Get to Know Megan Jerrard of Mapping Megan

I traveled with Megan Jerrard while living it up on Boracay, Philippines many years ago. Earlier that decade, after a chance meeting on an airplane with one of the world’s most successful bloggers at the time, Megan set out to create the life of her dreams.  Many later she is traveling the world with her husband and young son, blogging about her adventures at MappingMegan.  She joins us to talk about how she got her start, creating engaging videos, monetizing her blog, and her latest life and business transitions.

I know you studied Journalism in university, which probably makes you better at the craft of reporting and writing than many of us. What made you decide to pursue travel writing instead of a more traditional journalism path?

Travel writing was never the “when I grow up I want to be” dream, though I started discovering my love for travel during my years at University, and at the same time the online world was exploding with possibilities and completely reshaping the employment landscape.

When I graduated in 2012, blogging and online media was really taking off. Working for yourself online, or ‘blogging as a business’ weren’t mainstream concepts, so I was met with a healthy amount of skepticism and ‘how will this ever make money’ questions, but I decided that I didn’t have anything to lose as a fresh graduate, and that I may be able to get some travel in before starting in an office job.

As I threw myself into blogging, I realized the potential for combining my passion for writing with my passion for travel, and that there was real money to be made from monetizing personal blogs.

And if you’re looking at potential career paths, and one involves reporting back to superiors in a newsroom, and the other involves jumping between Costa Rica, Antarctica, and 100 other countries in between, where you’re also your own boss … the decision to me of which to pursue was pretty clear cut!

 

Has that training made you better at talking to strangers and interviewing people to get a good story?

Journalism study has absolutely given me the skills I need for storytelling in my travel writing today, whether it’s approaching strangers to ask if they’ll sit down for a chat, or setting up more formal interviews which are scheduled and planned in advance.

Our assessments in school were very practical, and would include heading out into the streets to find a story, to conduct vox pop interviews, so I’m very grateful for having had the experience.

I’ve since interviewed people from all walks of life in places like the Faroe Islands for pieces on the controversial Grindadrap (whale hunts), and aimed to capture the stories of unique explorers, like when three Norwegian travelers set out to break the world record for the most countries visited in one day (they succeeded!), or when a Danish traveler decided to cycle around the world.

When did you realize this travel blogging thing was actually a pursuit that would earn you enough to travel on and live on?

I was flying home to Australia from the States and was seated next to a gentleman named Gary Arndt on the plane. I struck up a conversation to be polite, and as it turns out, this instance of “general chit chat” with the passenger seated next to me completely changed the course of my life.

I was in absolute awe of this man who had sold everything he owned to travel the world full time. Not only that, but companies and brands were actually paying him to document his experiences on his blog, and he was earning a full time income!

My first thought was “why didn’t I know that this was a thing”, and my second thought was if this guy sitting next to me can do it, then surely so can I! At that time I didn’t realize that Gary Arndt was one of the most successful travel bloggers in the world, but it ignited a determination within me that I was going to achieve the same. (Editor’s note — he now runs an even more popular history podcast and we need to update our interview.)

Eleven years later and I’ve had this career now for more than a decade.

I think it’s easier to chase “impossible dreams” when we see firsthand that it can be done. When we can say “I’ve met someone who actually does that for a living” or “I know a guy who does that” it helps us visualize the goal, makes it easier to believe we can do it too.

What are your primary income streams and how have they changed over time?

My primary income stream has always been through content based advertising and sponsored posts, and this has stayed true over the course of the past eleven years, even throughout the pandemic when many income streams within the travel space were paused.

Whether this is a product review, an endorsement, or a general travel article where I place a link back to a company site, I’ve always maintained that any industry can be linked to and spoken about in a natural way within the context of travel if you’re creative enough.

Banking sector? Talk about which credit cards you use for travel.

Bedding company wants to place an advertisement? Talk about how to recreate that hotel room feel with beautiful sheets for your bedroom.

Coffee company? Write a post on coffee culture around the world.

Give me any industry and I guarantee I can make it relevant to travel. Diversifying my client base has allowed my main income stream to remain constant over the past 10 years, and I have been able to produce fantastic travel content, working with clients from a wide range of different sectors.

I even have an article on how vane pumps work to improve air travel, working with a hydraulic pump client.

I have also since established Solo Female Travelers Tours with another content creator, Mar Pages, and we run women only tours around the world, which support female owned guides and businesses in the countries we visit.

These tours have provided a new income stream which is completely separate to the content creation from my blog.

You obviously spend a good bit of time on crafting quality videos. What advice do you have in that area and how has the video output helped build an audience or add to your income?

My biggest advice for video is to create an engaging story from stringing together very short clips. People have a very short attention span, so if a clip is longer than 5-10 seconds and not ridiculously exciting, you’ll start to lose them.

In terms of building an audience, video is a fantastic way to keep people engaged. It’s a completely different way to tell a story, and if done right, it can transport your audience to the destination with you. An engaged audience then in turn leads to interest from advertisers which adds to your income.

So while I don’t make money from my videos directly, everything you do in blogging is part of a bigger picture, and the work you’re not paid to do has a direct impact on being able to land clients for the paid stuff. For example, engaging content = engaged readers = interest from advertisers = income from the blog.

You spent a lot of years being nomadic and now you’ve got motherhood on your plate. What’s your process for controlling the work flow between a blog, an active Facebook group, and a tour company without going crazy?

I’ve definitely learned the hard way since taking on motherhood, about prioritization, efficiency, and working smarter. It’s a daily struggle to balance work / life / parenting / everything I had built to date, and reconstructing my priorities around the demanding role that being a parent now also entails.

It’s a rewarding struggle, as I have a beautiful little boy, but it has definitely shifted my perspectives and priorities, and I have had to come to a level of acceptance that I simply don’t have the time or energy to do everything I did beforehand.

I’ve needed to restructure the way I approach work and really lean into team support, where I have previously always had a decent level of control, and develop a very clear picture of what my ultimate goals are now that the dynamic of my personal life has changed.

Let’s be honest, I go a bit crazy every day! But balance is something which is always front of mind, and a project which I’ll constantly be working on.

What are the places you haven’t been to yet that you dream of visiting?

Madagascar and Namibia. Though now that I also organize tours for a living, I’m in a unique position of hopefully being able to visit both soon!

Megan Jerrard is an Australian Journalist behind Mappingmegan.com, and Co-Founder of Solo Female Travelers, a tour company reshaping the travel industry to be more equitable for women by supporting local female-owned & led businesses in amazing destinations around the world. She has been travel writing and blogging since 2012, and organizing tours for women since 2021.