When Kris Caluwaerts felt so burned out at work he couldn’t take it anymore, he discovered himself at a crossroads together with Sylvia Van Overvelt.
On a whim, they determined to take an opportunity and comply with their ardour for journey. Beforehand, they solely actually traveled critically yearly. However, at that second in 2017, they determined to dive headfirst into their journey they usually created their weblog Wapiti Travel.
Relatively than being a normal journey weblog, they concentrate on three essential locations: Japan, South Korea, and Portugal. Their weblog has allowed them to journey the world and earn passive earnings.
Actually, they’ve been incomes 6 figures a yr from show advertisements alone.
Preserve studying to search out out:
- What led them to create their web site
- What their authentic thought was
- The place their earnings comes from
- Their essential advertising methods
- Their ideas on search engine optimization
- Their method to key phrase analysis
- How they create content material
- How they develop their e mail record
- Their go-to assets and instruments
- Their biggest problem
- Their essential accomplishment
- Their greatest mistake
- Their plans to pivot
- Their recommendation for different entrepreneurs
Meet Sylvia Van Overvelt and Kris Caluwaerts
Kris: Journey buddies since date primary—that is us!
We spent half that night geeking out over journey tales. Seems, exploring the world is our shared obsession. Sylvia even dreamt of being an explorer as a child!
Sylvia: Life took a detour although.
We each had regular jobs, and for years our adventures had been restricted to annual epic journeys and metropolis breaks.
However then, Kris hit the brakes with a burnout. It wasn’t supreme, nevertheless it turned the push Kris wanted to show his journey ardour into one thing actual.
We do not have youngsters, however we have a furry little adventurer named Pepper!
Sadly, he cannot be part of our globetrotting expeditions, however fortunately, he is received superior cat-sitters on the prepared (aka our household) who spoil him rotten whereas we’re gone.
Why They Created Their Web site
Sylvia: Kris’s burnout was truly a bizarre sort of fortunate break. If that hadn’t occurred, we would nonetheless be within the rat race.
Nevertheless it pressured Kris to do one thing together with his journey ardour, and hey, guess what? Seems we’re each loopy about exploring the world!
Reality be advised, a weblog wasn’t our authentic grasp plan. We had been truly going to construct this entire fancy journey platform for planning epic journeys. The weblog was meant to be only one piece of it.
The concept was to create an internet platform the place individuals might independently plan their journeys based mostly on waypoints.
Kris labored on it for a few yr after his burnout. Nevertheless, it by no means went dwell.
Regularly, we realized that this is able to be too huge of a challenge requiring vital funding and collaboration with many individuals, which was not one thing we needed to pursue.
As that plan grew a bit too bold, we pivoted and centered totally on the weblog as an alternative.
Again then, we had no clue you may truly make money just from blogging. Who knew?!
We found that entire facet of issues as soon as we began digging into the running a blog world.
We began our weblog in October 2017. At first, we didn’t know what we had been doing. After our first journey to Japan in March 2018, we began to take it extra critically.
How A lot They’re Incomes
Our running a blog journey began gradual and regular.
We initially wrote about no matter got here to thoughts, however after a couple of months, we determined to get strategic and began researching search engine optimization and key phrase analysis.
The primary yr was powerful. We had barely any guests and it took months to earn our first fee of about 1 euro. We had been so excited, we did a bit dance!
We saved going, even when issues had been powerful. It took plenty of perseverance, however finally, we began seeing some traction.
We had been incomes about €2500 per 30 days when Covid hit. It was a tricky time, however we saved creating content and promoting our blog.
We believed that journey would finally bounce again, and we had been proper. Now, we’re each capable of make a full-time dwelling from our weblog.
Our essential supply of earnings is affiliate internet marketing. We earn commissions from selling resorts, automotive leases, and different travel-related merchandise.
We’re additionally members of Mediavine Professional, which suggests we earned over $100,000 in promoting income final yr.
Here is a breakdown of our earnings:
We’re grateful for the chance to share our love of journey with the world. We’re excited to see what the long run holds for Wapiti Journey!
Our workload for the weblog can range rather a lot.
