Hi & welcome! If you’re here, you’re probably thinking about starting a blog in 2024 . Whether you’re thinking of starting a blog to make money, share your travels, or augment your content creation business, you’re in the right place! From basic SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to how to combat the rise of AI-generated content, here’s the best tips to start a travel blog in 2024:
Isn’t the Travel Blogging Industry too Saturated?
A lot of people thinking of starting a blog to make money wonder if the travel blogging industry is too saturated too start a successful travel blog in 2024. The industry might be saturated and popular, it is definitely not too late to start. When searching for travel advice on the internet, people prefer newer articles to older, meaning that there is always a chance to break in as a new writer.
Like every industry, the travel blogging industry is always changing. This means that there is always opportunity for savvy new writers to break in.
Hey there! This article contains affiliate links. That means if you choose to make a purchase based on a recommendation I’ve made, I make a small kickback at no additional cost to you.
From SEO, to integrating social media and blogging trends, here are the best tips to starting a travel blog in 2024.
1) Pick a narrow niche: the single smartest move for travel bloggers in 2024
One of the smartest moves you can make as a travel blogger in 2024 is picking a laser-focused and narrow niche. Do you love national parks? Focus your travel blog on visiting national parks specifically. Are you a fan of local travel? Focus your travel blog on travelling within your state or region.
The category “solo female traveller” is no longer niche enough; it’s smarter to dedicate your blog specifically to categories more specific. For example, if you were thinking of starting a blog about solo female travel, you might redirect to content pillars “northeast hiking trails”, “solo female camping”, and “best gear for women”.
Keep in mind: you don’t actually need to travel to start a travel blog! Some of the best travel blogs begin by focusing on local travel and branch out from there.
2) Choose 2-4 content pillars
You don’t have to pick just one narrow niche to see success! Think of your blog as a cluster of 2-4 content pillars (pick two to start and expand as you expand) and fill out your content around those pillars. I like to think of the content in my pillars as a series of inter-related resources all designed to help a specific audience.
For example, under my content pillar “Midwest”, you can find trail and outdoor travel guides to destinations within the Midwest. These resources are made for Midwest Adventurers and generate income through affiliate linking, ebook sales, and backlinking to Substack. Under content pillar “Creator Tips”, my audience is people looking to expand or begin their content creator portfolio. These resources (blog posts) generate income through affiliate linking and photo preset sales.
More than four content pillars can make your blog difficult to navigate and be very difficult for you to keep up, especially as a one-man-team. Probably the best strategy for content pillars is to start with 2-3 very specific pillars (niches) such as “northeast hiking trails”, “northeast coffee & bakeries”, and “solo female camping”. Because you can create a large quantity of content on related topics, your SEO will improve as Google recognizes you as an expert on these topics. With time, you can collapse your two northeast pillars into one, “northeast travel”, and add more content pillars.
3) Keep it personal to combat Artificial Intelligence as a blogger in 2024
A lot of bloggers are very concerned about the rise of AI-written content. Bloggers who write exclusively dime-a-dozen listicles absolutely have reason to worry! With the rise of AI, readers are going to seek out a more personal experience, and Google will prioritize content clearly written by a person.
For this reason, incorporating first person personal accounts of places, including your own experiences and opinions, and being honest about which places you visited on your trip and which are on your list for next time are one of the best moves you can make in travel blogging in 2024.
Despite the rise of AI-written content, the future of Travel Blogging in 2024 is really bright!
Try Googling “How to Start a Travel Blog in 2024.” Are a lot of the articles that pop up very similar? That’s what I experienced when researching for this article. A lot of the blog posts on the internet are just the same listicle, published over and over again.
Now Google “What to do in Olympic National Park”. Do the first few blog posts look pretty much the same? This is actually great news for aspiring travel writers! A lot of the content online is looking more and more similar. If you can write engaging and helpful articles that show your personality and clearly provide value for the reader, you’ll easily not only outcompete AI, but also a lot of other established bloggers.
Combatting the 2024 Google Updates for Bloggers:
The 2024 Helpful Content update really knocked a lot of the top bloggers out of the search rankings, and unfortunately it’s easy to see why. The March 2024 Helpful Content update focused on cutting down on content jammed with keywords, specifically just designed to rank in search engines and promote affiliate links, which unfortunately is a lot of top blogs (definitely not all), especially in the outdoor and travel space.
