S7 E78: Getting Your Travel Stories Published

Get the show’s transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[00:00:00] YD: Welcome to the Travel Media Lab Podcast. I’m your host, Yulia Denisyuk, an award-winning travel photographer and writer, entrepreneur, community builder, and a firm believer that every one of us can go after the stories we’ve always wanted to tell with the right support, encouragement, and structure. I’m on a mission to help women storytellers everywhere break into and thrive in the travel media space.

If you’re ready to ditch your fears to the side, grow your knowledge and confidence, and publish your travel stories, you’re in the right place. Let’s go!

[EPISODE]

[00:00:37] YD: Are you curious about what Intro to Travel Journalism Program is all about? Are you wondering if it could be the thing that kick-starts your travel media career next year and helps you work with magazines and tourism boards, publish your own stories, and see your name on the pages of your favorite publications? If so, keep listening because today, we have a sneak peek inside our program with our Intro to Travel Journalism information session that I ran last week. I created this information session called Get Your Travel Stories Published so that anyone interested in the program can really understand all the parts in the program that works together to help you get started in the industry. 

Here's some really awesome news. Enrollment for this program is now open, so come check us out at travelmedialab.com/class. During the six-month program, students will also have access to our amazing support inside our Circle membership. For the people who will be joining our program this fall, they will get to experience the best of both, a foundation of travel journalism knowledge that I give in the program, plus the ongoing support inside our membership for them to actually apply all of it and most importantly, stick to it. If getting your travel stories published is something you dream about, definitely listen to this episode, and then come visit travelmedialab.com/class to join us.

Welcome everyone to our info session. Looking inside our Intro to Travel Journalism Program. I'm going to share with you what this program is all about, how it can help you achieve your own goals, what we do inside, how we go about helping our members get their stories published, and really get a footing in the travel journalism industry. I'll share with you some of the stories, some of the success stories from our members. Then at the end, we'll have time to answer your questions. My guess is that you are here today, you are interested in coming and learning more about what we do with the Intro to Travel Journalism Program because you have this dream, or this goal of becoming a travel photographer writer working with magazines, working with tourism boards, but it feels like a dream that's kind of hard to achieve. Or maybe you don't really know where to begin with trying to get your work published, and I definitely resonate with that. Because when I started in the industry six years ago, I had no idea actually how to start. There wasn't as many resources back then than they are now. The industry was very close very much a good old boy kind of club. If you already knew somebody in, if you knew some of the editors, then you could get in. But if you didn't know anybody, it was really hard to break into this industry, so I totally resonate with this.

Then, you also feel like you have so many stories that you want to tell. You obviously love travel, right? Everybody who comes to my sessions, that's sort of the unifying thread that we all love travel, we're all passionate about travel, and we're also passionate about telling stories. You have stories, you have ideas, but the thought of reaching out to editors, and reaching out to some of those publications, that feels intimidating and scary. Or maybe you wish that there was some sort of a roadmap that you can follow step by step with instructions on how to get started in the industry and how to do this work. Maybe you're here because you want to understand how the travel media industry works, maybe you want to get better at pitching, and maybe you want to become more proactive with your work. Because what I always say to anyone who will listen is that really, the key to anything in life, the key to achieving anything in life is that you actually have to go out and put yourself out there, you have to put your ideas out there, you have to present your ideas, you have to share your ideas.

[00:05:00] Which in this industry, in the context of this industry means, that you have pitch. You have to pitch your ideas to publications. There is just no way around it, especially in the beginning when you're first starting out, when you haven't established yet a portfolio or a network, you have to be out there. That can be scary. It stops a lot of people from actually doing it, because people are afraid, they're afraid they're going to get rejected, they're not sure if their ideas are good enough or not, so, they don't even try. That actually stops a lot of people from ever getting anywhere with their ideas and with their aspirations. I know that there is a better way and there is a way to do this. I know this because I've been fortunate that since the beginning of the pandemic, actually, I started teaching travel journalism to students.

For the past two years now, I've helped over 50 students get their footing in the industry, and get their stories published. These are just some of the places where we've been published, where our students been published. I'm very proud of them. It's interesting, I always feel like I'm this proud mom, even though these are my students, they're not my children, but I feel like that. Every time we have a win in our community, we celebrate it because that's just such a huge accomplishment. Yeah, I'm very, very proud of all the work that our students and our members are doing, and the progress that they're making from starting from zero, basically, starting from scratch, not knowing anything in the industry to now establishing themselves as these creators in the industry. That's super exciting. 

