the retreat countdown checklist & jumpstart · after running hundreds of retreats, both for...

The Retreat Countdown Checklist & Jumpstart Guide

wanderlustentrepreneur.com

Hi everyone! I’m so excited that you’re ready to plan a transformational destination retreat.

Perhaps you’re dreaming of taking your clients to Bali, Costa Rica, Greece, Peru or somewhere really unique. Or maybe you want to start a bit closer to home before you jet off abroad?

For some of you, you’ve already run a retreat or are in the process of planning one so you know how incredibly helpful it is to have a checklist at your fingertips since there are a lot of details to keep track of!

No matter whether you’re thinking of traveling near or far, whether you’re a retreat virgin or an experienced pro, I’ll bet you can practically feel the sunshine on your skin, taste the local food, and feel the pride and amazement as you watch your folks transform before your eyes!

But before you can dig out your passport and pack your bags, there’s a lot of work (deeply satisfying work!) in properlydesigning, promoting, and selling-out your destination retreat.

After all, no one wants to put in all the time and effort into planning and marketing a retreat, only to

not be able to fill it and lose money – or worse yet, have to cancel!

Sheri Rosenthal

http://www.wanderlustentrepreneur.com

And while retreats can be quite lucrative if you know how to price them properly – easily adding $10,000 to $100,000 to your bottom line – you can end up in the negative if you don’t.

And what about making sure you are covered legally? There’s a lot to consider!

That’s why I created The Retreat Countdown Checklist and Jumpstart Guide.

After running hundreds of retreats, both for myself as a life and business coach as well as for other facilitators through my boutique travel agency Journeys of the Spirit®, I know how helpful it is to have a month-by-month plan laid out that can be checked off 1-2-3. Easy-peasy.

Imagine the comfort of knowing that nothing’s forgotten – whether it’s in the planning, promoting or packing for your trip! It’s the exact checklist I use each and every time I plan a retreat.

In the Countdown Checklist with its accompanying guide, we’ll cover:

Twelve Months Before:• Planning & Pricing Your Retreat• Getting Your Retreat Online!• Marketing Your Retreat

Then what you’ll want to do as the countdown begins:• Three Months Before Departure• One Month Before Departure

As well as what to do:• After Your Retreat

But before we dive into the Checklist, let me tell you about my first transformational destination retreat that changed my business forever.

It was 2003 and I was offering one-on-one coaching and weekend workshops. Sure, I had seen my clients make great progress, but I wanted to find a way to leverage my time, increase my income and create an opportunity




for deeper transformation. I knew in my bones that it was time for me to play bigger and share my message with a larger audience.

I loved to travel and had gone on transformational destination retreats that had totally changed my life with my spiritual teacher don Miguel Ruiz, author of the international bestseller The Four Agreements. So I thought, “Why not?” and booked my first retreat. As the date grew closer, I couldn’t wait to get out of my daily routine and hop onboard a plane to Mexico!

On the last day of this totally incredible trip, my group and I were sitting on top of the Pyramid of the Sun in the sacred ruins of Teotihuacan after a powerful and moving ceremony.

The sun was streaming down on us and there was a slight breeze in the air. As I looked around our circle and then out over the ancient city, I couldn’t believe how far we had come in just a few days.

The transformation on each person’s face was noticeable. (I wish I had taken before and after photos!) We had walked through fear, self-doubt, and judgment and bonded as a tight-knit group that would remain friends for years to come. The hope, trust and joy showing on their faces reflected my own delight – and was confirmed in their words of appreciation and tight hugs of gratitude.

I knew in that moment that transformational destination retreats had to be an integral part of my business.

Why?

Not only did I witness 10 times the transformational power in a few days compared to months of working together, I had evolved as a transformational leader in terms of my teaching and coaching skills, confidence and clarity. Plus I walked away with $11,500 in 5 days – much more than I was charging at the time with my private clients.



So if you’re a heart-based entrepreneur, coach or healer who wants to:

• Travel the world and not be stuck in an office on a computer.• Leverage your valuable time.• Showcase your multiple talents.• Super-size your transformational power.• Share your message with a larger audience.• Challenge yourself – and your clients to grow and change.• Learn to monetize your retreats by easily upselling your other

services & offerings.• Create another stream of income while visiting some of the most

stunning places in the world and• Have fun doing so…

Then it’s time to have a step-by-step action checklist at your fingertips so you can start designing, promoting, and selling out your transformational destination retreat!

