How To Start A Travel Blog Without Travelling: Tips & Tricks + Step-by-Step Guide For Setting Up Your Travel Website

This article about how to start a travel blog without travelling may contain affiliate/compensated links. For full information, please see my disclaimer here.

If you are eager to start your own travel blog but aren’t sure how to do so, keep reading. And if you want to be a travel blogger, but you can’t travel right now, it’s also possible. This article will explain to you step-by-step how you can start a travel blog without travelling. It’ll tell you how you can make money with such a blog and everything you’ll need to start your dream. You don’t have to travel to start a travel blog. Learn how to do so below.

First of all, I’ll give you the reasons and ways how it’s possible to start a travel blog without travelling. After, you’ll get a complete guide for where to start, how to set up your website, and write your first blog post. In the end, you’ll find out how you can earn money with your travel blog.

In the end, I’ll also recommend a perfect blogging course to help you start your business and profit from your passions in a little over a year. So stick with me.

 

 

What To Do To Start A Travel Blog Without Travelling

So you might be asking how it’s possible to start a travel blog if you can’t travel at the moment. Well, it’s possible. You don’t have to be necessarily travelling if you want to be a travel blogger. You can start from scratch, taking small steps, which will eventually lead to bigger results.

If you want to be a travel blogger, of course, you need some content for your blog, and it needs to be related to travelling. But maybe you can’t travel because you’re broke, due to a Covid pandemic, or family issues.

Whatever your reason is, there are still ways to start a travel blog. Below, I am giving you 5 great tips and ideas for starting a travel blog even if you cannot travel right now.

1. Put together your past travel experience
2. Make day trips whenever you have time
3. Make little road trips on your days off
4. Get inspiration from others
5. Report travel experience of your friends and family

 

 

1. Put Together Your Past Travel Experience

Why would it matter that you can’t travel right now? If you want to start a travel blog, you are most probably passionate about travelling. That means you must have travelled somewhere at least a few times in your life. Well, that’s great news because you have some content to start with for your travel blog.

If you can’t travel right now, remember all your past travel experience, where you’ve been, what you did, and how it was. Then you can write an article about the place. This is one of the ways how you can start a blog without travelling.

 

2. Make Day Trips Whenever You Have Time

Another tip for starting your travel blog if you can’t travel, especially due to lack of time, is to make some day trips. Take small steps at the beginning and explore some places when you have time. Instead of watching TV on the weekend or wasting your time, go and see something.

After, you can write an article about it for your travel blog. The goal is to produce as much content as possible and get as much inspiration from travels.

 

3. Make Little Road Trips On Your Days Off

In case you’re broke, get a side job and try to save as much money as possible. For instance, I always worked many hours even after my University classes to earn extra cash. Then I saved it and waited for the opportunity to go and make some road trips around my area.

You can always save up if you want to. Instead of going to the party and spending your cash on drinks, save it. Or instead of buying an extra piece of clothes, which you actually don’t need, keep the cash.

The world constantly makes us want to consume something. The sad thing is that we don’t need that stuff. So be strong and save your cash for more important things, like travel. If you really want to start a travel blog and need some content, it’s actually easy to find ways to save your cash for travelling.

You don’t have to go far away. Just focus on the things around your country that you can explore and write about. And keep in mind your niche, which we will talk about later in this article.

 

4. Get Inspiration From Others

In case you don’t know where to go or what to write about, get some inspiration from others. Check out travel channels on Youtube and see what kind of content they produce. But please, never copy anyone’s work.

What I mean here is to get inspiration for places you can visit or things you can do even in your own country. Google it or watch some Youtube videos. Then go there yourself and create your own content. Please, never copy someone’s work.

If you need some inspiration for road trips, check out my travel itineraries and you don’t even have to spend too much time planning.

 

5. Report Travel Experience Of Your Friends & Family 

As with the case above, if you need extra inspiration, ask your family and friends where they’ve been on holiday. Ask your grandpa where he’s been and what he’s experienced. You can, for example, do an interview with your friend or a family member about his travel experience and then report it on your website as an article.

