Stories of Change & Creativity

How to build a Creative Career with Kelsey Graves

• Professor Judy Oskam • Episode 76

Share episode

What if a career change could unlock your creativity and transform your life? That's what happened to Content Creator and Podcaster Kelsey Graves.  She is the creator and host of the Trip Tales podcast. 

Kelsey inspires listeners with her journey from marketing to content creation. During our conversation, Kelsey showcases the power of embracing change while nurturing creativity. She shares her experiences of manifesting dreams, family travel adventures, and navigating the gig economy.  Kelsey encourages others to take baby steps towards their passions. 

In this episode, you will learn: 

• How Kelsey pivoted her career from advertising to social media 
• The importance of transferable skills 
• How to find your passion and make a career work for your lifestyle
• The significance of manifestation resulting in a memorable trip to a Taylor Swift concert
• How you can use social media to engage authentically with your audience
• The importance of taking baby steps to move your career forward
• Social media tips to promote your online brand

Kelsey's Bio:

Kelsey Graves is the host of the Trip Tales Podcast, where she shares real travel stories and inspires her engaged community of travel lovers. A mom of three and a seasoned travel content creator, Kelsey has spent 12 years turning her passion for exploration into a thriving career. With a dedicated following on Instagram at @kelsey_graves, she shares vacation destinations, family travel tips, and viral travel Reels that drive real bookings and vacation plans. Kelsey's work has lead her to partner with top brands like JW Marriott, Dollywood, and Dagne Dover, making her a trusted voice in the travel industry.

Kelsey Graves website:
https://www.triptalespodcast.com/

You can listen to our Amsterdam Taylor Swift trip interview here.  Kelsey interviews me and Wendy Conklin of Chair Whimsy about our adventure.  


Thanks for listening! Please send me your feedback in a text message -


If you’re enjoying Stories of Change and Creativity, make sure to subscribe, rate, and leave a review—it helps more people discover the show. Here’s to a year full of change and creativity.

Judy Oskam:

Have you ever wanted to pivot your career, make a change, take a leap into your true passion, maybe go a different direction? Well, this episode is for you. Welcome to Stories of Change and Creativity. I'm your host, Judy Oskam. I'm a university professor at Texas State University and I love interviewing interesting people about their creative journey. On this episode, I talk with content creator and seasoned traveler, Kelsey Graves. Kelsey is the host of the Trip Tales podcast, where she shares real travel stories and inspires her engaged community of travel lovers travel lovers like me. Kelsey and her husband have a busy life with three kids. She spent 12 years turning her passion for exploration into a thriving career. During our conversation, we talk about why it's okay to change directions. We discuss Kelsey's path to podcasting and how manifesting her best life led her to the Taylor Swift concert. Well, I hope you enjoy our conversation.

Kelsey Graves:

Well, it's definitely quite a zigzag of a story, but I will shorten it too. I started in advertising and marketing. That was like my first career, real job out of college. I was in Chicago and I worked for OMD, which was a big media buying agency, and so I kind of learned the digital marketing world there. And then I moved into more of the digital magazine space. So when I started there wasn't as much social media happening a little bit here and there but there were still magazines, but they were turning to online. So I was working for Better Homes and Gardens online, fitness Magazine online and I was selling ad space on those websites to big companies like General Mills and Kimberly-Clark. So I liked all that quite a bit I really did.

Kelsey Graves:

But I've always had this content creator side in me, even before. When I was a kid, I would be constantly videoing things or taking pictures of things and making them look really pretty, almost editorial. So I was always trying to capture stories in some way and put it out there in a creative way. I just didn't know what to do with that and I don't think really colleges back then didn't know what to do with that. They're doing a much better job now with lots of different classes.

Kelsey Graves:

But back then, you know, I just kind of majored in marketing and journalism and my classes were like, here's how you write a radio spot and it's like what am I going to do with that? I mean maybe I would have gotten into radio, but and it's like what am I going to do with that? I mean, maybe I would have gotten into radio, but anyhow, when I had my first child 12 years ago, I decided I wanted to have some flexibility. I didn't want.

