How To Archives - Travel Blogger Blueprint

April 14, 2016April 14, 2016

14 Ways To Get Recognized And Get Those Numbers Up

I see some people say that numbers aren’t important, its engagement. I don’t necessarily agree entirely as if you look at every single, well almost every single opportunity that comes up, it asks for guess what “good” numbers. Of course the term “good” and “high” differ by brands, location, blogger, etc. so that makes it even more difficult.

We are humans and that’s how we measure things; that’s why we do Top 10 Lists as we want to know the best in any category.

It’s the high numbers that sometimes get your foot in the door, then the engagement comes. Not usually low numbers with good engagement. It could happen, but not usually. Don’t fool yourselves.

And this does vary by region. I was in Asia at ITB Asia and almost every brand I met the first conversation was what are your numbers. And unless it was five figures, you’d typically be overlooked. As a matter of fact; I got turned down for some stays and I know others who got the same comps as they had higher numbers. Which is fine, just letting you know how it seems to be in that part of the world. Your experience may differ of course.

Brands want awareness so they look at really large numbers to get this. This is why celebrities get paid so much money to make appearances; they have mass appeal.

I know I’ve been overlooked many times as my social media numbers are not as high as the brands want; great engagement though. Now don’t go crazy now, I did say this is not the case every time :-).

So what do you do then if you have “lower” numbers?

Build your brand and your audience.

And whatever you do, as tempting as it may be, do not buy or cultivate the numbers as that only ends in one way; disaster!

Some people are lucky and their brands are built quickly; for others it takes time and a boatload of work.

Don’t be disheartened though, just keep at it. Here are some ways to get your numbers up in a random order:

1). Use Facebook Ads to target your audience. Yes, this will cost you, but you should invest some money in your business. Here you can choose the exact audience you want to Like your page or subscribe to your newsletter, etc. Head over to Facebook.com/ads to get started. I also did a piece on Facebook Ads here.

2). Create a sticky item on your site that brings users back. Do a survey and find out what is it that your users want and if you can build it for them. It maybe a place to check off a bucket list or do some kind of calculation; maybe a calculation to figure out how much money to take on a trip to a European city as opposed to a trip to an Asian city. You can use free tools such as Google Forms or Survey Monkey to create these surveys. And hire coders from places like Upwork.com.

3). Have a competition and give away something in which your audience has interest. Have them do something to increase your numbers; e.g. have them Like your Facebook page, or follow you on twitter or Instagram. There is a tool called King Sumo from the Sumome folks that works really well. It does cost, but again, you need to invest in your business

4). Concentrate on one metric/social media at a time. Don’t try to be everywhere every time, yet. Yes, Snapchat is getting big now, but is that where your audience lies? Find your social media niche and work it. For me, that is primarily Facebook, so I spend more efforts there. Instagram is growing, but not as much as Facebook, so I try to concentrate there. What I’ve noticed is that if you are big in one media and then move to another it works better as your fans will follow you wherever you are as they like YOU.

5). Start a newsletter and create an opt-in bribe that your readers would pay for, but give it away for free. The bribe does not have to be lengthy, but it has to be something with which your audience resonates. So maybe a checklist for packing for a ski trip, or a five tips to get upgraded on the next flight or ten of your best photos. You know your audience, give them what they want. There are many newsletter engines out there; I use Convertkit and Aweber, but there’s Mailchimp, Madmimi, Drip and at the highend, Ontraport, Infusionsoft. And there are many, many more. Start small and as you build your list ensure that it pays for itself by looking for sponsors or companies of which to become Affiliates. The key to finding a good email product is to ensure that you can tag and segment your list. By this I mean, put list members in categories so you can tailor emails to them. So for example, you may have a beginner category for travelers or golfers, skiers. This way you can send them information that’s appropriate. It increases your open and click through rates and makes your readers happier. I’ve found that Convertkit does that really well.

6). Do a guest post. I know that many of you “don’t work for free,” but a guest post is a good way to introduce yourself to a new audience and pick up some followers. Shoot for larger publications as they will give you the best bang for your buck, well time. Have a game plan, so ensure you have similar articles on the site so users can stay longer when they come. Also the link in your bio should perhaps go to a special page for those readers so they feel special. Be different.

