How to Become a Travel Influencer: 8 Important Tips

Updated July 2023

The internet is always opening doors for new career opportunities. If you’ve always wanted to travel the world and leave traditional office jobs behind, you might have a promising future on social media. This guide explains how to become a travel influencer with eight easy tips that will get you started. Your greatest passion is about to become your career and make you feel more fulfilled than ever.

1. Learn How to Use Social Media

Many people are on social media every day. They have personal accounts that they use to keep up with friends, family and the latest news. Even if you spend all day cycling through your favorite apps, recreational social media browsing isn’t the same as using it for your business.

Influencers create branded social media accounts so they can keep up a refined image and specific content. Think about which platforms you know best and pick one or two to start your influencer career. It’s easier to manage your social media presence by starting small. Establish Instagram and Twitter accounts for your new brand, then learn when to post to maximize your digital interactions and follower count.

You’ll quickly learn that each platform has unique perks. Pick your favorite one, using the rest as advertising venues.

2. Pick Your Preferred Niche

Traveling is one subject, but it contains many subtopics that you could cover in each blog post or social media update. Pick one to three topics you’ll focus on so your followers understand what they’ll get by checking out your content.

For example, you could specialize in selfie trips or curate posts related to eco-travel. You can always expand your primary topics after building trust with an audience that knows what they can look forward to when you post.

Brainstorm a list like the following and go from there:

• Private jet travel 
• #Vanlife 
• Off-grid adventures
• Affordable family fun 
• Quirky museums and roadside attractions 

3. Plan Your Weekly Posts

You won’t be able to travel every day of the year, so part of learning how to become a travel influencer is planning posts outside of your vacations. You’ll have to post regularly to maintain your follower count, like daily pictures or weekly updates. Write about related topics your readers will get excited about and return for more. You could mention how you protect your property while traveling or find the best deals on flights. Useful information will make people share your posts and check back for your next round of content.

4. Create a Travel Budget

How often do you want to travel? How much can you afford? Answering these questions makes it easy to pick your destinations and plan a year full of trips. Use your existing budget to save for traveling and expand that budget if your influencer career begins to take off.

Choose your affiliates carefully. Many people dream of becoming travel influencers because they want rewards like luxury trips in exchange for articles and vlogs. The unfortunate reality is that most places will want to see results — aka, considerable traffic to your site or social media page — before they offer comps. 

You’ll have to put in the work before you reap rewards like $500-a-night hotel stays. While you grow, work within your means, using cheaper alternatives to travel to destinations and establishing a portfolio you can take with you to present to prospects when you’re ready to bargain.

5. Take Incredible Photos

Influencers reach bigger audiences when they post pictures worth liking and sharing. Investing in a high-quality camera will help you get past the amateur accounts that only use their phones. Compare the latest models to discover one within your budget and post incredible photos that make people want to hit the follow button.

6. Choose the Best Hashtags

Hashtags are how people find you on social media, but you can’t just add a random assortment at the end of each post. The best influencers find the trending hashtags to jump onto search results that people are currently searching. As long as they’re related to your content, people will appreciate seeing your pictures and may start following you because the social media platform suggested you on the trending page.

7. Connect With Other Influencers

Brands partner with other companies all the time. It’s an effort to combine similar audiences so both companies benefit from the exposure. Influencers do the same thing. Find other travel influencers on the social media sites you want to use and connect with them after gaining a following. You could stop by their popular podcast or guest write on their blog while giving them exposure through your future posts. It won’t cost anything and helps expand your reach.

8. Study Your Audience

Who’s following you on social media and who’s visiting your blog? Tailoring future content to your growing core audience will help your platform expand faster. If your readers are mainly baby boomers, research shows that they use Instagram 59% more often than other apps. Gen Z kids are also leaving Facebook, so that shouldn’t be the site you primarily use to reach them.

Study your audience’s ages, interests and which sites drive the most clicks for your content. When you begin publishing pictures or posts relevant to their interests and lifestyles, you’ll get more long-term followers and better engagement.

Learn How to Become a Travel Influencer

Passionate globetrotters can use this guide to discover how to become a travel influencer, even if they’ve never operated a business or owned a brand before. Learning how to use social media platforms strategically, post curated content and grow your audience will help your new career succeed and keep you traveling instead of sitting behind a desk.