For me, the Helpful Content update more than tripled my reach via organic search. Here’s why: all of the content I have written on my blog is specifically designed to serve as a resource to the reader first, and promote links second and only when relevant. When I first started blogging, I was told by more than one person that my content was too long, too detailed, and too personal. In 2024, that is definitely not true.
Here’s how blog for the Google Algorithm in 2024:
- Focus less on SEO: Definitely don’t ditch it entirely, but write a good resource first, and think about keywords second.
- Keep it personal: Only write about things you actually know about, or are willing to put in the research on. Tell the story of your experience with your topic.
- Write helpful content: This sounds really, really rudimentary but the best thing you can do to keep a blog alive in 2024 is write content that is truly designed to help the reader and serve as a resource for them, and not marketing for you. If providing good information and helping people is not the driving force behind your blog in 2024, it likely won’t succeed.
4) Consider Content Type & Provide Value
When focusing in on your travel blog, consider the type of content your writing. For example, while writing an article about what you did on a trip to Glacier National Park and the experiences you had might be fun, you will see more success reframing it as a resource and using your experiences to argument and provide credibility to that resource.
For example, the article “my magical weekend in Glacier National Park” won’t preform as well as the article “A Weekend Guide to Glacier National Park (Budget-Friendly!)”. The second concept is more specific, provides express value to the reader, and answers a specific question readers are likely to have.
However, it’s a great idea to use your personal experiences to augment this article! The primarily difference between these two articles is the outline of the second article will look different, with clear headings and subheadings answering the question “what to do in Glacier National Park in a weekend on a budget”. Meanwhile, information and experiences from your personal trip can fill in portions of the body text.
It’s also important to keep in mind that there are places where personal stories about your travels succeed! For example, while on my WordPress site (what you’re reading) I focus on blogging to create resources and generate SEO traffic, on my Substack (email newsletter/social media platform), I tell more personal stories to a smaller community of interested and highly engaged readers. I’ll touch more on using Substack later in this post!
5) Answer reader’s questions: an easy approach to SEO for bloggers in 2024
One of the best ways to integrate powerful SEO-strategy into your website is to consider questions your ideal readers might have and answer them very directly. If you’re looking to start a travel blog in 2024 that focuses on National Parks, your readers might ask “What are the cheapest National parks to visit in 2024?”. To answer this question, you might write “14 most affordable National Parks to Visit in 2024”.
6) Consider how you might want to monetize from the beginning
There are several ways to monetize your blog, including affiliate linking, selling adspace, selling your own physical or digital products, and more. In generally, affiliate linking and selling adspace require you have at least 10,000 monthly visitors to use.
If, however, you’re looking to sell your own products, you can monetize much sooner. Early on, take the time to think about the types of digital products you might want to sell, and start writing related content before you create and launch the product. This way, it will be easy to integrate links to your product into your blog post and see more immediate results.
For example, long before I started selling trail guide eBooks, I wrote blog posts about the best hiking trails in the regions I covered in the books. After publishing the ebooks, I was able to go back through blog posts that already had decent monthly traffic and add in links to my ebook series.
Learn about creating, marketing, and selling eBooks for Content Creators
Rather than integrate a shop through WordPress, I use Sellfy to sell both digital and physical products.
7) Longer is better, as long as it’s still good writing
One of the latest trends in travel writing is that longer content tends to rank higher in Google, so long as all of the content is quality, and so long as the content remains scannable. Create resources that can be read quickly at a surface level to determine value, and then saved for deeper reading at a later date.
Take this blog post for example. This blog post could have easily been titled and outlined as “10 things to know for starting a blog in 2024” (or ideally something shorter). Rather than publish a shorter article, by publishing 29 tips for blogging I convey in the title that this article is jam-packed with blogging tips, and more bang for your click than the alternate title. Furthermore, the post is set up so that the reader (you) can easily scan the 29 tips and get something out of the post or alternately, dive into the post and spend a lot of time reading and taking notes.
8) It’s better to be honest than to be an expert
My most controversial blogging opinion is that it is better to be honest about your knowledge of a topic than pretend to be an expert. If you exaggerate your knowledge on a topic then get something wrong, be it recommending the wrong park pass for a trailhead or camping illegally, you immediately shatter all trust with your reader if they spot your mistake.
