In partnership with
Last Tuesday I sent an email selling a $27 guide.
Two hours later, I pulled it down.
Not because it was bad. The guide is good. It's called How to Turn Instagram Into Sales Conversations, and it walks you through turning followers into real conversations, then into clients.
I just couldn't shake the feeling that something was off.
I've spent five years building The Expert's Guild for one reason: to help luxury travel advisors get better at marketing. That's the whole point of this newsletter. And there I was, asking you to pull out a credit card for a document that does exactly what I say I want to do for free.
So I killed the product.
Here's what I'm doing instead.
Starting today, I'm giving away the whole guide, one piece at a time, every Monday, for free. Eight more Mondays after this one. No opt-in, no credit card. Just here in your inbox.
The guide follows one path: better content earns a response, a response opens a conversation, and a real conversation becomes an opportunity.
Content → Response → Conversation → Opportunity.
Every Monday for the next two months, we'll work through it one step at a time.
Let's start today.
Subscribe to my Personal Newsletter for Entrepreneurs Over 50
Before a sales conversation can happen, someone has to respond.
Most travel content is built to be looked at. A beautiful hotel, a favorite destination, a nice view. People enjoy it, maybe save it, and the relationship stops right there.
If you want Instagram to lead to real conversations, some of your posts need to give people an easy reason to say something back. Here are five ways to do that.
1. Ask people to choose.
Travel is full of choices. Beach or city. Hotel or villa. A Wine and Culinary specialist might ask: "Five nights in Tuscany. One countryside hotel the whole time, or split between Florence and the country?" The answer takes no effort to give, and it tells you something real about how that person likes to travel.
Clients can find destination facts anywhere. They can't find your judgment. "I'm recommending September in Italy more carefully these days. Some places feel like July now." That's an opinion, and it opens the door for someone to ask what you'd suggest instead.
3. Answer a question clients already ask you.
You already have a list of these sitting in your inbox. "Is four nights enough?" "Hotel or villa?" "Can we do this with kids?" Each one is a post waiting to happen, because you already know someone out there cares about the answer.
4. Tell a story that makes them think about their own trip.
Not a dramatic tale, just something real. Two hotels in the same region, one with the famous name, one closer to the towns your clients actually want to explore. How you chose between them says more than any list of amenities.
5. Invite the right person to raise their hand.
"Thinking about Spain in 2027? Tell me what you're most curious about." No buying decision required, just an answer. And that answer tells you a lot.
You don't need all five in one week. Start with whichever feels most natural, and pay attention to which ones actually get the right people talking.
Next Monday: what to do with your CTAs so posts don't just get likes, they get replies.
Want the full toolkit that goes with this? Reply CONTENT and I'll send you 30 ready-to-use post ideas built around these five types.
If you'd rather hand the whole thing off, my team runs social media for luxury travel advisors full time. Reply SOCIAL and I'll tell you how it works.
See you next Monday.
Alex
It's Here: Pique's New Caffeine-Free Afternoon Energy
I quit my afternoon coffee. Not because I wanted to — because I found something better.
You know that wall you hit every day around 2–3 PM? I used to just accept it as the cost of doing anything. Another coffee, a quick spike, then the crash — and somehow I'd still feel dehydrated by dinner.
Then I tried X·E Fountain, Pique's brand-new electrolyte energy drink, and I genuinely wasn't ready for how good "no crash" could feel.
No caffeine jitters. No 4 PM slump. Just clean, steady energy that actually hydrates me instead of draining me. It's built with a premium Vitamin B Complex for natural cellular energy, Magnesium Malate + Taurate for real focus, and a full electrolyte blend that makes it feel like a treat, not a chore.
The cucumber-celery-lime flavor is so crisp and refreshing — it's basically stolen my afternoon coffee slot completely.
📩 Share this email with your colleagues and invite them to join our expanding community of luxury travel professionals.
📫 If you received The Expert’s Guild Weekly from a friend and would like to subscribe, please do so here:
