All Posts Tagged: Business Skills
What Does Your Personal Mountain in the Path of Your Travel Writing Dreams Look Like?
If you’ve attended any of our events or webinars, you know that I don’t sugar coat things.
When people first start asking me to coaching them so they could achieve the same level of success with their travel writing income and choice of clients as I had, I embarked on a journey of inquiry that lasted for years and led to the 400 pages of The Six-Figure Travel Writing Map.
Aside from learning tips and tricks for excelling both as a freelancer and as a trace writer from the best of each world, one of the main things I did was have a lot of conversations with folks just like you.
Are Freelancers Travel Writers Beginning to Lose Ground to Full-time Staff?
There’s a very interesting job listing making the rounds right now that some of you may have seen.
It clearly appears to be posted in error (at least the overly honest part), but I can’t say that it surprises me.
Can Five Minutes a Day Really Increase Your Assignment Rate Four Fold?
Wanted to make sure you heard a few quick things about today’s call:
Our webinar will take place today at a very different time than usual as I need to catch a flight to a get down to a writing conference in Nashville before our weeklong boot camp starts on Sunday.
(I’m so excited to see some of you there! We have been working so hard on the outings, set up, and menus for this week to welcome writers coming from as far as Argentina to take their career to an entirely new level! If you’re interest in joining us for next spring’s bootcamp, you can take 25% off now in our summer’s last hurrah sale!)
Our topic for today may literally be the most important thing that we will every cover in a webinar.
How Do You Respond When Travel Companies Ask You to Blink First in Negotiations?
Photo by Helloquence on Unsplash
Welcome to a new feature here at Dream of Travel Writing–the Monday Mailbag! We often get questions from readers, folks in our accountability group, or coaching program members that we think would apply to a lot of you.
Now, with permission, agony-aunt-style, we’ll be sharing a new one with you each Monday. If you have a question you’d like to see included, please send it to us at questions [at] dreamoftravelwriting.com and make sure to include a line saying we have permission to reprint your question.
On to the tricky travel writing questions!
Are You Putting Your Best Foot Forward When You Blog for Other Websites?
We all write online, right?
We write social media posts. We write blog posts. We write for other people’s websites (whether for pay or as a guest post).
On our blogs, voice matters. The “product” you’re selling (whether to advertisers, those providing free trips, or other types of sponsors) is often eye balls. And your voice and other unique aspects of your style are what distinguishes you in that race for eyeballs.
On travel company websites, the product is what they’re selling. It’s laid out there in black and white. Tours, safaris, hotel rooms, you name it.
With tourism boards, they’re selling a destination, its hotel rooms, its restaurants and its experiences.
The words are not the product.
Big Changes Are Coming to Our At-Home IdeaFest, Pitchapalooza, and TravelContentCon Programs
There are a lot of changes coming to our at-home programs–the versions of our live events, like Pitchapalooza, that take place over several weeks that you do from home rather than our location in the Catskills.
- major changes coming to ensure participants participate and finish their programs
- moving to a university-like model in many ways–your lessons and homework are when they are, and they’re due when they’re do–to move further away from the issues with online courses that people never finish
- new TravelContentCon and IdeaFest programs on the horizon
- IdeaFest (live or at-home) will now be a prerequisite Pitchapalooza (live or at-home)
- groups will be smaller and prices for some programs will change, but there will be much more personal attention as a result (in some cases more similar to a limited-term intensive coaching program, like at the retreats) and it will allow me to even run programs with just three people at a time if that’s who we have at that time (see–extra personal attention!)
- participation in group discussions (on a discussion platform for pitch- and idea-related programs or in group calls for TravelContentCon) will be a core component as it is essential to success–MFA programs are based on group critique sessions for a reason Read More
How to Sell Your Blogging Services to Tourism Boards and Travel Companies (Even When They Don’t Say They Need Writers)
Almost universally, when people start travel writing, or even considering whether it’s a viable possibility as an actual income-generating career, they google some form of “paying travel websites,” “travel writing jobs,” or “travel magazine pay.”
On a recent coaching call, a writer I had asked to assemble lists of online markets (places to writer for) that interested her around certain themes like running, New York City and the Hudson Valley, and expat life, ran into this issue. Rather than focusing on legitimate markets around her specific areas of expertise, she embarked on some general googling. It wasn’t an inspiring journey, to say the least.
How Do You Follow Up on Informal Assignments from Editors?
Welcome to the Dream of Travel Writing–the Monday Mailbag! We often get questions from readers, folks in our accountability group, or coaching program members that we think would apply to a lot of you.
Now, with permission, agony-aunt-style, we’ll be sharing a new one with you each Monday. If you have a question you’d like to see included, please send it to us at questions [at] dreamoftravelwriting.com and make sure to include a line saying we have permission to reprint your question.
On to the tricky travel writing questions!
Are You Pitching Square Ideas to Round Magazine Sections?
I’ve learned to really hate the term “angle.”
It’s so mushy. What does it really mean? I poked around, and even Google didn’t seem very forthcoming with a definition. Here’s as far as I got:
“In books, it’s called the premise (a woman works her way through Julia Child’s cookbook in a year). In advertising, it’s called the handle (“Trix are for kids!”). In movies, it’s the concept (humans invade the magical habitat of peaceful blue beings on another planet). In an essay, an angle is the controlling idea.”
– Writer’s Digest
“This ‘angle’ is the specific way a news source addresses an issue by offering one perspective or point of view of that story. “
– New York Times
“Short for news angle, it is that aspect of a story which a journalist chooses to highlight and develop. Usually the most newsworthy of its key points. Also called hook or peg. ”
– The News Manual Journalism and Media Glossary
Over time teaching travel writing, and specifically generating article ideas, to writers, I’ve found that it does more harm than good.
When Things Start to Go Sour With a Long-Time Editor Relationship, When Should You Cut the Cord?
Photo by Harli Marten on Unsplash
Welcome to the Dream of Travel Writing–the Monday Mailbag! We often get questions from readers, folks in our accountability group, or coaching program members that we think would apply to a lot of you.
Now, with permission, agony-aunt-style, we’ll be sharing a new one with you each Monday. If you have a question you’d like to see included, please send it to us at questions [at] dreamoftravelwriting.com and make sure to include a line saying we have permission to reprint your question.
On to the tricky travel writing questions!