Just a little bit about me. In case you don't know me, my name is Yulia. I am a travel journalist, travel photographer, travel writer. Like I was mentioning in the beginning, before we started recording. This fall was an absolutely crazy whirlwind fall for me because I went on a seven countries, seven-week trip/ Six of those seven countries were on assignments. I sort of stacked them back-to-back. It was absolutely worldwide, and I was very grateful for that, but also very exhausted. Now, I'm back in Chicago and just recovering a little bit from all the travel. I also found that Travel Media Lab, like I mentioned, at the beginning of the pandemic, I started teaching, I started creating resources for people who wanted to enter the industry. You can find me on Instagram, @insearchofperfect, that's my personal account, and @travelmedialab, that's our platform account.

If anything today resonates with you, if you get any sort of insights or aha moments, please share them with me on Instagram. I'm always very grateful for feedback on anything that I'm doing. I've also been published in various publications now. This year, a career highlight for me has been getting published in the New York Times' T Magazine with some of their travel stories. That's been really cool. Yes, here's what actually – no one in this industry or in any other industries where you're trying to sort of go after a creative dream, or creative aspiration that you have, here's what no one teaches you. This framework is something that I've developed over the past six years. Again, it started with the fact that when I entered, when I was trying to enter the industry, I didn't know how to do it. I didn't have a mentor. I didn't have a guide. I didn't have anyone who would tell me, "Well, Yulia. This is how you should do it." For me, this was really a lot of trial and error. It was several years that I spent just really pursuing all kinds of different opportunities, or knocking on doors, or cold emailing people, and just really not getting anywhere. Until I really sat down and thought about okay, what is it that I actually want to do, who do I want to be in this in this career path, what kind of travel photographer and writer I want to be, what kind of stories do I want to tell, what kind of magazines do I want to work with, what regions of the world do I want to work in.

I really had to sit down and get myself a really clear idea of what is it that I'm actually trying to accomplish. I see this a lot with our students too, that everybody says, "I want to do what you do, Yulia. I want to travel. I want to tell stories." But when you dig deeper into that people actually haven't spent that much time thinking about, "Well, what does that actually mean?" What does that actually mean for you? What kind of work do you want to do. That's so, so important because that's the foundation from which you're going to build everything else.

[00:10:14] Then the second part to this framework is that you have to build your confidence. A lot of us, unfortunately, particularly women, because a lot of the work we do in a Travel Media Lab community is focused and centered on women because we have lots of words and lots of thoughts that are actually not helping us. We don't think we're good enough. We don't think we have what it takes. We think we're too old for this or that our time has passed. There are just so many internal fears and internal doubts that are stopping us from taking that action, and from putting ourselves out there, and from reaching out to that editor, and from having the confidence that we have stories that these magazines want. That's a huge part of this work, that you have to build your confidence. Because this industry, in this industry, you need thick skin, because you're going to get rejected, for sure. You're going to get rejected, you're going to hear silences from editors too. It's just the kind of nature of this industry. We go in-depth into that, in our program as well. But you need thick skin, and you need to realize that that rejection that you're getting, it has absolutely no – it's not a judgment on you, it's not a judgment on the value of your ideas. It's just the nature of the industry.

Again, we go in-depth into what that means in the program, but it's really important that you have that confidence. As you're getting those rejections or as you're even not hearing at all, from people that you're reaching out to that you keep going, and you keep emailing other publications, and you keep emailing these publication's new ideas of this idea that didn't work, that consistency, and that inner belief that you've got what it takes, it's really important in this industry. We spend a lot of time in building that confidence. Because again, a lot of the women that I meet, not just in the program, but overall, in the community, and on social media have that sort of. We struggle with our confidence, and that social, right? It's has nothing to do with us, and who we are. It's a social construct that a lot of us are indoctrinated into, unfortunately.

Then the third piece of this is taking action. I already spoke about this, so I'm not going to say too much here. But really, it's important because oftentimes, we feel like, "Well, I'm just going to put my reels on Instagram, or I'm going to put my photos up on Instagram, and surely, somebody will notice me. Surely, Condé Nast Traveler will notice me, and they will notice that I went, and had this amazing trip, and they will want to work with me." A lot of times, that's really what we think. We've had these conversations inside our community, and people do really hold these ideas for years. They try, and they put – or they put it up on their blog, on their Instagram, or TikTok, and they think, "Okay. Somebody is surely going to reach out to me." Well, they might, and it does happen that your story, your blog post gets noticed by somebody searching for something specific. I'm not saying it doesn't happen. What I'm saying is, if you only rely on that, you might be waiting for a long time for somebody to discover you.