Now we purposely created this checklist as a separate document for you so you can keep printing it out over and over again as you need to. And please feel free to refer to it as you're reading though this jumpstart guide and even laminate and reuse it if you like.

Now let’s breakdown the checklist section by section so you’ll know what to tackle in planning your trip.



What is a Transformational Destination Retreat?

So let’s make something clear right from the start. I’d like to share exactly what I mean by transformational destination retreats so that we’re all on the same wavelength, so to speak!

For me, a transformational destination retreat is a custom-crafted, life-changing experience for your clients that takes place most commonly in a group format in a beautiful location (although it can be one-one-one if you like). But most importantly, it’s not just about taking them to a pretty place and teaching your material – that’s not the idea at all!

It’s about creating a life-changing event where the location aligns with the material you’re teaching so that the impact and transformation you create is profound. And to be clear, it’s not necessarily about where YOU want to go – but about where the material you’re teaching needs you to go. And that’s something you never hear being discussed.

Now, the traditional definition of a retreat is an experience where we draw back for refuge, contemplation, rest, quiet and/or reflection. And of course you can create a retreat that is totally like that, as there's nothing wrong with those types of retreats. Or you can go the complete opposite route where your retreat is basically a workshop in a pretty place sitting on your butt all day in class.

But most folks really appreciate a combination of experiences where they do get to rest, but also take away something very special and magical from the teachings and activities. And what takes a retreat to the next level from normal to incredible is when the actual location of your event plays a part in the teachings themselves. That’s what we’re going to be focusing on.

Sure you can create a retreat on a stunning beach – I get it – that’s really romantic. But if you actually consider what you’re teaching, you might come to realize that there are other locations that would be much better

Twelve Months Before: Planning + Pricing Your Retreat



suited for your event and allow you to offer experiences that simply blow your participants away (and have them talking about you to everyone they know)!

In other words, the question I would like you to focus on is – is there a way for you to translate the concepts you teach into actual activities to make them deeply experiential?

For example, let’s say you’re a health coach and you want to help your people change the way they eat and care for themselves. In a workshop environment like this one – you might have them looking at your PowerPoint presentation while you’re speaking onstage all day.

You might be sharing healthy recipes from a notebook that you give folks to take home or you might have some of your clients speaking from the stage about their experience of putting into practice the many things you’re sharing.

But in your retreat, you could find a beautiful farmhouse in Tuscany that serves organic food and/or vegetarian food, or who even has a cleanse program depending on what you’re teaching. You could also conduct cooking classes where your folks could participate and leave the event with great skills they could use at home. Or you might teach them about juicing and show them how to do it – or even better – let them do it themselves.

Maybe the center has an organic garden where you could take them to harvest fresh veggies and pick fruit to juice, and then show them the difference in quality between locally grown food vs. processed food or even fresh food that’s been shipped cross-country or from out of the country. You could even compare them side-by-side and ask people to taste the difference between a shipped apple or tomato and a freshly grown one.

Maybe the place also has spa services that could help facilitate that cleanse by helping to remove toxins from their bodies through massage. Or better yet, use the spa and massage services to help process some of


the emotional baggage that comes up when your participants are doing transformational work on their body image and self–worth.

Many retreat centers have staff yoga teachers who give daily classes that your group could avail themselves of (if you’re not a yoga teacher yourself) – as that would really round out your retreat. So you can see – the place itself can and will direct the kind of experience you can dream up for your clients.

Or let’s say you are a leadership coach for corporations and you want to do a retreat that highlights team cooperation and more effective communication. What if you chartered a small sailing ship for the group and everyone had to learn a specific task on the boat for everything to go smoothly?

To do that everyone would have to know exactly what the boundaries of their particular task was. In addition, they would have to understand the language inherent to those tasks.

So if the captain says the boat needs to turn starboard – if the team doesn’t understand that language there’s going to be a serious problem. Corporations and businesses work the same way – they have their own culture, language, and rules.

By putting the company’s team on the ship, they can clearly see the dire effects of communication and cooperation issues that perhaps would not be as clearly pointed out in a lecture back in the office.

Can you see how powerful of an experience that team retreat would be? Imagine how different team dynamics and communication would be back in the office after 5 days of trying to sail a ship understanding that their company is exactly like a ship which has been going nowhere fast. Wow – what a difference that could make! Now the office issues are no longer an intellectual concept.

