December 3, 2024 • 34 mins
This episode is #incredible. Rebekah chats with co-founder Lia Garcia of Louisville Food Tours, about her journey from travel blogging to running a successful food tour business. Leah shares how she used SEO, influencer marketing, and affiliate programs to increase visibility and drive sales. Leah also discusses in detail the power of authentic storytelling and using it to build meaningful partnerships with local businesses to grow her revenue. If you’re a tour operator looking to enhance your marketing strategy and boost bookings via social media marketing and blogging, this episode has some valuable insights on how to leverage creativity as well as FareHarbor’s tools to achieve success!
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Welcome to Growth powered by Fair Harbor where we explore the strategies behind thrivingtour and activity businesses.
Whether you're just starting out or scaling up, this podcast is packed with insights tohelp you succeed.
Now here's your host, Fair Harbor's Community Manager, Rebecca Cosley.
(00:27):
All right, well, Leah, thank you so much for joining me for this very special episode ofGrowth Powered by Fair Harbor.
I'm so excited to have you here.
So Leah Garcia, Louisville Food Tours is your business.
Can you tell us a little bit about Louisville Food Tours, how long you've had the company,how did it start, and what your role kind of is there?
(00:50):
Yeah, so my husband and I co-founded Louisville Food Tours about two years ago, actually.
This month is our two-year anniversary.
Thank you.
So we really started it just out of wanting to tell the story of my hometown, Louisville,Kentucky, and a firm belief based on lots of experience with other food tours that that is
the way and most fun way to get to know the city.
(01:11):
Sorry to all the other kinds of tours out there, but we love food tours.
So, you know, we both have a background in storytelling and, you know, acting, education,kind of all these different skill sets that kind of come together to produce a food tour.
So we started running them two years ago.
My husband was the first tour guide that we had.
(01:33):
I handle everything that is not tour guiding or like he writes the scripts, he does thetraining, he does all of the actual like going outside part and I do all the sitting
inside and staring at a screen part.
So yeah, and when we first started, we were running one tour, two tours a week.
I had a six month old baby.
So I very quickly wanted us to.
(01:55):
have other tour guides running those tours.
So as we expanded, by the end of the first year, I think we were running about 35 tours aweek with about 10 tour guides.
And I think now we're about 10 to 15.
And I haven't sat down and counted.
when I did some back of the neck and math, it's like, I don't know, 45 to 50 tours a week,something like that.
Right now, it's high season too.
(02:15):
So it's not like that all the time.
Incredible.
Yeah.
And so why Louisville?
Are you from there, I am from Louisville originally.
I grew up there.
I traveled all over the world.
I lived in the Bay Area for 10 years.
That's where I met my husband.
And just going to all these places all over the world, there's always that one city thatyou fall in love with, that one place that is just sort of your soul place.
(02:35):
And for me, that's Louisville.
I just feel like, you know, the Ohio River water just runs deep in my veins.
So I always knew we wanted to move there and we chose to raise our family there.
my background is in, we'll get to this of course, my background is in blogging, travelblogging.
And we were telling stories about places all around the world and just really wanted tofocus on making a deeper impact on one place.
(02:57):
And for me, it's always been Louisville.
So you already just mentioned the blog, which is kind of the meat of this episode isreally getting into like what influencer and travel blog 101.
And especially for those small business owners who are like, keep hearing my SEO guys keeptelling me to do a blog and I don't really know how to execute that.
So I'm really excited.
(03:18):
for this episode with you.
Can you talk a little bit about your blog?
It's called Practical Wanderlust.
Practical Wanderlust was, yes, that's our big global travel blog.
So we started it about 10 years ago and during a year-long honeymoon that my husband and Itook, which was an absolute disaster but a lot of fun.
And by the end of that year, we kind of built it up into having an audience.
(03:38):
And I thought, well, maybe I can make this into a job.
At the time, blogging wasn't like a job, like that nobody knows how, even still I getquestions like, how do you make money?
and I wasn't sure either, but I kind of just figured it out.
And so we did that.
I did that for the last 10 years and we ended up growing to be one of the largest travelblogs in the world, which is pretty incredible.
(04:00):
know, pandemic definitely scrambled everything, changed everything.
Our priorities shifted.
You know, we spent so much time traveling around the world and then we decided we reallyjust wanted to be settled and plant roots and have a child and you know, all of those
things.
so.
but we shifted the focus.
We still have practical wanderlust, but we shifted the focus to really focusing onLouisville about two years ago.
(04:21):
I also, at that time, right before starting the food tour company, I started a destinationtravel blog called Let's Go Louisville, which is all about discovering Louisville and
Kentucky and the places nearby.
you, this all was something you just crafted.
Was there a specific goal when you made these websites or was it just something that wastruly born out of passion you just wanted to publish?
(04:44):
what you were doing on this year-long honeymoon.
That is, you must love your husband, Year-long.
I said, if we can make it married out of that, you know, spending a year in hostelstogether, I'm gonna be with this man forever.
We can have children.
So, okay.
we were backpacking.
yeah.
This is not a luxury kind of year-long honeymoon.
(05:05):
No, was great, actually.
You bored out of, like, passion?
Yeah.
Or did you make it with, a goal?
I really didn't.
have a goal in mind when I made it.
My goal, guess, was because I knew everybody was gonna be asking me what we were doing andI thought this would be the most efficient way to tell everybody without having to retell
the same story over and over again.
I was like, I'll just, write it.
I love writing.
(05:26):
So I started like a dinky free, it was a blogger site when I first started.
mean, this, you know, it was not, it didn't look good.
And I moved to WordPress eventually and I just didn't realize you could make any money outof it for maybe the first.
six months or so until I really started getting more traffic.
I heard about things like affiliate marketing.
My first partnerships, and they weren't paid.
(05:46):
My first just like collaborations were with like small tour operators, small cookingexperiences and food experiences.
And actually it's been so great today.
I've been meeting with several tour operators who I worked with like 10 years ago when Iwas a baby blogger and they were baby tour operators and we like.
You know, I took their tour and I loved it so much that I wrote about it and I've beensending them traffic ever since and visitors ever since.
(06:09):
So, yeah, I really just was excited and passionate and wanted to tell the stories of thethings that we were doing.
I wanted to write the guides that I didn't find online when I was planning our tripbecause we were going to some places that just weren't.
They were so off the beaten path, I guess, that like there really wasn't necessarilyalways a good reason to go there.
But also like if you do want to go there, here's what to do and where to set, you know.
(06:32):
or just the more helpful guides.
There were a lot of vague guides out there that sort of just said, go here, it's fun, butdidn't tell you how to go there and exactly what steps to take and what to do when you're
there and how to plan your itinerary.
Just the really nitty gritty stuff.
I wanted to do that.
year was when you started this?
2016.
that's, in 2016, there was Instagram, but it was a pretty early version.
(06:56):
Things have kind of changed a lot.
Yeah.
Has the blog?
kind of evolved with that, not change the landscape?
there's like bloggers, then there's influencers.
And I'm such a blogger.
Bloggers, we love to talk.
We love to tell stories.
We love to write.
We love using words like luff, you know, all the time and cobblestone streets.
(07:19):
And then there's influencers, and they like being in front of the video, and they likeshowing things visually.
That's awful.
Yeah, right.
So I like do it because I'm like, I have.
to do it.
I have to get into the room.
I have to be doing video, but I just want to write.
So for me, it's always been focused on blogging, focused on SEO, focused on storytelling.
(07:39):
And I was, you know, I was on Instagram, but I'm a late adopter to like, tick tock and allthis sort of video content.
I think our photos are great.
And I have video content, I have those skills and everything.
But it's not something that I wake up and I'm like, let me just
know, my hair and film a video that's like pulling teeth for me.
Right.
