I’ve been recently asked by a friend: can you really earn from your travel photos? Short and simple, yes: like with many other areas of photography, it is totally possible to earn from travel photos.. Taking photos while travelling is not only the best way to document your adventures, it is an opportunity to hone your skills and capture a chunk of reality that you can take back home.
So can you really make money from your travel photos? YES, one can earn from travel photos and actually from a travel blog in many ways. Here are some of the ways we earn on TravelersJoint.com. You can also try these tips on your own blog, especially if you got the time nowadays.
Table of Contents
Sell on Online Shops
The online world has opened a lot of doors for photographers and photo enthusiasts when it comes to exposure. Nowadays, you can sell your photos on stock photo websites – unlike in the days when printing is a must. Now, one can sell on sites like Depositphotos, Getty, Etsy, Redbubble, and many more. There will be some requirements for submitting photos, but you can be sure there’s one you can work with comfortably.
You can submit different styles and see which one would be sellable and go for that.
Print Your Photos as Postcards or as a Photobook
A fun and really fulfilling way to earn money is printing your travel photos as postcards. It’s such a proud moment seeing your own photo printed as a postcard!
Printing photos as postcards can also be done through online shops, but if you can get in contact with local printers, that would be good too. You can start locally to test the waters, so to say.
For your personal use, there online print shops that will print your photo and send the postcard directly to your recipient.
You can also do a photo collection and turn it to a coffee table book. Add a little anecdote, or ask friends for some short stories that would go well with each photo in the book.
Remember, you can also give these items out to friends, and ask them to help you spread through word of mouth about your brand.
Print on Designs
Just as books are now easy to print by yourself, so are T-shirts, souvenir items, canvas bags, and any other products you can print on. If you don’t know how to design, you can hire a graphic artist to help you out. You can straight out print a city photo on pretty much any surface, but you can also add other details, even abstract illustrations to add style.
Aside from ways to earn from your travel photos, there are also a lot of ways you can use a travel blog to earn. Here’s how:
Travel Booking
Having a flight booking portal on your blog would be convenient for your readers. If they suddenly feel the urge to visit a city, restaurant, or hotel you feature on your blog, you get to earn from that. You can either sign up for an airline booking service or have your own travel business booking portal. While the former is easier, the latter will make you you earn more.
Collaborating with Brands
Brands reach out to bloggers and influencers to be promoted, especially if there’s a large following involved. Bloggers and influencers have both dictated how the public sees brands and spending, just like how celebrities do – just on a different platform. There are numerous ways brands collaborate with bloggers, here are some:
Sponsoring Tours/Trips
While this may have diminished currently in relation to the world’s situation, the fact remains that brands sponsor travel bloggers on some tours or trips.
There’s an incentive given to those who are successfully chosen: a few days stay in a hotel for a review, city passes from the tourism board and feature the city on your blog, free plane ticket from an airline company, even cash at times. Sometimes, this doesn’t have to be paid as the worth of days for your stay will already be covered.
Social Media Promotions
Social media collaboration can also part of the sponsored trip deals, however, you don’t need to be in a city to be featured to do this. Brands can reach out to bloggers and promote their products, services, or simply have them mentioned while the blogger is in her hometown.
If you have Instagram, Pinterest, or Facebook just for the fun of it, and for keeping in contact with friends or just sharing your day to day life. Some people use their social media platforms to earn money. Most influencers use theirs as an extension of their blog reach.
Take Luxury Travel Influencer Mar Pages, she was a telecoms strategy management consultant who one day decided there was more to life than the fifteen hour working days – seven days a week. A year after taking a sabbatical in the South Pacific, Mar decided to quit her job and open a café in addition to starting her blog. Nowadays, she has a good following, has established her own brand and earning enough – or probably more than her regular job.
Influencer marketing is one way brands utilize marketing strategies. This is why niche-ing down is a good idea if you want to earn from your Instagram or Facebook page. Brands identify themselves with like-minded influencers and would more probably ask them to promote to an audience in behalf of them. Travel-related content will naturally get attention from travel-related companies.
Other platforms you can use are Snapchat, Youtube, Tiktok, as brands know how customers and audiences can be reached further through these media.
Blog Features
Contrary to what others believe, written media is still thriving, while it’s easier to watch videos, people still read. And a lot of people still rely on blogs for reviews and opinion. Brands reach out to blog owners for featuring them – usually through their contact page – so setup yours along with advertising policy. Also, there are platforms you can join where brands “meet” bloggers and influencers they could work with. Here are some we’ve worked with through the years:
Intellifluence
Intellifluence is a global platform that makes it easier for brands to find bloggers to promote their brands. They pay via paypal and has been very reliable, join Intellifluence here.
Getblogged
This platform works reverse – influencers can apply for opportunities and brands choose from the applicants – join GetBlogged here.
Affiliate Marketing
An add on for a flight booking portal, and another good way to earn from your travel blog is to be a hotel and room booking affiliates. This is all the more beneficial if you feature accommodation reviews on your travel blog.
There are also tours and tickets you can sell and get a commission from them. Sites like getyourguide, booking.com, and tripadvisor are the best for this kind of affiliate marketing. Products related to travel can also be sold on your blog though amazon, shopstyle, and rewardstyle.
Ads
Yes, the ads you see on websites may be annoying, but each of them adds up to a blog’s revenue. The most used ad platforms would be google adsense, but monumetric and mediavine gets a lot more love from bloggers – although their requirements are far stricter.
Bloggers can also utilize sidebar spaces for ad boards – like rent spaces for companies. You can put your information regarding banner advertisement and such and contact details so brands can source you.
Earn from Your Travel Photos and Blog While At Home
If you have a pile of photos (in your computer drives, that is), it’s the best time to make use of them and make some serious money.
Yes, you can earn from your travel photos: sell them online, have them printed as postcards or on other items, even as a photobook. It takes time and effort, but seeing your own photos and print is exciting. There are also other to earn from your travel blog, you only need some plan and some time to spend on it. It may take some time to take off, but it will do. If you find all these ways a bit too much, you can always ask help from friends, or those with know-how. To earn from your travel photos and your travel blog while at home is not only a surefire safe way, it’s also enjoyable and viable.
