Well, that’s what one travel blogging brand is hoping for as it launches its first destination guide.
The Traveldudes Bangkok Travel Guide is a free to download ebook being launched this week, the first in a series.
Traveldudes, run by Melvin Boecher*, has long been a favourite site with backpackers, bloggers and those planning long-term travel. Its mix of travel tips, stories, videos and photos alongside Melvin’s determined community-building have propelled it to become one of the best-known travel blogs around.
The Bangkok guide is written by blogger Mark Wiens, of Migrationology, who has lived in the city for five years. It gives a great overview of the Thai capital – highlighting a number of Hollywood-fashioned mistruths like Bangkok being close to the beach, alongside the usual information on getting there, getting around and the best places to find wifi.
The book then highlights a number of top tens – the most popular attractions and the author’s list of unmissible things to see alongside evocative photos of the city.
The guide is aimed at independent travellers on a budget through to mid-range travellers, with listings for restaurants, bars and accommodation across the city. Although the restaurants range from street food to more sophisticated hangouts, and bars include some of the most expensive in town, I would have liked to see a more varied range of accommodation options. There were many listings for hostels, guesthouses and even long-stay apartments, but few hotels, and even budget travellers like a little luxury now and then.
What’s perhaps most fascinating about the Traveldudes guide, however is the business model devised by Melvin. The guide has sponsorship and advertorial packages available and has so far pulled in G Adventures on a deal.
Melvin explains:
I think it’s a concept which should be of interest for travel bloggers. People can download the ebook for free and the sponsors will pay €1-1.50 per download depending on their sponsorship package.
But the sponsors only pay for the first 3,000 downloads – if any more ebooks are downloaded, the sponsors will be lucky to get these and the exposure from them, for free.
We think we’ll generate more downloads that way, as there is no risk to spend €2-12 for an ebook where you don’t know what you’ll get, while the sponsors get adverts, links, an advertorial in the book and mentions in promotional tweets.
The download can be offered by everyone – accommodations, tour operators, bloggers, could all offer it as a valuable guide for their customers and readers.
What’s more, profits from the ebook will be shared with a charity in Bangkok. In Search of Sanuk undertakes a range of individual action and voluntary projects to alleviate the ills of urban poverty in Bangkok. It will receive 20 Euro cents per download when the guide reaches 3,000 downloads. If a second sponsor comes on board, Traveldudes will double the amount they donate and triple it with a third.
All in all, it’s a good book with valuable hints and tips, an interesting concept and an innovative route to monetising content produced by bloggers.
Could we be seeing the start of a new trend in travel publishing?
Image: Str1ke
* Melvin Boecher was Communities Manager at Travelllll.com until 28 Nov 2011.
Post Revisions:
- 5 February, 2012 @ 17:58 [Current Revision] by Sarah Lee
- 5 February, 2012 @ 17:51 by Alastair McKenzie
- 4 February, 2012 @ 15:43 by Alastair McKenzie
- 4 February, 2012 @ 10:27 by Alastair McKenzie
- 4 February, 2012 @ 10:27 by Alastair McKenzie
- 4 February, 2012 @ 10:25 by Alastair McKenzie
- 4 February, 2012 @ 10:25 by Alastair McKenzie
That’s a truly interesting project and business model and… well… I’m not surprised since Melvin is a goldmine of ideas.
It will be nice to see the number of downloads and feed-back from readers over the next few weeks. Meanwhile… Congratulations to Melvin and his Traveldudes!
Interesting concept – good luck with it. Thumbs up for supporting a worthy cause like In Search of Sanuk.
This is an interesting idea and I think the % to charity is great, but can you clarify some things on the business model, please?
The sponsors pay the blogger 1/1.50 per download up to 3000 downloads? Is that correct? Is it correct to say that a producer of a popular guide could potentially hit an income cap?
Are there multiple sponsors per guide? What does a sponsorship cost?
Does TravelDudes find the sponsors?
What are the specs on the guide? How many pages?
Is the writer also obligated to embark on a social media campaign for promotion, or is that under the TravelDudes umbrella?
What kind of editorial oversight is used in the creation of the guides? If they include advertorial, is that stuff clearly demarcated in the publication?
Thanks.
@Pam, thanks for your questions.
I don’t really understand what you mean that with hitting an income cap. So just let me explain the concept. We want to share Bangkok tips with as many travelers as possible. That’s why I prefer an ebook which travelers can download for free. Sure costs needs to be covered, so we decided to go for sponsors to support it. As it’s our first eguidebook, it’s a bit tougher to find sponsors, which you often have with “new” products/concepts. Even having a fab product, it was important for me, that the sponsor have no risk. So they just pay per download with a budget limit. They know what their max budget is. No risk at all and our costs are covered.
It’s pretty much like banner advertising. You pay amount X as cpm and you maybe book 3.000 views. Only difference is, the sponsor is lucky if we reach more than 3.000 views/downloads. We have space for 4 logo packages.
Yes, we find the sponsors… Who else should, if not we (Traveldudes)? It’s our ebook… Sure, if a marketing guy knows possible sponsors, please contact me & we discuss further. :)
The full version will have around 50 pages and no the writer is not obliged to embark on a social campaign for promotion. We work together, we help each other, we support each other. Everybody working on the ebook stands behind the product and the concept and we want it to be it successfull, so why should I obligate the writer?
It’s a Traveldudes guidebook, written For Travelers, By Travelers… In that case by a fab travel blogger. We don’t try to be journalists or whatever. We are travelers, sharing our experiences. That works great!
And sure, advertorials will of course be marked. We’ll work on it, that they also won’t be the usual newspaper advertising advertorial stuff. They should be helpful for travelers.
I hope that answered your questions. Otherwise, please let me know if you have more. I’m happy to help.
Melvin, thanks for taking the time, but I don’t think you answered my all questions. Let me try presenting the open ones another way.
Let’s say I write the TravelDudes guide to Seattle.
1. How much does the guide sell for? Your comment makes me think it’s free. Is that correct?
2. As the writer, how much can I expect to earn at 3000 downloads? At 5000? At 10,000?
Now, let’s say I’m a Seattle business, a restaurant or small hotel. How much do I pay for an ad? Maybe you already published your ad rates — in which case, can you share a link to them?
Hi Pam,
if you are interested to write a Traveldudes guidebook for Seattle, feel free to contact me. We would then discuss how much you would get. ;-) We are three parties working on the ebook and we share the profit.
Haven’t you downloaded it yet? Then your first answer would have been answered. :) Yes, you can download it for free and at the moment we’ll reach 3.000 downloads with the full version, you would have donated to a good cause without even paying for it! :)
1. I have read the pre-release version of the guide, it’s a really good product.
2. The business model is tried-and-tested, and isn’t new. Physically printed guides – paid for by advertising/sponsorhip, and free to the consumer, have used this model for some time. Why not in the online world?
I wish the guys luck, seems like a win-win all round.
Thanks Nate! Nice to hear that you like the ebook.
Yes, in the print media, it’s not a new product. I also know of some magazines just financed by sponsors. But I hope that our quality is better than the ones I’m talking about. hahaha
It might even be that there is already an ebook with a similar concept. I haven’t of course checked all the ebooks on the market. With my every day’s work, I’m also very much focused on the travel industry, especially online. And there I haven’t seen a travel blogger financing an ebook with that concept yet. It’s of course more work to also find sponsors, but you should also get many more people to download it, as it’s for free.