Well, I always say that social media is obviously so helpful.
(08:02):
And I personally am in kind of like the zillennial camp of that.
do use a lot of SEO to find stuff for my vacations personally, but it's a lot ofreinforcement.
So if I'm seeing something that looks like a really good time on Instagram or TikTok.
I am going to Google and I am going to go to that website.
(08:25):
Hopefully it comes up and make sure it's safe to put my credit card number in there.
It all has to do with the booking flow and the travel planning stages of each process.
So I think TikTok and Instagram are so good for awareness.
Learning about a destination, especially a place like Louisville where I'm based that youmight not necessarily realize has a lot of things to do.
(08:47):
This might be the first time you're hearing about it.
And then once you're aware of it, then you go into the planning stages and then you go toGoogle and you're looking for blogs and you're looking for details and where to go and
what to do.
And this is the exact tour I recommend you taking.
This is the exact hotel you should stay in.
And I'm going to do all the work for you.
Not a lot of people are not as many people.
think it's changing when it comes to travel.
(09:07):
think people have their credit cards out ready to buy products on TikTok and Instagram,but are not as ready to book a hotel or a flight or even a tour when they're browsing on
social media.
Blogging is really, to me, still a very important part of the very bottom of that funnelwhen they're ready to buy.
And it's rooted in SEO blogging.
mean, how do you decide what content to include?
(09:29):
I guess I'll ask that question in two different branches.
So how do you know for your business blog versus practical wander list, how does that SEOpractice kind of differ when you're writing this content?
know, honestly, it's very similar.
do keyword research.
So we sort of have an idea.
theory, guess, hypothesis if you want to be sciency about it.
(09:50):
And then we like go and sort of explore like I think that people might be looking forwhere to stay in Louisville, right?
And then I'm gonna go into my keyword research tool.
I use key search and I start typing it in and they're gonna suggest to me well peoplemight not be looking for where to stay in Louisville but they might be looking for hotels
near downtown Louisville.
Maybe that has a higher amount of volume, right?
(10:11):
And the volume is the KPI that I'm looking at.
That's the number of people searching for that per month.
So how likely are you to rank for this keyword?
A keyword that is like things to do in New Orleans is going to be extremely hard to rankfor versus something more niche like best food tours of the garden district in New
Orleans.
The more specific you get, the more likely you are going to be able to rank for that.
(10:32):
So we always base it on a keyword.
There are times that we would just write it because we know that we want to write about itand people don't necessarily know to search for it unless they know it exists.
but we are not going to be expecting that that content will rank well or drive trafficwell.
We're going to send it out via email marketing or via some other kind of form of contentdistribution at that point.
(10:55):
Wow.
That is a lot of thinking, a lot of research.
How do you like content plan, I guess, when you're you're content planning for yourbusiness specifically?
Because obviously you have a passion for food, you have a passion for travel.
And as creatives, I like to consider myself a creative, and as creatives, when things arerooted in passion and we get to write about those things, it comes so naturally.
(11:20):
Whereas I think when people are writing a blog, in my experience, my listeners are like,girl, you say this every episode, but I was on the account management team for a little
while, and I would see blogs all the time, but they were so rooted in formula.
which was good and bad, but it kind of lacked authenticity.
What do you do to keep both relevancy in those keywords you mentioned, but also keeprooted in the food, the passion of the business?
(11:48):
It is a tricky balance.
If you write like a robot, you might please Google, but nobody wants to read it.
They're just going to scroll through.
It's really obvious.
Sorry, chat GPT.
I'm not a fan.
But the SEO and the keywords are all about getting people to click onto you.
on the SERPs, which are the search results, you want to be the one that they click into,but then it's up to you to hold their attention.
(12:11):
So that's where all the personality and the passion needs to come through.
And really, you got to kind of hit them in the face with it right away, right?
Like that first couple of paragraphs, your personality needs to come out.
If it sounds like it was written by ChatGPT and it sounds, know, nobody thinks the ChatGPTreally has any authority necessarily.
I think it's a convenient way of getting information across, but it doesn't.
(12:32):
It just lacks.
or any kind of emotions.
for us, and the reason why our blog grew so quickly and why we did experience so muchsuccess is because our personality shines through in every single article.
We basically are kind of like thing, our overarching theme is that we are disastroustravelers.
Like my husband and I are just everywhere we go, we do everything horribly wrong.
(12:55):
Just we make every mistake in the book and then we tell you exactly how to avoid it.
But we're not just gonna come in and write, here's the perfect
itinerary.
We're going to tell you about all our stupid mistakes.
We're going to tell you the story.
Like if you and I are sitting down over wine and you're like, how was your trip?
I'm going be like, my God, let me tell you about this.
Like we got lost, we missed this train, we, you know, whatever, right?
(13:16):
That's what you really want to hear.
That's what's in intra-training.
That's interesting.
It's informative.
You want to have that personality coming through.
So that has been our driving force.
Putting our personality first, telling a really good story.
It's the same thing that goes into making a really effective
It's all about storytelling.
It's all about that human connection.
And yes, you're conveying information, but you need to do it in a way that delivers areally human story.
(13:40):
There has to be that element of connectivity, or it's just a lot of information.
having that, like getting that keyword and getting an outline where you're deliveringinformation and then finding ways to even like, sometimes I'll go through and I'll write
all the information and then I'll.
go back through and add the personality.
I'll add the jokes, I'll add the stories, and make it really actually interesting and funto read.
(14:02):
that's awesome.
And yeah, I did notice it's just like very clear, like you said, the passion that comesthrough in your blog, which I find really admirable and fun.
And I love that you were able to have all of those experiences.
And I'm glad that you reflect on them so fondly, because when I went on a trip once thatwas just like that, it was just like one thing after another, the worst.
(14:24):
things that could possibly happen.
And you sound like a great travel partner.
just like adapt.
good travel partner.
That's a point.
No, but those are the best stories.
It's always the most fun things that you have are when things just don't go as planned.
And sometimes it's disastrous results and you're cranky and you're tired and you'rehungry, but they're funny to talk about later when you've got some food and some sleep,
(14:48):
you know, and you come home.
And that's what people like to share when they talk about their travels.
They want to tell those stories.
For us, it happens to be disasters.
But for you, maybe it's this, my god, it's this amazing food that I have to tell you aboutthis.
Or I went and saw this beautiful hike.
Whatever it is, people want to hear that passion.
And that's what draws them to you.
Well, let's talk about when we are focused on our business.
(15:12):
So if we're a tour operator trying to start a blog.
Can you break down a little bit of the benefits of having a blog on your business siteversus the effort, how much time or how much time it should take, how much time maybe it
shouldn't take?
my goodness.
It can be a full-time job if you want it to be a full-time job.
Probably nobody listening has room to throw that in.
(15:35):
I will say, when it comes to time, my goal, I set myself a schedule.
I wanted to publish a blog closed.
It started out, it was every single Friday.
when I kind of started thinking about planning my content schedule, I was plugging thingsinto knowing that I have to get out four blog posts this month, right?
And so when I was doing it for the travel blog, it was something like, you know, one ofthose posts is just going to be really personality based, really a story that I just want
(16:01):
to tell just because it's going to foster that relationship with my audience.
One of them is going to make me money, right?
So it's going to be affiliate driven or product driven or a sponsorship of some kind.
One of them is going to be a
cornerstone piece, so something that's going to build out my authority.
So I kind of like categorized it, right?
So maybe, for example, if I was doing it as a food tour operator, maybe it's like one as arecipe, one as a destination guide, one as a restaurant feature, and one as a travel guide
(16:27):
to my destination, right?
So kind of thinking of it in those categories and then coming up with a list of the thingsthat you want to write.
Every single piece doesn't have to be like your magnum opus, which if you go to my blog, Ididn't take my own advice because they're all like 6,000 to 10,000 words.
are so long, but they don't have to be.
