The Social Media Takeaway - Louise McDonnell

Create a 6-Figure Retreat Business with Leni Cavocos

• Louise McDonnell • Season 1 • Episode 38

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In this week's episode of the Social Media Takeaway, I am delighted to be joined by Leni Cavazos, a marketing and business strategist who helps coaches and entrepreneurs build six-figure retreat businesses. We dive into the power of hosting transformational retreats and how they can significantly boost both your income and brand. Leni shares practical tips on planning retreats, choosing the right locations, and setting profitable pricing strategies. She also highlights the importance of using retreats as part of a larger business ecosystem to ensure long-term success. Whether you're new to retreat planning or looking to refine your approach, this episode offers valuable insights to help you make retreats a powerful income stream.

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Louise McDonnell:

Welcome to the social media takeaway. I'm your host, Louise McDonnell, and this is the show for business people who want to know how to use social media to drive more sales and leads for their business. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe. And if there's anybody who, you know, in your network who would benefit from the show, please make sure that you share the links to the show with them. So today I'm delighted to be joined by Lenny So Lenny is based in Mexico and she is a marketing and business strategist and the founder of the Retreat Planner. With over 18 years of experience, she helps coaches and entrepreneurs to build six figure retreat businesses. Lenny is hired by those who dream of transforming lives through impactful retreats and scaling their businesses. You're very welcome to the show, Lenny.

Leni Cavazos:

Thank you so much for having me, Louise. I am so thrilled to be able to talk to you and for all of your audience to learn a little bit more about what retreats are and how you can actually bring them into your business and how deeply, deeply transformational they are.

Louise McDonnell:

I can't actually wait to hear more. I'm like, I'm there already. So tell me Lenny, before we get into the whole idea of retreats, I know this is a huge growth area at the moment, but how did you get into it?

Leni Cavazos:

Well, it's a funny story. I actually kind of landed into it in a way. Like, I don't believe I landed. I knew it was part of it, but I've been running marketing and events for many, many years since then. Like I started running events when I was 15 years old. So I have like a soul for events. I used to have a catering company and then I moved to Dubai and was working for Marriott for the corporate office for Middle East and Africa. So I was doing loyalty marketing with events and it was just absolutely beautiful. And then the pandemic hit and I was just like, okay, should I stay trapped in the desert or should I go back to beautiful green Mexico where there was a lot more freedom? So I moved back here and I actually started attending retreats. It just kind of like, people started inviting me to go to retreats. I have to say my family owns a retreat center here in Mexico. So it was an easy landing. So it was just like I started started there. But then more people started inviting me. And then I went to one highly transformational retreat for me. It was a women's retreat. It was so deep. It really allowed me to reconnect with who I was. I was a woman. And to understand so many things about myself, like living in the Middle East, I had to kind of move there. And in working in the corporate world, I had to move to a very masculine approach of me doing my job. I had to like, show up and like, play their own, you know, at their own game. And it was very exhausting. I didn't know at that time, but later on, I realized I was like, This is, I can be like feminine and nice and I can still be a boss and I can still do all the things like, what is this? Right. It was so beautiful and it was so deeply transformational. I just want it more. So I asked the host that like, they were becoming my friends. So what is the next one? And they were like, no, we're not doing another one because we barely made any money. And I was like, it's not possible. How is this possible? Like you have 13 women, these retreat has changed my life. I would have paid 10 times the price of this retreat. Because it was just so, so good and I just couldn't believe it. Honestly, I was a little bit upset. I was just like, this is not fair. I mean, what's going on here. So I actually was like, no, and I gave myself a mission and, any one of you who gets to like meet me a little bit deeper and spend more time with me, you will see that I don't do anything halfway. So I went and I interviewed over a hundred retreat leaders to figure out what was going on. Because I couldn't just let it go. I was just like, no, no, no, this needs to continue. More people need to host retreats. Like this is so deeply, deeply transformational. it's almost like magic. And as I started doing all this research, like people started contacting me for like my business strategy and marketing. And they were like, Hey, can you help us? And I started helping people. And then one of my clients actually came and she approached me and she's like, Lainey, do you want to host a retreat with Joe Dispenza with me? Like, can you run, like, the logistics and the operations and all these kind of things for, like, a retreat with him? I was like, of course! I was actually like three weeks before I was thinking I really wanted to work with him. And then three weeks later, I had it there on my platter, right? So I just kind of started working in this beautiful way where amazing teachers asked me to organize retreats for them. People started hiring me for private retreats. And then I started doing consulting for people who wanted to host retreats. And that's how really the retreat planner came to space. It moved from like a conscious marketing agency into a very, very specialized place where we go and we do a lot of research to figure out what's going on in the market. How is it growing? Why some retreats are working? Why other ones are not? But really, my deep space, it's like, I want people to be able to transform their lives in a place where they feel safe, they feel contained, right? So the teachers need to be experts. And I also want for the teachers to receive back for all the energy that they're putting, and that means being profitable. That means actually making money. That means Being apologetic about charging your prices, because the reality is that if you don't do that later on in this space, you're not going to be able to keep doing it and you're going to have to go back to your nine to five job. So, will you actually be able to help more people because you were afraid to charge. The value of your program.

