172. We F*cked Up... Listening to Your Feedback - Interview with Tatianna Taylor-Tait

0:00Natalie Palmer:Hello, welcome, and thanks for checking in today to No Vacancy, the podcast. I'm your host, Natalie Palmer. I'm an Airbnb ambassador and 17-time superhost, and I've hosted over 1 ,000 reservations. I'm a stay-at-home mom of two and manage my eight listings remotely. My mission is to help new and experienced vacation rental hosts turn their listings into fully booked, profitable properties that can be managed from anywhere so you too can have no vacancies. If that sounds good to you, let's get right into the show.

0:52Natalie Palmer:Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another episode of No Vacancy, the podcast. I'm your host, Natalie Palmer, and this week I have back on my partner in crime, my international business partner, Tatiana Taylor-Tate. Nobody has heard from us together since we were on stage in March at Level Up Your Listing Summit, and we are in the thick of planning the 2026 Level Up Your Listing, March 29th through 31st, back in Phoenix, Arizona. And I thought it was about time we bring Tatiana back. We do a catch up on what's changed since you guys last heard from us together, what we're doing new for this year's summit.

1:29Natalie Palmer:Tatiana, your life is like completely different, mine too, but we've both like grown and changed so much since this March. It's crazy. So people have heard sort of like my new career shift. I'm doing capital raising, buying a camp, so many changes around here. I quit my coaching program. What's new with you? Well, first of all, it sounds like we want witness protection without lawyers. But no, there is a lot that's new. And it's so crazy to be like back already planning for our fourth year for Level Up. And to just see like how much you and I have grown is insane. There's been a lot. And I don't even know which one we could get started with.

2:15but what is it like?

2:17Natalie Palmer:It sucks is the biggest announcement of all that you have you can't even talk about. But give us the tease. Give us the tease that legally you're allowed to say. So biggest announcement that I am not allowed to talk about but I can tease with is that I have been working on a super special project, something that has been a dream of mine. And I can say that I may or may not be on a major network coming soon near to you. May or may not be. We didn't disclose anything. All in compliance with the NDAs, right? Yes. But it's been a whirlwind. Honestly, I am so grateful and so excited for what 2026 has in store, not only for me, but for you too.

3:15Natalie Palmer:Yeah, yeah. No, we've both been like you guys heard recently, I just went through a whole thing about why I've like not been on social media and you haven't either because you may or may not have been off filming something somewhere for some amount of time for some project that may be aired somewhere, maybe. so yes both of us have been like very mia on social media thank god we have our team to like pick up for level up because all the social posts like shout out to adrian he's killing it with like promoting the summit and everything and then we've got alicia doing our email marketing because you and i haven't said shit about this summit coming up even though we're very excited but yeah thank god we have our team to like pick up the slack um you kind of hey it's still like a brainchild of us our team is amazing but i'm pretty freaking excited about our theme this year that's one thing that i think is really it's bloomed so much from what it was in the beginning and i think this one's gonna be it's gonna take the cake yeah okay let's let's talk about the theme briefly so yeah in previous years if you guys have attended level up our theme has always just been like color like fun bold patterns and color but there's never been an actual theme around the summit and this year we were like I think it'd be fun to theme it out and on one of our team calls we kind of came up with like a space theme like an out of this world and I think at the time yeah at the time I think we came up with it more because it was like aesthetic like we were like oh we can do chromes and fun colors and it just gives us something to like fall back on but i actually think that that team that theme ended up being very like providential because it's so fitting now like you and i have both expanded so much outside of short-term rentals and the summit is going to reflect that like this this is so much more than just being an airbnb be host.

5:25Natalie Palmer:And yeah, we're really talking this year on focusing like how to really build a business, how to exit a business, positioning yourself to sell. What else are we talking about? What are other topics? We have, of course, financial literacy is always at the forefront of getting ourselves that way. And then we got some, of course, there's design, but there's going to be different areas of design this year and different topics things like you know if you want to import and export because that's something new in our lives as well from a different country so those are some of the topics that we want to do on top of that i feel like our speaker lineup is going to be amazing we have some heavy hitters coming to speak so it's gonna be a good year this is also the first year you guys that we are doing breakout workshops so previously if you've ever attended level up before you'll know that we always had one track of conferences the only exception was in the morning we do an optional wellness workshop so it would be like sound bath one day or like a meditative breathing or like a what do we have one year we had like that sports coach like the motivational speaker she was really good so we've always done like an optional wellness morning workshop but besides that it's always been one track one stage and this is the first year that we were like okay we think that we've got enough of a grasp on this that we can handle two tracks it's so much more work trying to balance two schedules and the movement of people from one room to another even just the space allowing for it it's also more expensive it's a whole other room we're paying for av costs and recording and building another stage so a lot more cost intensive.