Acting and actually proactively putting yourself in situations where you put your ideas in front of these people, that's a really important piece of this overall puzzle. Again, we start with our foundation, what is it that we want to do with our career in this industry, how do we build up the confidence to keep going even when we're getting those rejections and we're getting those silences, and then we're acting, and we're continuing to act proactively. Really, that's the secret, guys. That's the secret not just in this career. In many careers where there isn't a clear-cut path, I often have this example of – if you want to become a partner at a law firm, you really know what to do. You need to pass the LSAT, you need to go to law school, you need to study really hard, and lose sleep for years. Then you need to become an associate in a good law firm. Basically, there are steps right through your career path.

Well, in a lot of creative career paths, there aren't those steps, right? What is the clear-cut way? Even again, the question then becomes, what are you trying to do? Are you trying finally become an editor-in-chief of Condé Nast Traveler? Are you trying to become a world-renowned New York Times-published author? Are you trying to work with tourism boards and maybe go into consulting even? Which is an interesting conversation. There is just so many paths to take, and it all has to start with, what are you trying to do? What is your goal? Then, all those pieces are going to fall into place.

[00:15:29] I want to share with you just a few really short stories of a couple of people who went through our program and who've been just so, so amazing to work with, and who are very dear friends of mine now. One of them is Hannah Foster-Roe. She came to us also at the beginning of the pandemic. She was working in theater in London before that. She just really felt like becoming a travel writer, which was a dream of hers, was actually a pipe dream. She didn't really think that she could do it, but we helped her do it. Now, she says that it isn't just a pipe dream. It's entirely achievable and within distance. Hannah is just so amazing. She went on to work with multiple publications like adventurer.com, Time Magazine, The Independence, and others. She's now working with tourism boards. I think she just came back from a trip to Latvia, that she went on assignment for National Geographic, and we're very proud of Hannah.

She really worked hard on boosting up that confidence that I was talking about, because she had ideas, she had good ideas. But she was afraid that she – because she didn't go to journalism school, let's say, or she's never been published before. So she had these ideas of, "Well, who is going to take me seriously or who is going to take my ideas?" Well, lots of people, lots of editors like her ideas. It's really wonderful. 

Then, Ashley is another student of ours who was waiting to finish a perfect piece of writing before she could ever pitch anybody. Her challenge was that she was a bit of a perfectionist. She was like, "Well, it's still not good enough. It's still not good enough. It's still not good enough." That again, stopped her from taking action and from actually start pitching her ideas that might not have been perfect, but they were ready to be shared with publications, and with people. Now, she definitely feels differently about this career. She says this program has made the impossible feel possible. We gave her a toolbox to launch this career, and she's worked with Condé Nast Traveler, and Huffington Post, and other publications as well after that.

Then Vanessa, who is a photographer. By the way, we work with both aspiring photographers and writers. We do that because I myself, both a photographer and writer. I don't necessarily want to put people in boxes. I prefer to think of people as storytellers first and foremost. Then whatever the medium is, that's kind of secondary to me. That's why we work with both people who want to do photography and writing. We even are starting to think about video, of course, which I know we're behind the curve, because video is so important now. But just to note that you don't have to necessarily think that, "Okay, this is just for photographers. This is just for writers." No, it's for anybody who wants to work in this industry, really. That's the key. If you're interested in the travel media industry, if you're interested in working with travel magazines, travel tourism boards, then that's the space for you.

Vanessa was a photographer, and she was one of the people that we have who was waiting to be discovered. She had that thing where, "Okay, I'm putting my photographs on Instagram. Somebody is surely going to notice that." Our program helped her stop waiting and start doing things with some great results. She's saying that we teach her how to unlock that door and kick it open because of all the tools that we share. She's been working with the Toronto Star, which is a Canadian newspaper, TripSavvy, and other publications as well. 

Just a little preview of what we're going to cover today. We're going to look at who this program is for, how it works, and then we also have a special bonus for you, and we'll answer some of your questions. Again, keep your questions till the end. You can drop them in the chat as we go along. But then, I will check the chat at the end and we can have a conversation. Our program is perfect for again, as I mentioned, not only writers, not only photographers, both, storytellers who are at any stage of their journey who want to start working in the travel media industry. In the program, we'll help you get the foundation of the industry. How does the industry work? How do you work with tourism boards? How do you work with publications? What is a pitch look like? What are angles? Lots of different conversations.