Kelsey Graves:

I was traveling a ton in these online sales roles and you know, up at 5 AM off to New York city, and that was super fun for my twenties, for sure. But when I decided to have a kid I was like, okay, I want to stay, have the flexibility to be home, but still do something creative and make some money from it honestly. And so I started a website called we Heart Parties and this was my first foray into the content creation world. I loved parties. I loved super themed first birthday parties, baby showers, bridal showers, just all that creativity that came with parties. This was before Pinterest.

Kelsey Graves:

I guess, if I was a little bit smarter, I could have created a Pinterest, but I just created a website where I was sharing all these party ideas. It was kind of like a blog style. But what I did is I created a component which was really hard I had a web developer help me where other people could upload their parties too, so it wasn't just me trying to create this content weekly, other people could upload it and then they had their own little slideshow of this was my son's first birthday party, monster jam, whatever and so it became a little platform and community of all these party people sharing their ideas. That's where I launched my Instagram account from. If you scroll way back in my Instagram account, it's party ideas, right, right. So I did that for a while, really loved it, kind of got my feet wet in how to grow an online account, how to take pictures and create content, and then I just got burnt out from parties.

Kelsey Graves:

I was working with brands. I was doing party scapes for Oriental Trading Company or Chinette, the disposable plate company. So I was doing some sponsored stuff and making some money, but that was a lot of stuff in my house, a lot of just junk. At the end of the day, I actually started feeling so wasteful because I would get all this stuff shipped to me. I would set up a whole party and then it's like what are you doing? I still remember that it was a Peppa Pig party that pushed me over the edge. I was like no more parties and my husband also was like this is a lot Like we just had boxes and boxes and you know, things just run its course. And that's something I wanted to talk about today is not being afraid to say, okay, I'm going to go in a different direction and it's okay. And even though I built this audience around parties, you know it's okay to say I'm done with parties and I'm done with this account. So I slowly just kind of stopped the party content, kind of just kept it up with lifestyle stuff.

Kelsey Graves:

And what I really started to do then was I had a friend approach me and say, hey, would you ever do social media and all this stuff you're doing for a company Like for us? They had a really cool boutique in a super adorable town that I lived in at the time called Newberry Port, massachusetts, up in Boston, and so I said, sure, I'll try it. I've never done it for somebody else before, but that worked really well and I did that for about five years where I there was a point where I was running from six to 10 other businesses Instagram accounts, facebook accounts, all their content. I would go in and do cool videos and make all the fun little TikToks and that was like the most lucrative time of my career, because people need that and, as you know, it's a full-time job to try to keep up with the social media stuff, to try to promote your own business.

Kelsey Graves:

For some people it's really hard to talk about their own business and brand. For some reason, they don't like to brag on themselves. It doesn't feel natural. So for someone else to come in and say, tell me about your awesome business.

Kelsey Graves:

I'm going to do this super cool video for you. People really like that. So that was a great time in my career. It just got to be a lot.

Kelsey Graves:

Social media never sleeps. People's businesses never sleep. So I'm constantly getting texts hey, can you post this? Hey, we're going to have a sale tomorrow. Oh, my gosh, it's a snow day. We're closed. Can you post this? And I did.

Kelsey Graves:

But it got to a point again where I was just like this is feeling like too much. So I slowly unwinded that a bit. I still do a couple companies here and there seasonally for different things, just because I'm so ingrained that it's like, okay, it'd be easier for me to just do this for you than hire somebody else. But that is a great way to make money if you're good at doing that sort of thing. But so, to make a long story long I guess, I then finally started looking at what was working on my social media accounts. What am I passionate about? What do I really want to hone in here on and narrow down my niche? And I started looking back at some of the social media stuff I'd done, and it was always travel. It was always our family trips, our travel tips, and I wasn't necessarily a travel expert or in the travel world at that point.

Kelsey Graves:

But I thought, what if I narrow down super narrow, because everything I read and heard was like get as narrow as possible when you're trying to create some sort of content and I just jumped into travel full about a year ago, maybe two years ago on the social media, and in February of this year for the podcast, and it just kind of happened. Sometimes I think things come to us more than we chase them and I just got this idea. That was like I love listening to podcasts about travel. There's really none out there for me right now that was doing super relatable family travel stuff that's like not necessarily here's how to fly around the world on points that stuff's awesome too, but just a real story like here's where we went, here's how to fly around the world on points that stuff's awesome too, but just a real story, like here's where we went, here's where we stayed.