I hope you can now see how much more interesting creating a retreat in this way would be than just a typical weekend workshop. There’s a huge difference in what people would end up taking away from this type of retreat. Truthfully you’re limited only by your own imagination.




So put on your thinking cap and get creative. The world is your oyster when it comes to planning and designing your unique, one-of-a-kind, never-to-be-forgotten trip!

The Benefits of Using a Travel Agency or Tour Operator

Now that your creative juices are flowing on designing your retreat to be a unique and unusual experience, let’s talk about planning logistics.

How does it work if you want to run a retreat to a location that you’ve personally never been to yourself? And what if you don’t want to stay in just one place but rather offer a journey that moves from one stunning location to another?

Then you might want to consider enlisting the help of a travel agency or tour operator such as my company – Journeys of the Spirit® Travel. (FYI: We are Journeys of the Spirit® Travel at www.journeysofthespirit. com & www.luxurytraveljourneys.com)

Think about this for a moment. Imagine being in foreign country (or even a “foreign” part of your own country!) where you really don’t know all the ins and outs of the area. Perhaps you don’t even speak the language.

Or picture having to deal with three or four hotels, trying to get the best pricing for rooms at each hotel, figuring out their payment schedules, then trying to negotiate with a transportation company, and to having to deal with finding a local guide from afar, and hoping that all of this comes together without any issues.

That’s simply over the top from my point of view for someone to do who’s not an experienced travel expert!

And truly that’s not YOUR specialty – your specialty is teaching, sharing, and creating transformation for your clients and it’s a waste of time for you to be doing something that’s outside of your expertise.

The extra money you’re going to have to spend for the tour company or travel agency to help you will be made up by the discounts you’ll get in pricing because you’re working with people who do this for a living

http://www.journeysofthespirit.com


http://www.luxurytraveljourneys.com



and negotiate with local hotels on a regular basis – and by the peace of mind you’ll have by not having to deal with all minute details that go into planning a group journey.

That’s why it’s really great to have a travel agent or tour company working with you because they can deal with issues as they come up throughout your trip without your participants even knowing that something’s gone wrong, and without you having to take your attention away from your group to deal with these kinds of matters.

For example, when my travel company plans a group trip, that facilitator knows they can ring us any time of day – or night - if a problem arises. Plus they have not only us, but the operator we’ve contracted with in that country to help them. And that is very, VERY comforting, and very, very smart.

So be smart and use a travel agent who has the connections, experience and expertise to book hotels, transportation, special activities and outings that you might not know about. Both you and your participants will be glad you did!

How to Price Your Retreat to Meet Or EXCEED Your Projected Income

Now that you’re clear on what you’re teaching and the transformation you’re offering, and have a good idea of where you're going and what life-altering activities you have planned, it’s time to take out your calculator and crunch some numbers!

Pricing an event is critical as we always want to make sure that we make a profit after all our hard work at the end of our retreat. That’s a given. And that involves making sure that you’ve included all your costs into the price of the retreat. And I mean ALL!

So what should you include in your pricing? Well, you need to include your flights, your room, your food at the event and in transit, your supplies,



cell phone costs, advertising the event, any extras, credit card fees (like for example, on a $2000 trip, that would be at least $50 a person if your percentage was 2.5%), the price of your hotel room if you’re arriving the day before, transportation costs, tips, etc.

I can’t tell you how many people I’ve worked with who told me they made money on their retreat and then I re–ran their numbers and showed them they actually LOST money!

Seriously. I’m being very straight up here. And why? Because they didn’t consider all the things they spent money on for their event. So let’s not make that mistake – ever!

So let’s discuss the elements that go into pricing your retreat so that we have clarity about it.

List of items that should be in your pricing:

Room package: The cost per person double occupancy

Trip leader’s package: The cost of your room (unless it is comp’ed)

Supplies per person: Any costs for copies, goodies, or anything you spend for your group

Trip leader’s flights: Your round trip flights to your retreat – even if you’re using points!

Extra hotel night: The cost of a room for you to arrive the day before

Meeting room: If the retreat center or hotel is charging you for this

Participant’s meals: Add this in per person if meals are separate from the room pricing



Trip Leader’s meals: Estimate the total number and cost of all your meals if meals are not included

Tips: Include any tips that you’re going to have to make

Advertising: This is for any costs you incur to promote the retreat

Phone: Any long distance out of country fees on your cell phone

Guides: If you contract to have someone take you on an outing or tour

Entrance fees: For any activity you plan

Assistant’s costs: If you bring a helper and you’re covering their room, flights, and or food

Special activity: Costs for any special activities you design

Rental car or van: This could be pickup at the airport or transport for a special activity

Credit card fees: Around 2.5–4% of the total trip cost

Taxes: State, local or countries appropriate taxes

Your teaching fee: Make sure to add in your net per day. I’d add in at least a $100 minimum per day per person. You can obviously add in what you want.