7:12Natalie Palmer:But I think our feedback forums really showed that the one track is very good for like our high level motivational speakers, the people that can like really inspire a room. But when you want to learn something more targeted and specific to you, you want to break out in a smaller group for that. So I'm really excited that we're doing the breakout rooms. But because of that, our main stage lineup has shrunk so much. Like most of the sessions are going to be breakout workshops. So we only have a few slots for like dedicated keynote speakers. So yeah, we keep getting speaker pitches and we have to be very, very lean and picky this year.

7:54Natalie Palmer:So if you've submitted your name to be a speaker and haven't heard back from us yet, I'm sorry, but that's why we are so limited on the spots we can allow. This year though, I'm super excited. I feel like we have been, you know, every year we always look at how can we get better and we listen to the feedback forms more than ever we take those extremely seriously and yeah we were like how can we make level up feel like you just went through an intensive boot camp and got as much knowledge that you can implement right away as much as possible and that's where with these break like the breakouts they're going to be exactly that.

8:36Everything has to be tangible that you can apply right away. And it is going to be hard as I think about it and all the moving parts and logistics. But, you know, for our community, I feel like it's going to be so worth it. And selfishly, like I'm here to learn as well.

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9:30Natalie Palmer:i'm sad because you're only gonna be able to pick one like there can be two workshops going on at the same time and we will do the best job we can like if there's a workshop on like content creation we'll put that at the same time as like a tax workshop like hopefully those are different audiences but i feel like we're still not going to get it perfect there's going to be someone who sends an email and says i wanted to go to this one but it was at the same time is this and to that person I'm so sorry join join our membership so you can get the recordings and you can watch the ones you missed I don't know what else to say that's exactly and speaking of that we're switching things up for VIP this year yes I'm so pumped for this okay can we be like very transparent as to why I think people will appreciate the the authenticity here so previous years, our VIP, the biggest upsell of our VIP.

10:25Natalie Palmer:First of all, you get to skip the line at registration, you get a VIP swag bag, and then you get our lounge seating. So you get to be comfy and sit in our bougie little armchairs and couches at the front of the room. So that's kind of been the perk of VIP. But the big selling point was always that we had our offsite VIP happy hour. And it's a smaller, more intimate group, just with more high level people willing to pay more to shake hands. And this year, it was kind of frustrating at first, but I actually am really grateful that we have this problem. What we noticed last year was that there was so many people like speakers and sponsors that started hosting their own offsite happy hours on day two, the evening of when we always do our VIP party.

11:11Natalie Palmer:And I think that people realized like, oh, I don't need to pay extra for a VIP ticket when there's six different off-site happy hours to choose from to attend. And there was part of us that was like, this sucks. This is screwing over like our VIP ticket sales because people have so many options now on what they can attend. And I think that there's other people in this industry who would make a sponsor or a speaker like pay them a fee to host an offsite event. And we thought about doing that for like a split second. We were like, should we charge these people? Because this is crazy. This is like killing, like cutting into our business.

11:51Natalie Palmer:And then I think immediately Tatiana and I were like, no, like this is actually a great problem to have. Like the fact that our event has grown so much that we have multiple people willing to host their own offsite events during our summit. it like we couldn't have even dreamed of that happening year one when we built this so we don't want to mess with that at all so what we decided to do is we're like how do we reinvent vip to make the value more than just a happy hour cocktail hour where you have other options of what to attend so we have completely reinvented vip this year this is actually the first year hearing of this So Tatiana, what are we doing instead for our VIPs?

12:31Well, we did. I'm also sad, though, about the things that we couldn't do for VIP that we wanted to because of weather permitting.

12:40Natalie Palmer:I'm like, I will. I'll just say, you guys, we like, please, Mo, we try everything we can for you. We literally looked into doing hot air balloon ride dinners for our VIP party because we're like, we got to compete with all these free happy hours that people are hosting. so we literally tried to do hot air balloon ride dinners and they're closed because they said that march is like the windiest season in phoenix and they were like your hot air balloon will literally blow away and they're like who was tether it to the ground like we tried to argue we're like just just tether it and they were like no like even with a tether your hot air balloon will be blowing away like you cannot have dinner on a hot air balloon in windy season in the desert we swept festival kind of thing yeah so we had to let that dream go but like we try so hard for you guys okay so we had to scrap the hot air balloons but now instead of doing an evening happy hour so whether you buy vip or ga you will have your choice of like plenty of free vip or free happy hours to go to the evening of the summits like people will be hosting stuff for sure so what value are we providing to VIPs instead this year?