Kelsey Graves:

So I just started taking the baby steps and learning how to create a podcast which, as you know, hundreds of thousands of people are doing it. But at the very beginning it's a little like how do I actually get this on Apple Podcasts? It takes a minute to get it all set up. But then I just did it and I launched it and it's going well and people are resonating with it and it's called Trip Tales, so it's just about people's trips. If you want to go to Florida, maybe you'll get an idea about a great resort, but it's morphed into something else now, too, called. We have a Trip Fails series, which is super fun because there are people who have shared hey, this one trip actually went horribly wrong for me and they're really fun and funny episodes and it helps people not make the same mistakes. Exactly, exactly.

Kelsey Graves:

That's kind of me in a nutshell which is a lot of stuff.

Judy Oskam:

I love that, and I love how you talked about transitioning and being open to change, because this podcast is about change and creativity and you've got both right. So I think that's great. But you've got three kids. I have three kids, yes, and a happy marriage. You say yes.

Kelsey Graves:

I love that there's a lot going on at home as well, which is fun because I can pop off a podcast and go to the school lunch if there's an event going on and then come back home and dive back into my things. So I do have a lot of flexibility, which I think comes in the creative world, and I do believe I may have some sort of a undiagnosed ADD. I think all creatives might that I'm figuring out now in my forties, but I do just kind of like bounce around, like my brain just kind of bounces around, but it works out at the end of the day and I get all my stuff done, yeah, and that energy and that empowers you to keep going and you find another path or you find a new story.

Judy Oskam:

And if you're like me, I mean I found you through Buzzsprout. Both of us use that as our hosting site and there was a exchange some ideas. So Wendy and I were on your podcast and I appreciate that and I love how you're open to kind of telling all these different types of stories.

Kelsey Graves:

Yes, you guys should go listen to her episode. Judy's episode on my podcast is about her and her best friend's mother-daughter trip to Amsterdam to see Taylor Swift, which is just such a fun episode it's fun. It's fun because you learn tips about traveling to Amsterdam, which is helpful for a lot of people, but then you also get the Taylor Swift component, which is fun as well.

Judy Oskam:

Yeah Well, speaking of Taylor Swift, so let's talk about that a little bit. You told us when we did our conversation oh, I'd really love to go to the concert. Where are you on that? What have you done? Have you had a chance to see Taylor I?

Kelsey Graves:

went. I went. It was so exciting. So when they were on, I mean I'm a huge Swifty. I've loved all the albums, I love Taylor Swift. I've tried to get tickets when she was in Nashville. It was just obviously so expensive and so complicated and I was telling them in their episode I really want to try to go to this Heiress tour, but I don't know if it's going to happen. Don't know if it's going to happen. Well, this is kind of a fun story. I do believe a bit in manifestation and affirmations and speaking things that you want to happen, because words are powerful and it can change your brain chemistry and it can just move things in different directions. It can.

Kelsey Graves:

I totally agree with you and it keeps you open for the world right, yes, and so in August 2023, so well over a year ago I wrote in my notes app I went to the Taylor Swift Eras concert in Indianapolis. It was amazing. I even snagged a t-shirt. I have a screenshot of it. I wrote that down in August 2023. Well, you know, fast forward a whole year. I still haven't gone to the Eras tour.

Kelsey Graves:

She's coming to Indianapolis. I'm from Indianapolis, born and raised. I live in Nashville, so Indianapolis is just a short four to five hour drive. My parents are there. They have a house there that I could stay in. I was just like I've got to get to this concert. Tickets are $2,000 to $3,000. I could not make that happen and it was the weekend she was coming. It was Thursday or Friday of the weekend. She was going to be in Indianapolis and I posted on my Instagram last call putting this out in the universe If anyone even comes across a single ticket, I will drive up and go by myself. I won't even put on a cute outfit, I will just get to the venue.

