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The solution? Traveling with your community
Blog written by Helene Sula, @heleneinbetween
TrovaTrip Host Helene Sula with Travelers on a tuk-tuk tour through Lisbon, Portugal.
Being a content creator is just like running any other small business: there's always something to do. In a nutshell, building your personal brand on social media includes the following:
- Making sure your accounts are fully up-to-date
- Having a niche or area of expertise
- Regularly sharing creative content
- Staying positive!
- Keeping your brand voice, imaging and tone consistent
- Collaborating with other influencers and brands
- Connecting with your community
—the list goes on and on! While these are important aspects of being a creator, they don't always help you monetize. But what if you could build your brand, make money, and connect with your community through travel? The answer is something you likely have never considered—group travel. Hear me out.
Group travel has been on the rise in recent years, and for good reason. Not only does it allow you to meet new people and explore different cultures, it also gives you a chance to make money while doing what you love by traveling with the people who make up your close-knit community. And what's not to love about that?!
When I first started my Instagram and blog, it was purely for fun. I thought it was a great way to connect with my audience and share my passions. As I continued, I realized how much time and effort this passion project took.
I knew I wanted to find ways to build my brand and monetize what I shared. But often sponsored posts left me feeling overwhelmed and sales-y. Frankly, it feels like you're working for someone else. Not for yourself. And that's exactly the opposite of what I set out to do!
Enter group travel. On my first ever hosted group trip, I was nervous. But as soon as the trip went live, I knew this was going to be amazing. I didn't realize just how transformative this would be! In this guide, I'm going to share how you can build your brand on social media and monetize with group travel trips in a step-by-step process to make traveling for a living a reality.
People from all over the world came to travel with me. And when we went on the trip we absorbed our surroundings and grew in the experiences we shared. I was able to share my passion with them, they experienced a phenomenal trip, and I was able to monetize in a way that felt natural to me. It's a win-win-win!
If you're a content creator, there are a few things you should consider about group travel before getting started. Here's what you need to know.
How Content Creators Can Utilize Group Travel
TrovaTrip Host Helene Sula with Travelers in vineyards on her group trip to Portugal.
1. Group travel is a great way to build your brand.
When you travel with your followers, you have the opportunity to connect with them on a more personal level. This can help you further position yourself as an expert within your niche, and it also helps build loyalty.
Not only are you sharing about the trip, but others in your group are too! People naturally want to "tune in" and watch to see what you're doing, where you're going, and what you're learning or experiencing. It sparks interest for more trips and helps you to share exactly what your brand is about.
For my trip, we came up with the hashtag #helenemademedoit - on the trip, everyone used the hashtag to share about the experiences, the food, and pictures together. As more and more people used the hashtag, it caught on and even went viral! People from all over clicked the hashtag to see what we were up to. Now, it’s a hashtag my followers use to share about trips they take inspired by me!
2. You can create unique content for your brand partnerships.
Build your brand by benefiting from increased traffic and original content by partnering with other brands, then create content around the world! Whether a brand reaches out to you or you want to work with a particular company, you can create unique content for them whenever you go!
For example, let's say you're working with a hiking boot company. You can create content leading up to the trip, during the trip, and even after the trip that is specific to that partnership. This helps you secure more brand partnerships and also creates more value for your followers.
3. Group travel is one of the best ways to connect with your audience.
And here's the BEST part! The connections you make. When you're able to connect with your audience on a personal level, it helps create loyalty and a sense of community. This is exactly what group travel does.
You're able to share your passion with others, learn about their interests, understand what they're looking for in a trip, and create lasting relationships. These are the types of connections that help you build your brand and turn your followers into lifelong fans. In fact, on many of my hosted group trips, the connections we made were lifelong—many of my travelers went on additional trips together or booked future trips with me!
4. You are creating a space for your followers to learn, grow, and experience.
We all know that travel is life-changing. But it's not easy to find the best trips or to go solo. It's also overwhelming (and time-consuming) to book hotels and plan itineraries. Group travel allows you to meet like-minded people, make friends, and have someone to experience the world with. Plus it takes the stress away from organizing all the details.
Group travel is a space for personal growth and development. And as a content creator, you are uniquely positioned to curate these experiences. Your followers will come back from the trip changed in some way—whether it's a new skill they learned or a different perspective they gained.
5. You can generate recurring income with group travel.
If you're a content creator, chances are you're always searching for new ways to monetize your platform. And what's great about group travel is that it provides you with a way to generate repeatable income.
This means that you can continue to offer trips and experiences to your followers without having to start from scratch each time. Not only does this provide more stability for your business, but it also allows you to build deeper relationships with your followers.
Try the pricing calculator below to see how much you could make hosting a trip with TrovaTrip!
Why Monetizing with Group Travel is Right for You
One thing that really made me shy away from group travel was the headaches. As a frequent traveler, I know there are so many things to juggle: planning the trip, booking hotels, tours, and so much more. Frankly, it felt daunting and overwhelming.
Then there's the process of finding group travel rates and vetting hotels and tour companies. I don't know about you, but I've got enough on my plate when it comes to running my own business.
That's why I went with TrovaTrip. I've hosted multiple trips with TrovaTrip. I'm able to delegate the stress to them. They have proven trips and itineraries, work with the best hotels, get the best rates, and use sustainable travel practices to create a trusted travel experience.