Possibilities are endless. You only have to open up to receive them. As I’ve already mentioned several times, you will somehow make it happen if you really want to do something (like a travel blog).

 

Now that you have some ideas for how to start a travel blog without travelling, you need to know how to actually start such a blog. The next section will guide you through the entire process of setting up a website and writing your articles on it. So keep reading.

 

 

Full Guide On How To Start A Travel Blog Without Travelling

One thing you should keep in mind is that it doesn’t have to be perfect right away. Mute the perfectionist inside you at the beginning, and just start working on your travel content. The most important thing is to get round into travel blogging.

After, you can always change things around and improve your strategy. In the beginning, it is essential to produce as much travel content as you can and perfect your blog posts to be visible in Google Search.

So now, let’s get into the step-by-step guide for actually starting your travel blog. You’ll learn how to get web hosting, design your own website, write perfect blog posts to grow your site, and eventually earn money with your site.

 

Steps To Start A Travel Blog Without Travelling

1. Choose your travel niche
2. Create a name for your website & domain
3. Buy a web hosting & set up your domain
4. Choose a theme
5. Download some plug-ins
6. Design your website & create first pages
7. Learn SEO skills
8. Write your first blog post
9. Create categories
10. Keep producing content
11. Start with email marketing
12. Become an affiliate
13. Earn the first dollars with your travel blog

 

 

1.Step: Choose Your Travel Niche

You might have heard about this step as everybody on the internet talks about it. But truly, it is the foundation of your travel blog and a road to success. If you have a good niche, you’ll have visitors to your site because you’ll attract a specific type of audience.

A good niche will also ensure you earn money with your blog later on. A good niche is everything.

You want to be a travel blog, but it’s not enough. There are thousands of travel bloggers, so you have to think more specifically to succeed. This is what niche is all about. Finding a topic within the travel industry and writing about it. So you have to decide what kind of travel blogger you’ll be.

You can focus on family travel, adventure travel, cultural travel. Then you can only choose one continent or an area. So, e.g., you can write about adventure travel in the USA. After, you can narrow it down even more and decide to whom you want to talk: students, families, people on a budget, or luxury travel. So your blog can be, e.g., all about adventurous travel in the USA on a budget.

 

Be specific & Check Out Competition

Try to be as specific as possible. The more specific you are, the better your blog will perform. You’ll talk to a specific audience that will return to your site. So now, the first thing you have to do is to think about what type of travel interests you. Write down even several ideas.

Remember that you have to be also passionate about that type of travel. You’ll be writing about it for the next few years, so you need to also enjoy it.

Last but not least, check out whether the niche you’ve selected isn’t too competitive. You can do so by trying to think of one blog post idea within your niche. Then write it into the Google Search and see what pops up.

This way, you’ll see whether there are already many bloggers with this niche or not. If the market is too saturated and you spot many bloggers are writing within your niche, try to find any niche. Remember, you have to be very specific with your niche, passionate about it, and be too competitive.

 

Get 15 Name Ideas for Your Travel Blog For Free

I’ve brainstormed different name ideas for your travel blog to make it easier for you.

Get my list of 15 name ideas for your new blog and avoid the pain of finding the perfect name.

Choose a name right away, and start working on your blog. Don’t get stuck even for a second.

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It also includes exact steps for how to register your domain name correctly.

 

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2.Step: Create A Name For Your Website & Domain

Now you have your niche, which is one of the most challenging parts of starting your blog, actually, so congratulations. Next, it is time to create your domain. A domain is essentially the address of your website so that visitors can locate it on the internet. It is the URL of your website (the code of your website in the search/URL bar).

You can have any domain name, but it should definitely contain your blog name. So before creating your domain, give a name to your blog/website/blogging business. The name of your blog should reflect your niche.

So if somebody is writing about the best food in the USA (this is not a very specific niche, so don’t choose it), your blog can have a name: The US Foodie. My blog is called ‘Voices of Travel’ because I write about travel and languages for travel.

