HOW TO MAKE MONEY AS A TRAVEL BLOGGER
This post may contain affiliate links, which means I'll receive a commission if you purchase through my link, at no extra cost to you.
This post is about how to make money from a travel blog
Do yo have a travel blog and want to start earning some money from it? When I first started, monitisation was a mystery but over the years I’ve learned how to make money from my passion for travel.
Is it your dream to do the same? Imagine being able to visit places around the world and get paid for doing so. It’s the dream right?
The power of affiliate marketing is key to start earning an income from your travel blog.
Even if you’re brand new to blogging you can start the monetisation process from your very first blog post and it’s important to get to grips with how to use affiliate marketing on your website.
There’s a lot to get through so let’s get right into it.
Planning your trip? Use my favourite resources!
🏨 Accommodation : I recommend Booking.com
✈️ Flights : for the cheapest flights, I use Skyscanner
🚗 Rental Car : I recommend Rental Cars
🛡️ Travel Insurance : for the best deals I rely on HeyMondo
NO TIME TO READ NOW? 📍PIN FOR LATER
WHAT IS AN AFFILIATE PROGRAM?
🗺
Firsty, if you’re brand new, you may be wondering what an affiliate program is. In simple terms an affiliate program is where an online retailer pays a commission to another website for driving traffic to their website and generating sales or leads.
Here's how it generally works:
Participation: Affiliates join the affiliate program offered by a merchant.
Promotion: Affiliates promote the merchant's products or services on their own platforms (like websites, blogs, social media, etc.) using unique affiliate links.
Tracking: These affiliate links contain special tracking codes that monitor when a user clicks on them and makes a purchase or performs a specific action on the merchant's site.
Commission: When a sale or action occurs through an affiliate's link, the merchant pays the affiliate a commission, which is typically a percentage of the sale value or a fixed amount.
READ NEXT : How to plan a solo trip
JOIN AN AFFILIATE PROGRAM
🗺
There are many travel affiliate programs out there but the one I recommend you join right now is TravelPayouts
The great thing about TravelPayouts is that you’re not just joining one affiliate program, you’re joining some of the top travel brands in the world. It is a travel partnership platform that focuses on travel brands and their affiliate networks.
TravelPayouts includes some of the top travel brands in the industry such as TripAdvisor and GetYourGuide which makes it the perfect place for travel bloggers to monetise their own travel experiences and content.
With TravelPayouts, creators earn commissions by promoting various travel services that are available on the TravelPayouts website.
Let’s give an example of this.
In my Solo Womens Guide to Italy I recommend several tours that I’ve been on around the country as well as some of my favourite hotels in different areas of Italy. I have used my TravelPayouts GetYourGuide affiliate link for the tours and my Booking.com affiliate link to the hotels I recommend. When someone visits this blog post and clicks on the link and books either a tour or a hotel I earn a commision from that sale. Simple!
WHICH TRAVEL AFFILIATE PROGRAMS ARE AVAILABLE ON TRAVEL PAYOUTS?
🗺
There are many options to choose from when using Travelpayouts to apply to travel affiliate programs and we’ll go through them below.
What I love the most about TravelPayouts is that all the travel affiliate programs are in one place. Before discovering TravelPayouts I was a member of different affiliate programs that I would have to individually log in to and it was a complete pain everytime I wanted to create an affiliate link or check my stats and commisions.
When you use different affiliate programs you have to wait to reach a payment threshold whereas when you use TravelPayouts they combine commisions that you earn across all of your affiliate programs and they all count towards your total payout threshold.
So which travel affiliate programs are included on TravelPayouts?
I’m not going to include every affiliate program that is on TravelPayouts but I’ll list some of the bigger ones.
Booking.com the number one website for booking accommodation around the world.
RentalCars.com helps people find a hire car in 60,000 locations across 160 countries.
Tiqets where you can book tickets for many attractions around the world.
TripAdvisor the worlds largest travel site.
HostelWorld helps you find hostel accommodation in over 178 countries.
WHO IS TRAVEL PAYOUTS FOR?
🗺
If you create any content online in the travel niche TravelPayouts is perfect for you to monetise your content. Maybe you’re more of a lifestyle content creator? You can still benefit from using TravelPayouts depending on your audience.