13:51Natalie Palmer:You want to take it away? Well, fill me in a bit if I'm missing anything, but we are actually going to do on the Sunday instead. So Sunday before our actual summit welcome party during the day, I believe we're going to do it at 11 a.m. till 2 p.m. We are actually going to host an off-site workshop. So it's a brunch and workshop where we're going to have a little bit even deeper of a dive. It is going to be a specific topic. We're still kind of in talks of the topic, but it will be high level and it's going to be a little bit more high level of an experience than just our happy hours that we've been doing on the typical Tuesday night.

14:42The swag bags this year are unreal for VIP. Like I'm talking like these swag bags are like valued at minimum. They're still growing, but.

14:53Natalie Palmer:Literal$100 of like full size bougie products. Like$600 worth, you know, like VIP full size swag that's going to be given to you at this workshop. We're going to have a couple of speakers talking throughout as well. And again, like I said, the topic is high level. This is something we haven't done before. I'm actually quite excited about it. And to like kick it off at the beginning of the summit, it's going to really allow all of our VIPs to be in the perfect mentality to really kind of like network and utilize this summit as much as possible throughout the rest of the days. Yeah, I think that that's what I'm the most excited for.

15:37Natalie Palmer:So when we decided to reinvent VIP, we realized and here I'll back up to if nobody's ever attended our summit before the schedule we always do is night one is our welcome party kicks off around 6 p.m. and that's kind of where everyone like meets and greets there's no education that night it's just super fun interactive all our sponsor booths are open so you can start learning about the tools out there but they all have like activations like cotton candy and braid babes doing hair temporary tattoos like it's just fun It's like a little festival. And then day two and day three are full day programming.

16:11Natalie Palmer:And our VIP happy hour has always been the evening of day two. And so we wanted to make sure that we left that open for you guys to like go do or attend like one of these other free events that we know people will be hosting. So when we looked at where to move our VIP exclusive event, we figured let's do it day one before the welcome party kicks off. And I'm actually so excited for this because now I feel like our VIPs are going to walk into the welcome party already having we limit we cap VIP at 35 tickets you're going to walk in already having 34 other like close friends that you spend the whole half day with like bonding networking workshopping with like it's just going to be such a tight-knit group that walks in you're going to already have gotten your swag earlier um you're going to have sat through like an intensive workshop and yeah I just can't wait for them to like I think that this the experience for VIPs this year is going to be completely different instead of waiting until the evening of day two to like meet your tight-knit group you're going to walk in like already with those relationships and networking it's going to be so good so it'll be like a brunch like a half-day brunch workshop day one before you ever like come to the welcome party or anything and right now what we're thinking of is that the topic will be focused around building a company to sell.

17:34Natalie Palmer:So what we want to do is make sure that it's tailored to whatever you guys are doing. So if you're trying to build a property management company to sell, if you're thinking of selling your short-term rental portfolio one day, if you want to sell an interior design firm or start a brokerage, maybe you're a realtor and you want to start a brokerage, you can sell. You can take this so many directions. We're going to keep it broad enough that no matter what your little niche is, you'll get value out of it. But we're thinking that that's kind of the next step for somebody who's been through short-term rentals, been through real estate investing, and now they're really trying to build something that they can sell or exit one day.

18:12And even if you don't want to, if you don't think you're ever going to sell or exit, like even just the knowledge and like how to reverse engineer that is so valuable in so many ways.

18:22Natalie Palmer:Yeah. Yeah. This is going to be so good. Yeah. So if that sounds like more your style and you don't just need a reason to have a few extra cocktails one evening, like if you would rather sit down and meet the 34 other VIPs and really connect and build those bonds, learn something valuable, spend the morning having a nice bougie brunch, get your VIP swag. If that sounds like your style this year, then reconsider VIP if you have written it off in previous years. If you already got your GA ticket, send us an email and we will happily upgrade you. But yeah, more to come on that. More to come. There will be also like little added things throughout the summit that benefit VIPs a lot more than the past years as well.

19:07So stay tuned for those. Those will get updated on the website and throughout the event as well.

