I’ll be talking in this article about how to start a travel blog, and if it is something you are interested in, you should read all through this travel blogging for beginners guide.
There are an estimated 31.7 million bloggers in the U.S. alone in 2020, and you know what?
New blogs are created each given day, and travel blogs are among the most popular, which are taking a huge chunk from these numbers.
Everyone needs to travel at one point or the other, and with travel blogs being the go-to resources for insights and ideas about traveling around the world, it is not a surprise that 33% of travelers in the United States leverage travel blogs for getting travel advice.
This shows a huge potential for a travel blog, and when money is involved, I must tell you that besides other means of monetizing a travel blog, the average travel blogger charges an average of $200 for each sponsored post on their blogs.
This is just a fraction of what you can earn from a blog like this but tells that while you share your journey around the world, those flights and expenses could be paid in full by your travel blog.
There are so many benefits of setting up a travel blog, but one great one is the fact that you get to discover and document your trips around the world for which you are passionate about, and feel a sense of fulfillment.
While anyone passionate about traveling and sharing with others can start a travel blog, I’m strongly advocating for more females to step their feet into setting up a travel blog.
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Why Start A Travel Blog?
Looking for other reasons why you might want to create a travel blog?
Well, here are a couple of reasons for starting a travel blog:
– Establish connections to new and like-minded people.
– Documenting your travel experiences and memories
– Feel happy and satisfied
– Income earning
– Learn or acquire new experiences in a variety of fields
– Become committed and engaged
– Get rid of boredom
– Enhance your writing skills
– Build your portfolio or expertise
– Establish an influencer profile
– Assist others with travel tips, advice, information, etc.
If you’re weighing your options about setting up a travel blog, let passion take the lead, and if you make up your mind to flow along with the tide, I’m going to share right below, my ultimate guide to starting a travel blog.
Without further ado, here is the step-by-step tutorial for setting up a travel blog.
Step 1: Have a Purpose
For every step you should take in life, you need to sustain it with a strong reason.
It isn’t any different when it comes to setting up a travel blog.
Having a purpose will guide you toward finding a direction and becoming goal-oriented.
I’ve mentioned some reasons why you should start a travel blog in the earlier paragraphs, and while some or all of the outlined reasons could serve as your purpose of starting a blog about travel, there may be more reasons in your own case.
Therefore, whatever your reasons, identify them and set your goals in that respect.
Step 2: Specify Your Niche
Travel blogging is already a niche, but while you can document your every trip and the stories behind it, I guess you may be specific about your reasons for traveling and the kind of places you are passionate about traveling to, or just willing to give travel information and ideas.
You may dwell in the same mindset or interest with other people who want to travel, so you can build a niche on that and target those specific people that would be interested in your kind of topics.
Below are a couple of travel niches on which you can blog;
– Travel financing
– Solo travel
– Family travel
– Travel outfits or fashion
– Travel ideas, hacks, and tips
– Luxury travel
– Travel adventures
There are just so many niches to choose from, as someone aspiring to blog about travel, and as this will describe your blog to the world, you should make sure to go for the one that will fit your purpose and actions.
Step 3: Choose Your Domain Name
Having mapped your kind objectives to start a travel blog, it is time to make that bold step or the creation of your site.
This is no other thing than finding a suitable name that will vibe along your journey.
To find the right name for your domain, here are some of the hints travel bloggers use to find appropriate names for their sites.
-Use a top-level domain extension, preferably a .com extension.
-Success will make you one day convert your blog name into a brand, so make it brandable.
-You don’t want to be using your age or something that vibes along with age sometimes, because you may outgrow that. So, make your domain name an evergreen one.
-Keep your domain name memorable and easy to spell.
-Avoid using symbols or hyphens as people find it difficult to write into their web browsers and sometimes forget the existence of these little symbols.
-Your domain name should predict your kind of blog.
When it comes to finding the right name for your site, there are several factors you should consider, but if you’re having trouble finding a suitable name, you may want to leverage the use of domain name generators.
Sometimes, your preferred domain name might be taken by some other person, and if it is something you can’t blog about travel without, you should consider winning it through domain flipping sites like Flippa, if it hasn’t been put into use, and many domain name providers will be able to help you get it for a service charge.
In other cases, you may need to approach the domain name owner if they could sell to you.
For the hassles and money associated with winning a domain name from another owner, I’ll suggest you look around for another name and go with that.
When you choose an appropriate name, go to a domain name provider, either Godaddy, Namecheap, Freenom, or any other, to purchase it.
The thing is that most domain hosting providers also sell domain names, and some even provide the names as a bonus if you could pay for their hosting.
