Month: June 2023

Posted on by — Leave a comment

The Benefits of Using an Independent Travel Agent

Guest blog from Independent Travel Agent Lynne Page

Why should you use a travel agent when you can book everything so easily yourself online?

I can tell you several reasons why!

An Independent Travel Agent can help you find your ideal holiday

Using an Independent Travel Agent is a valuable resource and can save you so much time, and we all know how precious our time is.

We are experts in our field, can give you personal recommendations due to being well-travelled, and can help you with unexpected situations should they arise.

When you are looking for a holiday, it can be overwhelming as there are so many choices out there, and you may not know where to start. If you like to travel but spend all day at a computer, the last thing you are going to want to do is spend hours trawling the internet trying to find the best deal. The thing I hear the most from my clients is, “ I hate looking for holidays! “

This is where I come in. I can do all the research for you and find hotels and attractions that suit your budget and taste. I can find deals from my many suppliers that are only available to people in the travel industry. I am ABTA and ATOL protected, and you can check my reviews on Google, Facebook and LinkedIn.

My service is personal and flexible

I am a home-based travel agent, and I like to be accessible and personable. I like to build a relationship with my clients. You choose how you would like to communicate with me, whether by email, phone, WhatsApp or meeting locally for a coffee and a chat.

I don’t charge a fee; I earn commission directly from our travel partners upon booking. For example, if I booked your holiday through Jet2 or EasyJet, they would pay me a commission. You would have paid exactly the same as if you had booked it yourself online, but you have me for support. And you are supporting a small business.

I look after my clients before, during and after the trip. I can check-in for you and print your boarding passes, or you can do this yourself if you prefer. I can recommend places to visit or maybe avoid. If there are any changes to your flights or itinerary, I will be able to support you with this.

Whether it’s a family holiday to Greece or a solo tour of India, I will be able to help.

How you can get started

Before contacting your travel agent, it would be a good idea to have some information ready to give them. An idea of where you would like to go, a maximum flight time, and the airports you are willing to travel from? How many nights would you like to stay, and on what board basis? Do you want to be near a beach and local amenities, or are you happy sitting by the pool with a book and a cocktail? Are you willing to pay extra for a sea view and/or a private transfer? What is the minimum star rating you want your hotel to be? The most crucial piece of information is your budget. This is key as everyone’s idea of a ‘bargain’ is different, and it needs to be realistic to avoid disappointment.

So the next time you are thinking about booking your holiday, please consider using an Independent Travel Agent.

Lynne Page - independent travel agent

Find out more:

https://www.lynnepagetravel.co.uk

https://www.facebook.com/LynnePTravel

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lynnepagetravel

email: lynne@theholidayvillage.co.uk

Posted on by — Leave a comment

How you can reuse old marketing content

Reuse old marketing content

Batch-creating content is one of the easiest ways of creating consistent marketing content when you’re busy, but it’s not the only way. If you’ve been marketing your business for a while, you might think you’ve covered every possible subject. You could be right, but there’s always a new way to address the same topic. Here’s how to reuse old marketing content and give it a fresh spin.

Choose the right content

Sometimes, you write a blog post or share something on social media, and it strikes a chord, while other things fall flat—understanding which is which can help you decide which posts to use again. When you reuse old content, make sure it’s something that worked well the first time around. Alternatively, choose an evergreen topic that won’t date.

Look at your social media statistics or Google Analytics to work out what went well.

Share something again

Reusing content can sometimes be as simple as sharing it again. If a topic is still relevant and the advice you’d give hasn’t changed, there’s no harm in reposting it. Newer followers won’t have seen it, and it can be a helpful reminder of key principles for people who’ve been with you for a while.

Think carefully about timing so your content doesn’t get repetitive. I’d recommend waiting at least six months, possibly longer, before sharing something again.

Update an old blog post

You might have a post where the subject is still relevant, but some of the information you want to share has been updated. You can reuse old content by tweaking it instead of writing a new post.