7). Speak at a conference or in your local community; this will show you as an authority and open up a whole new audience to your brand. Look at Meetup.com and find some local event. There are also local Social Media Days in lots of cities. People need to know who you are and what you are about.

8). You could even have a piece of content and in order for them to receive it they have to tweet to unlock it. Here are some plugins you can use.

9). Whatever you do, do it well and then some! Write quality content, teach, give, take great photos, make enchanting videos, entertain, give. Invest your time in the business.

10). Be You. No one else can. This is hard since we always want to emulate others with large numbers. But we can’t get there unless we are us. It’s much harder now to build a brand from scratch. And its not as easy to build a twitter following as it was when twitter started 10 years and two days ago. But if you are you and are likable that goes a long way.

11). Be different. Look at what’s going on in your niche and try to be a little different; sometimes that’s all it takes to breakthrough the clutter. Don’t be afraid to fail. I’ve failed many times and still trying new things. When you fail, its good as you now know what does not work.

12). Market yourself. I can take a lot of blame for this one as I’m not good at this. But I’m taking steps to fix that and you can too. It does not take much to make it all happen. Get yourself out there and show yourself as an authority. Many of the tips in this piece can go a long way to help. And sometimes you just have to take a stance on something and go with it.

13). Hone your craft. If you aren’t good at what you do, no one will follow you on social media. It’s that simple. So take time to be good at what you do. If that means taking online courses, then do it. Attending seminars then do it. Maybe a class at a local community college. Do it.

14). Be patient. It takes time, unless you are lucky:-). Usually it does not happen overnight. And sometimes you have to spend your own money. I think I remember Lee Abbamonte saying at a conference that he used his own money to visit all the countries in the world, then he got noticed and now he gets paid to travel. So be patient and have fun doing it. It may not happen right away, but it will.

These are but a few of the items that you can do to get your numbers to the levels where you will start to be noticed.

What say you? What have you done to increase your numbers? If you currently have “high” numbers or are building your numbers? How did it all work for you initially?

And if you are a Brand who thinks I’m all wet, let me know as well. Are you numbers focussed? Honestly, what do you look for if the blogger does not have “high” numbers?

August 4, 2015August 4, 2015

15 Steps To Get You Started Using Targeting With Facebook Ads

I see many comments online all the time about how mean Facebook has become since its not free to get your content out anymore. Remember that Facebook is an Ad Agency; they are a public company and selling Ads is one of their revenue models. So here are 15 steps to get you started using targeting with Facebook Ads.

If you have a business, you should know by now that you can’t offer everything for free. I mean, how will you pay the bills?

My overall strategy for Facebook Advertising is to increase targeted traffic to my site. The important word here is “targeted.” Facebook makes this super easy. Then get them to subscribe to my newsletter where I can talk to them and have a conversation, do a survey and give them exactly what they need.

Also, when they are on your list, you can always remind them to Like your FB page.

So all my Like campaigns target a particular country and a particular interest. I choose the countries that I know my audience exists, but are not familiar with my page/services. Initially I did pure Like Campaigns, but now I’ll do campaigns that encourage them to click on a Facebook Post that will take them to my site to build traffic, knowing that if I target correctly, the propensity for them to join my mailing list or return later is very high.

Also, when I target people who do not currently Like the Page, they see a “Like” button inserted by Facebook on the ad, so they may like the page outside of the original intention of the ad.

I do one country at a time as its easier to measure and Facebook prefers it that way, so the ads work better. It may cost a bit more since I have to do each country, but that works well.

I normally run a Like campaign for just under $100 then stop it and let organic Likes take over. What you will find is that the friends of the folks who Like your page will follow since they trust their friends. It is imperative that you watch the Ad like a hawk initially so you can adjust the bids up or down so it starts to be shown to visitors. Once it starts going, still watch it as most times, the bid lowers and you want to lower your offer as well. Remember you can pause the Ad at any time, analyze, make changes and re-start it. Go to Facebook.com/ads and then click on the ad. Look over on the right hand side you will see a box similar to the one below. Click on the On button to toggle on/off.

