Search engine optimization (SEO) is something most travel bloggers ignore initially, then think is automatic, and finally end up playing catch up on when they realize it’s important for making money with your travel blog. SEO is important at every stage of travel blogging unless your aren’t concerned about being found online.
An excellent resource that explains SEO from the ground up is the DIY SEO Guide, written by Shannon O’Donnell and Andy Hayes. It’s particularly adept at explaining the technical details of what you can do to your website to make an online presence. Both Andy and Shannon are SEO experts (the good kind) and I’ve read the DIY SEO Guide and highly recommend it.
DIY SEO comes with an audio introduction, the guide itself, and a worksheet to help you on your way through the course. I don’t recommend looking back on SEO, like myself and most other do; it’s harder to implement after the fact. Actually I heard that too when I first got serious about blogging 2 years ago and ignored everyone else’s advice as well. Looking back on it, I would have started with SEO and moved forward, not the other way around.
No matter what stage of travel blogging you’re in, if you haven’t taken a serious look at SEO and optimizing your website, check out the DIY SEO Guide which goes for $49. I like guides that actually come down to technical specifics, how to tweak a page or code, and DIY does such a good job of it I wrote a separate review for the Tech Guide For Travel. In addition to the guide, Shannon and Andy also have a guided tour where they’ll help you, step by step, with the SEO process. The $249 price for the guided tour is well worth the expert advice from two people who know SEO and travel blogging.