Within the early years, we had been each engaged on it full-time. Now, there are some weeks the place we’re full-time on the weblog, however there are additionally weeks the place we take it a bit simpler.
We’re taking issues a bit slower proper now as a result of it isn’t totally clear how Google goes to evolve.
We do not need to pour a ton of time into the positioning if we’re unsure what the very best plan of action is in the meanwhile.
Their High Advertising Technique
The Fastlane course was a game-changer for us. It taught us rather a lot about search engine optimization, specializing in our strengths, and email marketing.
We discovered the right way to optimize our weblog posts. We additionally discovered the right way to determine the subjects that had been bringing us probably the most visitors.
The course additionally coated the right way to construct an e mail record. We managed to develop ours to over 18,000 subscribers.
We’re so glad we took the Fastlane course. It is helped us take our weblog to the subsequent degree.
Their Ideas on search engine optimization
search engine optimization is our bread and butter. We have by no means paid for promoting, and we depend on search engine optimization to drive visitors to our weblog.
We solely write about locations we have been to and that we predict we are able to rank for. This can be a huge distinction from our early days after we would write about something and all the pieces.
This additionally signifies that we don’t cowl all of the locations that we journey to.
We’re unsure if search engine optimization is lifeless or not. Google has been making some unusual modifications these days, and we had been hit by the HCU replace in September 2023.
We have been specializing in search engine optimization for the previous few years, however we’re questioning if we must always diversify. Nevertheless, we’re not fairly positive how we might do this.
Key phrase Analysis
As I discussed earlier than, we do not write about each vacation spot we have visited.
We additionally write in clusters, which suggests we create plenty of content material across the similar matter. We concentrate on Japan, South Korea and Portugal.
These are locations we go to frequently.
Key phrase analysis is tremendous vital for this, and it is one thing we spend plenty of time on. I attempt to concentrate on long-tail keywords that the competition hasn’t written about intimately but, and that complement current content material that is already doing effectively.
This takes plenty of work. Typically I spend half a day on the lookout for the proper key phrase.
I maintain these key phrases in an inventory and search for associated key phrases.
Hyperlink Constructing
Hyperlink constructing shouldn’t be one thing we actually concentrate on. No less than not on exterior hyperlinks.
We will place internal links in a lot of the content material we write, however we do not actively hunt down exterior hyperlinks.
Now that our weblog is a bit older, we’re seeing some exterior hyperlinks coming in robotically. Not rather a lot, however a couple of right here and there.
Their Content material Creation Course of
Earlier than we write an article, we examine to see if it matches with our current content and if it’s something we can rank for.
Provided that that is the case will we begin writing the article.
Due to the element we put into our articles, it generally takes 3 to 4 days to put in writing one.
So we actually need to make it possible for individuals will truly discover these articles earlier than we spend 4 days writing one thing that may simply accumulate mud.
We presently have about 400 articles dwell on our web site.
Their Electronic mail Checklist
Guests can join emails in regards to the vacation spot they’re studying about.
When individuals go to a few of our pages, they’ll obtain a journey guidelines in trade for his or her e mail tackle. As soon as they’ve crammed this in, they’re added to our mailing record, and we ship out an automatic e mail sequence. In these emails, we share helpful data and primarily direct them to our affiliate pages.
After all, we do not have these emails for all locations, however we get good suggestions on those we do.
We presently have 18,000 individuals on this record.
We even have a variety of Fb teams the place individuals can go away their particulars once they be part of, in the event that they need to. We get fairly a couple of e mail addresses from there too.
We now have round 4 Fb teams centered on particular locations the place individuals can ask questions. In these teams, we additionally share helpful data. We additionally extract helpful ideas for new posts from the teams.
Their Favourite Sources
Kris: We’d suggest the Fastlane course. We discovered rather a lot from this course within the early years.
Sylvia personally follows the Revenue Faculty YouTube channel and we additionally discovered rather a lot from blogger teams on Fb.
She follows the DNW group by Sharon Gourlay and the Mediavine group each day.
Their High Instruments
Kris: WordPress is our blogging platform of alternative.
Certain, it has its flaws and is continually beneath fireplace from potential hackers, nevertheless it’s nonetheless an actual blessing to work with.