Kelsey Graves:

Well, my sweet dad who's one of the most amazing people on the planet and really I think that's where I get my creativity and my spontaneity and my risk-taking from him, because he's always been an entrepreneur. He always is out to kind of do the fun thing. But I wasn't expecting him to buy me Taylor Swift tickets by any means. Well, he started kind of getting a little bit of this FOMO, I think this huge stars. In my town I've got a lot of friends whose kids are going looking around and he's really busy. He runs two companies so he wasn't even it wasn't on his radar to look for tickets. Well, he is starting to text my sister and I. My sister lives in Boise, idaho, and he's going hey, I think I can get two tickets, allie, could you fly in. And then he texts back oh my gosh, I lost them. I mean, you tried to get tickets, you know.

Judy Oskam:

That's why we went to Amsterdam.

Kelsey Graves:

Yeah, it was a complicated thing. And then he texts us out of the blue and says I bought four tickets. And I am just like, is this real? Is it all still feels like a dream. So I'm like, oh my gosh, I've got to find something sparkly and get my 12-year-old out of school and we're driving to Indianapolis and my sister's like I got to get a flight from Boise, idaho, to Indianapolis, but we'll fly anywhere for Taylor Swift. And so we all get to Indianapolis and it's a whirlwind and we change into our sparkles, we put glitter on our face and we have a bunch.

Kelsey Graves:

It was the most happy, joyful, lovely experience. The police officers were there on horses that had friendship bracelets draped around their necks, gorgeous, huge friendship bracelets. The police officers were exchanging friendship bracelets with people. Everybody was, you know, dressed to the nines and whatever they felt the most swifty and comfortable in, and we had the time of our lives just singing every song. And I have all these videos and it honestly still feels like a dream, because it's such an epic show that really feels like once in a lifetime. And the biggest joke was my dad saw the Beatles for his first concert when he was young and he's never forgotten that and he's never stopped talking about that. So my daughter and my sister's daughter first concert now was Taylor Swift, which he was a part of, and we were like that's amazing. You can tell that for the rest of your life and this might be your first concert, might be your best concert for the rest of your life.

Kelsey Graves:

So the bar was set a little high, Sure sure concert for the rest of your life.

Judy Oskam:

So the bar was set a little high. Sure, sure, I love that. That's amazing. Well, and, and you know, Kelsey, what does that say about taking the chance and just putting, putting the word out there and then being ready to just pick up and go?

Kelsey Graves:

Yes, I believe that that is part of manifestation, all the things I think Oprah once said. You know, there's no luck. It's where preparation meets opportunity, and it's true. Like you know, I was prepared, I had a sparkly dress, I was ready to drive. I'm not afraid to drop everything and go. Honey, husband, you're in charge of these two and we're going to go this way for just 24 hours and, yeah, I do think putting stuff out there and just being ready for what's next, whether that's a career decision or an amazing experience, you know, like a concert, that's a fun way to live.

Judy Oskam:

Well, and the idea of experiential learning and going with the experience. You really go there for the experience.

Kelsey Graves:

It's more than just listening to music right ? Agreed, and I'm big with that on my kids, especially with the travel stuff. It's like you got listening to music Agreed, and I'm big with that on my kids, especially with the travel stuff. It's like you got to go places to see things. You've got to go places to see how other people live. It opens parts of your brain that you just can't do if you don't go and see and experience, which is a huge part of why I love to travel. Our kids were littler for the longest time and we did the typical go down to Florida, an easy trip, meet up with the grandparents. And now it's like, oh my gosh, they're a little older and I'm like, okay, we're doing New York city. And then I'm like, what's next? We're going to go out of the country. Like I want them to see the world and experience things.

Judy Oskam:

I love that. Well, and in my program at Texas State we started the education abroad and the study abroad because we think it's so valuable to get students into another culture, to see and just learn. Some of our students had never been on a plane before, so my faculty would work with them on. What do you do at the airport? You walk through this security thing. How do you do that? But once they go, it changes their world you know, yes, 100%.

Kelsey Graves:

And that's something that I'm doing now with my oldest, who's 12, is, anytime we travel now I'll go. Okay, you get us to the gate, like I'll go, where do we go now? And I'll let her lead us through security, because that's a big part of travel and you know they'll know how to travel because we're taking them all these places. But it is fun to say why don't you try to get us there? Do we need to take the little plane train? Do we need to? And let them lead the way, which is really fun to see as well.