[00:20:28] Then we help you actually write, and complete a pitch, and then send it out to publication. We don't stop there, right? Because if you only send one pitch, and that's it, and let's say that pitch doesn't get accepted, or let's say you never hear from the publication because the editor was busy, their inbox was overflowing, or whatever else, they were on vacation, and then the email got buried. There are so many reasons why you never hear back from some of these. If you just send that one pitch, and that's it, you're going to have 100% failure rate. Because in this industry, like in many creative industries, you have to do it 10 times, 20 times, 50 times, whatever it takes, until you get that first byline, until you get that fifth byline, that tenth byline.

Byline, by the way, is the industry term for authorship. When you write an article, the byline is the one that says "By Yulia Denisyuk." That's your byline. You have to keep doing it. That's where - it's really important that you not only get the foundation, the knowledge that I'm sharing in the program, but that you also get the support of our group, which I'm going to talk about in a minute to tell you, "Hey, don't stop here. Keep going, keep pitching, keep reaching out, because once is not enough." That's the other common mistake that I see people do, right? They try something once, or let's say they try something twice, or let's say they try something five times and then doesn't work, they don't see the result that they want, and they give up. And they say, "Okay, that's it. It's not for me."

Well, again, in this industry, that five times is not enough. You need to keep going until you get a result. Because that, I actually believe I have a very strong conviction that that's almost like a law of physics. If you're going to keep working at something, eventually, it's going to produce results. Because you're also learning along the way, you're becoming better, you're sharpening your ideas. As you do all that, eventually, if you don't give up, eventually, you're going to get results. It's just as simple as that. It's just a matter of to keep going and to not give up. That's where actually, that's where we come in and that's the support that we provide for you, to not give up and keep going.

We're looking for storytellers who are ready to take that action that I was talking about because again, I can share with you all this knowledge, I can give you all the support, I can tell you how amazing you are, and how brilliant your ideas are. But unless you actually sit down in front of your laptop eventually, and write that email, and send it out, and keep doing that again, and again, and again, nothing's going to happen. That is the final piece that is super important. You have to take action. If you're ready to do that, then this is an amazing program for you.

What is it? What does the Intro to Travel Journalism Program actually entail? It's a six-month program, so it's not going to be one month, it's not going to be a couple of weeks. We're on this journey for six months. That's going to help you publish your travel stories by teaching those fundamentals that I mentioned through a series of video lessons, and providing support to you through our membership, The Circle. You get both because both are very important. You need the foundation in those lessons, and you also need the support, live support, live Zoom lessons, live Zoom calls, like the one that we're doing now where I answer all your questions, where I help you with your fears, and with your challenges. Whatever it may be, we help you with that.

During this time, you are going to learn how to take action, how to actually build your career, what is – again, what does the industry look like. You're going to grow because you're not going to be just by yourself. This is a group program and that's the beauty of this program, that there are people that are evolving alongside of you. I'm also very happy to say that a lot of our students have become lifelong friends, which is just such a beautiful thing, that they find people who are very like-minded, like-hearted. Because again, we are all here, first of all united by our love for travel and by our love for storytelling, so that's a very powerful foundation. So people find very good friends here.

[00:25:15] In this program, you're also going to start reaching out to some of those publications, and start seeing your byline, your name out there in those pages. The other thing that separates sort of what we do inside this program from some of the other, perhaps, opportunities that you might have to learn from somebody is that a lot of other programs, they focus on the what. What is trouble writing? How do you write? How do you take photographs? That's not what we teach here. Now, we're going to cover some of that. We're going to look at pitching, we're going to look at what is a good pitch, we're going to look at angles again, and how do you structure that. But we're not going to teach you how to write, or how to take photographs. This is really important. There are other programs for that. If that's what you're looking for, this is not a good fit. Instead, what we're going to teach you here is how. Not the what, but the how. We're going to teach you how do you actually break into the industry. How does the industry work? Who are the people you need to be talking to? That's a really important distinction. 