Step 4: Find a Good Web Hosting Company
While there are several which include locally based and international hosting companies, I’m emphasizing the need for a good one.
This is to avoid making so much of your hard work go in vain because there are a lot of hosting companies that have poor security measures, worst downtimes, and many other inconsistencies.
While choosing a good web hosting company, there are several things you should consider, and here are a few of them:
– Storage capacity and bandwidth.
– Email and e-commerce features
– Database management and support
– Backups and security services.
– Technical support provisions
– User testimonials and reviews
There are several features to consider when choosing the right web hosting service, and all should be ruled by the things you’re willing to add to your travel blog.
To spare you the stress of moving through different web pages looking for the best web hosting companies, the world-renowned ones include Bluehost, Godaddy, Namecheap, and Kinsta.
At this point, I would also like to stress the need for a superb content management system CMS.
While most bloggers are leveraging WordPress, there are other travel blogging-friendly platforms which include Wix, and Squarespace that you’ll probably want to check out.
Given that your domain name is ready, you can now link your domain name with your host.
Linking your domain name to your host is easy to do but for a newbie, it may require a step-by-step tutorial, but chances are that your web hosting provider will have a straightforward guide for getting this done without much hassle.
Step 5: Design Your Blog
Now that you have your domain pointed to your host, you can begin the design of the blog.
Depending on your preferred CMS, you may be provided with a website builder that will help you design a beautiful blog without the need to code, but if it doesn’t, that means you have to code things afresh, which isn’t ideal for beginners.
Now, back to our exclusive travel blogging for beginners website building.
Your WordPress blog can be built in a very short time with the use of a website theme or template.
So, choose a nice website theme and install it on your blog.
Before using any theme on your site especially if you are on WordPress, below are some things you should note:
– Never use a cloned or nulled theme for your blog because many are incorporated with malware and other stuff that will hurt your site.
– Use a mobile-responsive theme.
– The SEO friendliness of a theme also matters.
– Although a beautiful design can be eye-catching and improve the user experience, it is important to take into account the simplicity of your site for the users’ sake.
While building or designing your website, you should add the appropriate categories, and include the basic pages that will serve as a road map for readers which include the About Us page, Contact forms, Disclaimer page, and the rest.
Step 6: Gather Your Blogging Tools
The travel blogging for beginners guide wouldn’t be that complete without speaking about tools you may need from the start.
As a travel blogger, there are a lot of tools you’ll need to start a travel blog, and some of the essentials to it include:
Good camera: for the stories and trips you share with your audience, you’ll need to justify things by taking great pictures and sharing them on your blog posts.
Having excellent photography skills will come in handy, and items like selfie sticks or tripods are also helpful.
Tools like Canva will also be useful when it comes to giving your pictures a fresh, professional look.
– A writing device: while some people like to write blog posts from their tablets, others like me would rather write using a laptop.
Whichever device you feel comfortable writing your blogs from, you should feel free to do, but find a good offline writing tool, then you import your written content into your blog dashboard and add some finishing touches before hitting the publish button.
Grammar apps and plagiarism checkers like Grammarly are also worth having.
– Plugins: website plugins have the potential to make blogging a lot of fun and simplified, so check the plugins you’ll be needing and add them to the list of tools you need.
Some of the things you may need will come at a later time, so work with the things that you remember for now and that which you can afford and when the time comes for upgrading your tools, you will know it.
Step 7: Publish Content
To remind you how far we’ve gone, we talked about locating a niche, a domain name, a suitable web hosting platform, website design, and the tools you’ll need to launch your blog about travel.
Now it’s time to start posting content and as I always do, I’m going to share below a few tips for better content on your blog.
– A travel blog may take the shape of your personality or just serve as a resource for guides, so make sure you carry the audiences along by keeping your content engaging.
– A travel blog is best accompanied by photos. So, you should leverage images to improve your content and attract new faces.
– Rather than focusing on volume, you should focus on the quality of your content.
– Tap into content marketing to grow.
– Your blog is your creative outlet, so don’t be afraid to be as personalized as you want to.
– Conduct keyword research for each content and always capitalize on SEO best practices.
Final Thoughts
Now that you have your blog published and ready to be viewed by people from different corners of the world, you should know that this opens a new chapter for the struggle.
Your readers will be always in need of content to consume and you will on the other hand need to devise different promotional strategies to win the interest of more readers, so, it is important you learn more about social media marketing, search engine optimization, and email marketing, etc.
Luckily, I’ve covered all this in this blog, so feel free to check my articles that discuss tips and insights on how to become successful with blogging.
In your opinion, are you cool with starting a travel blog or already managing one?
I’m just curious, you know.
Check out these 100 Travel Blog Post Ideas for Travel Bloggers
