Megan Jerrard has been traveling the world since 2007, visiting 45 countries across six continents so far. She has snorkeled with sea turtles and sea lions in the Galapagos Islands, summited Mt. Kilimanjaro and rode Bolivia’s notorious "Death Road" on a mountain bike. She and her husband Mike, an adventure photographer, have figured out how to make a living through traveling and sharing their experiences with the world over Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and their blog Mapping Megan. It’s a dream job, no doubt, but capturing the right images and crafting blog posts that appeal to her followers sometimes requires a leap of faith. “I have a tendency to throw myself out of planes if I feel the landscape would look better from a bird’s eye view,” she says.
Meet today’s traveling social media influencers, a growing wave of savvy professionals who have quit their full-time jobs, left their homes, pared down most of their belongings to the essentials and who now spend their days traveling the world and sharing their experiences with the followers they’ve amassed. Influencer marketing, once a social media experiment, has ballooned into a movement in which major brands are shelling out $255 million a month just for Instagram posts, according to Captiv8, a company that connects influencers with brands, and as reported by Bloomberg. To cash in, professionals have turned their globetrotting into a personal brand, which they leverage to provide sponsored content for tourism and fashion companies.
Brands often provide influencers with free travel accommodations, meals, excursions and apparel. “I am grateful for the generosity of the brands I work with, who spoil me with beautiful suites and dinners at the most amazing, romantic restaurants,” says influencer Ann Tran, who has worked with brands such as Azamara Club Cruises, Marriott and TripAdvisor. But that’s just the start. Many top influencers bring in six-figure incomes to share their travel experiences and promote brands. Scott Eddy, who works with brands such as Marriott, The Ritz-Carlton and F1, says he’s making well over six figures a year as a social media influencer. His “goldmine:” Twitter, where he can converse, drive engagement and make his followers become evangelists of his personal brand, he explains.
Thanks to this budding industry, the dream job of traveling the world has become more accessible than ever before. Since the industry and job are constantly evolving, Jerrard says it can be challenging as “there’s no set job description” and “no real industry standards as this is a very new field.” The role also comes with questions about how influencers should disclose their sponsored posts—a murky area that industry regulators like the FTC have been working to set guidelines for. Nevertheless, the profession’s filled with opportunity and promise, and centers on real-world experiences and novelty that most other types of jobs simply can’t rival.
Each day brings a new set of adventures, and plans often change at a moment’s notice. When Jill DeConti, social media influencer and founder of the blog The Luxe Travelers, for example, fell in love with Bali, she and her boyfriend Patrick extended their one-month stay to nine months. “It’s hard not to have a permanent smile on your face in Bali, especially when you’re riding on a motorbike through the green rice fields with the wind in your hair, eating healthy and delicious foods and being near the most beautiful beaches every day,” she says.
If you’re looking for tips on how to turn this dream job into a reality, here’s some advice from social media influencers who are putting their skills, curiosity and exploration to work around the globe.
Build Your Personal Brand
With so many social media influencers vying for fame and followers, it’s important for individuals to find ways to make their personal brand stand out in the crowd. Tran says the art of travel marketing “is in your images, videos and authentic storytelling.” Rather than posting a photo that yells, “hey, look at where I am today,” she focuses on storytelling so that followers are waiting in suspense for what might unfold next during her journeys.
Meanwhile, Jerrard takes a service-oriented approach, spending a great deal of time “crafting the perfect itinerary for each destination” and then sharing the information with others who might not take as much pleasure in travel planning.
DeConti helps to fuel her personal brand by working to inspire others: “I love inspiring people to see the world and take the road less traveled,” she says. But that also means filtering her experiences and carefully selecting the images she shares—what she refers to as a “highlight reel” of her life. She says there have been plenty of times when she missed a flight and was “stuck in a hot, stuffy airport in China for 16 hours” or when she was delayed “on a broken down overnight train in Thailand with no air conditioner and no food,” she recounts. “Those kinds of unexpected—and less ideal—things happen all the time when traveling,” she admits. “I consciously choose to post inspirational and uplifting things, but that doesn’t mean I have a perfect life or that everything always goes as planned.”
Grow Your Following
A fan base often grows as influencers travel, but it also requires some careful strategizing and networking, such as pinpointing the online platform that best suits the influencer and then branching out to other platforms while keeping the messaging consistent. Eddy entered the influencer marketing field with a high volume of followers thanks to his past experience starting up a digital marketing agency in Thailand, but he says that’s not the norm. The majority of influencers slowly collect their followers as they set across the globe, spreading the word to family and friends back home, then those they meet on the road and later introducing themselves to those interested in particular brands.
To find success, influencers also turn to each other for support. Some join forums on Facebook where influencers help each other out, and many reach out to those who inspire them and interview them on their strategies and techniques. Often times, a type of mentor relationship develops.
Develop a Dazzling Set of Skills
Many social media influencers have studied marketing or communications in the past, and others have worked in finance or the travel industry. Influencer Claire Ryan, who runs a blog called Forever Chasing Wanderlust, has a marketing and public relations degree and a master’s degree in project management, while Jerrard studied journalism and law. Eddy says his biggest asset is his past experience as a stockbroker, where he really learned how to sell.
But beyond past experiences and studies, influencers emphasize the need to be able to create perfect “Instagrammable” photos that appeal to their audience. DeConti suggests investing in a good camera and Adobe Creative Suite. “A lot of effort goes on behind the scenes to take great photos and then a lot of time goes into editing them in (Adobe) Lightroom,” she says. Solid writing skills help, too, especially for those influencers relying on their blog to reach their audience.
In addition, it’s important to stay ahead of the curve regarding new technology trends. With the majority of influencers tapping into Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat to tell their stories, others are experimenting with their own YouTube channels. “If you don’t keep up and adapt business strategies to new technologies, you’ll become irrelevant,” Jerrard says.
Always Be Selective
The key to success: finding brands that align with your personal brand, Ryan says. Companies “want to sponsor people who embody the style of their brand, so there is no point trying to approach companies that don’t share the same values or lifestyle you portray.” If the brand messaging doesn’t align, there will be a disconnect and the influencer’s audience won’t be engaged, she explains.
Some influencers are subtle in their approach, tagging brands in their posts and hoping to spark a relationship that could lead to paid work. Other influencers pitch brands directly via email, and some know firsthand about the added benefits of picking up the phone. Some individuals say they follow other influencers who share similarities with their own personal brand and pitch some of the companies they work with. Clients often collaborate with multiple influencers.
DeConti, who works with 353 Degrees North Villa and JUCY Rentals, has also ventured into fashion, collaborating with brands such as Shashi Jewelry, Chloe Rose Swimwear and sustainable tote company Uashmama. She has stumbled on a delicate way to marry travel and fashion and incorporate both into her posts.
Above all, it’s important for influencers to be selective when determining which companies to work with. “You don’t want to be a walking billboard for every single thing out there,” Tran says. “If you are building relationships and genuinely connecting, the brands will come to you.”