Louise McDonnell:

that's such an issue for so many business people, coaches, consultants is to charge their value. Yeah. So, okay. So can any business run a retreat or is it like, cause I think that lots of people would think this is just wellness. tell me the broader, give us the lowdown Lenny.

Leni Cavazos:

Oh my God. Yes. I mean, just getting goosebumps of the excitement to like, open up this space for people to have crazy ideas of like running retreats. Yes. So wellness professionals, I would say there's three types of people who run most of the retreats in the space. Number one, it's actually coaches. you see a lot more on the wellness professional space, but like the ones where more profitable tend to be coaches than therapists and then wellness professionals. Meditation teachers, yoga teachers anything else, right? So anyone who works with wellness, masseuse, right? You can run a retreat being a masseuse. Then I would say you can have retreats for any type of hobby, right? So we fall under like there's four different categories for retreats. So if you fall under any of this, and I'm sure you do you can find it, you can run a retreat, right? So we have wealth. So retreats for anything that is about wellness. Money generating, right? So it could be a retreat for people to like go and rebound their social media presence. That's a retreat, right? it can be about creating legacy in your business, it can be about learning how to invest your money. And that's a retreat. It can be about how to build a funnel. It can be about how to build a website. It can be about business strategy. It can be about marketing. It can be about podcasts. It could be about many, many things, right? So I can keep going on that space. Then you have retreats are on the category on their relationships, right? So Relationships, couples, kids, parents, grandparents, single people anything else, anything that has to do with relationships, boundary setting, anything, right? So that makes into that space. Relationship, you can even put inside of relationships, like becoming a speaker, right? Like learning to share your voice because it's about how you relate with others, right? So if you do anything that creates relationship with Person A and person B, then you can be doing a retreat for something in the space of relationships. Then we have wellness, And then wellness is all about healing, right? So detox, yoga, meditation, massage, relaxation, resetting your nervous system, anything within wellness. And then the last category that usually tends to be like the smaller on the pot. It's all about hobbies. horseback riding, patchwork, scrapbooking, painting. Anything on that space falls under that. Now, in this space, and this one falls under, like, I think it can fall under most of the categories. We also have retreats for corporate offices, and I'm such a fan for retreats for corporate offices. Sometimes we call them off sites. But because I do believe that we need more conscious bankers, more conscious attorneys, more conscious doctors, It's not just about everyone becoming a shaman tomorrow. It's about becoming a better person of who you are and enjoying the life that you live and changing the things that you don't want. But not really necessarily from the space of, like, now I need to go live six months in India to figure out what's my next step, right? A lot of people have that preconception, like, if I want to be more conscious, then I need to release everything, no more Rolex, no more fancy car, I need to go and live on the streets. And it's not true. Consciousness. It's about becoming aware of who we are. And in this generation, we know that we are allowed to make money and it's okay because the more money we would have, the more money we can give back.

Louise McDonnell:

Okay. So for anyone listening in here, right? Okay. So let's say my business. if I was to do a retreat for my business, my business is all around social media. I have an agency, I have clients in my agency, and then I have clients in my coaching academy. so obviously you're bringing people to location. Do you bring them to your own location? Do I bring everyone to the west of Ireland? Or do I bring them to a location, a sunny location? Or how do you choose a location? And how long should the retreat be?

