Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Lainey Melnick. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Lainey thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. One of the toughest things about progressing in your career is that there are almost always unexpected problems that come up – problems that you often can’t read about in advance, can’t prepare for, etc. Have you had such and experience and if so, can you tell us the story of one of those unexpected problems you’ve encountered?

The travel industry is packed full of continual unexpected problems. A large part of my job is managing conflict and issues for my clients, so I take on all that stress, and they can enjoy the travel and adventure experience. A travel advisor and entrepreneur must be a skilled problem solver to succeed. This is my fifth business, and after a long executive career in the high-tech industry, dabbling in politics. With decades of experience in communications, media, filmmaking, personnel management, technology, website development, retail sales, restaurant and hospitality management, major account sales, channel marketing, product management, and service, I have honed those problem-solving skills. Still, nothing prepares you completely for a crisis like we were faced with the COVID-19 pandemic. To take you back to those glory days before we knew what that even meant, I was having my best sales months ever. The travel business was booming. I was on track to have my first million-dollar sales year, but in January 2020, those of us in the industry began to take notice of issues in China that were starting to affect our clients. Managing the re-routing issues at that point was the main focus without understanding what was ahead. Things escalated in February 2020, with Italy locking down their country and the rest of the world starting to take notice. Again, I was mainly focused on re-routing clients, ensuring they could travel to the parts of the world they wanted to go to easily and safely. Cancellations were starting to roll in, with clients thinking they would need to push out their travels six months to a year until this had passed. Then the cruise ships came into focus. With the first ship off of Japan quarantined and prevented from docking, fear and panic spread. In March 2020, the CDC issued its first “no sail” order, plus the Trump administration instituted a travel ban for non-US citizens traveling to our country. My industry began its free fall. My clients had been booking their travel sometimes a year or more in advance. So I had future travel on my books from as far back as February 2019. The way the travel industry works, I don’t get paid until my clients travel. The work that I do is a future investment in income. Like some in my industry, I’ve never charged a planning fee. So while 2019 had been my highest sales year to date, the cancellations started to eat away at my 2019 sales, which would have been my 2020 income, plus decimated my 2020 sales, which would be my income for 2020 and beyond. While January to March 2020 had been my highest sales quarter to date, suddenly, I had half a million dollars in cancellations and commission recalls from suppliers, with sales at almost a complete standstill. Daily my focus was on rebooking instead of canceling. The tactical response was how to save the sale for some time. Most experts predicted we would return to normal within a few months. No one knew what was in store. I was still problem-solving at a tactical level. If a problem for my company arose, I was dealing with solving that issue instead of looking at an overall new strategy. With ventilator shortages and deaths rising in the US, states began to shut down, and social activity was stopped. Instead of being able to meet in person with clients and suppliers, I shifted to zoom video conferencing, as did many companies. Once I got through managing my current bookings and cancellations, I realized that my phone wasn’t ringing, emails weren’t coming, texts had stopped, and sales had dropped to zero most months. I was concerned about my employees and their ability to survive financially until we were back to normal. I moved my full-commission employees to salary, increasing my expenses instead of cutting them. My thought was that it would only be for a short time, but as the months continued, I couldn’t keep that up and asked my employees to file for unemployment. I had advertising contracts that I could not cancel, so all of my other expenses were locked in. With zero income and the same level of expenses, I realized that I needed to change my overall business strategy. I had already been largely focused on marketing through social media and video, but I didn’t have a social media strategy. I was posting haphazardly. I created a new plan. With the world stuck in the house, I was going to provide the most up-to-date educational information to help my clients and the world navigate the new world of travel through video. Instead of considering the sale, I thought about how to make people comfortable with travel again. I became an expert on everything COVID. I created videos to walk people through all the COVID restrictions and policies, and I traveled to show them how to do it. My travel videos are sometimes 4 hours or more, but I have tens of thousands of viewers who watch every minute to learn, to be inspired, and to feel comfortable with travel. This strategy has paid off. I am now at over a million in sales for the past year despite COVID. I am at the professional content creator partnership level with YouTube and Facebook, so my content is being monetized for a secondary income stream. I added TikTok to my portfolio more recently. I started focusing on shorter reels with Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube shorts to bring in more viewers for my longer videos. I have been featured in the press for my innovative strategy and for re-imagining the travel agent. It was devastating for my business for three years, but we have returned stronger.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?