Judy Oskam:

I think that's great. And my youngest daughter's 23 and she just got back from a solo trip to Japan and she found a really cheap ticket from LA and so she booked everything, did a solo trip. She met a friend over there but she didn't stay. She stayed solo. I was worried the whole time, but you know, I mean just to give. She had her Apple Maps, which sometimes don't work so well in foreign countries, so that was another thing. But well, look ahead and talk a little about the content that you're looking at sharing in the future. I did hear your trip fails and I think that's a great series idea to do. What are you looking to do and how do you want to connect with your audience? Moving forward.

Kelsey Graves:

So it started as just trip tales and we're going to have a guest on and share about a trip and people are going to get practical information and be able to either go on a mini vacation during their day hearing about someone else's trip or they're going to be able to get practical tips to plan their own trip. And it's slowly starting to evolve as the community is starting to build and people are starting to listen to more episodes where it's becoming almost more of like a conversation. And so, for an example, one of my friends reached out to me, so this was after I shared I went on a Disney cruise. It didn't go so well. It's a hilarious episode, you can listen to it, but we got stuck at sea for two extra days because Hurricane Milton had hit Florida and closed the Orlando port and I wasn't so sure about cruising. We weren't sure if we were a cruising family and basically everything that could have gone wrong went wrong. Like you can listen to the episode, but it's motion sickness, stomach bugs, getting stuck at sea, not really wanting to be on the ship anymore and just kind of being tossed and turned in the waves. So, anyways, I was sharing that story very authentically. I think that's where this whole thing is working is being very open, not painting a sugary picture of our Disney cruise and just making a pretty Instagram reel about it, but saying this actually didn't work so well for us and sharing our real story.

Kelsey Graves:

And a fellow podcaster sent me a voice memo and she said Kelsey, I was hooked. I was on the edge of my seat that entire episode. I was like what's going to happen next on this cruise? How long are you going to be stuck here? I loved the rawness of it so much. She goes. I can't help but think you should do trip fails, she goes, trip tails, trip fails. It rhymes and I was like oh my gosh, you're right, that is so fun. So, without knowing it, the Disney cruise episode was my first trip fail. Anyhow, fast forward to, one of my friends reaches out to me and she says oh my gosh, I had a trip fail. She goes.

Kelsey Graves:

We went to the super famous beaches Turks and Caicos and she goes. On Instagram everybody's raving about it. It's so glowy and shiny and she goes. We had a completely opposite experience. There was all this rundown stuff. Our room was run down. The service was horrible. We didn't like the food. She goes. We spent so much money on this trip and we were like are we missing something? So she was like can I come on and share about it? And I was like a little like well, here goes my opportunity to get a hosted stay at Beaches, Turks and Caicos.

Kelsey Graves:

Then I did an Instagram reel about it, which I'd also love to talk a bit about how I kind of learned how to get Instagram reels and stuff to go viral to promote whatever it is you're doing. So I do an Instagram reel. It goes viral and people are fighting in the comments Not negative, but I love Beaches, turks and Caicos. We had the same experience. Everything has run down. No, no, no, we had the best experience. We had the same experience. Everything has run down. No, no, no, we had the best experience. Blah, blah, blah, blah, back and forth.

Kelsey Graves:

So I end up getting two DMs. One is from someone I know who said we've been twice, we love it and we're booked for a third time. She goes I was so disheartened to hear about your friend's trip. And then a travel agent who has quite a big following on Instagram, like a pretty renowned travel agent, gets all worked up and voice memos me. A 10 minute voice memo. Oh man, this was inaccurate, this isn't right. Blah, blah, blah and I was like okay, I hear both of you. Why don't we do another episode? Let's keep this conversation going. I would love to have you two on. I'm not here to say no one should go to beaches, turks and Caicos. By any means, I've never been there, so we have a rebuttal episode coming about. Why Beaches, Turks and Caicos is amazing, I love it.