By researching throughly and linking to external resources (even if it’s other bloggers!) when you don’t know an answer, you build more credibility with your readers than pretending to be an expert.
9) Create your own high-quality images (one of the most important tips for starting a blog in 2024!)
If you’re looking for the single best way to stand out as a blog in 2024, start creating your own high-quality images for your travel blog. You don’t need a fancy camera to do this, the phone in your pocket is fine! Spend time mastering editing tricks in Lightroom to create beautiful images to accompany your blog.
Having excellent imagery on your blog sets you up for success in a few ways. First, most people simply scan blog posts, and beautiful photos make just as much of an impact as headings. Second, beautiful photos sets you up well for potential paid blog posts. Because I loaded by blog with beautiful photos early on, I got my first sponsored blog posts at just 2,000 monthly page views. Lastly, having beautiful photos combined with great SEO can be a great lead for people looking to license photos of a specific region or scene.
Almost all of my photo licensing inquires have come in because my blog lead magazines or travel boards to my photos.
Learn tricks for editing photos in Lightroom
10) Use social media to promote your blog
A key factor in building your blog and content creation business is social media presence. Social media can both directly and indirectly boost SEO, and active social media gives people who find your blog and like it a way to follow and keep up with you. In 2024, Instagram and Tiktok are the two best social media apps for travel bloggers.
Be sure to include links to your social media on your website, and ideally include an Instagram feed widget to get blog viewers onto your Instagram.
Quick Tips for promoting blog posts on Social Media:
Building your social media in itself requires time and dedication, and it’s own dedicated blog post. To oversimplify, social media success for travel bloggers depends on consistency and keeping up with trends. Here are a few quick tips to promoting your blog posts on social media:
- Use the link in bio function to create a linktree on your website! This way you will have access to insights including which links visitors are clicking, and you will own your own page. (I’ve actually opted to create my links page in Substack rather than here, as my ultimate goal for most readers is newsletter subscriptions)
- Post microblogs, or smaller versions of your blog post and direct readers back to your bio link for the full article.
- Excerpt tips from your blog post as a reel or TikTok and direct viewers back to your blog for more tips
- In addition to telling readers to click your bio link for your blog posts, tell readers to google “your blog title + your blog name” to create more organic search traffic.
- Link to blog posts in your stories, and create graphics to go with your blog links in stories. Later, you can collect all of your blog posts and matching graphics in a story highlight on your profile.
11) Consider how your blog posts work together
Similar to thinking of your blog in terms of content pillars, it’s important to consider how your blog posts are related. One of the best things you can do before writing is brainstorm related blogs. For example, if your blog is National Parks focused and you have a trip to Olympic National Park planned, here are a few related topics you could write:
- Best Beaches in Olympic National Park
- Where to camp near Olympic National Park
- 23 Best Things to do in Olympic National Park
These three articles are all on a related topic, and you will easily be able to interlink between blogs.
12) Use shorter paragraphs and focus on scanability
Attention spans are shrinking and scannable articles are now more important than ever. This means that most readers will read the headings of your blog posts, and the first sentences or paragraphs.
Readers are likely to ignore, or even leave your site if they see big blocks of text. To avoid this, keep most paragraphs 3-5 sentences and all paragraphs under six lines in length on a desktop screen (mobile will be different due to screen size).
Don’t be afraid to use one sentence paragraphs for emphasis.
13) Use WordPress to build your blog
The best platform you can use to build your blog if you intend to make blogging a part of your business is WordPress.org. WordPress is highly customizable, sees better SEO results than other platforms, and is what most successful bloggers use. Using WordPress sets you up for long-term success.
Setting up a WordPress site can be a challenge, but there are plenty of resources online. The effort is 100% worth it.
14) Integrate in a Newsletter
One of the best ways to build a community as a blogger is to create a newsletter and build an email list. Traditionally, a newsletter is a quick, weekly update on your, the travel blogger personalities, life, links to blog posts back on the website to check out and more. Often, newsletters contain affiliate links and are used to make sales.
A good way to build your newsletter and email list is to offer a free digital product in exchange for email subscription.
15) Use Substack to build community in lieu of the traditional Newsletter
Personally, I’ve stayed away from the traditional newsletter and opted to use Substack instead. Substack is a newsletter, blog, social media hybrid. The major pro of Substack is that it allows for commenting, has a built in community on it’s own platform, and is easy to monetize through paid subscriptions.