Leni Cavazos:

Okay, very good question. So all these questions are highly interconnected. the first one I would say, when it's your first retreat, you usually want to choose somewhere near home. The reason you do that is because It's easier. You might know already some people that can help you with certain details. You might already be maybe in a beautiful boutique hotel that you really loved, that has the rooms that you know the service is good, that you know that the breakfast is amazing. Maybe you've seen these beautiful big properties in Ireland and you're like, people want to really always go to a castle. Like, I mean, like, hello, like, you know what I mean? It's a, it's an easy sell. So. You bring people into your space, first of all, because it's easier. The costs are lower as well, because when you're pricing, if you're doing it international, you need to, book additional nights for you in a hotel, right? You need to actually, pay for your flight ticket, extra meals, there's a few additional expenses, and you need to do a lot more research. you might even want to, like, depending on how Let's say perfectionist you are, you might need to travel beforehand to actually go see the venue to create content. So I would say the first one I recommend for people to start local. Unless local for them means somewhere where people cannot reach, you know, it's very, very far away and people will not be able to get there. let's say all your clients are in America and you're based in Australia, hosting a retreat all the way in Australia, it's going to be very hard for you to sell because people will need to take 36 hours just to get to Australia plus your retreat. So if you need to consider where's your audience at, right? So if your audience is mainly in Europe, in us, Europe, it's an amazing place, right? If you're in Europe and your client as Mexico, for example, South America, it's an amazing place. Because also it's a little bit easier in a way, like also prices are not so high. So I always highly recommend that, for example, your first retreat, you don't go and do Hawaii. Yeah. Because Hawaii is very, very expensive. Like there's actually a law that came during COVID that only a few places can actually rent the space for retreats. Because of that, you have very limited offer. Because a lot of people were renting houses instead of going to the hotels because of the pandemic. Okay. Right. And it's stuck. It's stuck, right? It's there. The prices of running a retreat in Hawaii, it's actually quite high. The island itself is, it's expensive. So I would not suggest that you start with a place where your costs are so high because then your ticket needs to go higher. And then what you tend doing is it's, you're like, well, I make my profits smaller because then people will pay for this. You're barely making any money and you end up working for the venue, for the caterer, for the facilitators, for the airline, for the gas station, for the car rental, for everyone else but yourself.

Louise McDonnell:

I love that. I love that example. It's so true, isn't it? You end up working for everybody else.

Leni Cavazos:

Yes, exactly. And then when it comes to the length, the same thing applies. So if people are look around you, so let's say you are in, London, for example, And most of your clients are in London. you can do a retreat. It is like a short term retreat. So we can retreat two nights, three days, kind of like in that space. And it can happen. Usually I would say no more than the two hours to a week. Radios driving from the location where most of your clients are, because let's say if you're going for a weekend and you have to drive for five hours, you might not feel like it, right? You might find a little bit more things. So I would say smaller, shorter retreats, your audience should be kind of around that area. So they can just travel for one and a half hours, two hours max to get there. And then for longer retreats, I would say, if people are traveling abroad. I am the person who says, like, for example, I learned this from one of my, my students in my program master in theater retreat planning, she said, you know, I like to travel and stay at least one day per hour of the flight.

Louise McDonnell:

Oh, that's a great one.

Leni Cavazos:

It's a great one. Right? So the retreat doesn't have to be as long. So if the flight is 11 hours, it doesn't mean your retreat needs to be 11 hours. But I would say if your flight is 11 hours. It needs to be at least four nights, five days.

Louise McDonnell:

Yeah.

Leni Cavazos:

Where it's worth it. Yeah. So that would be the minimum for someone traveling, let's say across continents? Or even five hours or something. I would say minimum four to five. A lot of people who like retreats are hosted, let's say in Europe, and the clients are in mainly in America. They would be six nights, seven days, or five nights, six days. I like the five nights, six days specifically because if you're traveling and you're taking a week off work. You can arrive the day that retreat starts and then you can live and you just take your five days of holidays. You don't have to actually take extra days from your vacation slot.

Louise McDonnell:

Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. And I'm sure these are really practical things that people don't think about Lenny when they're planning their retreats. This is actually really, really good information. So how do people make sure that they make money from it? How do they make sure they're charging enough?