19:13Natalie Palmer:Yeah. Yeah. Overall, how are you feeling about this year's upcoming summit? We did our out of space theme because we're going, we're exploring a new frontier beyond short term rentals. We're going out of this world. We've totally revamped VIP. We've totally revamped our schedule by doing breakout workshops. How do you feel about like sponsorships, like speakers, attendees, like all of this stuff that we have locked in? Honestly, it feels really good. It's been like thinking back to when you and I just like started this and we had to convince people yeah that was going to be a great summit we had to like you know sponsors before didn't even believe us to like well you have nothing to compare it to or like trust us we give you our word but it'd be really cute just spend your money with us yeah but no at this point it is so cool and like beyond me to think that we've built such an amazing community, a loyal community, and just the brand itself.

20:20We, Natalie and I have stuck by, you know, our beliefs and our morals and values of this brand. We have not tried to sell out or anything like that. And I think at the end of the day, that's what makes the difference that we're true to the brand, we're true to our values and what the summit represents. And we just want to continue to grow that and, you know, educate women and people and entrepreneurs in the industry on, you know, how we can all grow professionally and personally. That's the one thing we are. We do not forget about the personal and the mental and wellness portions of it, because that is a huge factor in being an entrepreneur.

21:06So even just the fact that we are one of the summits that lean into that heavily, I feel like, I don't know, we've built something that I love. And it doesn't feel like even though it is hard, some days, most days, you know, it doesn't feel like work, it feels like something that is just like, naturally, something that we have to do. I don't know, I don't look at it like as like, oh no, I have to plan this. It's something we look forward to attending ourselves every year.

21:39Natalie Palmer:Yeah, and I don't know about you, but I feel like it's gotten so much easier this year too. Like a lot of the logistics have been in place. Like we're using the same venue as last year. We loved our catering company. So we'll stick with them. Loyal to our AV team, loyal to our install team. So like we have so many of our vendors in place now. So that's been easier. But even like, guys, we are way ahead on ticket sales than we've been at this point in previous years. Sponsorship, we are way ahead. Is it just me or has this been the easiest year to sell sponsorships? I feel like past years, it was like multiple follow-ups with people.

22:15Natalie Palmer:And this year we're getting on like 10 minute calls and sponsors are like, yep, send an invoice. Tell me where to sign. We'll pay in full. And we're just like, okay, great. Like they're coming to us for the first time. It's so nice. it feels it feels really good to just be recognized and appreciated for like what we the work that we've done and what we've put out there it is working again i just am so appreciative of the people that stand by us because there would be no summit without the community without these sponsors that are willing to take a leap of faith on us every year because like it still is like even though we know what we're putting out every year's a leap of faith who knows what's going to happen you know and we're blessed and very lucky to be doing something like this it's very exciting and I think this year with how much like we're trying to go all out so I don't know this year I'm I'm so excited to see what the whole event will look like and what you know Natalie and I have a vision that we kind of put forth to our team and I feel like our team gets it more than ever now so to see I'm excited to see what our concept for our stage is this year and like everything that will be to kind of grab people's attention throughout I am excited about the activations this year it's we're not playing you guys that's just touch on have you thought about your outfits yet like are we going like xenon like are we doing like outer space chrome galactic like what are we what are we doing that's the whole thing of itself yeah no chrome would be cool i'm just thinking about that too i was like i have absolutely no idea i'm lucky this has happened to me two years in a row where I've like ordered an extra outfit panicking last minute and then it never shows up on time so like I've been able to like reuse a past outfit for this year yeah so there's one I got one outfit that I'll be able to apply I think our colors still go but um I don't know it'll be cool I feel like we need to do like euphoria makeup or something okay I'm gonna have to hire a makeup artist for that that's send out the palette so everyone knows because like all the attendees love to dress the theme too yeah so i think you're gonna need to send out some outfit ideas we should do that we should do that we should send out an email with like a whole pinterest mood board of like what to wear what to pack and again you guys you do not have to like get into theme here like the main point of this is networking and education but But if you're a little bit extra like we are and you want to come all out, we will provide you the inspiration you need to knock it out of the park.

25:22Oh, goodness. It's going to be so good. And I feel like it was interesting this year also, you know, gathering feedback and from friends in the industry at the same time, just seeing what people are actually interested in, where the direction of the short-term rental industry and real estate investing, what that's looking like. more than ever. So, you know, obviously people are always going to be interested in boutique hotels and investing in things like that. But we're trying to think a little bit outside of the box here and come up with some more creative ways for you to be investing your money and building your portfolio.