Then once you have the total of all your expenses, I suggest adding in whatever your teaching fee is going to be last. Depending on your niche – you could charge anywhere from a MINIMUM (and I do mean minimum)of $100 per person per day to upward of $10,000-50,000 net per personfor high-end business or deeply transformational retreats.

Now I know all these numbers might make your head spin, and for a lot of us heart-based entrepreneurs, numbers are not our favorite part of our business. But pricing your retreat properly is the difference between losing money and earning what you are truly worth - which enables you to live the lifestyle of your dreams.

That’s why we have our own special excel sheet system that our clients use for pricing and I recommend you do the same.

Monetizing Your Retreat

While we’re on the topic of money, let’s discuss ways to monetize your retreat. The number one way to monetize your retreat is to run your retreat knowing that you have a follow-up program at the ready that you’re going to offer to your clients during your event.

It's important to understand that a retreat as a one-off deal is never a good idea.

For example, you could offer:

• Private Sessions during the retreat

• Pre & Post Retreat VIP Days & Intensives

• Post Retreat Course

• Post Retreat Coaching Program

Please – if you learn anything from me it should be this! You’re putting all that time and energy into your wonderful participants and to not offer them a way to follow up with you after the event is simply negligent!



Because in all likelihood they’re going to need help integrating what they’ve learned from you AND need help processing all that transformation afterwards. It’s almost abandonment to leave people with no way to continue that process with you.

If you go into your retreat with a post-retreat program all written up and ready to present to your group, you’ll be doing them a favor and adding to your bottom line in a huge way, and best of all you won’t be constantly chasing clients to fill your programs and courses.

Your follow up could be a three, six or 12-month group coaching program, individual coaching, a high-end group mastermind, or any number of shorter weekly group teleclass programs.

For example, let’s say you offered a year-long deep-dive group coaching program at only $500 a month to 12 people. That alone would add an additional $72,000 to your year!

An eight-week paid online in-depth class after the retreat at $997 for 12 people would bring in $11,964. If only 3, just 3 of the 12 attendees signed up for private year-long coaching with you at $750 a month that would net you an additional $27,000!

This one tip alone is going to make a HUGE difference in your bottom line. I think you can see that it’s not really hard to add an extra $10,000 or even $100,000 dollars onto a properly priced retreat. And that’s really exciting!

Retreat Legalities

I know that the idea of running retreats is so romantic – and the possibility of adding a lot of cash to your yearly income is thrilling, but we’re all going to have to come down from the clouds for a few moments to go over some really important legal issues that everyone needs to know before running retreats or journeys which applies no matter what country you’re in.



But first, do keep in mind that if you accept money for a retreat with lodging, you are accepting money for travel and that makes you a “Seller of Travel.” So do make sure you are functioning legally since there are strict rules around selling travel in most countries.

Keep in mind you might be required to work with a legal travel agency in your location to solve this issue. Of course there are ways around these concerns, which we won’t get into right now, but we thoroughly cover them in our Retreat Blueprint course.

So let’s get to it. There are 3 important actions you’ll want to take to make sure you have the legal aspects covered so that these types of issues don’t get in the way of creating a fabulous experience.

1. Do make sure you and your participants are properly

insured.

This means that you are covered by professional liability (errors &omissions) insurance for your business AND liability insurance foryour retreats or travel, and that your participants are covered withtrip cancellation insurance.

Now I know all these different types of insurance can be confusing,so let’s briefly look at each and what it covers.

Professional liability insurance protects you in the event that aclient is harmed from a service or advice that you provide for whichyou’re held legally liable. You never know if a client is going to saythat the advice you gave them caused them to have a problem intheir life, get divorced, get sick, lose too much weight, or do whoknows what!

However, what if something happens to a client while you’re on aretreat – like if a client is hurt while on your trip and blames you forthat? Then you’ll want to be covered by a special errors andomissions insurance policy for doing retreats or travel that wouldn’tbe covered in your business liability policy.