They can be 2,000 words or so.
too short and you're not really doing much, but too long and you're doing too much.
(16:48):
doing too much.
People are not really reading every single thing.
So yeah, coming up with all those content pieces, doing a little bit of keyword research.
I wouldn't spend a ton of time doing keyword research.
When you find a keyword that you want to write about, you feel like you're prepared to sitdown and write it.
You can have a conversation about it, right?
And there are enough people looking for it, like maybe at least 100 or 200 searches amonth.
(17:08):
Put it on your list.
Great.
Whatever's easiest for you to bang out.
is the first one that you should do.
I always tell people when they start to blog, the hardest thing is just starting.
The second hardest, and like hitting publish on your very first post.
That's the hardest part of blogging.
The second hardest part is continuing to do it on a consistent basis.
So having that kind of deadline for yourself and seriously, whatever is easiest to write,just get that one out.
(17:32):
The more you practice, the better it gets.
For those of us who are very busy and maybe don't want to do it themselves, I have aneditor.
So at this point,
You know, I've been blogging for years and he's actually been working with me for years aswell.
So he manages the blog side of things.
He manages our content calendar.
And you asked about content planning.
For us, we're thinking about six months out because that's about how long it's going totake Google to rank it and for it to start to get some traction so that when you're
(17:58):
looking for something that may have some seasonality, it'll be in the SERP about sixmonths later.
So if someone is thinking, OK, I'm going to start a blog and they're following your adviceon like, OK, I have the time.
to do this at this cadence.
I'm going to start planning content.
What is there like bones to a good post?
(18:18):
Is there, how does that work?
know you, we hit keywords really hard and researching keywords.
Is there anything beyond that?
Using those keywords.
You gotta use them or you're never gonna rank for them.
So I like to use them in my headers, right?
So you get your top header, your H1 header and to use the technical kind of formattingverbiage.
(18:40):
That's your title, right?
So you want to have your primary keyword that you're targeting in that title.
And then your outline is going to be things that sort of relate to that.
So I'll give you an example.
If I'm writing a blog post to where to stay in Louisville, Kentucky, my main keyword iswhere to stay in Louisville.
That's going to be in my title of my blog post.
Then I'm going to go through my headers are going to be things like where to stay in yourdowntown, best hotels for families, best hotels with a pool near downtown, right?
(19:06):
Like, and those are also keywords.
And I could write a whole blog post just for that if I really wanted to and if there wasenough content.
But a lot of the time, that also just has to do with my main keyword, and it's reallyrelated.
And you'll capture some of the people searching for that as well.
So that, I kind of create my outline based off of my keyword research as well.
The tool that I use, KeySearch, it has like a suggested, like questions people are alsoasking.
(19:29):
But you can also just Google it, and Google also tells you all these questions.
And those are based off of what people are Googling as well.
So kind of including that and making sure you're hitting all the answers that are relatedto the blog post that you're writing, that really becomes your outline.
So it ends up just being like a couple of paragraphs of introduction, which again, chatGPT is perfectly fine for it, but get that personality in as soon as you can to hook
(19:56):
people in.
So they're like, okay, I'm actually gonna read this.
I'm not just gonna scroll and look for the answers.
and then all your headers and all your different sections.
And then just a little conclusion where I kind of am like, hey, can also go book my touror follow me on social or subscribe to my email newsletter, that kind of thing.
Amazing.
Thank you.
That's so helpful.
OK, so we've talked about creation.
(20:16):
We've talked about passion.
Now we know kind of the bones of where to start in having an effective blog.
Now what if I want to be featured on one?
So whether, I know you said you're more of a blogger versus like an influencer, but Ithink
you have a lot of experience in both work.
I do both.
I don't like it.
I don't like the social media, but yes, I do.
(20:37):
Yeah.
So if I'm an operator and I want to be featured on someone's blog or featured on someone'sInstagram grid, what should I do?
What does that etiquette look like?
And how do I even choose an influencer?
So I will say, first of all, it's so much easier to be featured rather than create ityourself.
First thing I would do, whether you're deciding whether you're going to write a blog oryou're not sure yet,
(20:59):
is go and Google the keywords that you'd like to rank for and see if somebody else alreadywrote that post or maybe a few bloggers already wrote that post.
And if they wrote that post, A, you're unlikely to outrank them and B, it's going to belot easier for you to just get listed, right?
You just have to ask.
When you're reaching out, let's say that you Google your keyword, best food tours in NewOrleans, right?
(21:20):
And you find an amazing blog that you really want to rank for and then email and say, hey,like I have this food tour.
I think it would be a great addition to your site.
and then give them a reason for adding it, give them kind of a motivation.
So if they're a local blogger, offer to bring them on the tour, you know, but also offerto give them an affiliate link that's going to pay them every single time somebody books
(21:42):
it.
There are a few ways to do that, right?
So you can use FareHarbor's built-in affiliate tool if you're familiar with it.
You basically fill out a form and they send you a link, but you do then have to likemanually pay them out.
Or if you're using Byattour,
You can actually use Viator links because Viator has a fantastic affiliate program thatthey've created.
And actually I helped them design that.
(22:04):
was on the Viator affiliate advisory board.
They do a great job.
Honestly, that's what a lot of your commission is going towards is paying influencers andbloggers.
So you can say, know, if you're on the Viator affiliate program, here's my Viator link.
You don't have to worry about it.
Viator will pay them out.
There are some bloggers.
If it's a large blog, like my blog, Practical Wanderlust.
(22:24):
They may also ask for like an implementation fee, which is basically just like a hundredbucks or 200 bucks to cover their time or their team's time to go in and add that.
Sometimes there are things that they're doing that you don't even necessarily see, right?
Sometimes they're, yes, they're writing, they're adding you to their list.
They're taking your text, they're taking your copy, they're rewriting it to make itfamiliar to your audience.
(22:45):
They're taking a picture that you, that you may already use.
They might also have like newsletter sequences that include
that are driving people to that page or like I have a list of on my newsletter on my emailnewsletter I have 50,000 subscribers and I know which of them are planning visits at what
time to which destinations that I've written about.
(23:06):
So I can actually go in and say to this section of my email list that's currently planninga trip to New Orleans I'm gonna add you into my email about food tours in New Orleans
because I know that you're ready to book right now because you're it's about a month outfrom your trip right?
So and that's all part of my, like I've already done that work, right?
So when you go to a blogger that's already done that, you're taking the shortcuts.
So that's what that fee covers, right?
(23:26):
Is access to all of those kinds of things behind the scenes.
Lots of small bloggers are kind of just happy to get, you know, five to 12 % commission.
And some people might ask for a fee.
And so I would be prepared to offer that and be open to that in the conversation.
It's hard for bloggers to ask for money.
It's just an awkward conversation.
So sometimes I like to leave it really open and let.
(23:47):
Let that be a natural next step.
So I'll say something like, you know, I'd really like to be featured on your website.
I think it would be a great fit from your visitors.
Can you let me know what the next steps are for, for doing that?
Right.
So that they can then come back with a media kit or a rate sheet or tell me exactly what,what that would be like when it comes to working with influencers, you know, Google is
easy because you can just go and like search for the keywords you want to be ranking for.
(24:08):
When it to influencers, you have to do a little bit of scrolling, you to do a little work.
have to like go look at your location and find who are the local influencers.
that are consistently kind of featuring your destination because when it comes toinfluencers, if they've already visited the place, they're gone, right?
They may or may not be coming back unless they live nearby.
And so getting them to actually feature you, they don't have the content for that.
(24:30):
You may not be able to provide the content.
likes to use somebody else's content.
If they're gone, they're gone, right?
So if they've already gone there and written about it on a blog post, fair game, ask themto add you, right?
