How to make money as a Travel Blogger

If you’re an avid traveler with a passion for documenting your journey, you can find millions of ways to earn money from it.

Making money from traveling is unlike any other job because you won’t be working 9–5; instead, you’ll spend time planning your trip, documenting each part of your journey in a blog, photos, and videos, and sharing insights about the places such as popular tourist spots, less explored places, culture and lifestyle, food, music, etc.

Alyson from WorldTravelFamily.com points out,

Travel blogging funds our life, two adults, two kids now almost grown, full-time travel. Travel blogging and running this travel blog allowed us to see the world. We’re 100% legitimate, and the money comes from the blog, not selling courses.

This proves that you can make money from travel blogging. However, first thing first, you should start with concrete research and plan. Don’t just start traveling for the sake of making easy money because many travelers who didn’t have a plan but went out anyway landed up broke.

You must have heard of few travelers selling their items on the flea market to make enough to repurchase a ticket home. Hence, you won’t always find a pot of gold on the other end of the rainbow.

Don’t make this your fate!

10 Best Ways to Make Money as a Travel Blogger

So, what are the endeavors available for travelers to make money? Let’s take a look at all the possibilities of making money from travel.

Use your Travel Experience as a resume.

You don’t know this yet, but your initial work will attract other works. The travel blogs, photos, and videos that you churn will help to attract blog owners, and in some cases, advertisers and travel companies.

With the advent of social media, it has become easier than before to get noticed. You can start with setting up a page on Facebook and Instagram to post photos of your travel regularly along with a link back to your blog. When you start amassing followers, you will notice that people will start sharing your work which will likely be seen by travel blog owners and, in some cases, advertisers.

Start with writing about your travel and destinations regularly, so your readers will always find something to read and share about.

Get Started with Affiliate Marketing

Travel bloggers make the most money from advertising, so it’s never too early to start with affiliate marketing.

In most cases, you can make 50% of your revenue from advertising and affiliates. However, you must keep in mind that it’s a long game. You won’t see a substantial revenue from affiliate until you have amassed a large number of readers. Sometimes, it may take months or even a year to start making money from the affiliate. It all depends on how popular your travel posts are.

You can start with a great affiliate network for your blog.

• Amazon

• Rakuten

• CJ

• Etsy

• Groupon

• Hotel Booking Sites

• Travel Insurance Sites

As most experts claim, you shouldn’t put all of your eggs in the same basket. Hence, don’t just rely on affiliate marketing to make money. Find other ways to leverage your expertise to earn income.

Place Ads

Place advertisement in your travel blogs. The best way to do it is through sponsored posts where you place a product in your post. The sponsored content is more prevalent in social media such as Instagram and Facebook posts.

It isn’t easy to convince advertisers to sponsor your content initially; hence you would need to build on amassing more followers.

In the beginning, you can start with Google AdSense. Yes, the payout will be less, but you can earn some money. Once you get over 50,000 visitors on your site, focus on getting a more prominent advertiser like Mediavine. Mediavine is one of the best ad networks around, with a great network of bloggers and a super helpful team of employees.

Once your blog becomes popular, you can focus on getting companies to advertise on your site, including travel gear sites, ticketing, travel agencies, clothing, etc.

Sell your photos

Most travelers with an apt to take great pictures often make the most money from selling photos and videos. There are many great websites like Shutterstock and 500px where you can sell your photos and videos for different prices.

The more unique your photos are, the likelier people will buy them.

Instagram is a valuable marketing tool to advertise your travel photos. Although you won’t make money from posting on Instagram, you’d amass enough followers to buy your photos and videos.

Some people make a decent passive income this way.

Don’t forget to buy a quality DSLR with different lenses with sharp quality and color. Spend some money on learning Photoshop skills.

Monetize Videos

Many travel bloggers earn a good amount of money from videos. It would be best if you thanked YouTube for this.

Today, many newbies have started Vlogging as a way to make money on YouTube. If you make great videos and are consistent, then you’re likely to build an audience for yourself. Once you have crossed a minimum threshold for videos and subscribers, you can opt for the “Monetize” option, where YouTube will start posting ads on your videos. The more people see the ad, the more you will get in revenue.

Don’t just start thinking that you’ll post few videos, and your monetization will start churning money. Nope, it takes a while to start with monetizing videos. Consider producing great videos and consistently.

Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing employs leading, niche content creators to improve brand awareness, increase traffic, and drive the brand’s message to the target audience.

This is a valuable marketing technique for successful travel bloggers. The brands will pay you money for advertising their products on your blog and Instagram, and Facebook posts.

It only makes sense if the destination and the campaign make sense with your brand and if you can deliver everything that you promise.

Depending on your followers’ number, the brand will pay you different amounts. A more successful blogger can easily earn over $20,000 from sponsored content every month.

Develop your products

The most successful travel entrepreneurs make money from their products. Yes, advertising is there to earn money, but if you want to create something your own to make money, you should start making a course or a book or launching a product such as clothing items, travel gears, handbooks, etc.

It’s essential to have a minimum viable audience jumping on the bandwagon of creating a product.

For beginners, advertising is a more viable option to earn money.

Podcast

There are not many travelers who run podcasts related to travel, so this can be your niche. But before starting podcasting, you should know who your listeners are, what they are looking for, and how you can make the best out of your every podcast.

Check out some popular travel podcasts before you start your own.

• The Travel Diaries

• Armchair Explorer

• No Shitting in the Toilet

• Zero to Travel

• You Should Have Been There

• JUMP with Traveling Jackie

• Beach Too Sandy, Water Too Wet

• A Girls Guide to Traveling Alone

• Travel Goals

• Alice in Wanderland

• The First Mile

• The Big Travel Podcast

• Travel with Rick Steves

Check this infographic out for more information.

Get in touch with Rick Perdian, the best travel music consultant, to find new ways to earn money from traveling.