses I invited to participate loved it because for one small fee they got an opportunity to meet with hundreds of prospective clients that work right in their neighborhood.

I loved it because it was very easy for me to do, I’d make at least $1,200 on each and land a bunch of new great clients.

For each fair I just rinsed and repeated. I keep my rubber bin packed and organized and I had a checklist I followed so I could organize each health fair in under 2 hours.

I encourage you to try one or both of these strategies to promote your travel agency. If you’re in the Travel Expert Marketing Academy, be sure to take advantage of all of the done-for-you resources in Module 23.

Now I’d love to hear from you. Have you done any public speaking in your travel business and if so, where did you speak and how did it go? Please share in the comments below.

Love & Success,

Heidi and Your Marketing Team