For example, a post on financial planning might have the same core advice, but you need to update it to reflect that some of the tax rules have changed.

Reuse the idea

Reviewing your old content can reveal old posts where the topic is still relevant but where you’d give completely different advice. For example, there may have been a change in the law, new research or advances in your industry, or you’ve got more experience to share.

You’ll need to write a new post, so it isn’t a quick fix when you’re short on time. However, it’s great for SEO, showing Google that your content is still relevant.

Go in-depth on a subheading

This is an easy way to come up with a new topic, but you’ll still have to find time to write a new blog post. If you’ve written a general overview of a subject, pick one of the subheadings and write a more in-depth piece.

For example, if you’ve written a post about healthy eating, you might have a paragraph on eating your five a day. That could turn into a post about the health benefits or tips on ways to eat more vegetables.

Change the format

I’ve talked about ways to make your content go further before, and there are loads of ways to do it. You can reuse old content by changing the format. That could mean breaking down a blog post, sharing the same content in a video or turning a series of blog posts into an eBook.

You can also share old content on a new platform that you want to try out.

Do you want to stop creating your own marketing content? I can help create posts that make your content go further. If you’d like a chat to find out how it works, you can book a call here.

You can also sign up to receive monthly emails packed with helpful content writing and marketing tips using the form below.

Posted on by — Leave a comment

How you can batch-create content

Actual footage of me batch creating content
Image by Julie Grant Photography

“Why should I batch-create content?” I hear you cry. The simple answer is that it’ll save you a whole load of time. That’s a massive win when your business is busy, or you want to take some time off.

So, here’s how you can batch-create content for your business, along with a few other reasons why it’s a great idea.

Pick a theme

Picking a theme for each month’s marketing means that all your content can refer back to the same thing. You don’t have to wrack your brains coming up with new stuff for every post, so it saves you time. It also helps your audience understand what you do because they see you mention the same thing each time.

Choose a theme that relates to a particular service or your customer’s needs, for example, helping them get ready for the summer holidays.

Create a plan

After you’ve chosen your theme for the month, start planning how you’ll cover it. For example, I have a few themed posts that I do every month, such as quick tips, buzzwords and testimonials, and I supplement them with other ideas based on my theme.

I plan how many posts I need throughout the month and jot down ideas next to dates in my planner. Doing it this way helps me to see what I’m going to post and when, so I don’t panic and share something random because I haven’t posted in a while.

Write one (or two) blog posts

When I batch-create content, I always start with blog posts. They’re big pieces of content that cover a few different points. Depending on the length of each post, they can help your audience to understand a subject in depth or give them a quick overview. They can talk people through a detailed process or link to other useful resources.

Planning your blog posts will give you a good idea of what your audience needs to know. Then, you can reuse them in different ways, including breaking them down into individual social media posts. This brings me to my next point…

Squeeze all the juice out of your content

No one will see everything when you use social media for your marketing. This means you can share the same point, or a variation, more than once. I wish I’d come up with the phrase ‘squeeze the juice out of your content’, but I didn’t. It was Clare Mitchell of The Girls Mean Business.

Anyway, it illustrates the point perfectly. When you write a piece of content, write several posts that share the same thing in different ways. Edit each paragraph or your blog post so it works on its own. Cut and paste a tip onto a graphic or use it as a video script.

Schedule your posts

Finally, when you’ve created your content, schedule it so it goes out without you needing to get involved. You can spend an hour scheduling everything for the coming month and then relax knowing it’s all sorted.

If you use Facebook and Instagram, you can schedule posts, Reels, and Stories using Meta Business Suite and LinkedIn have introduced native scheduling too. Of course, you can also use a third-party scheduler if you prefer.

Do you want to stop creating your own marketing content? I can help with that and even help you batch-create your posts. If you’d like a chat to find out how it works, you can book a call here.

You can also sign up to receive monthly emails packed with useful content writing and marketing tips using the form below.