When it comes to social, I would target local influencers.
Find the destination specific influencers that are either in your region, in your city,driving distance to your city.
(24:52):
They're all targeting your target audience and you're going to get a lot more localslooking as well, but also people who are planning trips to your destination, they're
looking at those locals.
And is that through like a location tag on Instagram?
That helps.
Local hashtags.
would go to your, honestly, go to your like DMO, like your visitor center, right?
What hashtags are they using?
Oftentimes there's like a hashtag that the visitor center has created.
(25:15):
So ours is like hashtag blue the love.
So who's using that, right?
And once you start searching for it, the algorithms are real smart and they'll startdelivering that content to you.
So your feed will be full of local content about your destination, cause they know.
And they're also, they're looking at your geographic location in your phone too.
And they're connecting you with people nearby.
But so sort of like find a like group of influencers that are posting about your location.
(25:40):
whatever size they are, you know, it's sometimes very surprising.
A small following doesn't necessarily mean low reach.
Yeah, especially on TikTok.
TikTok.
TikTok.
I just aged myself.
But anyway, you can get a viral video regardless of size.
don't necessarily be too worried about that.
I always look for like, you know, 5,000 followers or up.
(26:03):
It's a very low, low bar there.
So when you start getting to the bigger influencers, you know, 100, 200,000 and up,
they may not necessarily have the best engagement.
So when I say engagement, that's anything that somebody does to engage with their content.
So that's likes, follows, shares, saves.
And if you go and look at their reels on Instagram, or you go and look at the views onTikTok, and comments, it'll show you how many people are actually engaging with it versus
(26:29):
just like looking at it and scrolling by.
So you wanna see a healthy leveling of engagement.
And I would take a look at some of those comments and make sure that they're in yourtarget market.
There is an example, I was speaking at the Viator conference about content creation lastweek and somebody raised their hand and they said, you know, I tried to work with this big
influencer.
She's like a supermodel.
She has all these hundred thousands of followers.
And then it turns out all of her followers are just like teenage boys.
(26:52):
So that's not your target audience, right?
Make sure that your target audience is reflected in those comments.
If they're tagging their friends, if they have a picture of their dog and it's a privateprofile, those are real people.
Those are not like bots, right?
So do a little checking just to make sure.
So I kind of have like a running list of influencers in my target market that I like towork with or that I want to reach out to.
(27:15):
And I just send them a message and I say, hey, you know, I'm Louisville Food Tours.
We run walking food tours in Louisville, Kentucky.
We'd love to have you come experience a tour.
Can you let me know what would be the next steps or are you interested in partnering withus?
A lot of them are just super down to it for free because it's fun.
And a lot of influencers are not in it for the money and are not making any money.
So they're happy to just come and do it.
And I let that conversation be very kind of relaxed and natural.
(27:39):
I don't offer them money before they ask for it, but I also like leave that door open forthem.
I don't want to make it super weird for them.
Baker influencers will usually say like, okay, here's my media kit.
And that'll usually have a breakdown of the information about their audience that I'mlooking for.
Demographics, age, some KPIs when it comes to engagement and their rates, right?
(28:00):
So then I can decide what I really want out of this partnership.
Is it just a single
real on Instagram or do I also want it on TikTok?
Do I want some stories?
Do I want those stories to have a link that they can click through?
And when you're paying influencers, you get to have a say in those kinds of things.
And as you get to ask for deliverables, you can actually set deadlines and you can evennegotiate things like licensing their content.
(28:25):
So that means that that beautiful video that they created, you can ask for them to liketag you as a collaborator and you can also then
download that video or ask them to send it to you and use it in paid ads later.
And that's incredibly valuable and well worth the fee.
You're gonna be paying a videographer or photographer a lot more than you're gonna bepaying that influencer.
So I like to pay influencers so that I can get that content and use it for other purposes.
(28:50):
It's a great way to get images and videos to use.
But when you're doing a free or comped partnership where you're just providing a tour, youdon't get to have a say.
You don't get to ask for deliverables.
You don't get to tell them, I'd like it to be like this.
I'd like it to be at this time.
It's called earned media at that point.
It's essentially the same as working with a journalist.
(29:10):
You're just inviting them to come along and crossing your fingers in the hopes that youmight get something out of it.
So it's important to have those expectations so that you can kind of know, you know, ifwe're, if we're paying, there's a contract in place, there's a scope of work that you'll
want to provide and have them assign.
It's going to be very meticulous and detailed.
It's a business transaction.
If you're just asking them to come along.
(29:31):
it's a journalist, it's a PR, it's earned media, you get no say and you're just gonna bethrilled with whatever happens.
And if you do wanna use those pictures or video, you're gonna need to get explicit writteninstruction for them.
Otherwise you're in copyright law violation.
wow.
Yeah.
I didn't even think about that.
So let's talk about, before I send you off to enjoy the rest of the content of theconference, again, thank you for your time here.
(29:54):
Let's talk about tracking.
I would be remiss if I didn't ask about tracking.
So.
You mentioned you use Viator.
You've dabbled in using the affiliate links with Fair Harbor as well.
I'm sure you've dabbled in like code, so using like a coupon code or campaign code as wecall them at Fair Harbor.
What do you find is the most effective way to measure that?
Is it GA4?
(30:15):
Is it using a code or is it using those links and just looking at your reporting in thedashboard?
What does that look like for you?
I will say when it's in Fair Harbor, you have a lot more visibility over the data.
So when I set up affiliates in Fair Harbor and I kind of created a whole like, like mentalsort of, not mental, I created a PDF like program to welcome all the influencers that I
(30:37):
invite to give them all their information, give them their codes and give them some tips.
And I give everybody not just the affiliate links, but I also give them a promo code.
So they have both because if you're posting on social media, nobody's really clicking on alink or, you know, they might, but it's less likely having a promo code is usually more
effective.
the other way around for blogging, right?
(30:57):
You want to have a link that they can click.
They may or may not use a promo code.
So I like to give them both so that they can decide what they want to use and what's thebest fit for the audience.
When it comes to Viator, you don't have visibility.
You'll have to ask your influencer partner to provide that if you want to know how manythey've driven for you.
And if they're interested in expanding your partnership, maybe doing a paid collaborationor working with you more, they might be happy to provide that.
(31:22):
Nobody's ever asked me for it, to be honest with you.
But I have a whole dashboard, a suite of reports on the affiliate side of things that I'dbe happy to provide to anybody who wanted it.
It's like the opposite on Fair Harbor.
The affiliate, the blogger, doesn't have any visibility to reporting.
They have to ask you when they want that reporting to know how much that they'redelivering.
(31:42):
it's like the honor system.
They kind of have to rely on you to tell them, hey, you earned this much, and here's yourpayout.
Like I said, 10 years ago, I started partnering with
some tour operators that are here today at Spark.
And I just met them today for the first time, which is great.
We've been like partnered together on using a Fair Harbor affiliate link, like almost 10years.
So.
I love that.
Well, thank you so much for being here today, Leah.
(32:04):
I hope you're getting a lot out of New Orleans.
And as a foodie, I hope you're getting a lot out of New Orleans.
And also as a Spark attendee, I hope you're getting a lot out of the content.
I know people are going to love this episode.
Before we go, I would love if you plugged your business as well as your blog before wesign off here.
Yeah, so Louisville food tours, if you are coming to Louisville, we run walking foodtours.
(32:25):
You can experience the story of Louisville one bite at a time and bourbon.
We do have lots of bourbon.
If you're planning that trip to Louisville, you'll want to go to letgo Louisville.com.
So that's my Louisville website where you can find all of the travel guidance that youneed to plan your trip.
And then if you're planning a trip somewhere else in the world, check outpracticalwanderlust.com and maybe we've written about it.