Kelsey Graves:

Where I'm at is just kind of like everybody has their own experiences and their own perspectives, and people might pick up on a certain person and say I think I resonate with that person more and I'm gonna trust their opinion. Or they might say you know, these people are saying look past the parts that are run down, there's so much beauty in this place. And I resonate with them. So I'm basically open to where the community conversation is ebbing and flowing. At first I thought it was going to be all family travel. Sure, but similar to what you said about your daughter, one of my best friends just took a solo trip to Paris because she wanted to go to Paris. It's so hard to coordinate all the childcare with the kids and if the husband's going to go and all the things. She needed a breath and a break. And she went for three nights and I was like should?

Kelsey Graves:

I go somewhere alone at this moment I know, so I want to have her on to share about why she did it. It's a story and it's people's experiences and I do have episodes booked out. We're doing a lot of ski trip, family ski trip stuff but really where I want to take it is wherever the conversation goes, and we can have positives and we can have negatives, and it's okay because it's all just part of the story I love that.

Judy Oskam:

That's where it's headed and I love that, and I am following you on Instagram and that's how I was worried about you guys. Are you going to get off of the ship? That's how I was worried about you guys. Are you going to get off of the ship?

Kelsey Graves:

I was kind of worried about that.

Judy Oskam:

Talk about your Instagram and how you are using that to kind of communicate the message.

Kelsey Graves:

Yes. So Instagram has been a huge driver for me ever since I did the party ideas thing and I've built the audience over time. But recently, when I really niched down, is when it is taking off, and I've heard this over and over and over again. There's plenty of people sharing everything there is to share on Instagram If you really want to, and there's no reason to have a ton of followers. I think people chase followers just because that's what you do, but you'll never be satisfied in the amount of followers you have.

Kelsey Graves:

If you're trying to build an account, I promise you, I tried to get to 1K. I got there. Then I wanted 10K. I got to 10K, I wanted 20K. I'm at 50K now. That would have been blowing my mind five years ago and now I'm like well, I need to get to 100K. So I try to keep that in check and be like it doesn't matter, there's people with 25 million, there's people with 1,000. That part doesn't matter. It's speaking to your community and providing things of value to the people that are already there.

Kelsey Graves:

Sometimes I say, if you think about all the people who follow you on Instagram being in a room, if there were 800 people or 2,000 people in a room being like what did you want to say? And you're like, oh hi, that's a lot of people that you can talk to. So think about those people, don't think about the people that you're going to try to get. So start there and then know your niche, niche down super far and it only takes about six posts nine really before your Instagram feed looks super niched up because all you can see when you go to see someone's page is nine little photos. So mine is very cohesive. It's very travel.

Kelsey Graves:

I have the same little kind of text box on the front of every post so that it all looks the same oh, if I click on this one, I'm going to learn about the Bahamas. If I click on this one, I'm going to learn about a Disney cruise. But the real way right now to kind of go viral, I would say, where you can drive someone to, you know, for our purposes, a podcast episode is by. I have this little theory and it's working over and over again is you got to hook them? So you have to say something in the first two seconds that are going to make someone stay and watch, because people are just swiping like this so fast. So the hook is normally like I can't gatekeep this resort or you're never going to believe what happened, or a big one right now with the trip fails, is unpopular opinion. Those types of things that say, oh, and you can Google.

Judy Oskam:

Yeah, you can use ChatGPT. ChatGPT. Yeah, yeah.

Kelsey Graves:

Yeah, and then you give them something valuable quickly. You don't need it's not a podcast, it's not 30 minutes you give them. You know I'll say most people out there love Disney cruises, but for us we had a slightly different experience. If you've ever wondered if you're a cruising family and then you end with a call to action, very clear call to action because you have to tell people what to do. If not, they're swiping. You know they're doom scrolling for two hours.

Kelsey Graves:

You say comment below or send this to a friend or like this post. You literally tell them what you want them to do. It sounds kind of silly the first couple of times. You do it, but people do it. And then my favorite tool right now, the best tool that's working for me, is called LinkDM. It's LinkDMcom and it's this website that allows you to. If someone comments something on your post, you can set up these little triggers where it will automatically DM them something. So I say I share all about this.