The lessons that we're teaching inside this program are broken into six different modules, which all support that framework that I shared with you earlier. We're going to start at shaping your mindset. Sorry, we're going to start by looking at shaping your mindset, thinking about what is it that you want to achieve in this career actually. What is your dream? What do you want. We're going to be building your confidence. We're going to be having discussions about rates and why you always need to ask for a higher rate. When you're in conversations with editors, we're going to look at the basics of the industry, we're going to look at, well, how do you actually find ideas for your stories, how do you write your pitches, and how do you keep that momentum. Which is again, very important that you have to keep that momentum going and keep showing up day in and day out. 

All of these lessons are broken into video modules. Each of the modules is very short, so it's like maybe 10, 15 minutes each. You don't have to sit in front of a two-hour video every time. They're all sort of bite-sized. We've improved this program quite a bit from the first time we ran it, because it used to be really this long two-hour video that I did. But you know, I'm also improving, so now it's very short, bite-sized, very simple, and effective, and we'll have worksheets, we'll have homework for you. For you to learn the content of the program. There's also a private podcast. You don't have to sit in front of a laptop, and listen to it and look at the video. You can get it on your phone, and as you're working out, or you're walking your dog, or cooking, or whatever it is that you're doing, you can keep learning with the podcast.

Again, that whole system, these modules, they support this framework that I've developed over the past six years. Which is, you have to start with your foundation. Why do you do? Why do you want to do this? You have to build your confidence, and then you have to actually act, because nothing happens before that. I talked a little bit about some of the things that we do inside. But again, they're very, very detailed. Each of the modules is very detailed. For example, in module two, you're going to think about how do I market myself, what do I bring to the table, what is my mission, what am I trying to accomplish in this career. The interesting side effect that happens in this module is that, oftentimes, people realize that they actually need to dream way bigger than what they originally thought about. 

Again, it's because, people come to me and they say, "I want to be a travel photographer and writer. I want to work with National Geographic. I want to do what you do, Yulia." But that's just three sentences. That's just three statements. Have you actually sat down and thought about what does that look like in practice, in reality, like what is a dream day inside your career look like, an ideal day inside your career. Do you know the answers to those questions? Is your dream big enough, actually? We spent lot of time in this part, because again, this is the foundation, this is where everything. It's going to guide everything that we do after. We're building our confidence, we're learning how the industry works, we're learning on how to evaluate publications, how to find opportunities. There are, believe it or not, there are so many opportunities out there, you just sort of need to know where to look and how to find them. 

[00:30:11] We're going to look at developing our storytelling skills. Again, that conversation about angles, which people, usually, they don't know anything about angles, and angles are really important in this industry. We're going to look at print versus online publications, what are some specificities of those, we're going to look at specifically inside print, what's the best place to break into print publication. We're going to demystify the process of working with editors. It's a really, really detailed, really sort of jam-packed knowledge that is my knowledge, basically, again, from the past six years that I put it all in that program and in that course. Here's another comment from one of our students who said that in this program, you're going to get the real advice, and the ins and outs, and she wishes that she had done it sooner. But she wasn't ready at the time, and now she feels that she is ready.

Another person said, "Intro to Travel Journalism got me way ahead of where I would have been at this point on my own." That's actually a good point to say that, nothing that I'm teaching here is rocket science or nuclear medicine. Meaning that, if you go out and start doing this on your own, eventually, you're going to get somewhere. Eventually, after lots of sort of trial and errors, after lots of poking around, you're probably going to end up in the same space, right? Which is what I did by myself, because I didn't have a program like this. I was just poking around, and reaching out to people, and making a lot of mistakes. Eventually, I got to this place where I'm at now. But the thing is, that it took me three to four years to get here, even more probably. You know, you can absolutely do it. But the thing is that this program is going to give you that boost to avoid a lot of that time waste, and a lot of that mistakes that I did, a lot of that sort of poking around, because I already know all of this, I already have the knowledge.

Now, you don't have to go and replicate my path. Your path can be much – what's the word? Your path can be much more straightforward than mine, because of that, right? Of course, you're going to write your pitch, you're going to look at what makes pitches work, what doesn't make them work, and then you're actually going to send your first pitch, and then your second pitch, and so on and so forth. You're also going to keep the momentum going. We're going to look at what are the habits, what are the practices that you need to be successful in the industry. You're going to look at what are some organizations that exist out there to give you ongoing support long after the program is over, et cetera, et cetera. 