25:59Natalie Palmer:Yeah, I'm really excited. I know for sure, like I want to host a workshop on being a passive investor. I feel like that's something we haven't talked about really in the past. It's the audience we've attracted has really been like operators, like people doing the being in the thick of it. And I think it will be really cool this year to talk about, hey, maybe now you've come into some wealth, like you've been doing this for a few years, and maybe you're feeling a little bit of burnout. How can you continue investing more on the passive side? I know for you, again, we still can't say much about where you were or were not this summer and what may or may not be airing next year.

26:37Natalie Palmer:But like you have so much you can speak to now on like building a brand and positioning yourself. And it's just gone so far beyond. Yeah, like how to tweak your Airbnb listing. Like our audience is so far past that. And hey, we may still do a deep dive workshop on those fundamentals. But at this point, it's like if you need help in that, you can go just to that workshop. And we know that our main stage sessions are going to be so much more like inspiring for the next phase of your business, especially our VIP workshops. And I think like, honestly, if it wasn't for level up and like seeing, like just even attending the event, no matter like we've had other designers, we've had real estate professionals, as you've said, and, you know, hosts in the industry, all at different phases.

27:25But if even for me, if I didn't attend level up and see what is actually possible. Like it is such a different realm. Like you step into this space where literally anything's possible. You are inspired by everyone that is surrounding you. And it shows just like even where you and I are. I don't think you and I could have predicted what we would be doing. If you asked us at the beginning, there's no way we would be saying this. Like, I feel like, yeah, you would have maybe been saying like, oh, I'll have a course. But I don't think you'd be saying that you've left your course and in this direction.

28:10You know, it's, it's mind blowing to see because we think that we like, here's the path, I got to follow this to get from A to B. And we all think that in the industry. But I've kind of like gone rogue. And I'm like willy nilly. If people ask me like what's your plan i ain't got no plan because it doesn't work that way but it is interesting to see once you get to you know if we want to call it a playing field like once you get to a different level of what you can see around you that is possible then it opens up so many doors like the things that i'm thinking about now are so different than who i was a year two years ago And that is what I think is really, you know, the message behind Level Up is how can we continue to grow and be better and better ourselves and our family lives and things like that.

29:11And I don't know that this event is like it's going to sound cheesy, but there is a magic about this event and what we put on and the people that attend, like even thinking about our rising stars last year. they are slight years beyond where they were last year and they were like receiving awards from us like that is crazy to think about and you know we know people we've had our eye on a couple of

29:43Natalie Palmer:people we already have a short list going for next year's rising stars so oh i can't wait we just keep stalking everybody and we're like okay like we only have four like we only have four response to Kim who's going to make the cut but there's like it's it's something in the air there's a fire beneath everyone that attends this event and really just like the motivation the support that is given throughout the community it is so contagious and inspiring like I I don't know I'm excited. I'm due for the level up. I miss it. And just being surrounded by, you know, that community is so powerful. And I think it gives you the ability to think things are possible that you never would have thought of.

30:32Natalie Palmer:Yeah, no, I need this summit like for myself. There's no way I would be telling you guys that we're buying a summer camp if I hadn't heard from like Isaac French on our own stage last year seth and tori bolt heather blankenship like our own speakers that we pick we pick them because tatiana and i are like wait i want to learn from them so yeah it's just so like full circle like to like i don't know you and i are like each other's rising stars like i nominate you i've seen how much you've grown yeah i feel the same way but like we are we're walking the walk alongside you guys. Like, yes, we planned this event, but you know, this, this is also to like help us and like our goals and our businesses.

31:17Natalie Palmer:And we, we pick speakers and sessions and workshop topics that we also really want to learn about. And we're in those sessions, like learning it and putting everything into action. What are you doing next week? That's so exciting. Where do you go on Saturday? So this might be something that we talk about at the summit, because I feel like it is a hot topic of interest to people, especially if you are building or fully furnishing properties. I am going with a client. We are building a micro resort for him. So we are actually sourcing all materials and furniture from China. So I will be flying this Saturday to China to meet with all of our suppliers and look at importing everything which to be honest the numbers do not lie it makes sense even with the shipping we're looking at like one tenth of what it costs out here wait i actually was going to ask you this because by the time you guys like pay for your flights there and the client is paying for you to travel right like covering your flights and everything then you guys are staying there and then you have to ship everything back i was like trying to do the math in my head And I was like, can you just order on Alibaba?