Leni Cavazos:

Okay, great. This is an amazing question. I have to say out of my program, my favorite part, and I feel a little bit bad because I do love marketing, but my favorite part to teach is actually pricing because I really believe that pricing either makes it or breaks it in your business. Like if you have the wrong pricing, it's just a mistake. So for example, I saw a post the other day on Facebook, so this is not any one of my clients, but someone was saying Oh, my gosh, what do I do? I sold out my retreat, but I didn't took into consideration that the fees for stripe payment. So it's like two, five, 2. 5, 3%, right? So she's like, it's around 700 to 800 euros commissions. And she's like, I didn't take it. What can I do now? Like, she's like, most of my clients are American. And then people were like, well, you know, in America, people will not really do much of a transfer, It's not a thing either. credit card. Easy. Let's do this. And that's one of the biggest mistakes. We're getting to put something inside of your budget and imagine you're losing 700 to 800 or euros or what, you know, your currency just from a transactional fee. That should have been part of your pricing strategy because the client pays for that transaction fee, not you. So I think it's crucial from the space of starting from like the costs, the expenses of running a retreat. I remember this case when someone was flying in a facilitator from a different country. So when they did their budgeting for the retreat, the price, let's say, was 100. But then when they actually purchased the ticket, it was already 400. Because it was closer to the date, right? So they didn't go ahead and actually go and buy the ticket itself, but they budgeted on the price. They did not consider that they might be an increase. There was no space for extras or, you know, so then they were like, Oh, my God, it's like, this is like four times what we budgeted for, like this facilitator to come in. Things like this that might seem simple are the ones that really, really make a difference. And then when it comes to actually bring together how much to charge, there's different ways on how to do this. And I do teach different ways on how to do this inside of my, program, like Mastering the Art of Retreat Planning that is really important. An in depth program, like most of my students tell me like, Oh my gosh, I did not have any clue that all these things could come now into consideration, people come out of my programs and they can go and actually coach on how to host retreats because it's just like. We really go into the space, right? For me again, I said, I don't do things halfway. It's all about becoming an expert and really doing things properly. So you don't have the extra headaches. No, so we can avoid the extra headaches if possible. Anyway, so I'm going to tell you one thing that I think people need to consider. I would say that you should not be hosting a retreat if you're not making at least the amount of money that you would be making from one week of work. Okay. How much money are you putting on the table? And I will even go as bold and say double it because you don't want just to recover. Let's say this one on 1 sessions that you're missing. You want to make more than that. Right? So let's say your week is worth. 2,000 dollars, right? So you should be making 4, 000. This is very low numbers because I would say that you should not be making less than 10, 000 per retreat. And actually the way I teach people is you should be making around 25, 000 maybe just from the tickets or from tickets and upsells, right? There's different strategies based on your audience, your business, et cetera, et cetera. And that's something that we really go in depth and we cover because I don't believe there's a cookie cutter strategy. we need to define which one works for you. Because for me, I'm happy to put a retreat at 7, 000 or 10, 000. And I go for it and I charge that. And it's totally fine. Like, I don't feel any hesitation because I know that what I'm doing, it's worth. a hundred thousand, right? I do not expect everyone else to be on the same page as me. I just get so excited about this, but I hope everyone in the audience is just enjoying this. But like, for example, I have Tiffany, right? She worked with me a while ago and she's just absolutely amazing. She does retreats for moms. Tiffany Marshall, just if anyone wants to, like, if anyone wants to go for a monster retreat, she's the best. And she actually has main quarterly retreats are like my ticket. And then besides that she has. Monthly retreats are weekend retreats, or they're called like silent retreats. It's like 25 people, they come, the prices, the ticket is very, very low. But actually what she does later on is she upsells people inside of the retreat. And that's where the real money comes in. The other retreat is making around 4k for one weekend, still K, right? But that's not the real thing. It's really using retreats as a lead magnet. Okay. You bring people in, they get to know you, they get to trust you. And then they want to buy more from you.

Louise McDonnell:

That sounds great. That sounds absolutely wonderful.

Leni Cavazos:

Yeah.

Louise McDonnell:

So as a lead magnet or then having it as the main event itself.