Now on your client’s end, trip cancellation insurance can reimburse them for the pre-paid, non-refundable portions of a trip if they need to cancel or interrupt their trip with you for a covered reason. Or if you as the leader get deathly ill and have to cancel your trip. (You’ve already paid out all your monies which are non-refundable if you cancel so it would be challenging to pay all your participants back.)

If an illness, accident, or other covered unforeseen circumstance forces a traveler to cancel or interrupt their travel plans, they face two potentially major financial losses—money invested in nonrefundable pre-payments, and medical expenses that in many instances may not be covered by their regular health insurance. Trip cancellation insurance is good to have and relatively inexpensive too for the peace of mind it offers!

So make sure you and your participants have all three please!

2. Have proper liability forms ready to send out to yourparticipants.

I feel that it is crucial to have your participants sign liability formsthat specifically say that they are assuming the risks of travel ANDthat they’re releasing you from any liability that might arise fromyour negligence, carelessness or from their general participation inyour retreat.

Signing these forms won’t stop someone from suing if they want to,but at least you’ll have evidence that they signed the release andthat you educated your clients about the risks they might encounteron your trip, which is very positive in your favor.

In addition, I want my participants to have all the information theyneed to know about the trip so they feel well-prepared, well-informed and well-taken care of.



I send out to my participants before every trip:

• Trip Registration Form (so I have all their basic contact info& flights)

• Trip Information Form (so they have all the trip deets)

• Please Don’t Forget Me Form (so they forget nothing)

• Statement of Psychological & Health Conditions Form (soI know what meds they are taking and if they have anypsychological issues)

• Terms & Conditions (so that what they are getting is clear)

• Release of Liability & Assumption of All Risks (releasing mefrom any liability)

• Responsibility/Limitation of Liability Form (limitations of whatI am liable for)

As you can see from this list, any old forms will not do – they need to be written specifically for travel and the issues that occur while traveling. Having been a doctor has made me hyperaware of being protected, which is why we’ve designed our own set of legal forms which we use with our clients. Make sure you do the same!

In the end I suggest that you connect with your lawyer on this since every state and country is a little different and you want to make sure you’re properly covered.

3. You did carefully plan out your cancellation policy, right?

Why is this important? Well basically, your trip page and itscancellation policy is a legal statement, and it’s important to letpeople know what’s going to happen to their deposit when theysign up: if they’ll lose money if they need to cancel, and when istheir final balance due.



This policy should be on your marketing materials so that folks understand whether their deposit is either refundable, or refundable until a specific date, or non-refundable but transferable to another event, or non-refundable period – BEFORE they pay it! Because you can’t refund money to them that you’ve already paid to the retreat center!

You’ll want to carefully line up when payments are due to you so that you’ve got the money in hand before you have to pay the retreat center – and you’re going to base your cancellation policy on what they’re holding you to in your contract with them. This creates the proper cash flow so that you’re not laying out funds to the retreat center before you have the money from your trip participants.

Bottom line - be properly insured, have the proper forms and have a cancellation policy in place so you will be covered and your folks will be well taken care of.



Once you’ve designed and planned your itinerary, now it’s time to get the word out starting with your big beautiful trip webpage.

A stellar retreat webpage means:

• No boring trip titles.

• No run-on text with no bullets.

• No hard-to-read text which runs all across the page from left to right.

• Clarity as to who the trip is for and what the attendee is going togain.

• No poor quality or small pictures.

• Clear information about what’s included on the trip and what’s not.

• And a compelling reason as to why I would want to go on the retreatand what problems you’re going to help me solve!

In other words, just because your location is beautiful – that’s rarely the reason people use to determine if they want to come on your retreat. You must have delicious text to hook your perfect attendees, a breath-taking webpage layout, stunning photos and web design, and easy way to accept your client’s money.

So if this sounds like you and your retreat’s not selling – this is a great place to start to make some positive changes!

Having a few examples of great trip pages is always helpful so I want to share a retreat page that I personally built for our group mastermind retreat in Morocco. Check it out:

http://retreatmastermindmorocco.com

Twelve Months Before: Getting Your Retreat Online

http://retreatmastermindmorocco.com



The most important aspect of this page is that before you even scroll down one inch – I’ve already qualified you and you know exactly if this trip is for you or not.

I’ve identified my audiences concerns, talked about the location and food, the activities are amazing, what folks are going to come away with is clear, everything that's legally necessary is present, and this trip sold out in 2 months from the date it was posted. Now for those of you already running retreats – wouldn’t you love it if all of your trips were sold out that quickly? Of course you would!