Remember to set a daily budget; I usually set $5, so my ad runs for 20 days if I make it to $100. Of course you can adjust your budget accordingly.

You can run a specific campaign that basically just says “Like my page” with a photo that you know will appeal to your audience. You can choose I think up to five photos and look at the stats (https://www.facebook.com/help/787469977969222/). Stop the ones that are not performing and stick with the ones that are doing well.

So, if you have an eco travel site, you may say “Click Like If You Like Turtles,” or something you know your audience loves. Facebook will approve/disapprove the ads, so you won’t have to worry about it not being an appropriate message. Or you can drive people who do not Like your page currently to a particular post on your page, that will take them to your site and hope that they will like your page since they do not currently do so.

Then use a photo that’s appealing to them, maybe a turtle crossing the road, on the beach, swimming, etc.

Facebook has a tool that you can use to check the 20% text content. Go to https://www.facebook.com/help/468870969814641, read this section and there is a link to the tool.

Facebook Help files for Ads, really tells you all you need to get started. The advanced stuff takes trial and error and lots of reading to get it right, but the results are worth it.

I strongly encourage that you create some sort of product/service, this way you can keep your acquisition cost low and get your prospects to try your product/service.

If you are just starting out, concentrate on building a targeted quality audience based on demographics (country, age, marital status, gender) and then geography and interests. You can even target people whom you know like other pages. e.g. target people who like national geographic magazine’s Facebook page since more than likely they like traveling to cool place.

Steps To Take To Create an Ad to Promote Your Page.

Go to www.facebook.com/ads
Choose Create Ad
Choose the “Promote Your Page” option; it will then ask you to choose the page you wish to promote. Choose the page from the dropdown if you have multiple pages. Of course if you want to do other campaigns you can do that as well.
Facebook Ads Promote Your Page Option
Give the campaign a name after Facebook loads your page into its active memory. There is context sensitive Hep all along the way to help you.
Now there is some advanced stuff here, but just stick to the basics for now (so skip the piece about Create Custom Audiences [BTW, when you start using this part, you will be awed!]
Set up your Locations (you are better off just using one country per ad; it just works better and is more manageable and measurable), Age, Gender, Languages and Interests and Behavior. As you tailor your audience, Facebook tells you how large it is on the right hand side (Audience Definition). So you can see if you need to adjust items to make it better. As its a Promote Page Campaign, its going to people who have not yet Liked your page, but you can change that of course.
In Interests, you can find out the name of the page you know your users like and type it here. Not all pages are indexed by Facebook, so you may not see it show up, just try another one until you find one that is indexed. They say they are working on this, but the’ve been working on it forever :-). Don’t be despaired.
Really take a look at your Facebook Insights for your Page to determine what your users are doing and what you want to target in terms of Interests.
Facebook Ads – Defining Audience

Facebook Ads Save Connections
Set a Budget; start with $5/day. You can also set a lifetime budget as well. Choose what works for you.
Schedule your ads; start right away or at a specific time
Facebook Ads Budgeting
Chose Optimize for Page Likes, the default
Pricing, Decide how much you want to pay as your acquisition cost; FB will always choose something high, just adjust as your pocket can afford. Remember that you’ve set a daily budget, so once you hit that your ads will stop running, but you can always tweak it as you go along. So if you’re doing well and your budget hits, you may want to increase the budget or just wait for the next day for it to start over. Experiment with this part once your ad is running to see what is working. Some people have seen great results using the “Get the most likes at the best price – You will be charged for impressions” option. I have too, but experiment.
Facebook Ads – Optimize for Pricing Option
Leave Ad scheduling and delivery type; FB will figure that out.
Choose the images for your Ads by clicking on the image under the Select Images words; you can choose up to six images and Facebook will tell you which ones are doing best, then you just shut off the other Ads and use that one. Then add your marketing message to get users to visit and Like your page.
Once you are happy with the images and then entire Ad overall, click Place Your Order button. And then Facebook will get back to you once your Ad is approved.

So basically two thoughts here:

1). Run a specific campaign to gain targeted Likes for your page as you may want that so you can be in the runnings for campaigns from brands, etc.
2). Run a specific campaign to get targeted people to your site via a Facebook post [campaigns to Facebook.com are cheaper than to your own blog), join your mailing list, read your posts, then invite them to Like your page once you start communicating with them.