It affords so many potentialities, and because the introduction of the block editor, it is also turn out to be a lot simpler to use a lovely format to your web site.
Asana is our go-to software for protecting monitor of duties and priorities. We use it to divide up the work amongst ourselves and our VA.
In the mean time, our group is simply the two of us and a VA. Earlier than, we had about 5 freelance writers whom I discovered via Fiverr.
Sadly, Sylvia was very ailing final yr, which resulted in us virtually not working for 9 months and never writing any new posts.
Additionally, as a result of present Google updates, it would not appear opportune for us to speculate a lot time in new articles. As a substitute, we’re focusing extra on advertising our current posts.
KeySearch is our weapon of alternative for key phrase analysis. This helpful software helps us discover the proper key phrases to focus on in our blog posts in order that we are able to entice extra guests to our web site.
Their Greatest Problem
Beginning a weblog is a comparatively low-cost funding in comparison with many conventional companies. Certain, you may want a laptop computer and a few internet hosting, however that is about it.
The true price comes within the type of effort and time. It takes years to construct a profitable weblog, and through that point you may seemingly be incomes little or no.
We had been lucky sufficient to produce other sources of earnings after we began our weblog. However when you do not, it may be powerful to make ends meet within the early years.
It takes plenty of grit and dedication to keep it up, particularly if you’re not seeing any outcomes.
However when you’re keen about your matter and also you’re keen to place within the work, it may be extremely rewarding. We have been capable of journey the world and do what we love, all because of our weblog.
Sadly, we had been hit by the HCU replace in September 2023… as a result of nothing within the on-line world stays the identical for lengthy! Change is the secret.
As a result of we have realized the necessity to differentiate, we have additionally launched a brand new Japan web site referred to as Japan Here We Come. Nevertheless, this web site continues to be in its infancy.
Their Best Accomplishment
We’re tremendous proud that we have been capable of develop this weblog from nothing right into a enterprise that helps each of us. And the very best half? We’re not slaves to it!
We often journey for about 3 months annually (in 6-week blocks).
Once we’re on the highway, we barely do any work for the weblog, nevertheless it all the time saved on chugging alongside simply high-quality. We’ll see what the long run brings…
What They Want They Knew When They Began
Kris: We knew we had been taking a danger after we put all our eggs within the Google basket.
However we by no means anticipated {that a} single Google replace might have such a devastating influence on our search outcomes. We misplaced greater than 80% of our visitors.
Up till the September HCU replace, we had been bettering with each replace. If we had recognized this was coming, we might have diversified our traffic sources.
Lesson discovered. Do not put all of your eggs in a single basket!
We’d additionally select a name that resonates more with a blog.
We selected this title after we began with the opposite enterprise and saved it after we remodeled right into a weblog however Sylvia doesn’t prefer it in any respect.
Their Most important Mistake
Little question about it, we put all our eggs within the search engine optimization basket and uncared for different visitors sources. In hindsight that has for positive been our greatest mistake!
We incessantly obtain inquiries about whether or not we are able to manage full excursions. We’re presently exploring this selection.
Prior to now, we aimed to make our income as passive as attainable; nonetheless, given the present Google updates, we understand that relying solely on that’s now not viable.
Establishing a journey company specializing in Japan and South Korea stands out as the subsequent step. Moreover, it will enable us to proceed studying, which we additionally discover extremely satisfying.
Their Recommendation for Different Entrepreneurs
Sylvia: In terms of running a blog, I discover it very troublesome to present recommendation proper now. search engine optimization has been the identical for years, and when you discovered a great course and adopted the recommendation rigorously, you may make your web site a hit.
However now the foundations have modified. The sport has fully modified, and I do not assume anybody is aware of what to do proper now.
Possibly issues will likely be completely different in a couple of months, however the uncertainty might additionally final for years.
So would I like to recommend beginning a weblog proper now? I do not know.
However one factor we each agree on is that we’re each very glad that we began doing one thing with our ardour after Kris’ burnout. That has modified our lives fully.
Discovering work carefully aligned together with your passions is recommendation I’d give to anybody with out hesitation.