Substack also lends to a different type of content than the traditional newsletter or blog. Longer form writing and articles thrive here, personal stories from your travels, and more. Substack is really excellent for smaller creators looking to make money creating because you don’t need very many subscribers to effectively monetize. For example, at about 1,000 free email subscribers I was making $500 a month in paid subscriptions directly, and more in using Substack to sell eBooks.
While a traditional newsletter may help you build a larger community, Substack will help you build a tighter one.
16) Name your blog carefully and consider personal branding
When starting your blog, it’s important consider blog name and personal branding. For example, this blog operates under the name Hello Stranger, and the Substack newsletter uses the same name. My social media and this website domain however, operate under the name I publish under.
This isn’t necessarily the best way to do things, but it works well for me as someone writing books and a social media personality. Treating my blog as a portfolio (ie myname.com instead of hellostranger.com) also allows me a lot of flexibility for future branding.
Ultimately, you’ll need to choose a blog name, and decide if you want to use that blog name as your social media name and website name or not. In general, more content creators are moving away from cutesy Instagram names (ie if I were @maddyhikes instead of @maddymarq) because it pigeonholes you into a niche and can look less professional as your business ages. For example, you might start as a blogger and content creator, but then start to work as a professional photographer. Using your name can come across as more professional if you plan on using your blog as part of social media content creation.
17) Own your domain name
Pay to own your own domain name. yourname.wordpress.com just doesn’t look professional, and it’s definitely worth a few dollars.
18) Focus on Quality AND Quantity
Beginner bloggers looking for fast success should publish as many articles as possible. For a sustainable schedule, shoot for 4-8 blog posts a month. This might seem like a lot, especially in the beginning, but one thing to keep in mind when starting any new discipline is that quantity often yields quality.
The more practice you get writing as many blog posts as possible, the more experience you get.
Finding time to blog when you work full-time:
While it might be tempting to quit your day job and launch into full-time blogging, that just isn’t realistic or possible for everyone. While 4-8 posts a month is ideal, for most people it’s a lot.
When I was first starting blogging and content creation while also working a full time job, I started by setting aside two week nights a week and all day Sunday to work on blogging and content creation.
19) Monitor Results & Analytics
As you begin blogging, especially if you are in your focusing on quantity to create quality phase, carefully monitor the results of your blog posts. Check and see how long it takes them to rank on Google (an easy way to see if your article is appearing on Google is to search your blog post title followed by your blog name). In the beginning, it may take a few weeks (or even months) to see your articles rank, but after you begin to regularly create content that time should decrease.
Check regularly to see where on Google your article ranks by searching the keywords you wanted to rank for, the “question” you wanted to answer, and keep track of how many posts are listed above yours. Use Google Analytics or a similar application to understand which of your articles are getting the most traction and when.
You’ll start to notice patterns, and you can use your observations to tailor future content to reach more readers.
20) Sidebars are back IN!
For a while, the forces of the internet decided that sidebar with widgets is OUT. The sidebar is the place on this website where (if you’re reading on a desktop right now) you can find my “about me”, a link to my socials, a link to my eBook, and an affiliate link disclosure. The primary reason for deciding to axe the side bar was low conversion rates when it came to newsletter signups, and a general feeling that sidebars takeaway from the content itself.
For travel bloggers, I’m declaring the sidebar back IN! (I feel like with a lot of internet things you speak it and so it is true. I like sidebars so I am speaking it).
While a sidebar may not generate many actual clicks, there is always value in exposure to content. Providing a built-in “about me” feature lends a sense of authenticity to your blog, and proves that your content was written by a person. Furthermore, while I don’t get many eBook clicks from the sidebar directly, I did find that adding the sidebar ad for my eBook increased eBook clicks within articles.
21) Keep your site clean
One of the biggest mistakes bloggers make is cluttering their website with too many ads! While ads are a great way to monetize your blog, too many ads can make your blog impossible to read, and readers are more likely to click off your page and use someone else’s blog altogether than make a purchase. Furthermore, if you operate within a small niche many blog readers are likely repeat visitors. Off-putting visitors with too many ads and pop-ups can be a big mistake.
If you off-put readers with too many ads, especially if your blog is niche, readers are likely to remember and choose a competitor’s blog post over yours next time. This is true even if your blog currently ranks higher than your competitors in Google.