Maybe we had a disaster there at one point, highly likely.
(32:47):
Amazing.
Thank you all for listening to another episode of Growth Powered by Fair Harbor.
If you liked this episode, make sure to like and follow.
All right, we'll talk to you all next time.
Thanks for listening.
Thanks, Leah.
Thank you.
Welcome to Growth powered by Fair Harbor where we explore the strategies behind thrivingtour and activity businesses.
Whether you're just starting out or scaling up, this podcast is packed with insights tohelp you succeed.
Now here's your host, Fair Harbor's Community Manager, Rebecca Cosley.
(00:27):
All right, well, Leah, thank you so much for joining me for this very special episode ofGrowth Powered by Fair Harbor.
I'm so excited to have you here.
So Leah Garcia, Louisville Food Tours is your business.
Can you tell us a little bit about Louisville Food Tours, how long you've had the company,how did it start, and what your role kind of is there?
(00:50):
Yeah, so my husband and I co-founded Louisville Food Tours about two years ago, actually.
This month is our two-year anniversary.
Thank you.
So we really started it just out of wanting to tell the story of my hometown, Louisville,Kentucky, and a firm belief based on lots of experience with other food tours that that is
the way and most fun way to get to know the city.
(01:11):
Sorry to all the other kinds of tours out there, but we love food tours.
So, you know, we both have a background in storytelling and, you know, acting, education,kind of all these different skill sets that kind of come together to produce a food tour.
So we started running them two years ago.
My husband was the first tour guide that we had.
(01:33):
I handle everything that is not tour guiding or like he writes the scripts, he does thetraining, he does all of the actual like going outside part and I do all the sitting
inside and staring at a screen part.
So yeah, and when we first started, we were running one tour, two tours a week.
I had a six month old baby.
So I very quickly wanted us to.
(01:55):
have other tour guides running those tours.
So as we expanded, by the end of the first year, I think we were running about 35 tours aweek with about 10 tour guides.
And I think now we're about 10 to 15.
And I haven't sat down and counted.
when I did some back of the neck and math, it's like, I don't know, 45 to 50 tours a week,something like that.
Right now, it's high season too.
(02:15):
So it's not like that all the time.
Incredible.
Yeah.
And so why Louisville?
Are you from there, I am from Louisville originally.
I grew up there.
I traveled all over the world.
I lived in the Bay Area for 10 years.
That's where I met my husband.
And just going to all these places all over the world, there's always that one city thatyou fall in love with, that one place that is just sort of your soul place.
(02:35):
And for me, that's Louisville.
I just feel like, you know, the Ohio River water just runs deep in my veins.
So I always knew we wanted to move there and we chose to raise our family there.
my background is in, we'll get to this of course, my background is in blogging, travelblogging.
And we were telling stories about places all around the world and just really wanted tofocus on making a deeper impact on one place.
(02:57):
And for me, it's always been Louisville.
So you already just mentioned the blog, which is kind of the meat of this episode isreally getting into like what influencer and travel blog 101.
And especially for those small business owners who are like, keep hearing my SEO guys keeptelling me to do a blog and I don't really know how to execute that.
So I'm really excited.
(03:18):
for this episode with you.
Can you talk a little bit about your blog?
It's called Practical Wanderlust.
Practical Wanderlust was, yes, that's our big global travel blog.
So we started it about 10 years ago and during a year-long honeymoon that my husband and Itook, which was an absolute disaster but a lot of fun.
And by the end of that year, we kind of built it up into having an audience.
(03:38):
And I thought, well, maybe I can make this into a job.
At the time, blogging wasn't like a job, like that nobody knows how, even still I getquestions like, how do you make money?
and I wasn't sure either, but I kind of just figured it out.
And so we did that.
I did that for the last 10 years and we ended up growing to be one of the largest travelblogs in the world, which is pretty incredible.
(04:00):
know, pandemic definitely scrambled everything, changed everything.
Our priorities shifted.
You know, we spent so much time traveling around the world and then we decided we reallyjust wanted to be settled and plant roots and have a child and you know, all of those
things.
so.
but we shifted the focus.
We still have practical wanderlust, but we shifted the focus to really focusing onLouisville about two years ago.
(04:21):
I also, at that time, right before starting the food tour company, I started a destinationtravel blog called Let's Go Louisville, which is all about discovering Louisville and
Kentucky and the places nearby.
you, this all was something you just crafted.
Was there a specific goal when you made these websites or was it just something that wastruly born out of passion you just wanted to publish?
(04:44):
what you were doing on this year-long honeymoon.
That is, you must love your husband, Year-long.
I said, if we can make it married out of that, you know, spending a year in hostelstogether, I'm gonna be with this man forever.
We can have children.
So, okay.
we were backpacking.
yeah.
This is not a luxury kind of year-long honeymoon.
(05:05):
No, was great, actually.
You bored out of, like, passion?
Yeah.
Or did you make it with, a goal?
I really didn't.
have a goal in mind when I made it.
My goal, guess, was because I knew everybody was gonna be asking me what we were doing andI thought this would be the most efficient way to tell everybody without having to retell
the same story over and over again.
I was like, I'll just, write it.
I love writing.
(05:26):
So I started like a dinky free, it was a blogger site when I first started.
mean, this, you know, it was not, it didn't look good.
And I moved to WordPress eventually and I just didn't realize you could make any money outof it for maybe the first.
six months or so until I really started getting more traffic.
I heard about things like affiliate marketing.
My first partnerships, and they weren't paid.
(05:46):
My first just like collaborations were with like small tour operators, small cookingexperiences and food experiences.
And actually it's been so great today.
I've been meeting with several tour operators who I worked with like 10 years ago when Iwas a baby blogger and they were baby tour operators and we like.
You know, I took their tour and I loved it so much that I wrote about it and I've beensending them traffic ever since and visitors ever since.
(06:09):
So, yeah, I really just was excited and passionate and wanted to tell the stories of thethings that we were doing.
I wanted to write the guides that I didn't find online when I was planning our tripbecause we were going to some places that just weren't.
They were so off the beaten path, I guess, that like there really wasn't necessarilyalways a good reason to go there.
But also like if you do want to go there, here's what to do and where to set, you know.
(06:32):
or just the more helpful guides.
There were a lot of vague guides out there that sort of just said, go here, it's fun, butdidn't tell you how to go there and exactly what steps to take and what to do when you're
there and how to plan your itinerary.
Just the really nitty gritty stuff.
I wanted to do that.
year was when you started this?
2016.
that's, in 2016, there was Instagram, but it was a pretty early version.
(06:56):
Things have kind of changed a lot.
Yeah.
Has the blog?
kind of evolved with that, not change the landscape?
there's like bloggers, then there's influencers.
And I'm such a blogger.
Bloggers, we love to talk.
We love to tell stories.
We love to write.
We love using words like luff, you know, all the time and cobblestone streets.
(07:19):
And then there's influencers, and they like being in front of the video, and they likeshowing things visually.
That's awful.
Yeah, right.
So I like do it because I'm like, I have.
to do it.
I have to get into the room.
I have to be doing video, but I just want to write.
So for me, it's always been focused on blogging, focused on SEO, focused on storytelling.
(07:39):
And I was, you know, I was on Instagram, but I'm a late adopter to like, tick tock and allthis sort of video content.
I think our photos are great.
And I have video content, I have those skills and everything.
But it's not something that I wake up and I'm like, let me just
know, my hair and film a video that's like pulling teeth for me.
Right.
Well, I always say that social media is obviously so helpful.
(08:02):
And I personally am in kind of like the zillennial camp of that.
do use a lot of SEO to find stuff for my vacations personally, but it's a lot ofreinforcement.
So if I'm seeing something that looks like a really good time on Instagram or TikTok.
I am going to Google and I am going to go to that website.