Kelsey Graves:

On episode 32 of my Trip Tales podcast, comment Disney below and I will send you the episode. So if someone comments Disney, I've set it up through this website that you join where if someone comments Disney on that post, they automatically get sent the link to my podcast. You can send any link you want. You could do a website link. I do the Apple podcast link because 90% of my listeners are Apple podcast and they can click right there and it opens in the podcast app. So it's just, I've seen a couple of mine go viral a Marco Island Florida one and Disney Wish and my listens go up super high because people are, oh, wish, okay, now it's in my phone, it's in my hand, the episode, and they can click right over.

Kelsey Graves:

It's not, you know, I'm not like necessarily going to gain tons and tons of subscribers and that people might listen and then never find me again this way. But I'm sure there's some conversion where 5% are saying, oh, I kind of liked that episode, I'll subscribe or follow along. So that's kind of my little wheel that's working right now. Um, you know, podcasting is tricky because for me it's fun, it's a hobby. There isn't a ton of income in it right now, which is why I'm still hanging on to some of those clients. But I do feel like as you get more listens and stuff and as you gain more influence, that's where some of those sponsorships can come. When they go oh, 2000 people listened to her talking about not to go to beaches. Maybe we should, you know, invite her to this place and get a positive review.

Judy Oskam:

That's right, that's right. Oh, those are some great tips. And again, niching down is hard. I tend to find a story everywhere I go, and that's my challenge is oh, there's a story here and there. There really is tying the common theme is the challenge that I always have, but for me it's a hobby too. But the more I talk to other podcasters I'm thinking maybe I should niche into only podcasters and still do my change and creativity focus, because that could be an interesting target area.

Kelsey Graves:

Right. And then other podcasters start following you and want to hear from other podcasters.

Judy Oskam:

Yeah, that's interesting. Well, and if you look at some of your strengths, I think and I always ask about strengths and you've mentioned you're open for creativity and you tend to see around the corner and you can anticipate trends, I'm sure because of your background. What are some other strengths that you think really kind of paint the picture? If someone were to say, tell me about Kelsey, what would they tell me?

Kelsey Graves:

So I thought about this and I have a couple. And then I asked my husband last night and it was really funny because he gave me different ones. So I was like, oh, that's so interesting, because sometimes you don't know how other people see you. But my first one is that it's a strength and a weakness. But I'm just an eternal optimist. I always have been Sorry, getting over a little cold here, but if any of your listeners are familiar with the Enneagram, I'm an Enneagram 7. So everything is just like bright and shiny and sunshine and rainbows. Not always I do have my moments, but I'm always forward thinking and I always believe everything's going to work out. So that is why I'm not afraid to start a podcast. I just kind of go for it. So I do think it's a strength, but it can be a weakness, because then I, you know, I get my family on a Disney cruise that we get stuck on, because I'm just like it's all going to work out.

Kelsey Graves:

We're going during hurricane season, but we're not going to be the ones stuck during the hurricane oh guess season. But we're not going to be the ones suffering the hurt oh guess what. So it's a strength and a weakness, but I'm always just assuming things are going to work out and you know, 80% of the time it does. I also feel like I just figure things out. Like some of this world of content creation can be a little tricky and complicated and it's really annoying sometimes, but sometimes it takes a whole day to figure out how to get your podcast set up, so you just got to sit in that for a minute and figure it out and it's annoying. But YouTube is your best friend and there's someone out there who has created a video on how to do just about anything these days, and so I think a strength is that I just figure it out by myself. Strength is that I just figured out by myself.

Kelsey Graves:

My husband said he thinks my biggest strength in this whole world is that I'm very curious and I'm naturally curious, and so that lends itself well to a podcast, because you'll say, wait, tell me more about that. Or like I really, really want to know about people's trips because I might plan it or I just want to hear and get to know somebody. So I think curiosity is a big strength. And then he joked and he said you've always been a talker. And I'm like that is true, I'm a talker. I created three talking talker children, so there's a lot of talking in our family, which I love, and that is super fun for me to be going down this podcast road and I get to talk and every time I get off one I'm in the best mood because I just talk to someone amazing, exactly.

Judy Oskam:

So, yeah, I would say those are some of my strengths have you ever thought about getting your kids on the podcast and asking them? From a kid perspective, that is a great idea.