22) Focus on Collaboration, not Competition
While it’s important to be aware of blogs and bloggers competing with your content, you stand to gain a lot more from treating other bloggers as friends and growing together. This can look like backlinking to each other’s blogs (especially when you used their’s as a resource!), reaching out on social media, or even guest writing for each other’s websites.
23) Don’t compare your chapter one to someone else’s chapter thirty
It can be really easy to compare your blog to other writer’s. I especially struggled with this around year two of seriously beginning blogging. I felt like I had been working really hard on my blog, and didn’t understand why it wasn’t seeing the success that some of the people I saw on the internet were experiencing.
Truth is, you never know someone else’s story. I’ve now been working in blogging and content creating for almost six years, and it was just at year five that I started to be able to really monetize my content effectively. It doesn’t take everyone this long, and one of the reasons I’m creating resources like this is to speed up your content creation journey!
There is a process out there for everyone. Yours will look different than mine, and that’s okay. Don’t stress too much if your blog isn’t where you want it to be yet; one day it will be.
24) Compress your images and name the file before uploading
One simple tip to help you optimize for SEO on your blog is to compress all of your images. Smaller images load more quickly, and you can use a free online image compressor.
Another simple thing that makes a huge difference for SEO is naming your images before uploading. For example, on my desktop I named all of the images in this blog “2024 how to start a blog” before even uploading them to my website.
25) Make sure your website is compatible with mobile
A huge chunk of readers will be accessing your website from their cell phones! Make sure that your website looks good viewed on both a cellphone and desktop. This is especially true if you use social media to promote your blog posts or you are an online content creator.
For online content creators getting into blogging, likely most of your visitors in the beginning of your blogging career will come from social media, not organic search (ie google). Today, most themes (which you can choose when building your website) will consider mobile, and you won’t have to think too much about it.
However, it’s important to make sure that your menus make sense in mobile, that your images appear reasonably sized, and that your articles are easy to share, and that any ads you place don’t interfere with the reader experience.
26) Regularly Update, SEO Audit, and link to new content
Your work on a blog post does not finish when you hit “publish”! One of the best things you can do to have a successful blog is go back through your old content and update it. In general, I set aside one full day a month to comb over my old content and make sure it is up-to-date. Sometimes, I add to the content and/or work in more keywords. Always, I add relevant links in old content to newer content.
Once a quarter, I sit down for 2-3 days and audit my entire website. I record which articles preform the best, which are making the most sales through affiliate linking, which are generating the most Substack subscriptions, and which are generating the most leads for digital products.
In addition, I record where on Google these articles rank for desired keywords. After recording the statistics for each post with a pen and paper, I make sure each article is up-to-date. Often I will also tweak affiliate links or ads based on what has worked best across my website.
27) Don’t use Wix.com
Wix.com is one of the easiest ways to set up a blog, but it is one of the worst sites for creating a long term successful blog. Wix has very little flexibility when it comes to customizing your blog, and is notorious for ranking poorly in Google. Getting readers via organic search on Google is the number one way to have a successful blog, and Wix pretty much immediately sets you up for failure. Also, most people with any amount of website building experience can smell a Wix site from a mile away.
WordPress is really the most powerful tool for blogging. A WordPress site can be tricky to set up yourself, but if you’re looking to make blogging a career it is definitely worth it.
28) Be Patient
Blog results take time! Most of the blog posts you write at the beginning of your blogging career likely won’t rank for a year or even two. Right now, my number one blog post in terms of traffic is the very first post I published on this site, published almost three years ago. This post began ranking only in April 2023 after I updated it in an SEO audit. Now it brings in 2,000+ pageviews a month.
While this is the first post I published on this blog, keep in mind that this was not my first blog. Check out my Peace Corps Blog here.
The wonderful part of blogging is that you will see the results of your work for years to come! Unlike social media where the lifetime of a post is 2-3 days, when blogging the lifetime of your post can be years to come.
29) Start Writing
The best thing you can do to start a blog in 2024 is just start! All writing is forward progress. Make mistakes, learn from them, troubleshoot, and try again. The sooner you start, the sooner you will see results.
Enjoy reading about how to start a travel blog in 2024? Check out these related articles to learn more about the Content Creation Industry!
- Learn how to create, market, and sell your eBooks to make money from blogging!
- Read the Lightroom editing tips Influencers won’t tell you
- Check out the article Are Influencers People? The answer may surprise you
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