The Beginning
I’ve been interested in travelling for a long time. Every year, my best friends and I go to a major European city: Dublin, Amsterdam, Budapest, etc. We spend about two to three days there, walking around, tasting the local food, taking pictures, and having fun in the bars and clubs. That’s why the idea of writing about traveling came naturally to my mind.
I’m also a rabid football fan. My favourite thing is the stadium atmosphere: hundreds of people gathered in an arena, singing, screaming, and clapping, although they usually don’t know each other. It’s magic!
I got the idea to mix my passions for travelling, football, and stadiums. Last year, in March of 2019, I launched stadiumtour.fr — a website that helps you organize your visit to the most famous football stadiums in the world in the best possible way and find the best ticket prices.
I created stadiumtour.fr for fun and to make some extra money. On the webpages with stadium descriptions, I place a block with ticket prices from different services: GetYourGuide, Musement, Viator, etc. Site visitors can then choose the best price.
I don’t remember the exact date when I started earning revenue from stadiumtour.fr. I think it started during the summer holidays — about four or five months after I launched the website. For now, the site is only a side job, but maybe one day it will be more than that.
Site Traffic
The amount of unique visitors per month depends on the season. During the holidays, there are about 7,500 unique visitors. During the rest of the year, the curve is usually flatter at around 3,000 unique visitors.
Stadiumtour.fr appears in the top Google search results for multiple different queries. People searching for a stadium tour in France (Parc des Princes, for example), England (Chelsea, for example) or Spain (Valencia, for example) have many chances to find my website in the top Google search results.
I believe that my website correctly answers searchers with what they intend to find:
- Useful information;
- High-quality images;
- Opportunity to choose the best price and buy a ticket in a few clicks.
And Google rewards me with high rankings! 92% of the traffic comes from Google’s organic results. 75% of my audience uses mobile devices.
5 Popular Stadium Bookings on My Website:
- Parc des Princes
- San Mamés
- Estádio do Dragão
- Johan Cruyff Arena
- Stade de France
Technical Features and Costs of Stadiumtour.FR
The website was made using a Ruby on Rails framework. The admin library is called Trestle.
While the maintenance costs of the site can’t be accurately estimated, since I do everything myself, I spend about €200 per year on promotion.
Why Did I Choose Travelpayouts CPA
I tried other CPA networks, such as Awin, but the results were not so good. Travelpayouts is effortless to use and is really focused on the travel market. There is a great variety of affiliate programs on one platform. You don’t need to spend time registering here, there, and everywhere. It makes a huge difference, trust me!
Affiliate Programs
I use several different affiliate programs. I’ll tell you more about Musement, Viator, and GetYourGuide.
Musement
Musement is a platform where travellers can buy tickets to many sporting and cultural events, exhibitions, museums, and amusement parks.
Pros
- Wide range of activities
- Free tours
Join the Musement affiliate program →
Viator
Thanks to Viator, I registered on the Travelpayouts network. I was looking for a Viator affiliate program and found Travelpayouts in the search results.
Pros
- Wide range of activities
- Viator is now part of TripAdvisor
- Allows for a full refund for up to 24 hours before the reservation date
Join the Viator affiliate program →
Getyourguide
I really like the GYG website. This company is one of the leaders within the travel industry. You can book many activities on their website, including stadium tours in France, Spain, and England.
Pros
- Available widgets
- Good and clean UX
- Multilingual website
For expert tips on how to earn with the GetYourGuide partner program, check out the webinar Earn on Tours & Activities: Top bloggers and brands share strategies.
Join the GetYourGuide affiliate program →
All of them — Musement, Viator, GetYourGuide — are trustworthy websites. Promoting their offers allows me to broaden the range of choices for buyers. It’s essential, as stadiumtour.fr promises to help people find the best prices.
Tips on How to Earn With Tours & Activities Affiliate Programs
Not all of these tips are original, but all of them are always effective:
- Regarding Viator, I recommend to mention that it is now part of TripAdvisor. That’s an interesting point to reassure users and engage them on your website.
- With Musement, you can’t miss talking about the free tours. “Free” is always a magic word!
- Make great content about events and provide value to your users. I think people expect websites to give more than plain textual content. People need to immerse themselves in the tour. If we talk about stadium tours, you know football fans are passionate, so you need to touch their hearts. For example, add some exclusive photos. This is true for other events and activities too.
- In this post-coronavirus period, I think publishers and bloggers should focus on domestic activities. The most viewed pages on my website are currently the ones about French stadium tours. I guess people don’t want to take the risk of traveling too far.
- Don’t forget to add affiliate links.
- Make an effort to direct traffic to your website!
- Be patient and the rest should follow.
And the best advice I can give is: do things! Don’t listen too much and don’t think too much. Look at your competitors and try to make something better than them.