Again, we do all of that, because we want to equip you with all the knowledge to get started in this industry, and avoid that meandering path that I had when I was starting out. Of course, again, we're all here today, because we want to see our names in those publications, so our students are getting those results. Like one here, I signed a contract with a massive publication. She was so happy when she shared that with us. Found out today that the editor wants to go forward with this. That's always an amazing email to get when the editor says yes to your idea. "Oh my god, I heard back from the editor and she likes the idea." That rush of excitement that you get, and I still get that too, by the way. When those emails come in, that's a feeling that I don't think it ever goes away no matter how long you do it. It's very exciting to see when the editor says yes to your idea, and then to see your work out there is extremely exciting. 

Again, the secret to getting that work done is these three key pieces. But after doing this program for several times, I realized that there was actually something that was missing still in this framework. That something was that support that I was talking about earlier. So first, you're getting all that foundation, you're understanding how the industry works, but still, you need something extra to take you to just really amazing results, and that's something extra is getting six months of support inside our membership, The Circle. The Circle is a membership that we have that's ongoing. You can sign up for the membership at any time. Inside the membership, we do a lot of different things. We have weekly 30-minute group check-ins. You're going to be part of that for six months. We have monthly brainstorming calls. We just had one yesterday. So we get on the call and we just brainstorm, okay, what the ideas that you have? Where should you pitch it? What about tweaking it here? I think it's a better fit for that publication, not this one." It's a really productive call that a lot of our members really like.

[00:35:25] We have a WhatsApp group, where I basically – the members can send their questions at any time, and I message them back. We share wins, we share when we're feeling low, we share opportunities, pitch calls, last minute opportunities. All of that is happening inside our WhatsApp group. We also do way more than that, believe it or not. We also have a monthly workshop at the beginning of the month, where I set a theme for the month, like what are we going to be focusing on this month? One of our prior themes was, "How do we ask for more money?" This is a very important topic, and one that people especially who are just starting out in the industry, they're very iffy about asking for more money, right? Because, "Well, I'm just starting out. This is my first assignment. Can I ask for more money right out of the gate?" That's a really important conversation.

We also do occasional workshops with guests that I invite inside the membership. We just had one with Jessica Poitevien, who's an amazing travel writer. She works with Travel and Leisure, Condé Nast Traveler, Insider, National Geographic, and many more. She came in and she did a series of workshops with our members as well, which was really cool. We have a pitch review process where you can submit your pitches, and I give you feedback on all of them, and other members are chiming in as well. Basically, anything you can think of, you have it inside our membership. Our community is what makes this membership the most special, and people just absolutely love being in our community. That is that missing piece that we recently added to this program that wasn't there before, that when you join this program, you're also going to be getting that support inside the membership that we have.

Now, I also said that I'm going to share with you a bonus for everyone who signed up, and registered for this info session, as a thank you guys for coming out and checking out what this program is all about. If you join us between now and next Wednesday, you're going to get one extra one-on-one session with me. This program already includes one on one one-on-one call with me in the six months. If you join between now and next Wednesday, you're going to get one more. You're going to get two calls instead of one. These calls are something that our members really love as well. That's your opportunity to really go deep and just work one-on-one instead of a group. Because all the other calls that we do, they're all group calls, so you're all interacting with each other, which is powerful in its own way. But when you work one-on-one, that is also powerful.

We've been able to get into some deep, deep territories with some of our members, some that even resulted in crying, and releasing some things, some issues. It's not always like that. Sometimes we really just focus on pitches, and ideas. But sometimes, we go into other territories, because we're all humans. I encourage everyone to show up as their full selves into this, because that's how I show up to my work as well. Again, if you join between now and next Wednesday, you're going to have two calls with me, two individual calls instead of one. Then, of course, all the other things that are part of this program. Like I mentioned, six months inside the membership, our online community, it's not on Facebook. We have our own sort of website, our own space where we're interacting. We have one individual session with me. We have also sharing with you my actual pitch that I use to this day and that I used to get published at National Geographic. There are extra workshops for you inside this program as well. Again, all of that, plus one extra call if you join between now and next Wednesday.

All of this that I'm offering inside this program, the masterclass itself with the knowledge of the industry, the weekly check-in calls, the monthly pitch brainstorm calls, private WhatsApp channel, private podcast of the program, the coaching session that we do one-on-one, our community, all the bonus workshops, and the pitch templates. All of that is – if you look at how much you would pay separately for each of these different things, it amounts to over $10,000 of value. I know that what I'm sharing with everyone is a lot of value. What the program costs for the six months is $2497. That's if you pay as a lump sum, or you can also join us at a payment plan of $497 today, and you start, and you're in the program, and then five more payments of $400. That's the cost.