Leni Cavazos:

As a main event itself. Yes. Or as part of a program, right? You can have your basic program that say you're coaching 12 weeks coaching program, and then you have the option where like they actually purchase. the retreat itself. So they have the coaching program and they end up with a retreat or they started with a retreat and then they end up with a coaching program. there's always different ways on how to play with this, but we want to really see retreats, not just as a separate offering in your business, but as part of your whole ecosystem, as part of your whole business structure where everything feeds the next piece. It's all connected. It's all connected between one and the next. And then the other one and the other one, the other one, because we tend to see it sometimes in business, especially when we didn't go to business school or anything like this. We tend to see things separately. And it's hard to. Put the threads together between one thing and the next. But once we start seeing like everything is working for the other piece and how did one work but for the other one and how like the coaching program can actually leverage my retreat and how my retreat can leverage my lead magnets and how my lead magnet, you know, like everything working together, like They're one because they are really one because they're an extension of who we are, of our energy, like our brand, right? If you're an entrepreneur, your brand is part of, it's a piece of you. I always say that it's kind of like an extension of my arm, right? It has everything for me. So it has to be one piece. It has to be cohesive. With people tend to see retreats as a once off on offer, like, Oh, I'll just add a retreat because I want to go to Bali, and we need to just give it a little bit of extra thought, why am I hosting a retreat. This is the first and most crucial question that I asked people inside of my containers. Why do you want to host a retreat. And the second one is, what do you want to get. From hosting a retreat because we always think retreats are one sided. We give, we, we give, we would give, no, we will receive. So we want to know what do we want to receive from the get go? Like, these are the most crucial questions you want to ask yourself when you're starting a journey with retreats, even if you have hosted retreats in the past, because I worked with a lot of people who have hosted retreats in the past, but they just not are like, Oh, well, first I want to be more profitable. Right. I want to not make the mistakes I've done in the past. And I want to just streamline it in a way that makes a lot of business sense.

Louise McDonnell:

That's all really, really wonderful information, Lenny. So apart from people not charging enough, like what are the mistakes in general that you see people making?

Leni Cavazos:

as I said, like I did like over a hundred interviews and I'm going through round two now because we have to keep ourselves updated, right? Like things change, that market is changing for retreats. Some retreats are selling great. Some retreats are not so I do see a lot of people like saying, yes, I sold out. And then there's people saying, oh my gosh, like I didn't sell anything. So there's the whole range of things happening. I would say that out of everything that I've found, there's usually like three main mistakes. The first one you might think, Oh, it's probably like, you don't know how to sell. The reality is actually the name, the name of the retreat. It's one of the biggest mistakes because we have seven seconds to really grab the attention of someone. So if their name of the retreat is wrong and people don't recognize themselves in it, Then they're going to leave away and they might be the ideal client. it might be perfect down below the copy. It might say exactly what they need to hear, but if it doesn't say it right there on the top, you're going to lose them. one great example for this is rest and relax and reset, in Bali. Typical name, right? Like It's like a spot name, right? hotels use these kinds of things all the time. It doesn't tell you anything. It doesn't tell you if it's for women, for men, for couples, for kids, if it's for relax from what, reset from what, right? instead, if you think about, maybe something has a little bit more results around it, reset, so you avoid burnout. That's a little bit more clear, right? Avoiding burnout for women in Bali. Ah, a little bit more clear. So really the name has to go that way. And I teach the four main types actually inside of my program on how to actually name your retreat for success, because there's different strategies on how to do it. And it actually, they match how you want to be like the intention and the transformation that you're offering instead of your retreat, So I would say number one is actually the name. Number two mistake, like we spoke about pricing. Yeah, pricing, 100 percent pricing, because why do you want to have a solar retreat where you're making 200? And you spent six months promoting. Yeah,

Louise McDonnell:

yeah. And all your energy.

Leni Cavazos:

And all your energy. Like, I've been there. I've done that. Like, I've been like, no, no, no. I, just want to focus my energy on one thing, da, da, da, this and that. And because my pricing is right, even if I don't sell out, I'm still good. Yeah, I'm good. Like, I'm fine. I'm making money. Like, it's not, it's not a thing about like, I need to sell out in order to be successful. It's about, I need to price right. So I can be successful. Right. And then number three, marketing sales promotion. Really? And I understand like I work with a lot of coaches and therapists and it's not their expertise to be marketing experts, right? It's not their thing. Like you're not supposed to be an expert in absolutely everything, but if you want to run your own marketing and your own sales, you do need to learn about it. And if you want to hire someone else, you do need to have a grasp of what's going on. So you can actually tell someone what you want. You can actually see the results of an ad campaign. I was listening to your latest episode that you were talking about, like, you know, how the reach of organic is really dropping and like, if you can, you should go for ads, et cetera, no. And I really like that LinkedIn and TikTok. I don't like TikTok, but I tried. I have one video on my account. But LinkedIn is still quite organic, right? And I was like, okay, very interesting information. I love that. And I know that a lot of people are like always thinking like, well, ads, you can waste money and it's true. Like I used to run a million dollar campaigns, right? So and I used to like read all the reports. So going into like smaller budget campaigns, it's a little bit harder. And then things always keep changing. So for me, even though I know how to read a report, I know how to build a campaign in the space of like, What I want, right? My desires and my needs for my campaign. I was like, I'm going to test my skills at actually building the campaigning side of the thing. Right. And I wasted a bunch of money. I can tell you, like, I did waste a bunch of money and it's because I didn't know how to like, do it properly. Right. Like, the setup piece. I never actually set up the campaigns. I always had an agency setting up the campaigns. So I'm a big fan of saying like, hey, you know what, maybe you want to hire someone who can run the campaign for you. But then there's a big caveat here. If you do not know how to read the report and the results, You're going to be wasting money because you will not be able to tell them, Hey, these results are not good enough. there's something wrong with the targeting. I remember these very specific, like example, when I was in Merritt, We used to do Middle East campaigns, right? So I was running the social media campaign and then they sent me like the report of like what was being posted and boosted the locate, like the target locations. And they actually targeted Israel for hotels in the Middle East. I mean, that's a no, no, that's like big PR problems. this could like actually become a huge, huge problem because If someone in Israel sees a hotel in Saudi, they take a screenshot and they say, look at this, Marriott is actually promoting a place where we're not allowed to go in our country. Oh my gosh, it was like, it was a PR nightmare waiting to happen, but because I know how to read reports and I know how to do it and I don't know how to build it maybe in the back end, but I know how to do it. I can read it so I can actually pick up on those stops. So if you don't know that

Louise McDonnell:

so many people, even when it comes to running those types of ads, like. You're so right that they will run. They try and do it themselves and so many people say to me, all of these are Iran ads and I got nothing from them. And like, if you're running the right ad, you should know what your cost per lead is. And then you should know what that lead did. If that lead converted, so you can know it's very simple. What did I spend and what did I make, So yeah, I love this having the right promotion and, and apart from ads, like how does social media feed into this whole kind of this area? Okay,

Leni Cavazos:

great. So I love this. Okay. So. first of all, I do teach full transparency that you don't just have to sell on social media. bear with me for a second, because I know like a lot of people think that if you're hosting a retreat, the only way to sell it is an Instagram or Facebook or, you know, and that's it. Right. And I'm like, no, no, no, you have to have a cohesive marketing campaign where you take them through a journey. There needs to be a customer journey. Yes. You want to have presence, you want to have authority on social media., but you wanna make sure that you're bringing them from social media into your space, right? If you have a CRM, that will be your CRM. If you do dms, then

Louise McDonnell:

on your email, and I presume the people on your email list, they're the warmest prospects anyway.

Leni Cavazos:

Exactly. Right. So I would say always like, take them out of social media eventually, like as soon as you can, because the reality is that you don't own anything on your social media.

Louise McDonnell:

Yeah. Absolutely. That's my thing. I love social media, but get them on your list. Cause you own your email list.

Leni Cavazos:

Exactly. A lot of people are like, yes, I have 100, 000 followers. Okay. So how big is your email list? It must be like a hundred thousand, right? They're like no, I would say usually it will be more like 20, 000, you know, but like 500. And I'm like, yeah, why?

Louise McDonnell:

But Lenny, that is so common. I have a hundred thousand followers. How big is your list? I don't have one. You're like, Oh, what a waste of opportunity. You know?

Leni Cavazos:

