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​Eli the Travel Guy is like a travel agent for people with credit card points.

It's like travel agents were replaced by the internet, but re-birthed in so many different ways and industries, we explore it here:

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🎧 Prefer listening to this? Here's a podcast version! 🎧

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(0:20) The internet wiped out the need for travel agents, but they’ve been reincarnated in the form of travel bloggers, agents that book high end travel, Instagram influencers etc.

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(1:00) Eli is like a CPA + Travel Agent in one. They work mainly with business owners to maximize credit card points and also book dope travel. Like getting $20k to $50k trips at 90% off that price.

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(1:46) My story how I owned an eCommerce business, and by accident built up million+ points (a lot at the time), and for the next SEVEN YEARS I never paid for a hotel again and travelled super well!

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(3:40) What is a “travel agent” now? Two different ways of working with people: 1.) They plan a fancy vacation where someone wants to go. 2.) They have a service where they’ll just search for the best trip they can get.

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(5:45) Where Eli makes money: They get kickbacks on credit card commissions ($100 to $800 each), they have an upfront fee ($2,500 to $15,000), or a monthly membership community.

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(8:20) The different avatars for this:
1.) The young single eCommerce guy spending $200,000/mo on ads, so he racks up tons of points, looking for the best nomad experience.
2.) Most people are 35 to 45 year old couple and family, own a business, wants them to book a $40,000 trip to Europe and plan it and optimize the credit card points.

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(9:25) Credit card optimization is so hard to follow.

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(10:30) I personally ask my friend Nomadic Matt about credit card stuff, but most people don’t have the biggest travel blogger to ask.

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(11:35) Points Per Mile is how you calculator value, and the best is for high end hotels or business/first travel.

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(13:35) What do people prefer: Super cool hotels or a first class flight? It just totally depends what you care about. For domestic flights I don’t care…for 10+ hours flights first class definitely helps.

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(15:38) My buddy Sam is a big dude, by random chance we flew in a private jet to LA, then on the flight back we were in the very back of a commercial plane, and he got middle seat and could literally barely fit.

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(18:12) First class has less variables. Every viral video you see of a fight on a plane it’s always in coach.

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(19:30) Paying for hotels feels like more of a ripoff to me than a flight. Especially if I’m barely in the hotel.

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(22:15) The different types of points: Non transferable = Bad. Airliner hotel cars = OK. Transferable bank points = Best. With transferable bank points you can get those crazy deals like $20,000 airline seats for $1,500 + points.

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(23:59) Why do airlines do this crazy transferring point structure for crazy deals. Banks price off revenue, and airlines price on zone. If you can arbitrage this you can get crazy deals.

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(25:35) Airlines are just banks with airplanes. Many airlines make ZERO profit from their flying operations, and all their money from their loyalty credit card programs.

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(26:32) The internet probably ruined some of the best benefits of these loyalty programs because any Joe Schmoe can figure it out now. However now new credit card signups went way up because people see some of the benefits

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(27:45) Subscribe to us!

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(28:41) Travel blogger monetization has dropped a lot because AI answers can be much more specific and better than generic articles. You have to compete on BRAND not just pure articles.

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(30:10) A guy in our community Joe (shallwegohometravel.com) moved from selling small guides to offering personalized itinerary planning for several hundred dollars per call.

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(30:10) Guy named Joe in our Copywriting Course Community runs shallwegohometravel.com was selling travel guides for $10, but now making 20x more by selling travel consulting.

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(33:15) How are travel bloggers monetizing? Affiliates, sponsorships, travel insurance...

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(35:00) Someone bought an Instagram account with 200k followers and used it to get free stuff wherever he went. That’s mostly gone as places realize this doesn’t equate to sales for them.

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(37:29) Someone else in the CC community made a service where hotels pay them to make travel itineraries for guests. Like a virtual concierge. They make money from the hotels AND the destinations.

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39:14) Online Travel Agencies are all affiliate driven (like Orbitz or Expedia) and get high commissions because they drive such big volume.

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(39:35) Ultra luxury travel where everything starts at $10,000+ and goes to hundreds of thousands per trip. They charge like $100,000 deposits and numbers where escrow and wire transfers are involved. They’ll book planes, yachts, helicopters, private homes etc.

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(41:40) I’ve flown private a few times (I never paid, it was others!) and it’s interesting to see this whole other world of airport FBO’s and private chauffeurs and other luxury travel accommodations.

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(42:50) Amex Platinum card FHR (Fine Hotel Resorts) will give you extra perks to super high end hotels.

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(44:08) Can a person that works a job accumulate this amount of points? Yes but you have to game it hard.

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(45:40) Some people will try to build eCommerce business that just break even JUST so they can get the credit card points. Some people do this with paid ads.

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(47:25) Eli by accident lived in a “creator house” where all the roommates were internet personalities. It actually made every pump each other up like comedians do on their podcasts.

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(49:09) Social media follower inflation is happening big time. A lot of these numbers are fake once you dig in.

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(50:35) Eli had some Instagram Reels hit 25m+ views, and most of the views/followers were not really customers. It more helped with credibility but almost no leads.

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(51:40) I’ve worked with a lot of large creators and all the money comes from email, social media definitely can add to credibility though.

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(54:00) Ross Hudgens makes very niche videos, so he has low follower counts and views, BUT each lead could result in $10,000,000.

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(55:10) Almost no companies doing social media can tell where all their traffic is coming from. After the famous iOS 14 update, and lots of privacy rules, it’s difficult to track traffic.

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(56:20) Showcasing mini case studies can get people thinking “OH I can do something similar…”

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(57:40) A lot times people will buy his travel services to make sure they actually take a trip.

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(58:25) Another reincarnation of travel agents is Costco, they book a ton of travel and have pre-set trips.

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(1:02:00) Eli uses Skool for community software because it’s just super ultra simple. Doesn’t have a lot of options but does basic community well. Circle is great but much more complex.

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(1:04:00) A lot of people will make a community but it doesn't NEED a private community. You have to have a purpose for the community to be alive, like Copywriting Course re-does people’s copy and that’s the backbone.

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(1:06:30) We removed the KK from Kopywriting Kourse, but I loved the goofiness of the K’s, it has a fun running joke around it.

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(1:08:30) Fun coincidence: His handle “elitravelguy” sounds like “Elite Travel Guy”

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(1:09:05) Join the Copywriting Course to become a great copywriter and get your copy/email/pages updated.

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​Watch the full interview here --> ​

Sincerely,
Neville Medhora - Copywriter and curious dude

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