Test, test, test. Each campaign will be different, they may not all be stellar, but keep at it.

Let me know if you all have any questions, I’ll do my best to answer them here so that all may benefit.

February 9, 2015February 14, 2015

Facebook Training: How To Use The New Facebook Select Targeting Option When Creating A Post

Facebook Select Targeting - How To Use The New Facebook Select Targeting Option

Facebook is always launching new ways to target your audience when making a post. The most recent is that they now added the “Select Targeting” feature when creating a post.

Once you place your cursor in the Create Post box, you will notice a compass rose appear to the right of the Location icon. As indicated by the blue arrow below.

Facebook Select Targeting option - First Step — Facebook Select Targeting option – First Step

Once you’ve created your post, first hover over the compass rose icon to see the message below explaining the usage of the function. You will also see “Select Targeting” dropdown arrow appear as well.

Once you click on the compass rose icon, you will see all the targeting options that are available to you:

Gender
Relationship Status
Educational Status
Age
Location
Language
Interests
Post End Date

If you decide to Target by Gender, just choose Gender and then you will have options appear for Male or Female. You will also be advised the number of people you are targeting based on the subset of the number of Likes you have. This will help you to figure out the likely reach of your post.

Facebook Select Targeting option - Target By Gender — Facebook Select Targeting option – Target By Gender

I’ve included examples of some of the other options here for you.

Target By Location allows you to choose a country, Region or State or a City.

Facebook Select Targeting option - Target By Location — Facebook Select Targeting option – Target By Location

Targeting By Age allows you to chose the age range that you wish to target.

Facebook Select Targeting option - Target By Age — Facebook Select Targeting option – Target By Age

Post End Date let’s you add a date and time to end your post. This is helpful if you have a timely offer that will expire. It helps to show scarcity as well.

Facebook Select Targeting option - Post End Date — Facebook Select Targeting option – Post End Date

So there you have it, a whole new way to target your post to ensure that only the customers you want will see it, thus improving your engagement.

Have you tried out this new feature? What do you think? Please leave a comment below.

October 23, 2014October 23, 2014

TBEX Athens 2014 Presentation – How To Network Without Becoming Annoying

Thank you for attending my talk at TBEX Athens. I certainly hope you enjoyed it and have now met a few more people than you imagined you would when you first decided to attend.

Cherish these relationships and nurture them so they will grow. Do not under any circumstances abuse them. The new people you’ve met have entrusted you and you should honor that trust.

In case you missed the presentation or wanted to listen to it again, it will be available soon from this page. So please check back from time to time.

Please leave a comment below and let me know what you thought of the session and also if you have any tips of your own or any funny networking stores.

Again, thank you.

May 15, 2014May 15, 2014

Kerwin’s Korner: March 2014 – My Monthly Activity Report

I’ve been meaning to start this for sometime now, but have not. Initially, I wanted it to be a Monthly Income Report, but I think a Monthly Activity Report works for now and will see where it heads. Maybe you’ll hate it and see no value in it and thus I’ll stop doing it or you’ll love it and want more. Let me know what you think though by leaving a comment below after you’ve read it, but only after you’ve read it. The goal is to inspire and stimulate you, so here goes.

Business Cards

I’m fresh out of business cards, so I made slight modifications and ordered new cards. This is my fifth iteration now. I keep making changes as my business model changes and I receive feedback. When I hand someone my card, I watch their reaction and listen carefully if they have any comments. Once I handed someone my card and they asked me what is my name. A clear sign that my name was not prominent enough. I fixed that as quickly as possible and dumped those cards. You have to be observant and adapt to feedback quickly. I use Vistaprint for all my cards.

Conferences

I’m very big on conferences so I tend to plan my stays with friends around that time. I get to see my friends and spend time with their families. A win-win for all involved. It’s fun being a nomad in that respect. Here are my conferences for March 2014.

New York Times Travel Show

I decided to hang out with one of my high school friends who live in the Bronx around this time. It’s always fun hanging with them and seeing my godsons as well. I can’t go to New York and not visit.

