People ask me all the time what separates the advisors who make it from the ones who stall out. They are hoping for a silver bullet, not the disappointing, honest answer: it's just someone who did the unglamorous work for a long time before it paid off.

Whether you are the type to be charmed by wordplay or more likely to roll your eyes at these portmanteaus, the following words were all created to describe real trends happening in travel and are worth consideration.

So many advisors measure growth by how many new clients they can bring in. Growth doesn't always come from taking on more, but from staying small enough to consistently deliver incredible service to every client in your rolodex.

I just returned from a week at content creation bootcamp. And by that, I mean I spent a week aboard an AmaWaterways ship with a group of Gifted Travel Network advisors, where we explored and captured several beautiful destinations, then learned how to strategically post about the trip on social media to expand reach and attract new potential clients.

So many advisors think that doing everything themselves is the mark of thoroughness. If you want it done right, you must plan every detail, vet every hotel, and coordinate every transfer yourself, because who's going to care about your client's trip as much as you do? It's a reasonable instinct. Also, more often than not, it's a blind spot in your business.

We can't expect every client to be dazzled, or even appreciative, when their advisor jumps in and works their magic when a situation goes sideways. But regardless of how it's received, the reality is that there will always be things outside of our control, and the best any of us can do is move forward, find a solution, and focus on the bright side.

So many career-change stories start from necessity: a layoff, a health scare, a financial cliff that finally pushes someone to do the thing they'd always wanted. But we rarely get to see what a second career looks like when nobody is forcing the decision, when a person could genuinely keep doing exactly what they were already doing, or nothing at all, and chose to build something new anyway.

There's an assumption that success is supposed to feel like arrival, like proof solid enough that the fear will finally allow you to rest. It doesn't work that way. The fear doesn't wait for you to feel ready, and it doesn't disappear once you've proven yourself. By practicing emotional fitness, what will change is your relationship to fear.

During summer, it's likely that a huge chunk of your book of business is moving through the same cycle at once. While someone is boarding a plane right now, someone else is unpacking and deciding which of their 300 photos to post first. During this busy time, it's crucial that you strike while the suitcase is still open and don't miss this golden window of opportunity for several reasons.

Many travel entrepreneurs ignore the importance of the inner work, especially because of how hard it can be. What top producer Katie Crago's story makes clear is that the mindset work isn't separate from building the business, but is the foundation on which the business is built. For Katie, that work started before she had any momentum to lean on.

For the fourth consecutive year, Gifted Travel Network (GTN) has earned a spot on Travel Weekly’s 2026 Power List.

People become travel advisors because of passion. They love seeing the world and sharing it with others, they have an entrepreneurial drive, and they usually bring some specific mojo to it, everything from marketing brilliance to being a systems-and-spreadsheets wizard. But one thing that comes up consistently within our network is that most advisors didn't get into this because they love putting themselves out there.

Dialing in your business and optimizing your time can feel overwhelming, but most of us are closer to that than we think. The answers are already there in places like our client conversations and our calendars. We just have to be willing to act on what we find and stick to it.

If you work in the luxury travel space, you know the importance of providing excellent service. You take the time to truly understand your clients so you can anticipate their needs, handle all the little details so nothing interrupts their experience, and make people feel seen.

So here's an uncomfortable question: Are you actually doing that for your LGBTQ+ clients?

Most of us start our travel businesses with the goal of being useful to everyone. We say yes, we stay flexible, and we don't close any doors. It feels like the right move when you're in the building phase, and that approach may work for a while. But eventually, it will plateau.

With AI woven into almost everyone's workflow now, I’ve seen three groups emerge: people who want nothing to do with it, people using it well, and people who think they're using it well... but don't take the time to check that the output actually makes sense. If you are worried you may be falling into that last group, this one’s for you.

This five-day immersive learning experience will be hosted aboard the fully-chartered AmaWaterways' AmaSonata, sailing from Budapest, Hungary to Vienna, Austria, March 5–10, 2027. By popular demand, this year's Symposium returns to the theme that launched the event back in 2023, selling group travel.

We talk a lot in this industry about building a business around your life. But what does it look like when your life and your business are intertwined in a way that sustains both?

That's what I kept coming back to in my conversation with Tammy Murphy and Justin Murphy of VIP Travel Experience when they joined me on The Travel Business Unpacked podcast.

There's something about spring that makes us want to clear the clutter and start fresh, and it’s a good idea to apply some of that energy to your business. If you’re feeling motivated to block off some time this month and clear out some cobwebs, here are some places where your travel business could probably use some attention.

When I invited Céleste Auger-Munshi, founder of Indulgent Voyages and Travel MBA mentor at Gifted Travel Network, to join me on The Travel Business Unpacked podcast, I expected a masterclass in cruise sales. What I got was something more useful: a look at what it actually means to build a sustainable travel business around a life that doesn't follow a predictable plan.