So now, try to think of your blog name. Once you have it, incorporate it into your domain. In my case, the domain name is voicesoftravel.com. In the example above, a domain name would be theusfoodie.com.

Now, there are some disputes about the domain name extension (.com, .eu, .org). I would say that ‘.com’ is the best one. It is great for international use for all topics. And it also shows that your website is secure, kind of gives a good reputation to your website.

Congratulations, you now have your specific travel niche (travel topic you’ll be writing about), your website name, and a domain name. Now we can actually start with creating your website.

 

Register Your Domain Name Correctly

Get my 15 name ideas for your new travel blog. It also includes exact stops for how to register your domain name. I’ve included some tips and tricks to follow so that you don’t make any mistakes and have your website set up right from the beginning.

Get this free guide and follow the steps to register your domain:

 

 

Get Free 15 Name Ideas For Your Travel Blog

 

 

3.Step: Buy A Web Hosting

A Web Hosting is basically a house where you’re website will live on the internet. It is the storage space for your website. You need web hosting to start your website.

There are several businesses offering web hosting. The most famous ones are Bluehost, HostGator, GoDaddy, Dreamhost, or A2 Hosting. Of course, you could find many more, but these are the most common ones among businesses.

 

Bluehost Web Hosting & Its Advantages

Now it’s time to choose your perfect Web Hosting. I personally use Bluehost, and I couldn’t have chosen better. They offer everything a good website must have. That includes an SSL Certificate (to have a secure site and protect your website), CDN (a content delivery network that spreads your website’s data across several servers worldwide), domain, and domain protection. In addition,

Bluehost is one of the cheapest web host providers. You can now start your own website for less than 3$ a month, which is amazing. It’s the price for a cup of coffee, so you don’t have more excuses.

Bluehost offers you a free domain as well, which is perfect. In many cases, you have to pay for the web hosting and an extra fee for your domain registration. Bluehost offers it free of charge.

Also, ff you already have an existing domain name, Bluehost even enables you to transfer it to your new Bluehost account for free.

Not to mention that they have 24/7 chat included in the price. I’ve used their chat several times when something went wrong on my site, and they always helped me. It is fast to get in touch with them, and they can help you with any issue, which is also very important for you as a beginner travel blogger.

Many bloggers and businesses use Bluehost, and it’s really one of the best web hosting providers, especially for beginners. It’s cheap and includes everything basic you need for your website as a beginner. After you grow your website, you can think of another provider, but for the beginning, Bluehost is great to start with.

 

 

Get Bluehost Here

 

Buy & Set Up Your Web Hosting & Register Domain

So now the next step is to buy your Web Hosting. After, you’ll already start creating your website. Normally, you would need to buy a domain name, but it is included in your Bluehost package, so you don’t have to think about it. Just buy your package, and start creating your website.

Once you buy your web-hosting service, you’ll have to register your domain name. The process is quite intuitive. Once you buy the web hosting, it will automatically guide you through registering your domain name and downloading WordPress.

One thing you should also be aware of is that your domain name might not be available anymore. That means somebody has already taken this name and used it on the internet. In this case, you’ll have to come up with a different domain name. If that’s the case, go back to step n. 2 and create a different domain name that will still reflect your blog name.

 

 

4.Step: Choose A Theme

I can say you’ve now set the foundation of your website and done the most important parts. You have your perfect niche and a website name and a house (web hosting) for your website with a great domain name reflecting your travel blog name. It’s time to get round into your actual website creation.

Go to your WordPress. Then the first thing you should do is to download a theme for your website. It is like the interior design for your blog. It has set features and a structure for your website. The theme should be easy to change.

It has to be easy to change things around and slightly change a design. With some themes, it is impossible to change a single feature, which we don’t want. A good theme gives you some freedom to change things around.

So either go for Astra theme or Ocean WP theme. I use Ocean WP, but many other bloggers use Astra. It is generally one of the best themes. So choose one of these two.