You can always apply for a Press pass for this event. If you qualify, there is no charge. The event brings together DMOs from mostly the Caribbean and local U.S. This year, Atlantic City, NJ had a large presence with their DOAC promotion. One cool event was a better form of speed dating. This allowed the DMOs to come to our tables and talk with us. As such, I was able to talk with several of them within an hour and a half (Barbados, Cayman Islands, Curaçao, Martinique and the USVI). These are now excellent contacts and will serve as great information for my readership.

It was freezing cold during this New York visit, but I took time out to do a Walks of New York walk with Jeff Dobbins. I had not realized that I knew so little about New York, even though I lived there for about six years or so until I did this walk. My favorite part of the walk was the visit to Grand Central station plus an inside look at the being renovated St. Patrick’s Cathedral. If you are in New York, I highly recommend it.

Blogger Match up in Asia

I had signed up for this new service to be able to get in touch with DMOs from the Asia side of things. I have readers always asking about this part of the world so I need to develop contacts and become proficient. I had signed up and totally forgotten about it. I did receive an invite to fill out the forms to qualify for attendance, but totally missed the “you are invited to apply” email. Once I saw it, I quickly filled it out and am now awaiting a response.

If you want to sign up for Blogger Match Up program, head over to http://bloggermatchup.com/sign-up/.

ProBlogger Event

I think, that this is one of the most hotly contested blogger conference tickets ever. Typically, within minutes of being available they disappear. For 2014, I missed the first offering as I was out of money, but was able to catch the second wave. No idea how I’m getting to Gold Coast, Australia just yet, but I’ll figure it out. Last year I got a great deal flying on Delta and booking a hotel together and may try that again this year. The year before, I just could not find anything that was worthwhile, but I did buy the virtual ticket so enjoyed the content. I got frequent flyer miles for the trip and also got upgrade to Business Class on the Sydney to Los Angeles, CA segment on the way back. It helped that I was already Gold Medallion status on Delta Airlines too.

Besides the obvious, networking, one great thing about this conference is that you get to apply for press trips setup by Queensland Tourism. I attended last year and was able to do one of the trips. I had a chance to explore the Gold Coast area, visiting attraction such as Warner Brothers Movie World, Paradise Jet Boating and the Tamborine Rainforest Skywalk as well as cycling along the beach then having breakfast at one of the local places. I now have great information for my readers who want to visit the Gold Coast area.

This year is no exception and you can see what they are offering here. Even if I don’t get one of the slots, I now have some great ideas of trips to do for myself and to suggest to my readers, plus I now have the great resource of the Tourism office. Either way I win in my book.

It’s too late for this year, unless someone cancels for the event, which does happen. You can keep an eye out for any extra tickets here. Oh, Darren provides a virtual ticket, so you can hear all the presentations. They are not live, but almost live. Somehow he manages to upload the audio and sometimes the presentations within hours after they are presented. You have to purchase a virtual ticket though to make this happen when they become available closer to the event.

ITB

I journeyed to Berlin, Germany to visit two friends who live in the city and also took the opportunity to visit the ITB Berlin Show. It’s fun being a nomad with friends worldwide. This turned out to be a very productive conference, I met two key contacts that I’ve wanted for a while and ran into random people plus rekindled friendships with other travel bloggers as well as meeting new travel bloggers.

I did also stay at the Wombats City Hostel so I could check it out having heard about it from a fellow travel blogger. The hostel is well run, clean and has ensuite rooms (toilet and showers in the room). I too would recommend this joint.

Medical Insurance

As I do not have medical insurance, I have to sign up by March 31, 2014, so I did just in the nick of time. I still have to call back and complete the application as the systems were down. I actually have travel insurance which does cover medical as long as I’m 100 miles or more from Houston.

Monetization – Affiliate Signups

This is my month of signing up for affiliates. Well all my months will be checking out affiliates. This is a great way to fund your blogging ventures. This month was pretty tough. Here’s what happened:

I got this notice from Mad Ads Media Network after submitting an application on Feb. 26, 2014. Looks like I have a lot of work to do.

We regret to inform you, but weâ€™re unable to accept your site into the Mad Ads Media network at this time.

