When Ting first set up her travel blog back in 2012, she\u2019d already worked for years in UK magazine publishing. But she found she needed a creative outlet she wasn\u2019t getting from her nine-to-five.<\/p>\n\n\n
I felt I wasn\u2019t flexing my creative writing juices enough (as a sub you don\u2019t get to write as much) so I decided to set up the blog as I was getting frustrated. It was the best decision I ever made.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n
Back then, she didn\u2019t have a social media account, let alone know how to build a blog and take photos or think about SEO. Fifteen years later, she does all of it on her own for My Travel Monkey<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n The blog has made me do better, to learn so much over the past 15 years, and in doing so, my skills have improved.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n Ting builds her site around useful, evergreen information on destinations she has visited \u2013 from London day trips and things to do in Las Vegas to Paris with kids and what to eat in San Sebastian. She aims to be a comprehensive source, going beyond individual posts to create full guides that help travelers plan their trips. As a result, her articles continue to attract readers long after she publishes them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Discover how Ting turned all her content \u2013 old and new \u2013 into a growing source of affiliate income.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My Travel Monkey began as a family travel blog. But as time has passed, Ting has expanded into area guides, honest hotel reviews, food guides, and independent travel.<\/p>\n\n\n Over the years, I\u2019ve traveled independently a lot, with friends, work, or with my husband, and I felt that there was so much content to write about it would be a waste not to feature it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n And having her own blog means she can let it evolve with her life.<\/p>\n\n\n I imagine, as my kids get older too, and they don\u2019t travel with us anymore, there will be a shift again. That\u2019s the beauty of having your own blog.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n But that freedom comes with a workload. Ting writes, researches, edits photos, and manages the site herself.<\/p>\n\n\n You\u2019ll often see me with a laptop in hand, watching TV, during the day, over the weekends and even while we\u2019re away. It\u2019s a 24\/7 job.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n With Ting handling everything herself, creating long-form content like blog posts can take days or even a week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For Ting, keyword research is still an important part of the process. Even as the search landscape changes, she continues to use SEO to understand what people are looking for and shape the articles she writes.<\/p>\n\n\n Yes, I still do that even in this AI world, because you still need to answer a question that someone is searching for.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n Though organic search currently brings her the most traffic, she is uncertain about its future:<\/p>\n\n\n I am concerned that we cannot rely on search engine traffic, and changing algorithms, things are changing constantly.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n That’s why she’s giving Pinterest another go. It’s uneven (“very hit and miss for me”), but she’s determined to build a second route to her content. Plus, growing her email subscriber list. The rest of social media takes a back seat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When you can’t control where your traffic comes from next year, earning more from the readers you already have starts to matter a lot more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last year, Ting was made redundant from her job as content lead at a large UK travel company. She went full-time as a blogger and freelancer \u2013 “it’s the best decision I made” \u2013 and stable income stopped being a nice-to-have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She\u2019s tried most monetization options available. Display advertising through Raptive was her main earner on the site for years. Sponsored posts, guest posts, and link insertions come in constantly, and she’s become selective.<\/p>\n\n\n I tend not to do them anymore, unless I have full editorial control. And also, I find many of those who approach me are not willing to pay enough to be featured on the blog.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n Brand and tourist-board campaigns are still exciting when the right ones appear, but she’s offered something worth doing maybe once a year. Affiliate marketing has turned out to behave differently.<\/p>\n\n\n Affiliates are a regular passive income which is definitely more stable and consistent, which, when you have a family, is the most important thing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n And it has now overtaken the earner it used to sit behind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ting joined Travelpayouts about four months ago and switched on Drive, our AI-powered content monetization system, on day one. Her reason was refreshingly blunt.<\/p>\n\n\n Purely for the fact I am super lazy, so if I can have an automated system that does it for me, why wouldn’t I try it?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n This is where 15 years of posts stop being a problem. Ting never opened those articles to add affiliate links, swap old ones, or rewrite guides so they’d earn.<\/p>\n\n\n I found it super easy. Drive has basically done all the hard work for me.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n Her one worry was that Drive would scatter links all over the site and annoy readers. In practice, she doesn’t notice them: from her own observations, they aren’t intrusive on her pages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It also didn’t disturb anything she already had running. Drive works on top of Ting’s existing setup, alongside her Raptive display ads \u2013 she didn’t have to choose between the two, and neither one got in the other’s way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because she enabled Drive from day one, Ting has no before-and-after to compare. But four months in, her earnings on Travelpayouts are already at a level she’s happy with.<\/p>\n\n\n I can see now income is beginning to hit over $1,000 per month \u2013 and I am hoping this will continue to rise. I view that as a win. It’s an extra substantial amount on top of all my other earnings.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n \n <\/div>\n\n\n\n Drive is free, and turning it on takes a few minutes \u2013 no coding, no changes to your content.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ting\u2019s main Drive earnings come from the Targeted Offers and Link Relevant Keywords functions.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\nFifteen years of posts \u2013 and she still does everything by herself<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Search still matters \u2013 even in the AI era<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
When affiliate income became the more dependable earner<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m super lazy\u201d: an automated way to earn from old posts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
How Drive works across her archive<\/h2>\n\n\n\n