 

 

 

5.Step: Download Some Plug-ins

The next step is to download the essential plug-ins. A Plug-in is a unit that adds specific features to your website. In other words, it helps your website to perform better in different ways.

As a beginner blogger, you’ll need the following plug-ins for your site:

• iThemes Security – for a security
• Akismet Anti-Spam – to protect your website from a spam
• Bluehost – to integrate WordPress with Bluehost control panel
• UpdraftPlus – Backup/Restore – to automatically backup your site in case of issues and lost of content
• W3 Total Cache – to improve speed and overall user experience on site
• Yoast SEO – to guide you to write SEO optimized articles

 

These plug-ins are the most essential to start with. They all help your website work well, keep it secure, well-accessible, and easy to find in Google Search. In the next steps, you’ll download a few more plug-ins that are relevant for blog posts and design.

Don’t have too many plug-ins on your site because it slows it down significantly. So have the most important ones without which your website wouldn’t be functioning properly. Also, later on, you might try some new plug-ins. If you see that you don’t use them too much, rather deactivate them. Website speed is one of the most important factors for your blog. Keep it in mind.

 

 

6.Step: Design Your Website & Create First Pages

Let’s start with designing your website. Maybe you already have a picture in your mind how you want your blog to look like. Or you need some inspiration and need a template to make the process faster and easier. In both cases, I have something for you.

I highly recommend you get Elementor. Elementor is a website builder that provides many designs for your web development. They have pre-set templates but also give you a free hand in designing your website. With Elementor, it is much easier and faster to create a beautiful website design. It looks appealing and professional.

 

Install Elementor & Create The First Pages

So now, install an additional plug-in called ‘Elementor’. Once you have it, you can start designing your website.

Before doing it, you need to first create some pages to have something to work on when it comes to design. Go to the left sidebar of your WordPress and click on ‘Pages.’ Then add a new page, write the page’s name, and publish it. Congratulations, you have your first page.

After, click on a blue bar that says ‘ Edit wit Elementor.’ You’ll be redirected to the Elementor, where you can play with the design of your page. You can add windows, choose a colour, font type, or choose one template from their database, and you’ll have an outline of your page done in a second.

After, you can still change things around in the template as you like.

I recommend you start creating your homepage at first. Then go to an about page and contact page. After, you can add other pages based on the topic of your travel blog. In my case, I chose to name each page with one European country. You can get some inspiration on my website, Voices of Travel. See its menu to go to the about and contact page.

 

Install A Few More Plug-ins

Here, you can download some extra plug-ins when creating your contact page called Contact Form 7. It’ll enable you to post a form through which people can write you a message directly on your site.

Another great plug-in I highly recommend is Duplicate Page. You can duplicate any page you’ve already created with it. Then just rename the duplicated page, and you’ll have the same design. You don’t have to create the page again from scratch. It’ll save you a lot of time.

I use this plug-in when creating additional destination pages. My pages for each country all look the same. So when I want to start a page with a new country, I just duplicate one page with a destination and only change the country’s name.

One of the most important plug-ins you’ll need on your site is Smush. It automatically reduces the size of your images once you upload them. You’ll need it from the very beginning when designing your website and uploading new images.

Photos and images are very critical because they are the ones that slow your website drastically. Smush plug-in automatically helps you reduce the size and optimize the images so that your speed is optimal.

Remember, your website speed is one of the most important factors when it comes to SEO.

 

Another plug-in you can download is Imsanity. It will immediately stop large images from uploading.

This is a summary of additional plug-ins I recommend you install:

• Contact Form 7
• Duplicate Page
• Smush
• Imsanity

 

 

7. Step: Learn SEO Skills

Besides creating your website on WordPress, this will be the most important step on your blogging journey. You need to learn SEO skills to be successful. This is the reality.

Without SEO, nobody will read your travel blog because no one has the time or is interested in reading your articles, unless you answer people’s questions or help them solve a problem.

And this is when SEO comes into play.

I’ve designed a full guide for you to learn the most important things about SEO. Before you start writing your articles, you need to learn about SEO. As I want you to implement the right strategies at the beginning, get my full guide about SEO for a small fee.