Reason:
Unfortunately at this time, this site fails to meet our traffic requirements. You are encouraged to reapply when the site reaches an 800k Alexa rank.

We encourage you to make the required changes and to submit your site for approval again.

Thank You,
MadAdsMedia.com Publisher Team

Linkoffers.com

I signed up with Linkoffers.com which is a service that allows you to chose credit card offers. It’s a very tough approval process that is based on the content on your site as well as the traffic. Hopefully I’ll get approved. I signed up for this service as my audience is a travel audience and I tell them how to get miles from credit card offers.

Avangate Affiliate program

I signed up with this company as they host the affiliate program for Screenflow for the Mac from Telestream. This piece of software allow you to record your screen as well as edit videos. I use it to edit my travel videos as well as create instructional videos for travelblogger101.com as well as showing travelers how to do something. Check out Screenflow.

Madmimi

This is yet another email marketing tool; yes there are many of these. I’ve not used Mad Mimi, but in looking at it, its another alternative on the low end of the scale. It starts out at $10/month and goes up from there. Aweber is $19/month for 500 subscribers and then it scales up from there. You can try Aweber, which is what I use, you can try it for $1 for the first month.

LinkVehicle

LinkVehicle is an affiliate network to earn money for your blog. I met these guys in Las Vegas at NMX and signed up then. I only got approved this month. I’ve not started using them as yet, but will check them out and advise. You enter information about what you would like to promote and what you will charge. They then go find advertisers that want to reach your audience and pay what you are asking.

Expedia Affiliate Network (EAN)

This is like having a complete booking engine on your site. The back engine is from Expedia.com. You also have options to change the colors so it matches your site. This is good to make money if you are trying to get your users to use your systems to book flights, cars and hotels, plus attractions.

LeadPages Affiliate program

This is a cool piece of software. I use it to create my offer pages. I’ve had it for almost a year now and love it. They have varying levels of sign up to meet your budget. The good thing is that you can easily create your pages without having to hire a programmer. The pages are very appealing as well. You can see a page I’m setting up here for a new project. Check out Leadpages.net for more details.

Affiliate Window Affiliate

This is the company has several affiliate programs. To keep out people who are not serious they have you pay 5 USD up front on applying, but that is credit to your account once approved. I had mixed feelings about this at first, but they had an advertiser whom I wanted to work with; Virgin Trains, so I signed up. If they have an advertiser that you want to use, you can sign up here as well.

Virgin Trains

They are handled by Affiliate Window, hence the reason for signing up. I’m starting to provide more content for my readers and ground travel is one of them. As such, I’m signing up with the different train services to make this happen. I’ve actually taken Virgin Trains before and love their service, so this works for me.

Affilinet

I signed up with this company as Deutsche Bahn uses them to manage their affilaite program. This vendor ties in with my offerings for train information for my readers. Check them out here.

Running for Office

I was nominated for a position with the Professional Travel Bloggers Association and I accepted the nomination as I know I can help to enhance our profession.

Outsourcing

I have a current developer, but he’s gone missing. I do need to continue providing functionality for my users especially with new partners, so I placed an ad on elance.com and Odesk.com for an API programmer. I’ve not yet hired someone, but will do that soon. I highly recommend that you outsource the things that are repetitive and that you are not an expert. This frees you up to do the things that works best for you.

Pitches

Fellow travel blogger, Lola Akinmade Akerstrom from geotraveler’s niche, has inspired me to document my pitches. She does a great job here. From conferences, referrals, etc. I sent out twenty-five pitches. This is a combination of hotels, tourist boards and reservation systems. You really have to do pitches, otherwise your business will not grow. Afterall, you do have to keep the lights on, right? The pitches were to people I met face to face as well as those to whom I was referred. Each month, I will endeavor to give you a good idea of what I’ve done in this realm. Here are the stats:

25 Pitches sent

8 responses received
2 – success; one granted me access to the system I needed, the other sent additional information requested
1 – success; will contact me once project is ready
1 – Works with bloggers from a specific country only
2 – Reviewing my proposal; awaiting decision
2 – Waiting for me to setup a time to talk with them (ArrivalGuides.com and Sixt.com)

17 – Awaiting a response
17 – followups sent

Tools

SimplyMeasured.com

I subscribe to Ian Cleary’s blog Razorsocial.com as its chock full of really good social media marketing content. I’ve also met Ian on to separate occasions and the guy is really an inspiration, plus he really knows social media. I recommend checking out his stuff. He mentioned a few tools in one of this newsletters and and one of them Simplymeasured.com, is pretty good. There is a 14-day free trial so you can see if it matches your needs otherwise its $500/month; pricey, but it depends on how you value what you want to measure and what additional business that can bring you. I tested out a few of the reports and loved them; no money to subscribe at this moment though.