If you share anything online that’s slightly travel related including suggestions of hotels or trips I recommend joining TravelPayouts so you can include affiliate links in your content.
A great thing about TravelPayouts is there is no minimum traffic needed to sign up so even if you’re brand new to blogging or content creation you can sign up and get started.
Maybe you don’t have a blog but you share travel content on YouTube or Instagram. You can still sign up to TravelPayouts and create affiliate links on those platforms.
WHAT ARE THE COMMISIONS ON TRAVEL PAYOUTS?
🗺
The commissions you can earn on TravelPayouts vary depending on the brand or affiliate program you connect with. The commissions are generally pretty good.
Here are a few examples of travel brands and the commissions offered on Travelpayouts:
8% commission
30 day cookie lifetime
8% commission
31 day cookie lifetime
8% commission
30 day cookie lifetime
12% commission
30-day cookie lifetime
18% commission
30 day cookie lifetime
WHO CAN USE TRAVEL PAYOUTS?
🗺
Anyone who creates content on any online platform can use TravelPayouts as a way to monetise their content. You can use links, widgets and banners on your content and earn money on Travelpayouts.
Bloggers
You can place your affiliate links into new or existing blog posts. You could have a ‘resources’ page and link to all the best travel resources that are on TravelPayouts. If you have a monthly newsletter you can add links to that.
YouTubers
You can include links in your video descriptions.
TikTokers
You can include links in your video captions or descriptions. You can also include links in your bio.
Instagrammers
You can post photos or Reels promoting a product, service or experience offered by a Travelpayouts brand and then include your affiliate link in your bio.
Another great way to earn money on Travelpayouts as a travel content creator is to refer other bloggers to Travelpayouts. You will get 7% of the earnings generated by your referrals for the first 2 years of your referral’s sign up. That’s a great addition to your affiliate income plus, it’s a great way to help other travel bloggers create an income online.
HOW DO I JOIN TRAVEL PAYOUTS?
🗺
Joining TravelPayouts couldn’t be easier. Firstly, head over to TravelPayouts.com and create an account and verify your email. This process takes about a minute and once you’ve verified your email address you can start using the platform. I’ve joined many affiliate programs over the years and let me tell you TravelPayouts is one of the simpliest to join and get approved for.
Before you can start getting links and including them in your existing content, you need to create your first project on Travelpayouts. Projects are an individual travel brand that you’re looking to promote such as HostelWorld. You can connect to as many projects under one account as you’d like.
When you are connecting to an individual travel brand you will need to enter some information about how and where you plan to promote the brand. You’ll also need to answer a couple of questions related to your audience and the content you create. It’s really simple and quick.
For some projects you will be accepted straight away whereas others require the brands approval. This is a quick process and I’ve always heard back from brands the same day.
Once you’re connected to a project, you can start creating affiliate links and using banners and widgets through Travelpayouts.
Sign up here to get started with TravelPayouts
Information About Solo Travel
If you still thinking about if you should travel solo check out these other solo travel guides and blog posts :
Destination Solo Travel Guides
Solo womans guide to Copenhagen, Denmark
Solo womans guide to Dubrovnik, Croatia
Solo travel tips and advice
How to research solo travel destinations
Best travel products for solo travel
Must have long haul flight essentials
TRAVEL ESSENTIALS
Planning a trip? Here are some of the resources and tools I personally use to organise my travel plans to anywhere in world.
FLIGHTS : Find the best deals on flights using Skyscanner.
VISAS : Use iVisa to check if you need a tourist visa for wherever you’re going to and apply for an expedited visa online. Use OneWayFly to obtain proof of onward travel/hotel reservation for your visa application if needed.
TRAVEL INSURANCE : Insure your trip with my preferred insurance for single trip and annual cover HeyMondo
AIRPORT TRANSFER : Pre-book your hotel transfers from the airport.
ACCOMMODATION : Find the best hotel deals on Booking.com.
DAY TRIPS : Find the best city tours and day excursions on your travels on Viator or Get Your Guide.
Did you know that …
When you purchase something through my links I earn a small fee. However, you still pay the same. Win-win!