Here’s another great trip page from one of our Retreat Blueprint Program graduates – Julie Lewin. Her “Amplify Your Energy: A Journey into Sedona’s Sacred Vortexes” page immediately informs you that it’s a spiritually-minded journey, hooks your attention with a great location picture and text, and then she clearly shares her promise so there’s no confusion about whether or not you should come.

http://intuitivehealingretreat.com/sedona-retreat/

Now that you have the keys to getting your retreat online, I can’t wait to see your page!

Here are a couple other really great pages:

http://www.return2lovejourneys.com/ http://www.journeystothesacred.com/retreats/spain/

http://intuitivehealingretreat.com/sedona-retreat/


http://www.return2lovejourneys.com/

http://www.journeystothesacred.com/retreats/spain/


Promoting Your Retreat

Considering how much time and financial risk is involved in creating a retreat – it’s wise to create a plan for getting your event out there and getting folks registered as soon as possible so that you have the cash flow necessary to pay for your deposit and other expenses.

I can tell you that before 2008 I could put up any trip on the Journeys of the Spirit® website and it would pretty much fill at least 2 months before the departure date doing basically nothing.

However, since the recession, the way people buy has changed, and it’s become much more difficult, but not impossible, to fill a retreat. Luckily we’re seeing a huge upswing in the number of people traveling these days so it’s actually a great time to be planning a retreat.

However, more and more people are signing up the last minute. And it can be VERY nerve-racking to be wondering whether or not your retreat is going to fill in the 11th hour.

Unfortunately most facilitators wait until the last minute to promote their event, which is a huge mistake because you have to pay the retreat center your balance normally 60 days out. That’s why in my Retreat Blueprint course I teach a structured phased approach to promoting your event. It takes a little longer that way, but at least you’ll have a profitable event!

And just so you know, bar-none, the number one way to fill your retreat is by marketing your business (not your retreat!) and by doing list-building activities all year long. That’s why I recommend taking 6-12 months to fill your retreat. If you try to advertise your retreat you’ll spend a lot of money that’s going to come out of your retreat’s budget and eat up your profits!

Key point here: market and grow your business, don’t advertise your retreat.

Twelve Months Before: Marketing Your Retreat



How do you ensure that you’ll be able to fill your retreat at the end of those 6-12 months? Simple. Layout exactly what list-building actions you’re going to take month-by-month to promote your trip until it’s filled. That way your trip fills with folks who know and love you rather than with strangers who you advertised to who don’t know you or care about what you’re teaching!

Here are 17 great ways to promote your retreat by marketing your business all year long:

1. Teleclasses, Webinars, and Google Hangouts

2. Summits

3. Freebies

4. Getting on a Podcast as a Guest

5. Early Bird Specials

6. Posting on Your Blog

7. Guest Posting

8. Newsletter Blasts

9. Social Media

10. Joint Venture Partnerships and Commission Payments

11. Advertising on Websites Your People Frequent

12. Print Ads, Google Ads, Facebook Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Twitter Ads,Pinterest Ads

13. Selling Your Retreat from an Online Course or Workshop

14. Lecturing and Speaking



15. Video

16. Business and Coaching Sponsorships

17. Buying a List and Targeting Them

Pick which promotional activities make the most sense for your business and appeal the most to you and map out what you are doing month-by-month.

Sharing content, educating, and teaching is actually the BEST way to fill your trip no matter what venue you use to share that content – meaning it can be a podcast, webinar, freebie, Google Hangout, livecast, teleclass, summit, video series, live workshop or stage event – OR all of the above.

But thinking that you can fill your event simply by putting it on social media – I can tell you that won’t work all by itself. Today it’s about a concert of ongoing, sustained marketing – that shows you off as an expert in your field.



Oooo, doesn’t it feel good to have your trip planned, your website up and your promotion going full steam ahead?

In the last three months before departure, you’ll want to do a final marketing push since many folks tend to sign up in the last 30-60 days.

Now it’s time to prepare to meet your peeps! Being a prepared, organized facilitator inspires your folks to have confidence in you. Now that your retreat’s starting to fill, you are going to have a lot of coordinating and communicating to do!

Participant Tracking

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention just how important it is to be well prepared and organized for your trip. Your participants are taking a leap of faith – trusting that you’re competent and capable of taking them out of the country, booking them in hotels that aren’t flea-ridden and that you’re able to handle whatever logistical or emotional issues arise during your time together (and they always do!)