Kelsey Graves:

I actually haven't yet, but maybe over like a break or summer break, that could be a fun time. I did listen to one episode on another travel podcast where they asked their kids what their favorite trip was in the last year and why, and they were also surprised and it gave me some insight into oh, sometimes we think we've got to plan this big elaborate thing, but they really just wanted to fish or whatever, and so I think that's a great idea and I'm going to do that. I think I'm going to make that a goal over summer break to do some kid episodes.

Judy Oskam:

Especially maybe the Taylor episode too, because I've thought about just getting my two daughters together in a room but they're so busy. Yeah, just to kind of talk about, let's kind of reflect back on that experience, and what did you like about going to see the concert but also visiting Amsterdam again, and so I think that could be a fun deal just to get them together, because sometimes when you're in the room, other things come up too. And I think the fact that you're modeling some of this communication and, I think, this experiential learning, I think pointing out to the kids why do you think we went on that trip or something, yeah, and even showing them what I do and how you can create your own job and look, it's just me and my headphones and my mic and my laptop and I've created this whole thing.

Kelsey Graves:

They can learn from that and go oh, I could create my own job someday if I wanted to, exactly Well and someone with three kids and you kind of created your own future.

Judy Oskam:

And I always want students and my own two kids to understand that you can do that. And what would you say to people out there thinking, oh, I don't want to do the nine to five and I've got kids. I mean, how do I create the life I want? What would you say to them?

Kelsey Graves:

I mean, I think we are lucky to be living in a day and age where we actually can create our own jobs. I think it's called the gig economy is growing rapidly, which is people with side gigs that are creating income for themselves. I would say, if you're reliant on that nine to five and you do need it, to just take baby steps when you have the time at night. I promise the only way I've gotten here is the tiniest baby steps. It's not a huge leap. You make these tiny goals. I remember when I was trying to start the podcast, I didn't even tell that many people. My best friend, I like got up I called it episode zero because I wanted to just see if I could get something out there Like it's. It's like will this actually play on a podcast app? And so I just did an episode zero and I got it out and I was like, oh my gosh, okay, I did this. And then I kind of posted about it and my best friend texted me and she goes when were you going to tell me you were starting a podcast? And I was like, oh sorry, but it was these baby steps where all of a sudden, it was just there. And sometimes when you take the baby steps, they feel small and inconsequential. But eventually you'll look back and go, oh my gosh, I'm now almost 40 episodes in. I remember when I thought if I can just get 10 episodes, that will be so cool. Now we're at 40 and it's, you know, rocking and rolling. So those baby steps really matter, even just you know, writing down the name of what you would do creating that Instagram account, saving that URL or, you know, learning how to get on Squarespace and make a website. Like it's baby steps. But before you know it you'll look back and you know it's risky. But you know we've got one life to live and you can always go back and apply for another.

Kelsey Graves:

Nine to five. You know, always there's jobs out there that people can get. But it is fun to kind of have a little bit of control of your own world and the flexibility. Like I'm leaving Friday morning for an entire week to take my daughter to a dance competition in Orlando and then to meet up with family for Thanksgiving and some of my stuff isn't done. But I can bring it all with me. I can bring my computer, I can edit stuff in the hotel room. It's really fun to have all the flexibility and go. Oh, I can do that anywhere. I can travel and do my job.

Judy Oskam:

And we only live once. We only live once, right, so let's do it. I love it. You'll see, this is so fun. I hope we'll maybe do something again together and keep moving forward, and I love it, and thank you so much for sharing your information and your guidance with us.

Kelsey Graves:

Thank you for having me. This has been so fun. It was fun for me to actually like wrap my brain around what I have done, because sometimes you're like, oh my gosh, it's been so zigzaggy, but it all had a purpose, you know, to get me here I love it. Thank you, Kelsey. Thank you for having me. This has been lovely.

Judy Oskam:

And thank you for joining us on Stories of Change and Creativity. If you're enjoying the show, please subscribe, share and leave a review. It helps me share great interviews like this one with others and remember if you've got a story to share or know someone who does reach out to me at judyoskam. com

People on this episode

Head Shot

Judy Oskam

Host
Head Shot

Kelsey Graves

Guest