This full guide on SEO will teach you:

• What is SEO & Why it’s important
• Best tools for SEO
• What makes a great keyword
• How to install Ubersuggest
• How to use Ubersuggest & other tools to find great keywords
• Mistakes to avoid as a travel blogger
• Course that will help you move forward

 

It’ll teach you how to write articles on your travel blog using SEO properly.

Nobody will read or find your articles if you don’t learn them. So you would be wasting your time.

Once you learn SEO, people will find your articles on Google. This way, you’ll get visitors to your website.

The better your SEO skills, the more visitors you’ll have on your site, and the more money you’ll earn from your travel blog.

So make sure to learn the right SEO strategies now before writing your articles.

Get my guide on SEO by clicking on the button or image below:

 

Learn SEO Skills With This Guide

 

 

8.Step: Write Your First Blog Post

Congratulations, you’ve now created your travel website. What a fantastic opportunity to celebrate. Take a deep breath and have a look at your work. You can always change things around, so don’t spend too much time with the design. The most important thing that comes right now, which is content creation.

Remember that you create your website for people to come and learn something. So your content is the most essential part of all. Don’t spend too much time with the design. Make your site look professional, but don’t try to perfect every single detail.

What will help your site to grow are your blog posts. So now it’s time to create the first one. Again, go to the left sidebar in your WordPress and click on ‘Posts.’ Then add new and start writing.

 

Gutenberg Or Classic Editor?

Back in 2018, WordPress released a new editor, which is called Gutenberg. It is now a default editor on WordPress, so once you click on create a new post, you’ll have Gutenberg to write into. However, some bloggers don’t like it and rather change to the former editor, the Classic one.

For me, the Classic editor is also much easy to navigate through. You can try both and then decide on which you want to write your blog posts. So in case you also don’t like Gutenberg, download an extra plugin, ‘Classic Editor.’

Another plugin you can install is ‘Easy Table of Contents. This will be useful especially for your readers and enable them to navigate through your articles simply.

Check out my article about how to make money online while travelling to see how the table of content looks like. 

 

 

9.Step: Create Categories

Once you have a couple of blog posts, you’ll need to organize them into categories. It helps your site and content be more organized and gives your readers suggestions about what to read next once they finish reading an article.

When you click on posts below in the left sidebar, you’ll have ‘Categories.’ Create a few and organize your posts into these categories.

A Parent Category is the main category under which other categories will fall. For instance, the main category can be ‘Destinations,’ and other sub-categories could be ‘Albania Travel,’ ‘Croatia Travel,’ etc. So if I create a category ‘Croatia Travel’, I can choose ‘Destinations’ as a parent category. Or don’t choose any parent category and click save.

 

 

10.Step: Keep Producing Content

As I mentioned above, your content is the core of your website, obviously. So keep producing as many blog posts as you can. Opt for 80 to 100 articles on your site, and you’ll see your first bigger results.

Remember, it is different for each blogger, so there is no specific time when your travel blog will be successful. But it will certainly attract visitors if you have great content written according to the best SEO practices.

 

 

11.Step: Start With Email Marketing

One crucial thing you have to do after you have a few articles on your site is to start with email marketing. It’s the gate for getting in touch with your readers and audience, establishing trust with them, and later on, making money from your site.

There are many email marketing services, so choose one from the following:

• Mailchimp
• HubSpot
• Convertkit
• Drip
• Constant Contact

I use Convertkit as my email marketing service. It is one of the best providers out there for professional bloggers. They offer everything you need to start with email marketing, and I am very satisfied with them so far.

 

 

12.Step: Become An Affiliate

So you’ve been blogging for a while now, have produced many articles on your site, and the first visitors started to arrive. You can see readers clicking through your pages and wondering how you can all monetize them.

The first option would be affiliate marketing. When you become an affiliate for a company or another business, you’ll essentially write about their products, services, or software.

When your reader clicks on their link on your site and purchases something from them, you’ll get a commission from the business. This is called affiliate marketing and is one of the income streams you can establish as a travel blogger.