Oh my God. Yeah. And now go and like talk to everyone and get them into your list. Like these hundred thousand followers. It's like a really rewarming up campaign. It's totally doable. Right. But it will take time. You'll probably need some assistance and to train something or a bot or something on that space. So. I think social media, it's so, so powerful. I would say that some people do great selling retweets on social media to complete strangers, and other people, don't. They can't, it doesn't really work out and it has to do a lot with like the copy, the pictures that you're using if people saw it right in the, at the bat, right? Like there's people who sell retreats inside of like Facebook groups and they just put it in one group and then they get 30 comments, but then it's about the follow up. How do you connect with them? How do you take them to the next process? Like, yeah. It's all about that because I would say also like, okay, you send a message and then they don't reply. Well, if you don't follow up, right, then what will happen and you follow up? They're not replying. It's going to message request. Like, there's so many things going out there. As soon as you can get them out, right off your email, like off the social media to your email list, it's easier to reach out to them because you might even ask in your form for a phone number. So you might send them a WhatsApp message, right? And be like, Hey, I saw you're interested, right? Like, really taking them into the next, step. And trying to get as much information as you can from them from the get go, usually for a retreat, you would not take them like you can take them directly to the sales page. it depends on like how good your copies on your sales page and whatnot. But I would say like, for me, I've had like retreat sales pages with like over 7, 000 visitors without really converting. So, and you don't get the email, you don't get anything. and maybe this person cannot come to this retreat because of these breaks. But what if they come to the next one? And if they just came into your website, they're going to forget about who you are, like, honestly, let's be very, very transparent here. Like people need to see you like 42 times to remember you. It's a huge number. If they saw you once, they're not going to remember you. Like, I'm so pleased when someone sends me a message, I'm like, I've been watching you, you know, I'm like, Oh my God, this person has been there and has been seeing me for a while. Right. So. Really, it's all about that. And like taking this approach where it's not just like, okay, well, there's emails and automations. What about the personal touch, like actually being a human being and reaching out to this person and, making sure that when they purchase, they feel like they're Or like everything is there already for them, right? Someone is reaching out to them, maybe yourself or an assistant and this works also for programs, right? This is not just for retreats, but like, Hey, thank you so much for joining our Social Media mastery program, right? We're so excited. We have sent you an email. let us know if, have you received it? do you have any questions about it? And this is actually all about creating loyalty marketing, that it's one of my favorite topics and one of the things that I really bring inside of my business and my clients, right? So anyone who comes into my program, don't just learn how to do retreats. You also learn how to build loyalty marketing in your business because loyal customers spend 67 percent more than non loyal customers.

Louise McDonnell:

Absolutely. I would say with social media so far what I'm hearing from you And with my social media head on, what I'm thinking of is like, there's the pre retreat, then there is the building the relationship with the people who've signed up. And then I can imagine as well, during the retreat and after the treat, there's the user generated content. It's when your people come to the retreat and then they share, Oh, look at me, here I am in Bali. And it's a beautiful experience. And I'm having the time of my life. It's beautiful. And plus the fact I've rediscovered my true self, and I've solved this problem that this retreat was going to solve for me that in turn is content they're sharing with their personal network, who may also be potential customers, but also that it's content that the retreat organizer Should be, you know, absolutely capturing and sharing on their socials, resharing on their socials, because there isn't any better content that's going to warm up a colder prospect than somebody actually solving their problem, having a good time and, coming out the other side. So yes, social media, but you're right. You're the warmest prospects are the people already on your list, already following you organically, all the people who've seen you 42 plus times. They're the people that are going to sign up first. The Facebook ads or the Instagram ads get you in front of new people who you can warm up and you can bring them on a journey with you. And then once they've signed up, you, you build that relationship with them. But I also think, and I would imagine that part of the strategy should be maximizing the user generated content from the retreat itself so that you fill the next retreat. would it be true?

Leni Cavazos:

Oh, yes, totally. So basically, well, I always suggest you have a photographer, a videographer who's creating like all this content is creating these reels. You can use it for your website, you can use it for many, many things. You might not need to have it for every single one. But I personally, I like to ask people to leave their phone on their side and not be very phone oriented. So bringing a photographer and a videographer really takes that away from like they can do that because then they will have the pictures they will have the videos so they don't have to be on their phone like oh let me take a picture right so and that's a personal choice it's all about being in the space besides of being behind the lens. Yeah. Yeah. It's all about being like present, but all this content that is created either by them or by the photographers or whatnot. And there's always different ways and how you can limit this and make sure that people are posting about your retreat while the retreat is happening. It's about also thinking about what happens after the retreat, right? So yes, getting testimonials from people who attended to retreat, putting it on social media. But it's also about, like, even upselling people inside of the retreat for your next retreat. Yes. they're there. They're warm. They love that. And then you can take them to us. So in three months we have step two. Do you want to come? Or in one year we have step two. Do you want to come? Right? they are super, they're not warm, they're hot in that moment, right? Or maybe they come and join one of your programs or your membership or something on that space that really allows you to keep continuing building that relationship with them. So they stay and be your clients in the future over and over and over and over again. It comes from a place of like booking a session after the retreat happens. So you can check with everyone and see like, Hey, how are you doing? How did this go? Did anything come after the retreat? Right. It's about this personal touch, loyalty marketing, and actually now this is like a new trending name for like many, many years, but really it's called customer relationship management. That's what it is. You manage the relationship with your customers, and you do the same with social media when you're getting people who are kind of new, they're super new, you know, you're leading them into the space. And you get it with people who are more warmer, but you need to know that you cannot treat people the same way. I don't know, it's like when you go to a party and you have your friends or like your friends for life, you come and you immediately you hug them, right? Like it's a hug. But if you don't know the other person, you're going to just like give your hand. It works exactly like that, depending on the level, you know, like the people who have been in my programs, I was just in Ibiza like a week ago, maybe. Yeah, a little bit longer than a week ago. I was in Ibiza with one of my clients. we're like family now, you know what I mean? Like, she calls me her soul sister, and it was absolutely beautiful. And we like spend time like I stayed in her house and we went and we had conversations, some of work, some of not work, right? Because I was coming to do some consulting for her. But like, I would not do the same with a complete stranger. Right.