Obviously you must be able to keep track of all your little ducklings and I’m going to tell you how to do so, and that involves good clear communication.

Your participants are going to need to know the nitty-gritty details of what to bring, passport/visa requirements, where to meet, how to change money, how to get in touch with you, and of course what yummy snacks to bring!

You’ll need to be on top of your game - coordinating flights & transportation, figuring out who is rooming together or who wants a single, food preferences, passport numbers, and keeping track of all that information.

Three Months Before Departure



For every trip I offer, I use my handy-dandy Participant Tracking Template to keep everything you need to know about your participants in one place, from their personal information, flights, food preferences, emergency contacts (which you need to have on file), your rooming list, and so much more.

The more clearly you communicate and the more organized you are, the less of a headache you’ll have and the more confidence your participants will feel knowing that you’re prepared to take care of them on your retreat.

Now it’s really getting exciting! Your trip is almost here and it’s time to start packing and double-checking, making sure you print anything you need to bring on your retreat, and have everyone’s signed liability forms, registration forms, and payments in full.

Don’t forget to pack your essential handouts, gifts to your participants, post-course follow-up offer, and emergency contact info in your carry-on. There have been many times when my bags haven’t made it to my destination with me, so anything that is critical for your retreat needs to be in your carry-on!

And it’s always wise to put together a first aid kit to bring in case participants do not bring the items that you told them to from your packing list.

Now off you go to your fantastic destination retreat!

One Month Before Departure



Now imagine for a minute that you’ve just returned from helping a group of fabulous clients who are deeply interested in what you have to share and your gifts, transformations happened every day, and you worked with them in a beautiful place you’ve always dreamt of traveling to? Pretty amazing!

So now let’s make sure you reflect and follow-up from your trip so you can be even more successful and profitable next time.

You’ll want to confirm that you made the money you estimated you would on the trip (because you priced it properly, including everything, right?). It’s time to reconcile your trip and look over all of your pricing.

Review the surveys from your participants and decide what you can do even better next time, along with info on follow up programs. Make sure folks are on your newsletter list. And of course you’ll want to sincerely thank you participants for coming! Sending a beautiful card out with a group photo on it is a lovely gesture.

Before you know it, you’ll be ready to dive in and plan your next adventure!

After Your Retreat



Final Thoughts

So now you have an excellent foundation for creating an amazing transformational destination retreat – one that changes not only your life, but the lives of others! And with your Countdown Checklist at your fingertips, you have a monthly to-do list that’s all-inclusive.

If you’d like to learn more about what we do and who we are – we welcome you to join us in our “I Love Transformational Destination Retreats” Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ILoveTransformationalDestinationRetreats

I feel honored to assist you in creating the transformational destination retreat of your dreams and if I can help you in ANY way (with trip planning and booking, how to create a retreat training and coaching, etc) please feel free to contact me or anyone on my team. Thank you so much!

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ILoveTransformationalDestinationRetreats/



About Sheri

Dr. Sheri Rosenthal is a transformational business coach, international retreat leader and author. A former podiatric surgeon, Sheri left behind a successful practice, a surgical residency program which she personally designed and directed (and a couple of husbands) to find her life’s calling.

Along the road from doctor to coach, she spent eight years traveling, meditating and studying ancient traditions of spiritual evolution with don Miguel Ruiz. Sheri’s studies with don Miguel inspired her to write The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Toltec Wisdom, Banish Mind Spam! and several online e-courses – including the very popular Retreat Blueprint program.

Today, Sheri is known as one of the most sought after retreat strategists for coaches, facilitators and authors and is the owner of Journeys of the Spirit®, a boutique travel agency.

Through her travel company she’s planned and managed hundreds of transformational retreats for herself and for other facilitators. And if anyone knows the retreat business, Sheri does – she’s literally seen everything that can go right and wrong with these types of events!

Currently, she’s famous for helping clients plan, fill, and profit from transformational retreats that both change lives and add serious income to their bottom line!

You can find her and her great team at: www.wanderlustentrepreneur.com www.sherirosenthal.com and www.journeysofthespirit.com and www.luxurytraveljourneys.com


http://www.sherirosenthal.com


http://www.luxurytraveljourneys.com


the retreat countdown checklist & jumpstart · after running hundreds of retreats, both for...

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