(08:25):
Hopefully it comes up and make sure it's safe to put my credit card number in there.
It all has to do with the booking flow and the travel planning stages of each process.
So I think TikTok and Instagram are so good for awareness.
Learning about a destination, especially a place like Louisville where I'm based that youmight not necessarily realize has a lot of things to do.
(08:47):
This might be the first time you're hearing about it.
And then once you're aware of it, then you go into the planning stages and then you go toGoogle and you're looking for blogs and you're looking for details and where to go and
what to do.
And this is the exact tour I recommend you taking.
This is the exact hotel you should stay in.
And I'm going to do all the work for you.
Not a lot of people are not as many people.
think it's changing when it comes to travel.
(09:07):
think people have their credit cards out ready to buy products on TikTok and Instagram,but are not as ready to book a hotel or a flight or even a tour when they're browsing on
social media.
Blogging is really, to me, still a very important part of the very bottom of that funnelwhen they're ready to buy.
And it's rooted in SEO blogging.
mean, how do you decide what content to include?
(09:29):
I guess I'll ask that question in two different branches.
So how do you know for your business blog versus practical wander list, how does that SEOpractice kind of differ when you're writing this content?
know, honestly, it's very similar.
do keyword research.
So we sort of have an idea.
theory, guess, hypothesis if you want to be sciency about it.
(09:50):
And then we like go and sort of explore like I think that people might be looking forwhere to stay in Louisville, right?
And then I'm gonna go into my keyword research tool.
I use key search and I start typing it in and they're gonna suggest to me well peoplemight not be looking for where to stay in Louisville but they might be looking for hotels
near downtown Louisville.
Maybe that has a higher amount of volume, right?
(10:11):
And the volume is the KPI that I'm looking at.
That's the number of people searching for that per month.
So how likely are you to rank for this keyword?
A keyword that is like things to do in New Orleans is going to be extremely hard to rankfor versus something more niche like best food tours of the garden district in New
Orleans.
The more specific you get, the more likely you are going to be able to rank for that.
(10:32):
So we always base it on a keyword.
There are times that we would just write it because we know that we want to write about itand people don't necessarily know to search for it unless they know it exists.
but we are not going to be expecting that that content will rank well or drive trafficwell.
We're going to send it out via email marketing or via some other kind of form of contentdistribution at that point.
(10:55):
Wow.
That is a lot of thinking, a lot of research.
How do you like content plan, I guess, when you're you're content planning for yourbusiness specifically?
Because obviously you have a passion for food, you have a passion for travel.
And as creatives, I like to consider myself a creative, and as creatives, when things arerooted in passion and we get to write about those things, it comes so naturally.
(11:20):
Whereas I think when people are writing a blog, in my experience, my listeners are like,girl, you say this every episode, but I was on the account management team for a little
while, and I would see blogs all the time, but they were so rooted in formula.
which was good and bad, but it kind of lacked authenticity.
What do you do to keep both relevancy in those keywords you mentioned, but also keeprooted in the food, the passion of the business?
(11:48):
It is a tricky balance.
If you write like a robot, you might please Google, but nobody wants to read it.
They're just going to scroll through.
It's really obvious.
Sorry, chat GPT.
I'm not a fan.
But the SEO and the keywords are all about getting people to click onto you.
on the SERPs, which are the search results, you want to be the one that they click into,but then it's up to you to hold their attention.
(12:11):
So that's where all the personality and the passion needs to come through.
And really, you got to kind of hit them in the face with it right away, right?
Like that first couple of paragraphs, your personality needs to come out.
If it sounds like it was written by ChatGPT and it sounds, know, nobody thinks the ChatGPTreally has any authority necessarily.
I think it's a convenient way of getting information across, but it doesn't.
(12:32):
It just lacks.
or any kind of emotions.
for us, and the reason why our blog grew so quickly and why we did experience so muchsuccess is because our personality shines through in every single article.
We basically are kind of like thing, our overarching theme is that we are disastroustravelers.
Like my husband and I are just everywhere we go, we do everything horribly wrong.
(12:55):
Just we make every mistake in the book and then we tell you exactly how to avoid it.
But we're not just gonna come in and write, here's the perfect
itinerary.
We're going to tell you about all our stupid mistakes.
We're going to tell you the story.
Like if you and I are sitting down over wine and you're like, how was your trip?
I'm going be like, my God, let me tell you about this.
Like we got lost, we missed this train, we, you know, whatever, right?
(13:16):
That's what you really want to hear.
That's what's in intra-training.
That's interesting.
It's informative.
You want to have that personality coming through.
So that has been our driving force.
Putting our personality first, telling a really good story.
It's the same thing that goes into making a really effective
It's all about storytelling.
It's all about that human connection.
And yes, you're conveying information, but you need to do it in a way that delivers areally human story.
(13:40):
There has to be that element of connectivity, or it's just a lot of information.
having that, like getting that keyword and getting an outline where you're deliveringinformation and then finding ways to even like, sometimes I'll go through and I'll write
all the information and then I'll.
go back through and add the personality.
I'll add the jokes, I'll add the stories, and make it really actually interesting and funto read.
(14:02):
that's awesome.
And yeah, I did notice it's just like very clear, like you said, the passion that comesthrough in your blog, which I find really admirable and fun.
And I love that you were able to have all of those experiences.
And I'm glad that you reflect on them so fondly, because when I went on a trip once thatwas just like that, it was just like one thing after another, the worst.
(14:24):
things that could possibly happen.
And you sound like a great travel partner.
just like adapt.
good travel partner.
That's a point.
No, but those are the best stories.
It's always the most fun things that you have are when things just don't go as planned.
And sometimes it's disastrous results and you're cranky and you're tired and you'rehungry, but they're funny to talk about later when you've got some food and some sleep,
(14:48):
you know, and you come home.
And that's what people like to share when they talk about their travels.
They want to tell those stories.
For us, it happens to be disasters.
But for you, maybe it's this, my god, it's this amazing food that I have to tell you aboutthis.
Or I went and saw this beautiful hike.
Whatever it is, people want to hear that passion.
And that's what draws them to you.
Well, let's talk about when we are focused on our business.
(15:12):
So if we're a tour operator trying to start a blog.
Can you break down a little bit of the benefits of having a blog on your business siteversus the effort, how much time or how much time it should take, how much time maybe it
shouldn't take?
my goodness.
It can be a full-time job if you want it to be a full-time job.
Probably nobody listening has room to throw that in.
(15:35):
I will say, when it comes to time, my goal, I set myself a schedule.
I wanted to publish a blog closed.
It started out, it was every single Friday.
when I kind of started thinking about planning my content schedule, I was plugging thingsinto knowing that I have to get out four blog posts this month, right?
And so when I was doing it for the travel blog, it was something like, you know, one ofthose posts is just going to be really personality based, really a story that I just want
(16:01):
to tell just because it's going to foster that relationship with my audience.
One of them is going to make me money, right?
So it's going to be affiliate driven or product driven or a sponsorship of some kind.
One of them is going to be a
cornerstone piece, so something that's going to build out my authority.
So I kind of like categorized it, right?
So maybe, for example, if I was doing it as a food tour operator, maybe it's like one as arecipe, one as a destination guide, one as a restaurant feature, and one as a travel guide
(16:27):
to my destination, right?
So kind of thinking of it in those categories and then coming up with a list of the thingsthat you want to write.
Every single piece doesn't have to be like your magnum opus, which if you go to my blog, Ididn't take my own advice because they're all like 6,000 to 10,000 words.
are so long, but they don't have to be.
They can be 2,000 words or so.
too short and you're not really doing much, but too long and you're doing too much.
(16:48):
doing too much.
People are not really reading every single thing.
So yeah, coming up with all those content pieces, doing a little bit of keyword research.