WebinarJam

This is a tool that competes with a few other online streaming tools. It uses Google Hangout as its backend. I will check it out and see what gives. I had bought MeetingBurner about a year ago, but its not working out for me, so I’m dropping it. My aim is to use this software to hold live events with my readers where we can talk about a destination, share ideas, tips, etc. Plus it can then replay the broadcast at the reader’s convenience. So check out WebinarJam and see if it will help you in your travel blogger business.

Blogging Finances

I’m a big fan of Pat Flynn over at SmartPassiveIncome.com. He has solid information and is actually a great person in person; met him a few few times at blogging conferences. He’s create a new podcast called AskPat where you can ask him questions about blogging. It actually inspired me to finally implement my AskKerwin.com service where users can ask me travel questions. So watch out for that. Well, he had an offer to try Freshbooks for 60 days instead of the normal 30 days. So I took him up on it as I’m still looking for something to keep track of the books. I think the offer has changed now as its just for 30 days without entering a credit card, so still a good deal. Hop over to AskPat.com.

Flew Norwegian Air

On my way back from Berlin, I had the pleasure of flying Norwegian Air from Berlin-Schonenfeld (SXF) to Oslo, Norway (OSL) and then onto Fort Lauderdale, Fl (FLL). This flight was a great price at just under $300. You do have to pay for your bag and food, but even with that you can’t beat the price to cross the Atlantic. Especially when you cross in a new Boeing 787-8. Check them out at Norwegian.com.

casey zeman building your audience with live vide 3/18

Sixt contacts

At ITB, I was able to get a brochure that has contact information for Sixt sales and marketing teams worldwide. If you are interested in working with Sixt, please let me know the country via email and I can send you the contact information for that representative.

myDriver.com

While visiting ITB, I met the folks from myDriver. This is a division of Sixt that offers three types of luxury cars (Mercedes, BWM and Audi) for local ground transportation. Berlin is one of the cities they serve, so I decided to test it out. Besides they gave me a 25 EUR certificate to try them. My trip from my friend’s house to the Berlin-Schonenfeld airport was abut 34 EUR, but the drive was sweet as I was picked up in a BMW 520d and had my personal chauffeur. I actually took a local train to a stop that was closer to the airport in order to minimize the cost and that worked well. The car had magazines, a charging unit for my phone and two bottles of water. The drive was polite and ontime. Plus, he gave me a 10 EUR coupon to use for my next trip. I highly recommend using them if you are in one of the cities they serve.

March 2014 Expenses

Item	Amount	Type
FounderFly (emarketing course)	9.95	Monthly
Payloadz (ebook distribution/hosting)	14.95	Monthly
Hostgator (Website Hosting)	15.94	Monthly
Hostgator (Website Hosting)	15.94	Monthly
Hostgator (Website Hosting)	15.94	Monthly
Lujure Media (Facebook Page)	15.00	Monthly
Wishlist (Membership site software)	20.00	Monthly
Outsourcing	27.00
Meeting Burner (streaming service)	39.95	Monthly
Reel Marketing Insider (Video Marketing Course)	49.00	Monthly
Aweber (email marketing software)	69.00	Monthly
T-Mobile (phone service)	82.16	Monthly
Sub Total	374.83

Webinar Software	297.00	One time
Problogger Event	358.42	One time

Sub Total	755.42
Grand Total	1,130.25

March 2014 Income

Item	Amount	Description
Amazon Royalties	9.80	Kindle Books
Passrider Series - How To Book Hotels in London, England	9.36	Ebook
Membership Site	89.52
Total	108.68

October 11, 2013

TBEX Photo Walk: How To Shoot A Water Fountain

St. Stephen's Green Fountain — St. Stephen’s Green Fountain

I recently attended a Photo Walk held by Laurence N and Daniel N in Dublin, Ireland. They did a short talk on how to shoot a water fountain. Watch the video to see what they had to say. Here is my image of the fountain. It was taken with my iPad, which means I have to go back and use the DLSR and practice some of the techniques covered in the video.