The online portal inside of TrovaTrip allows you to easily manage your trip - see the number of bookings, map out which itineraries you prefer, and even see how much you’ve earned! It gives you total peace of mind.
Not to mention, their platform makes the trip hosting process a breeze so you can easily launch multiple trips. After all, when people enjoy the experience they want to join you again and again!
This has allowed me to generate repeatable income and scale my brand in a way that I never thought possible. If you're looking for a way to monetize your platform and create unique content, group travel is the way to go! Sign up to learn how by using the form below.
How to Start Hosting Your Own Group Trips
Now that you know how to build your personal brand through the benefits of hosting your own group trip, you're probably wondering how to get started.
My recommendation? TrovaTrip. They make it super easy for content creators to host their own trips by handling all the logistics, from finding hotels and tour operators to booking flights and scheduling every activity. Here’s how hosting with TrovaTrip works:
1. Consider surveying your audience
This step is optional but in my experience it's a great way to find out the information you need to choose the best trip for your followers. If you already know what they want that's great! Go right ahead to step 2. But if not, or if you're just curious to know your community better, the survey is a quick and easy tool to jump start your hosting adventure. Plus it also helps create early buzz and excitement around your trip and brand! Upon signing up to host with TrovaTrip, they will generate a Host Profile Page for you to help capture audience data via a survey.
The survey collects insights on:
- Where your audience wants to go.
- What time of year is best for them to travel, and for how long.
- What kind of trip they’d be interested in.
- Workshops they want to take, led by you.
- What travel budget is reasonable for them.
- Demographic info like their ages.
After you have the data from your audience, you can use it to plan the perfect trip!
2. Plan your trip
Pick an itinerary and travel dates that line up with not only your passions and interests, but your audience's too. There are over 100 professionally designed itineraries created by industry experts offered by TrovaTrip. You literally can't go wrong!
My hosted group trip in Portugal was 10 days long and focused on photography and a blogging workshop while we toured Lisbon, Porto, and Lagos. In Italy, we did 7 days in Rome, Florence, and Cinque Terre with a focus on Instagram and blogging workshops.
Maybe you'd like to go to Bali and immerse yourself in the food and culture or lead yoga flows. Or adventure through Patagonia and trek the epic landscapes and teach your photography secrets. Or venture to France with a private photographer to get the perfect Instagram shots!
The final, and one of the most exciting things to consider when planning your trip, is how to make the trip unique to your brand. I personally recommend hosting a workshop to spark interest and bring what you know to the table! Your audience follows you for a reason, so why not share your talents with them? By offering a workshop, you are able to further position yourself as an expert within your industry while providing a value-add to your followers. Score!
TrovaTrip Host Helene Sula with Traveler visiting the Colosseum in Rome, Italy
3. Sell spots on your trip
Next, share your trip with your audience! What works best for selling spots on your trip is you being you! Share Instagram stories and/or TikToks talking directly to the camera about your excitement for the trip. Don't forget to use features like polls or Q&A to get your audience involved/excited.
I recommend promoting your trip across multiple platforms:
- TikTok
- Blog
- Podcast
- YouTube
- Your Newsletter
- Etc.
You can even use a trip landing page and attractive visuals (photos, videos) to help sell your trip.
I suggest sharing about your trip before it's live (include a countdown) to ramp up interest. When your trip launches, post about it across all your platforms! Your trip will become confirmed once it reaches the minimum number of travelers required to operate.
Personally, I recommend promoting your trip the first couple days of your launch and then continue sharing once a week until you confirm (or sell out). If it sells out you also have the option of creating a waitlist so travelers can be notified if a spot opens up, or so they can get first dibs in case you decide to launch a second trip.
4. Host your trip!
The best part: host your trip! TrovaTrip allows you to connect with your group through a provided group chat before the trip actually starts. This helps you get to know each other and sets your trip up for success. TrovaTrip also provides a local Guide to lead the way, translate and share details about the destination. Need to know where to get a SIM card? Or the closest ATM? A great restaurant nearby? Your Guide has all the details so you don’t need to stress.
On the trip, your role is to enjoy and interact with your audience. Be present! Take photos and videos to share across your platforms. This is such a great way to show your audience an exclusive look into your life as well as give them a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into running your brand. Trust me, they'll love it! Lastly, come prepared with your workshop material or any swag bags you plan to hand out to your travelers (nothing like some mementos to help them relive the memories!)
Now that you've hosted a trip, you're a pro and you're ready for the next one!
TrovaTrip Travelers on the beach in Greece.
Time to Make Money Traveling the World
There's no doubt that group travel is a great way to build your brand as a content creator. By hosting your own group trip, you can create unique content, generate repeatable income, and scale your brand in ways you never thought possible.
TrovaTrip will help you with an easy-to-use platform to sell your trip, and they even have travel experts to support you along the way!
Bottom line: hosting a group trip allows you to connect with like-minded people, create incredible content, and get paid to travel the world. You're creating core memories and deepening relationships with your audience and getting paid in a meaningful way.
If you're ready to take your brand to the next level, submit this form to learn more about hosting a trip with TrovaTrip. I can't wait to see your amazing adventure!