[00:40:45] Here are some more things that people have told us about going through the program. "I can do this. I can do this, I'm able to do this. I reframe my mindset. I think differently now about opportunities. I think differently now about what is and what isn't possible for me, and how amazing is that." That is something that expands way beyond just travel media. Actually, our students have told us that, "I now think about this in other areas of my life as well. What is possible has expanded, and that's huge." Then finally, do it. Very simply, do it. You will learn about travel journalism. You will learn about how to get started in this field. And lovely lingering top note, you will learn about yourself, which is always awesome to do that. 

Again, all of these things that we're offering inside the six-month program, you can get them today for $2497, or $497 initial payment, and then five more payments of $400. Again, if you join us between now and next Wednesday, you're going to get that one extra call. Official enrollments of this program starts next week, next Thursday on Thanksgiving. But for all of you guys who are in the info session today, and who registered for the info session, you can already enroll today and you can check it out. I just shared the link in in the chat, so you can check it out and see, spend some more time with this program, and see if this is something that you'd like to do. 

Finally, I want you to just think about, fast forward to six months from now, and think about how does it feels when you again are going to see that byline of yours, and you're going to start working with tourism boards and start working with publications. How would that feel? Think about how getting your voice and getting your stories change, again, changed the definition of what's possible for you. Think about all the opportunities you could get. Think about all the different destinations that you could travel to. Think about new projects that you could take on because you've really understood what it takes to pitch, to get your work published, and to put yourself out there. So we are waiting for you. We're welcoming you inside our program. That's one, one choice that you have. Then the second choice is that, you can do nothing and keep going as you are right now. Again, maybe you can do this on your own, maybe you're going to figure this out on your own, but we have a program, we have a framework, we have a community that's going to help you do that much more effectively. That's it. 

That's what we do inside our program, and I'm very passionate about this work. I'm very proud of the work that we do and the curriculum, and all the workshops, all the costs. There's a lot of thoughts that went into this, so I'm super excited to meet you inside the program, and to welcome you in the program as well. I shared the link in the chat, so check it out. Also, if you're watching this later, as a replay, there is a button just below this video, where you can check out the page and all the details as well. When you join us, you access this all immediately, and you get on the next call basically. The next call that we have, which is next Monday, you're going to be part of that already. Again, this is everything that we're offering inside the program and can't wait to get this cohort started when we start enrollment today. 

All right. So I'm going to come here now, and check out the chat, and see if you guys have any questions. Okay. Monica says the link is not clickable. Thank you, Monica. You can copy paste it and it's going to show up, but let me – actually, let me. Oops. Here. It's just going to do that. While I figure out the link, think about if you have any other questions, you guys. I'm going to go through the chat now and see if there's been any questions so far as well. All right, cool. Let's see. Okay. I don't see any questions in the chat. That means that you guys have no questions, and I have explained everything extremely well. Or it means that you are super shy, so don't be shy if you have questions. Definitely let me know what those are. You can ask me about the program. You can ask me about anything else in the travel media world? Let's use this opportunity since we're together. Feel free to ask me your questions. 

[00:45:52] If you don't have questions, then that's also wonderful. Again, that means that I explained everything very well. That's really good. Monica is saying, "Can you please go through the FAQs?" Sure, I can go through the FAQs. That works. Okay. Let's see. How much time does this program require? Actually, we have changed this a little bit. I used to suggest one module a week. But I now realized that that was probably a little bit too aggressive, because people are just – they don't process information this way. Some people do, and some people really go through one module a week. But for most people, I now see that it takes about two modules a month to go through the program, which means that you're here for six months inside the program, and you're done with all the modules in three months, and then you use the rest of the three months to really start pitching a lot, and to start engaging with our So, Circle membership community. That's what I recommend now. 

It's all asynchronous. The video lessons are asynchronous, so you can consume them at whatever pace you want. It's really whatever works for you. Also, the video lessons, you access to them. You can still take them a year from now, two years from now, whatever. What expires is your time inside the membership. That six month of membership support, that will expire in six months. But the lessons you can consume them as fast, or as slow as you want. Another question that people often ask us is that, I don't really have a good understanding of the industry. or which stories I can pitch. Is this right for me? The answer to that is, yes, because we designed this to support the different entrance points into the industry. If you're a beginner, if you've never worked in the industry, this is really great, because you're going to get that foundation. If you've been in the industry, maybe you've pitched a couple of places, but nothing really came out, then you're going get that support, for us to encourage you to keep going. 