Louise McDonnell:

of course, right?

Leni Cavazos:

So the same way it works with your costumers, right? You need to get to know the person before you pitch them into the sales. There's this marketing expert, I cannot remember his name, but he said that before he even sells something, he sends 52 emails once per week. So there's no offer until after 52 weeks of nurturing.

Louise McDonnell:

Oh, my goodness. That's a lot.

Leni Cavazos:

That's a little bit long. Too far for me. Like, I know there's people who are ready to say yes, right here, right now, in this moment. Yeah, some people in this audience might be thinking like, Oh, I really want to host retreats. I'm ready to like take a program because I want to be hosting a retreat in 2025.

Louise McDonnell:

you'll always find people that are different stages. They'll have somebody who come across this podcast, who has had it in their mind, the back of their mind for maybe a long time. And they just haven't ever had the time or something has held them back and maybe listening here today, they'll take action. And then somebody else is tuning in today that had never thought about it. But you planted a seed it's at the back of their mind and they may go seek you out on social media and follow you. And then eventually get, you know, maybe end up on your list and then eventually in time they take action. But people are all at different stages of the customer journey. for anyone who is tuning in, who wants to, to learn more about the subject, how do they find you?

Leni Cavazos:

Yeah, so it's super simple. They can just go to the retreatplanner. com slash go. So go, G O. And over there, you can just go ahead and book a call with me or someone from. My team to have a conversation. And what we do is we figure out if it's the right time for you to start retreats in your business. And then if it's the right time, this is a right match. Then we will make an offer. But the reality is for me, it's very, very important that The time that should be okay for you to actually run retreats. We're not doing this just for the sake of like sending a wild goose out there, right? We want people that actually are in the right moment in their business to add this because retreats are not for the faint of heart. I'm going to say it. So I prefer for people to be super, super ready. And that's why we offer these 30 minute call for anyone who wants to just find out. Or even figure out what am I missing to be able to host retreats? what steps do I need to take in order to get there?

Louise McDonnell:

Brilliant. Look, I think it's a really interesting area. I think it's an area that we're going to see a lot of growth in. I think the more that people work remotely, I think even companies will want to have retreats to get. Bonding sessions with their employees. I think that there's huge potential there for so many people that are listening in here now. If you've enjoyed this show, make sure that you subscribe and make sure that you give us some feedback on social media. I know you're going to find me under Louise McDonald on LinkedIn or sell on social. Um, How do people find you on social media then Lenny?

Leni Cavazos:

The retreat planner.

Louise McDonnell:

what platforms your favorite ones to use?

Leni Cavazos:

So I spent a lot of time on Facebook on Facebook you can find me as Lenny Cavazos and I spend time on LinkedIn as well so I love LinkedIn and Instagram. I do spend a little bit of time I don't think you'll get a reply for me on TikTok that's the only one.

Louise McDonnell:

Not a fan of TikTok but that's okay Lenny so much for coming on and sharing all your wonderful advice I think it's wonderful and I think it's something To plant a seed or for people to think about for running retreats for their business.

Leni Cavazos:

Thank you so much, Louise. I'm so excited. Thank you for having me.

Louise McDonnell:

Thank you.