We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Monique Cordier. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Monique below.
Hi Monique, thanks for joining us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?
I have been lucky enough to have a consistent and reliable income for two years now! It was not always this way, and took a lot of trial and error. I started my travel blogging journey at the end of 2017 / beginning of 2018. I spent almost an entire year “being a sponge” and trying to learn everything I could about the industry to really set up the path to reach my goals. I read just about every free guide online, paid for many courses on photography, Google SEO, Pinterest Marketing, and website development.
I was pretty adamant from the get-go that I did not want to become an “Instagram Influencer,” which obviously no hate to them I just knew I didn’t want that to be my job! I wanted to create consistent, passive income off my website through ad networks & affiliate links, which I can confidently say I have succeed in that goal.
When the pandemic hit in 2020, that obviously hit the entire travel industry pretty hard. Almost every travel creative I knew at the time either took a massive break or quit all together. When I saw all that I worked for from 2018-2020 go to nothing, I almost quit too. But I thought to myself as I hovered over the “delete” button on my site.. “Most people are going to quit right now when things are tough. If I push through and don’t quit, I will get there eventually.”
So in 2020, I learned the ins and outs of Google SEO, deleted my Instagram for about 3 months to really focus on my writing / website side of my business and it paid off!
Monique, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
My name is Monique and I am the creator of the travel blog, My Perfect Itinerary! While I specialize in writing detailed itineraries of destinations, I also work with tourism boards, hotels & travel companies to help promote them to my travel-loving audience.
This year, I have also launched courses to help other aspiring bloggers specifically on Pinterest Marketing & how to partner with hotels / tourism boards. These courses from other bloggers helped me SO much when I first started out, so I really wanted to pass down that same help to the next generation of travel creatives.
A little about me on a personal level: I was born & raised in Las Vegas, and even though I love to travel, I strongly believe Vegas will always be my home base. My business really took off in 2020 when I spent a lot of time photographing the strip while it was empty (thank you COVID!) and I wrote many Vegas itineraries while I was not traveling.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
In 2020, the travel industry got hit hard. The world was in a state of panic and the last thing on their mind was booking travel. For a travel blog, that means your viewers drop to almost nothing.
I was seconds away from deleting my entire site and giving up, thinking all my hard work could just vanish in the blink of an eye. But I thought to myself, “Most people are going to give up right now. If I push through, I will get there eventually.” I made up a quote that I would repeat to myself every time things got hard or I felt I wasn’t going anywhere:
“It’s not IF, it’s WHEN!”
It’s not about if I ever get there, it’s just a matter of when. Because as long as I don’t give up, I will figure it out eventually!
So in that moment, I decided to shift my focus. I focused on National Park travel & local USA road trips instead of international travel. That got me through the pandemic years and made my site more niche for west coast USA travel!
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
Learn photography & invest in a high-quality camera.
Yes, you will find a bunch of “motivational fluff” online of creatives telling you that you can create a following off I-Phone selfies and pre-made presets, but you will only get so far! Especially for the travel niche, people want to see high quality images! Plus, if you ever want to work with hotels, tourism boards, or companies, you will want to have a skill set worth selling.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://myperfectitinerary.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/myperfectitinerary/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Myperfectitinerary
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/MPItravels
- Other: https://www.pinterest.com/myperfectitinerary My “How to become a travel blogger” site: https://myperfecttravelblog.com/