I'm going to look at your pitches, and I'm going to tell you, "Okay, this doesn't work. This doesn't work, change this. What about that?" That's how you're going to improve your pitching ability, and your pitching skill as well. Is it worth it? We cover in this program every freaking aspect of the industry, everything that I've learned, and that I'm learning continuously. All the new things that I'm learning, I'm also sharing with everyone in the program as well. You're going to get that, plus you're going to learn how to pitch, plus you're going to be inside the membership, plus you're going to probably change the way you think about opportunities, the way you think about yourself, the way you think about what's possible, how much is that worth for you. I don't know. That's something that you have to answer. Finally, is there a payment plan? Yes, there is. We talked about this. $497 today, and then five more monthly payments of $400. 

That's it for us. Thank you so much for your attention today. Let's see, I think there's another question here. Kami is saying, "Yulia, I'm so nervous about starting this program. Even though I love writing, I haven't done much writing at all. I'm always too busy. But I know if my dream is to travel for my profession, I need to take the time. I guess I'm worried about time." Yes, thank you, Kami. Thank you for bringing this up, because this is something that a lot of people worry about, because a lot of us have that issue of not having time, or not being able to carve out time. What I say to that is that, you have to decide, you have to decide, you have to prioritize what's important to you? If you don't do that, then yes, it's not going to work, right? It's just not going to work. 

We have a lot of conversations inside the membership on how do you guard your time, how do you carve out that time in your week to commit to this path, to do tangible progress, to pitch, to write. There are many different ways to do that. We actually have a workshop inside the program that is specifically called How to Find More Time. What we do in that workshop, we do something called a time audit, where for two weeks, I asked you to write down on a piece of paper everything that you do from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to bed, and do that for two weeks. Then, analyze that and see some trends in what you do and how you do it. and then start thinking about what you can outsource to carve up some of that time, what you can give up maybe to carve out some of that time, and where does that time sit for you.

[00:51:07] The truth is that, if you don't carve out time, it's not going to happen. But how do you carve out time, it's a question about priority, and it's a question of saying, "This is important to me and I'm going to make this a priority." That is actually a question of worthiness. It actually comes down to that, because when we, women, especially, we're socialized to prioritize everyone else around us. If we have a family, if we're caretakers, if we're taking care of somebody, we are socialized to prioritize that. Not ourselves. We all know this. This is not a secret. The conversation then becomes, "Well, can I prioritize what's important to me? Is this important to me? If I haven't been able to prioritize this, is this important to me?" Maybe it's not important, right?

There's a lot of sorts of conversations that you have to go through and think about. But on average, what I would say is, a lot of our members come to us with that challenge of carving out time, and we do have strategies that we share. For example, putting an appointment in the calendar, where it's like Wednesday is my pitching day, Friday is my writing day, let's say. There's two hours every Wednesday or two hours every Friday that I come into this. But then the more important question is, you can put that appointment on the calendar. But the more important question is, how do you stick to that. That's where, again, our community comes in, where we're supporting each other, we're making appointments with ourselves, and we're saying, "No, I'm going to commit to this, and I'm going to do this." But at the end of the day, if you don't prioritize it, it's not going to happen. You have to prioritize it. That's sort of a short way to answer that.

All right. Well, I hope that answered some of your questions. Again, thank you so much, everyone, for showing up today. I will be following up via email with the recording of this info session. If you have any more questions later on, don't hesitate to reach out to me, to ask me your questions, to email me or whatever. The enrollment starts today. Again, until Wednesday, if you join us until Wednesday, you get two calls with me. Then Thursday, we open general enrollments, and then we close enrollment on November 30th. That's your last day to join us if you are interested in the program. Until then, I wish you a really great holiday season, winter season. Stay warm, everyone. It was amazing to see you today. Thank you so much for your attention, and for showing up, and I will see you guys very soon. Thanks, everyone. Thank you so much.

[OUTRO]

[00:54:05] YD: Did you hear something that resonated with you in our episode today? Maybe you were listening and you were like, "Oh, I've wanted that before. I felt that." If you've resonated with what I had to share today, then maybe our Intro to Travel Journalism Program is right for you. We are enrolling for this program now. Go to travelmedialab.com/class to join us today. Thank you so much for listening and I'll see you next week.

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