Travel Blog Income Report 2020
2020 Travel Blog Income Report
I’m still not able to believe that 2020 is almost gone. Although it wasn’t the best year for a lot of travel bloggers, I saw some impressive development in Wander Her Way. 2020 was my second complete year of blogging about travel, and I’m excited to see how things develop in 2021.
While I’ve posted an aggregate of 25 and income reports from travel blogs of other blogs, I’ve never published my own blog’s earnings analysis… until today.
I decided to create this income analysis for the year 2020 to let you know precisely how much I made through my blog in the year that I was blogging with statistics, such as an analysis of my income and sources of traffic.
Naturally, I’ll tell you how the pandemic impacted the travel blogs I write on!
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Background on My Blog
I began this blog about travel at the beginning of September 2018. I had a previous blog that I was earning money from for nearly one year, and it was my main goal. Wander Her Way has always been more of a side venture for me (although I’d like to make it a priority at the end of 2021!)
As of the end of the year, my website traffic was increasing on an upward trend, and I joined the Mediavine advertising network. But, about a month into 2020, everything came to an abrupt halt because of the pandemic.
I am able to say that my earnings could have been much greater this year if it was not the case, but I was fortunate the other site didn’t suffer, and I began my brand new website in March of 2020, which was able to grow very quickly. Even though my income from my travel blog fell, I enjoyed my highest-earning year to date, and I made significantly more than my other blogs within diverse categories.
Although it was a bit disappointing to observe the rapid growth of the blog I had been writing about abruptly stopped by COVID, I am looking forward to seeing how things will develop in 2021.
Blog Income Breakdown
I am able to earn Airbnb credit by referring people to sign up for Airbnb by using my referral link. Additionally, I made Disney gift cards that were made by people applying to an account with the Chase Disney Visa credit card using the referral links I provided. These cash-based earnings are a nice perk!
I actually had the opportunity to use some of the Disney gift cards during an excursion to Disney World on February 20, 2020, just prior to when the pandemic hit, and the parks were shut for a short period, which was great!
Display Ads
I began this year by promoting Monumetric ads in my blog; however, I applied to Mediavine Mediavine in December of this year after I had finally met their requirements for traffic.
In the beginning, it was 25,000 monthly sessions, but since then, it’s upped to 50,000 monthly sessions.
In mid-February, I was able to get Mediavine advertisements on my site and benefited from significantly higher ad revenues from them for two weeks.
Then, the pandemic hit, and my ad revenues suffered a massive drop. It’s not even come close to recovering from the levels it had in February. However, it’s slowly growing again.
For the first two weeks, I made more than $20 a day from advertisements, but during the height of the disease, I was earning just $5 per day, which was quite a shock.
Affiliate Marketing
My marketing affiliate income this year came from different affiliate programs (nine in all.)
The three highest-profit affiliate programs I’ve worked with during the past year…
Bluehost(thanks to me for a tutorial on how to create an online Travel blog).
Amazon (various products related to travel).
Skimlinks (mainly hotel and flight reservations).
The three affiliate programs mentioned above were the main source of my income from affiliate marketing. I’d say that most of my Amazon revenue is from affiliates to a particular article that I wrote, the Disney packing checklist, which has been immensely popular since the first time I published it.
I was getting more traction from bookings for hotels as well as affiliate purchases of my New York Pass and London Pass, but these stopped abruptly around the middle of March.
Here’s a comprehensive guide to the most effective Travel affiliate program for bloggers who travel.
Sponsored Posts
I was able to do some sponsored posts in the past year, which added a significant increase in my income. I don’t look for these opportunities, and I only make the occasional sponsored post if the brand is directly reaching out to me.
In the past, I’ve offered between $150 to $200 for a sponsored post; however, I’m really looking to increase my prices.
These aren’t things that I enjoy doing, and that’s why I don’t have the time to spend looking for them. However, they’re a nice increase in my income and don’t require a lot of effort.
Virtual Assistant Work
In November of last year, I started working with a fellow travel blogger, aiding her in various blog tasks. The things I support her with each month are…
Alongside this monthly job, I worked on some smaller projects along with another travel blogger.
Although this isn’t only “blogging” income, I include it because I earned this income through my blog about travel. I am really enjoying working with other bloggers, and I’d like to keep doing this!
How Much Time I Spent Working
As I stated at the start of this blog post, Wander Her Way has always been an off-the-wall project for me. It has been off the radar of my primary blog, which is my primary revenue source.
This particular year, I didn’t have to spend too much time working at Wander Her Way because of the pandemic. I found it to be more efficient and profitable to concentrate exclusively on the main website and the brand-new blog I set up, as they were making A lot more than my Travel blog.
Overall, I would estimate that I worked about two hours per week for Wander Her Way (excluding the time I spent on the work as a virtual assistant.)
The majority of the work consisted of writing blog posts, rewriting blog posts from the past, and uploading or creating pins on Pinterest.
I’m pretty satisfied with the amount I made in relation to the time I spent writing this blog.