Please leave a comment below and let me know what you think. Have you shot a fountain? Do you agree with what they had to say?

October 11, 2013October 11, 2013

TBEX Photo Walk: What Kind Of Camera Does Your Fellow Travel Bloggers Use?

When it comes to photography, I just put the camera on auto, frame, aim and let the electronics do the rest of the work. Some travel bloggers though are expert photographers who fiddle with every button on their camera in order to get the exact shot they desire. So due to my limited knowledge of photography, although I’ve taken thousands of photos at TBEX 2013 in Dublin, Ireland and other places, I decided to take the Photo Walk Workshop with Laurence from FindingTheUniverse.com and Daniel from Canvas-of-Light.com. These guys are proper photographers, so why not learn from two of the better photographers around.

This was one of two or three workshops offered as a part of the price of admission to the conference. These workshops are designed to give you hands on experience in the chosen topic, plus you get to meet other attendees as well; bonus! These occurred on the day before the two-day conference sessions started.

It was a wet and rainy afternoon when we set out, armed with umbrellas and parkas or not for some. But as good neighbors we shared our umbrellas; hey. its a great way to meet someone new and its the right thing to do. Despite the weather, we were all excited to see what we would learn as we set out.

We wandered through the neighborhood taking photos and networking as curious onlookers watched. Every now and then Daniel and/or Laurence would inject some of their photography knowledge into our heads. The bloggers were eager to make adjustments so they would get good photos.

We wandered through the streets of Dublin among its famous Georgian buildings as well as its wide and sometimes narrower streets, its Parks and finally a Pub; afterall we are in Dublin and no walk is completely without a pint of that Black gold.

Bloggers are usually curious about the cameras other bloggers use, so during the walk I thought it worthwhile to do a mini survey of what everyone was using. This was also a great way to meet everyone. For me, I do not travel with my DSLR (Nikon D70s) as its way too bulky and I don’t really have the room for it at all. So I only had my Samsung Galaxy S II and my iPad with me (I think I initially annoyed Daniel in a fun way when I revealed the iPad :-)). But I used it to take a few photos and movies, despite the inclement weather. As a matter of fact, the first photo on this page was taken using the iPad.

Here’s what I found out from my survey:

Daniel – Canon EOS 6D w/ 24-70mm
Emiliano – Canon EOS 7D w/ 24-105mm
Nienke – Sony NEX-3 w 18-55mm
Mijre – Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ150 5-108mm built-in
Mindi – Canon S100
Erik – Canon IXUS95IS
Brett – Canon EOS 7D w/ 24-105mm L
Stephen – Canon Rebel T3i w/ 18-55m
Sally – Nikon D3100 w/ Tamron 18-200mm
Agata – Canon 60D w/17-70mm
Christa – Canon Powershot SX 40 24-840mm
Helen –
Wilma – Nikon Coolpix 5-25mm
Lisa – Canon EOS Rebel T3 w/18-55mm
Vera – Sony Nex-7 w/ 3.5-5.6 16-50mm
Amanda – Olympus E-P2 w/ 14-42mm
Ryan – Nikon D3200 w/ 18-55mm
Lina – iPhone
Laurence – Canon 6D w/17-40mm

So only two Nikons in the group, but who’s counting. Check out the bloggers’ sites and photos and fell free to keep in touch with them and ask questions about the photography equipment or other questions that come to mind. This was a fun walk; I’m sure the others enjoyed it as much as I did. Thanks Laurence and Daniel.

What kind of camera do you use for your blog? Any tips for other blogger photographers? Please leave a comment below.

Plus, if you were on the walk, please share a link to your photos in the comments so we can see the walk through your eyes.

New To Travel Blogging? Then check out my FREE Travel Blogging 101 Course.