I use my 35+ years of executive experience in media, technology, marketing, and management to advise and curate my clients’ bespoke travel experiences. I specialize in luxury travel
by jet, yacht, cruise, rail, chauffeur, and self-drive, plus I assist with global vacation villa rentals. I don’t charge for my services. My worldwide travel supplier partners build my commission into their pricing, so my service is only to your advantage.
My agency is in the top sales tier, at 6% for worldwide sales, with over $1M in sales this past year. I am a luxury travel advisor and owner of Dream Vacations – Lainey Melnick & Associates in the Westlake Hills / Eanes ISD area of Austin, Texas.

I intended to follow a path in media and film production and worked in various jobs along those lines. For example, I was a DJ and worked in Chicago Radio; I worked for CBS in television production, dabbled in film production, and owned a video production company. When I couldn’t work in media, I worked in product management, marketing, and sales positions in the computer industry. My high-tech skills brought me to focus on digital video editing, which was still in the early stages. I developed the first video dating website, which match.com eventually bought. As a product line manager and Director of Marketing, I was hired in the San Francisco Bay Area to develop computerized video editing products for high-tech companies. I led the consumer division for this product line. I had been divorced with two young children, and my new husband, who found me from my website, was an engineer and was offered a transfer to a branch of his company in Austin where we could easily live on only his salary, double the size of our house, and I could have two more children. While raising our four children, I worked in businesses from home, first as a real estate broker, and then I opened my travel agency. I became involved in politics, worked for Obama, and then ran for the US House of Representatives. In addition, I was appointed Commissioner of the Ce-Bar Fire Department. My travel business combined my previous high-tech, marketing, sales, and PR skills. I now focus on producing educational and informational travel videos, social media networking, and content creation as my primary business marketing strategy.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

As the owner of a home-based travel agency, my “market” is the world. The beauty of the Internet is that it opens up your outreach to every person who has a phone or computer. With that in mind, my face to the world is my social media content and my brand image that I portray on all the social media and video platforms. Since I am in a personal sales professional service business, reputation is everything. Personal referrals with posted reviews have been extremely important to grow my business. I keep my focus on my clients and making sure that I give them that 5-star quality experience that makes their dreams come true. Having a happy, repeat client base is the best foundation for growth. With each happy client posting to their own networks with their recommendation to use my services, my reach then grows to their reach. It’s exponential. The same is true with my YouTube channel and TikTok. When others find value in what I post, when they share, repost, comment, like, they build the validity of my brand. Community service and involvement is important to me personally on a local level as well. Being involved in my Westlake Chamber of Commerce, leading their Humanitarian Services Committee, volunteering and supporting our local Eanes ISD Schools and political involvement has given me a local foundation of people who know me personally and validate my expertise. The Internet is king and all you have to do is google me, and you can only see hundreds of positive links about my service and my business. I am a certified spokesperson for my parent company, World Travel Holdings, and am featured by the press locally and internationally for my travel expertise. Having support from the media, clients, friends, family, colleagues is crucial to maintain a positive reputation.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

My social media strategy is the primary marketing foundation for my home-based business. I have over 20K followers across platforms. I am in the professional partnership programs for content creation on YouTube and Facebook so my travel videos on both platforms are monetized. On TikTok and Instagram, I’ve also met the requirements for professional achievement levels. Success on these platforms is not easy and does not happen overnight. I have built my following over a decade in business. I focus on creating the best information and content that is of value to others, and that’s how you build. People want to be entertained, but they also want to learn and get information. You need to give them something that makes them want to listen to you, again and again. Having the best content is not the entire formula though. In addition to also having the right title, the right description, the right thumbnail, the right hashtags, you have to be showing up in search results, being recommended and being shared, and getting those first impressions. Cross-marketing helps build your brand image and your reach. Some people are on one platform but not on others. It helps you to share your own content across all platforms. Your base will always be the people who really know you, your family, friends, clients, colleagues, suppliers and partners. You need their support when you start and build from there. If you don’t have anyone in your personal network, then your focus should be on building that network. Find something in your local community that interests you, and become involved. To be successful online, it helps to be successful in person. The more people you meet personally, the more you friend and follow. When you meet anyone, anywhere, ask them if they use social media and which they prefer. Ask to follow them. I have a QR code sticker that I have on my phone so no matter where I am, I can share my links with anyone who may want to follow me. I share my link tree on every post, every video and every email on every platform. Many people have resistance to self-promote, but in a business like mine, you must force yourself to tell others who you are and why knowing what you have to say is of benefit to them. Create your elevator pitch, who you are, what you do and most important, what you can do for them. Craft each post you make with the intention of showing people that information, build your brand image. People want to do business with someone they know and trust. Give them the reasons why that person is you. The best advice is to be yourself, be authentic. I bare my soul, unapologetically, to my network. People who come to me for my services, know me, trust me and have faith that I will put them first.

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Lainey Melnick