Just please, don’t write about something you don’t like. Only recommend products or services you personally use or you know are great and beneficial to your readers. Your visitors are smart, and they know whether you advertise someone’s product because of the high commission rate or you really like it and use it. So be careful.

 

 

13.Step: Earn The First Dollars With Your Travel Blog

I recommend you start with one income stream at the beginning. It can be affiliate marketing. Once you get better at it, see some results, and grow your traffic, you can start earning money from your travel blog in other ways. These could be the following:

• advertisements on your site
• create your own products
• write paid guest posts
• sponsorships & partners

 

 

What About Social Media?

You also need to market your site in some way and make it visible to your readers. Since it takes time to index your articles on Google and perfect your SEO, I recommend starting with social media. But don’t start an Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter at once.

The worst thing you can do is to have accounts for all social media. It’ll be too much work, and you’ll soon get overwhelmed. Your content and blog posts are the ones you have to focus on the most. Social Media is just the side hustle. So instead, focus on one and try to grow it.

I recommend you start with a Pinterest account. It is the best and easiest to drive traffic to your site. Get inspiration from my Pinterest account, choose a design, and create your first pins that will drive traffic to your website. Use appealing images and always include text on your pin. It is what attracts Pinterest users.

 

 

Profit From Your Travel Blog Faster

If you want to succeed on your blogging journey, you must learn the right strategies from the beginning.

As I mentioned before, the 1 essential thing you’ll need is SEO skills.

So don’t forget to grab your guide to learn these SEO strategies. It’ll save you a lot of time and bring you much closer to a profit from your travel blog.

Get my full guide on SEO and learn the most important skills:

 

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Profit From Travelling In 1 Year: Blogging Course

I started my travel blog by myself. Firstly, I watched a Youtube video to figure out how to create a website on WordPress. After that, I did everything I described in this article. However, I spent almost 3 full months creating my blog. This is waaaaayyy too much time I lost.

Only after I decided to take a blogging course. It made my life so much easier.

After looking for the perfect blogging course worth the money, I finally found one. Two travel bloggers, Anna and Tom, who have a website called Adventure In You, have perfected an excellent blogging course. So I signed up and never regretted it.

 

Blogging Fast Lane Course I Took

Anna and Tom teach you everything from starting a website to perfect SEO strategy, put you into the right mindset, and motivate you.

You’ll also learn how to write the perfect blog post, how to make money with affiliate marketing, and what is a value gift with which you can gain more subscribers.

Everyone says, ‘The money is in the list.’ that is: the best way you can earn money from your blog is with your newsletter. But first, you have to have subscribers and followers. They’ll teach you how everything works.

So if you want to start a travel blog and don’t be stuck, but earn money already after one year, take the Blogging Fast Lane Course, which I did, by clicking on the image or button below:

 

 

Take Blogging Fast Lane Course

 

You can learn more about the Blogging Fast Lane Course in the free webinar from Anna and Tom. You’ll see everything they teach you and how profitable it can be for you. Sign up for the webinar for free below:

Sign Up For Blogging Webinar – Free

 

 

 

Final Words

These are the best ways how you can start a travel blog without travelling and a full guide for doing so. I want to encourage you to chase your dream and start your travel blog even if you cannot travel right now. Perhaps, it is even a good thing because you can fully concentrate on content production and the growth of your site. Once you can finally travel, your website will be working, and you can already earn something while travelling with it.

The process to start a travel blog without travelling and your own website is quite intuitive, so if you follow the steps from my complete guide, you’ll get there. Just be patient and work hard. It will all pay off. Remember that the most important thing is your content (great and engaging articles). When writing articles, think about your niche (for whom you’re writing it). Later on, create your own products and start with an online shop to have another income stream.

Being a travel blogger is one of the best ways to make money online while travelling. If you like to see more ways to make money online while travelling, check out my article about it. Don’t hesitate to write me if you have any questions about starting a travel blog. I started on my own, and it is growing. You can do it as well.