I wouldn't spend a ton of time doing keyword research.
When you find a keyword that you want to write about, you feel like you're prepared to sitdown and write it.
You can have a conversation about it, right?
And there are enough people looking for it, like maybe at least 100 or 200 searches amonth.
(17:08):
Put it on your list.
Great.
Whatever's easiest for you to bang out.
is the first one that you should do.
I always tell people when they start to blog, the hardest thing is just starting.
The second hardest, and like hitting publish on your very first post.
That's the hardest part of blogging.
The second hardest part is continuing to do it on a consistent basis.
So having that kind of deadline for yourself and seriously, whatever is easiest to write,just get that one out.
(17:32):
The more you practice, the better it gets.
For those of us who are very busy and maybe don't want to do it themselves, I have aneditor.
So at this point,
You know, I've been blogging for years and he's actually been working with me for years aswell.
So he manages the blog side of things.
He manages our content calendar.
And you asked about content planning.
For us, we're thinking about six months out because that's about how long it's going totake Google to rank it and for it to start to get some traction so that when you're
(17:58):
looking for something that may have some seasonality, it'll be in the SERP about sixmonths later.
So if someone is thinking, OK, I'm going to start a blog and they're following your adviceon like, OK, I have the time.
to do this at this cadence.
I'm going to start planning content.
What is there like bones to a good post?
(18:18):
Is there, how does that work?
know you, we hit keywords really hard and researching keywords.
Is there anything beyond that?
Using those keywords.
You gotta use them or you're never gonna rank for them.
So I like to use them in my headers, right?
So you get your top header, your H1 header and to use the technical kind of formattingverbiage.
(18:40):
That's your title, right?
So you want to have your primary keyword that you're targeting in that title.
And then your outline is going to be things that sort of relate to that.
So I'll give you an example.
If I'm writing a blog post to where to stay in Louisville, Kentucky, my main keyword iswhere to stay in Louisville.
That's going to be in my title of my blog post.
Then I'm going to go through my headers are going to be things like where to stay in yourdowntown, best hotels for families, best hotels with a pool near downtown, right?
(19:06):
Like, and those are also keywords.
And I could write a whole blog post just for that if I really wanted to and if there wasenough content.
But a lot of the time, that also just has to do with my main keyword, and it's reallyrelated.
And you'll capture some of the people searching for that as well.
So that, I kind of create my outline based off of my keyword research as well.
The tool that I use, KeySearch, it has like a suggested, like questions people are alsoasking.
(19:29):
But you can also just Google it, and Google also tells you all these questions.
And those are based off of what people are Googling as well.
So kind of including that and making sure you're hitting all the answers that are relatedto the blog post that you're writing, that really becomes your outline.
So it ends up just being like a couple of paragraphs of introduction, which again, chatGPT is perfectly fine for it, but get that personality in as soon as you can to hook
(19:56):
people in.
So they're like, okay, I'm actually gonna read this.
I'm not just gonna scroll and look for the answers.
and then all your headers and all your different sections.
And then just a little conclusion where I kind of am like, hey, can also go book my touror follow me on social or subscribe to my email newsletter, that kind of thing.
Amazing.
Thank you.
That's so helpful.
OK, so we've talked about creation.
(20:16):
We've talked about passion.
Now we know kind of the bones of where to start in having an effective blog.
Now what if I want to be featured on one?
So whether, I know you said you're more of a blogger versus like an influencer, but Ithink
you have a lot of experience in both work.
I do both.
I don't like it.
I don't like the social media, but yes, I do.
(20:37):
Yeah.
So if I'm an operator and I want to be featured on someone's blog or featured on someone'sInstagram grid, what should I do?
What does that etiquette look like?
And how do I even choose an influencer?
So I will say, first of all, it's so much easier to be featured rather than create ityourself.
First thing I would do, whether you're deciding whether you're going to write a blog oryou're not sure yet,
(20:59):
is go and Google the keywords that you'd like to rank for and see if somebody else alreadywrote that post or maybe a few bloggers already wrote that post.
And if they wrote that post, A, you're unlikely to outrank them and B, it's going to belot easier for you to just get listed, right?
You just have to ask.
When you're reaching out, let's say that you Google your keyword, best food tours in NewOrleans, right?
(21:20):
And you find an amazing blog that you really want to rank for and then email and say, hey,like I have this food tour.
I think it would be a great addition to your site.
and then give them a reason for adding it, give them kind of a motivation.
So if they're a local blogger, offer to bring them on the tour, you know, but also offerto give them an affiliate link that's going to pay them every single time somebody books
(21:42):
it.
There are a few ways to do that, right?
So you can use FareHarbor's built-in affiliate tool if you're familiar with it.
You basically fill out a form and they send you a link, but you do then have to likemanually pay them out.
Or if you're using Byattour,
You can actually use Viator links because Viator has a fantastic affiliate program thatthey've created.
And actually I helped them design that.
(22:04):
was on the Viator affiliate advisory board.
They do a great job.
Honestly, that's what a lot of your commission is going towards is paying influencers andbloggers.
So you can say, know, if you're on the Viator affiliate program, here's my Viator link.
You don't have to worry about it.
Viator will pay them out.
There are some bloggers.
If it's a large blog, like my blog, Practical Wanderlust.
(22:24):
They may also ask for like an implementation fee, which is basically just like a hundredbucks or 200 bucks to cover their time or their team's time to go in and add that.
Sometimes there are things that they're doing that you don't even necessarily see, right?
Sometimes they're, yes, they're writing, they're adding you to their list.
They're taking your text, they're taking your copy, they're rewriting it to make itfamiliar to your audience.
(22:45):
They're taking a picture that you, that you may already use.
They might also have like newsletter sequences that include
that are driving people to that page or like I have a list of on my newsletter on my emailnewsletter I have 50,000 subscribers and I know which of them are planning visits at what
time to which destinations that I've written about.
(23:06):
So I can actually go in and say to this section of my email list that's currently planninga trip to New Orleans I'm gonna add you into my email about food tours in New Orleans
because I know that you're ready to book right now because you're it's about a month outfrom your trip right?
So and that's all part of my, like I've already done that work, right?
So when you go to a blogger that's already done that, you're taking the shortcuts.
So that's what that fee covers, right?
(23:26):
Is access to all of those kinds of things behind the scenes.
Lots of small bloggers are kind of just happy to get, you know, five to 12 % commission.
And some people might ask for a fee.
And so I would be prepared to offer that and be open to that in the conversation.
It's hard for bloggers to ask for money.
It's just an awkward conversation.
So sometimes I like to leave it really open and let.
(23:47):
Let that be a natural next step.
So I'll say something like, you know, I'd really like to be featured on your website.
I think it would be a great fit from your visitors.
Can you let me know what the next steps are for, for doing that?
Right.
So that they can then come back with a media kit or a rate sheet or tell me exactly what,what that would be like when it comes to working with influencers, you know, Google is
easy because you can just go and like search for the keywords you want to be ranking for.
(24:08):
When it to influencers, you have to do a little bit of scrolling, you to do a little work.
have to like go look at your location and find who are the local influencers.
that are consistently kind of featuring your destination because when it comes toinfluencers, if they've already visited the place, they're gone, right?
They may or may not be coming back unless they live nearby.
And so getting them to actually feature you, they don't have the content for that.
(24:30):
You may not be able to provide the content.
likes to use somebody else's content.
If they're gone, they're gone, right?
So if they've already gone there and written about it on a blog post, fair game, ask themto add you, right?
When it comes to social, I would target local influencers.
Find the destination specific influencers that are either in your region, in your city,driving distance to your city.
(24:52):
They're all targeting your target audience and you're going to get a lot more localslooking as well, but also people who are planning trips to your destination, they're
looking at those locals.
And is that through like a location tag on Instagram?
That helps.
Local hashtags.
would go to your, honestly, go to your like DMO, like your visitor center, right?
What hashtags are they using?
Oftentimes there's like a hashtag that the visitor center has created.
(25:15):
So ours is like hashtag blue the love.
So who's using that, right?
And once you start searching for it, the algorithms are real smart and they'll startdelivering that content to you.
So your feed will be full of local content about your destination, cause they know.
And they're also, they're looking at your geographic location in your phone too.
And they're connecting you with people nearby.
But so sort of like find a like group of influencers that are posting about your location.
(25:40):
whatever size they are, you know, it's sometimes very surprising.
A small following doesn't necessarily mean low reach.
Yeah, especially on TikTok.
TikTok.
TikTok.
I just aged myself.
But anyway, you can get a viral video regardless of size.
don't necessarily be too worried about that.
I always look for like, you know, 5,000 followers or up.
(26:03):
It's a very low, low bar there.
So when you start getting to the bigger influencers, you know, 100, 200,000 and up,
they may not necessarily have the best engagement.
So when I say engagement, that's anything that somebody does to engage with their content.
So that's likes, follows, shares, saves.
And if you go and look at their reels on Instagram, or you go and look at the views onTikTok, and comments, it'll show you how many people are actually engaging with it versus
(26:29):
just like looking at it and scrolling by.
So you wanna see a healthy leveling of engagement.
And I would take a look at some of those comments and make sure that they're in yourtarget market.
There is an example, I was speaking at the Viator conference about content creation lastweek and somebody raised their hand and they said, you know, I tried to work with this big
influencer.
She's like a supermodel.
She has all these hundred thousands of followers.
And then it turns out all of her followers are just like teenage boys.
(26:52):
So that's not your target audience, right?
Make sure that your target audience is reflected in those comments.
If they're tagging their friends, if they have a picture of their dog and it's a privateprofile, those are real people.
Those are not like bots, right?
So do a little checking just to make sure.
So I kind of have like a running list of influencers in my target market that I like towork with or that I want to reach out to.
(27:15):
And I just send them a message and I say, hey, you know, I'm Louisville Food Tours.
We run walking food tours in Louisville, Kentucky.
We'd love to have you come experience a tour.
Can you let me know what would be the next steps or are you interested in partnering withus?
A lot of them are just super down to it for free because it's fun.
And a lot of influencers are not in it for the money and are not making any money.
So they're happy to just come and do it.
And I let that conversation be very kind of relaxed and natural.
(27:39):
I don't offer them money before they ask for it, but I also like leave that door open forthem.
I don't want to make it super weird for them.
Baker influencers will usually say like, okay, here's my media kit.
And that'll usually have a breakdown of the information about their audience that I'mlooking for.
Demographics, age, some KPIs when it comes to engagement and their rates, right?
(28:00):
So then I can decide what I really want out of this partnership.
Is it just a single
real on Instagram or do I also want it on TikTok?
Do I want some stories?
Do I want those stories to have a link that they can click through?
And when you're paying influencers, you get to have a say in those kinds of things.
And as you get to ask for deliverables, you can actually set deadlines and you can evennegotiate things like licensing their content.
(28:25):
So that means that that beautiful video that they created, you can ask for them to liketag you as a collaborator and you can also then
download that video or ask them to send it to you and use it in paid ads later.
And that's incredibly valuable and well worth the fee.
You're gonna be paying a videographer or photographer a lot more than you're gonna bepaying that influencer.
So I like to pay influencers so that I can get that content and use it for other purposes.
(28:50):
It's a great way to get images and videos to use.
But when you're doing a free or comped partnership where you're just providing a tour, youdon't get to have a say.
You don't get to ask for deliverables.
You don't get to tell them, I'd like it to be like this.
I'd like it to be at this time.
It's called earned media at that point.
It's essentially the same as working with a journalist.
(29:10):
You're just inviting them to come along and crossing your fingers in the hopes that youmight get something out of it.
So it's important to have those expectations so that you can kind of know, you know, ifwe're, if we're paying, there's a contract in place, there's a scope of work that you'll
want to provide and have them assign.
It's going to be very meticulous and detailed.
It's a business transaction.
If you're just asking them to come along.
(29:31):
it's a journalist, it's a PR, it's earned media, you get no say and you're just gonna bethrilled with whatever happens.
And if you do wanna use those pictures or video, you're gonna need to get explicit writteninstruction for them.
Otherwise you're in copyright law violation.
wow.
Yeah.
I didn't even think about that.
So let's talk about, before I send you off to enjoy the rest of the content of theconference, again, thank you for your time here.
(29:54):
Let's talk about tracking.
I would be remiss if I didn't ask about tracking.
So.
You mentioned you use Viator.
You've dabbled in using the affiliate links with Fair Harbor as well.
I'm sure you've dabbled in like code, so using like a coupon code or campaign code as wecall them at Fair Harbor.
What do you find is the most effective way to measure that?
Is it GA4?
(30:15):
Is it using a code or is it using those links and just looking at your reporting in thedashboard?
What does that look like for you?
I will say when it's in Fair Harbor, you have a lot more visibility over the data.
So when I set up affiliates in Fair Harbor and I kind of created a whole like, like mentalsort of, not mental, I created a PDF like program to welcome all the influencers that I
(30:37):
invite to give them all their information, give them their codes and give them some tips.
And I give everybody not just the affiliate links, but I also give them a promo code.
So they have both because if you're posting on social media, nobody's really clicking on alink or, you know, they might, but it's less likely having a promo code is usually more
effective.
the other way around for blogging, right?
(30:57):
You want to have a link that they can click.
They may or may not use a promo code.
So I like to give them both so that they can decide what they want to use and what's thebest fit for the audience.
When it comes to Viator, you don't have visibility.
You'll have to ask your influencer partner to provide that if you want to know how manythey've driven for you.
And if they're interested in expanding your partnership, maybe doing a paid collaborationor working with you more, they might be happy to provide that.
(31:22):
Nobody's ever asked me for it, to be honest with you.
But I have a whole dashboard, a suite of reports on the affiliate side of things that I'dbe happy to provide to anybody who wanted it.
It's like the opposite on Fair Harbor.
The affiliate, the blogger, doesn't have any visibility to reporting.
They have to ask you when they want that reporting to know how much that they'redelivering.
(31:42):
it's like the honor system.
They kind of have to rely on you to tell them, hey, you earned this much, and here's yourpayout.
Like I said, 10 years ago, I started partnering with
some tour operators that are here today at Spark.
And I just met them today for the first time, which is great.
We've been like partnered together on using a Fair Harbor affiliate link, like almost 10years.
So.
I love that.
Well, thank you so much for being here today, Leah.
(32:04):
I hope you're getting a lot out of New Orleans.
And as a foodie, I hope you're getting a lot out of New Orleans.
And also as a Spark attendee, I hope you're getting a lot out of the content.
I know people are going to love this episode.
Before we go, I would love if you plugged your business as well as your blog before wesign off here.
Yeah, so Louisville food tours, if you are coming to Louisville, we run walking foodtours.
(32:25):
You can experience the story of Louisville one bite at a time and bourbon.
We do have lots of bourbon.
If you're planning that trip to Louisville, you'll want to go to letgo Louisville.com.
So that's my Louisville website where you can find all of the travel guidance that youneed to plan your trip.
And then if you're planning a trip somewhere else in the world, check outpracticalwanderlust.com and maybe we've written about it.
Maybe we had a disaster there at one point, highly likely.
(32:47):
Amazing.
Thank you all for listening to another episode of Growth Powered by Fair Harbor.
If you liked this episode, make sure to like and follow.
All right, we'll talk to you all next time.
Thanks for listening.
Thanks, Leah.
Thank you.
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