Regardless as a hobby or a profession, traveling is an activity that is close to us.
With the presence of the internet and travel websites, we can find out more and in depth about a location. We can also look for transportation and lodging in advance before traveling. Thanks to the travel website.
For those of you who like to go on vacation, maybe you are thinking about sharing your vacation experiences with others. Or for those of you who have a travel agent business who want to expand their business reach through digital platforms.
Can you make a travel website without mastering coding?
Don’t worry, you can really make your own travel website, even if you don’t know coding. This article will guide you to easily create your dream travel website.
How to Make a Travel Website with WordPress
For the first step, you need to plan things around the travel website first. Only then did the execution make it. Come on, listen.
1. Define Unique Value for Your Travel Website
To make a travel website stand out, you need to determine the unique value of the website. This will make it easier to build an audience.
How to? You can follow the tips below:
– Determine the form of a travel website
For those of you who are still confused about finding a travel website, here are some ideas you can consider:
a. Create a Travel Blog
For those of you who like to travel, creating a travel blog is one of the best ways to share travel stories. Through a personal blog, you can share your experiences and provide useful suggestions for readers.
Advantages:
– Can make personal stories as content
– Website customization can be done according to taste
Deficiency:
– It takes an investment of time and money to create content
– Has many competitors
Interested in becoming a travel blogger? We thoroughly discuss how to become a travel blogger here.
b. Create a Trip Planner Site
Having a travel planner website allows you to help put together travel plans for people who don’t have a lot of time and resources.
Book transportation and lodging, arrange tour and tour schedules, and order guides. There are many things you can do and offer to make a client’s life a lot easier.
Advantages:
– Many choices of itineraries that can be offered on the website
– Content doesn’t get stale quickly
Deficiency:
– Need a lot of relationships
c. Create a Travel Agent Website
If you have a travel agent business, creating a travel agent website is very important. Expanding your business into the digital world allows you to transcend geographic boundaries and reach a wider market.
Advantages:
– Static content and doesn’t get stale quickly
Deficiency:
– The appearance of the website is usually stiff
– For those of you who are interested in starting a travel agent business, you can read our full article here.
d. Create a Travel Review Site
What do you usually do if you want to know whether a product is good or not? Maybe you’ll look at the reviews of people who have experience with the product. This also applies to travel.
You can create your own review regarding the world of travel: from airlines, hotels, resorts, beaches, festivals, and many more.
Moreover, 80 percent of people read at least 12 reviews before choosing a hotel. So it can be said, the need for people to read reviews is quite large.
Advantages:
– Many aspects of travel can be used as review content.
– Can write a review without coming directly to the location.
Deficiency:
– Has many competitors
– Identify Reader’s Needs
To identify readers’ needs, you can research the problems experienced by travel website readers. Thus, the content that you create on your website can be a solution that answers readers’ concerns.
One way to do this is to look at several similar travel websites. In the review section or comments column, you can see any problems with travel service users.
– Competition Research
By doing research on competitors, you can find weaknesses in their content or services. Thus, you can prepare your website better.
This research also helps you see what your chances are in that field.
Through Ubersuggest, for example, you type the keyword “travel” in the search field. After the results appear, click the top row. Then a new page will appear displaying URLs that occupy Google’s top 100 rankings with the keyword “travel”.
– Market Test
By doing a market test, you can see whether your travel website content is progressing or not. If it doesn’t feel right, don’t hesitate to keep looking for the best content ideas for you.
To find out how to understand the needs of website visitors, you can also read our article on buyer personas and why they are important for business success. Including for your travel website.
2. Create a List of Content Ideas
One of the most important things in creating a travel website is creating consistent content.
Once you’ve found your niche and sub-niches for your website, it’s a good idea to make a list that includes ideas for your website content.
This stage is needed to make it easier for you to strategize so you don’t run out of ideas quickly.
When you’re planning a vacation, for example, you make a list like the following:
– What are the things you should take with you on vacation and why should you take them?
– What made you decide to take a vacation somewhere?
– What do you do so you don’t get bored while on a trip?
– How do you prepare for a location where your language is different?
– What are the things that should not be done while on vacation somewhere?
Apart from answering the questions above, you can also read popular travel blogger content to get inspiration for content ideas. For example, Trinity (Naked Traveler) or my Catper.
3. Choose a Travel Website Platform
The website platform is the medium that you use to manage your blog, from content publication to website optimization.
Then, what is the best website platform for you?
Each website platform has its own advantages. But in making this travel website, we recommend WordPress for you.
The reasons why we recommend that you create a travel website with WordPress include:
– Beginner Friendly WordPress
With WordPress, it will be easy for you to manage the travel website that you create, even if you are a beginner. WordPress also provides many themes (both free and paid) to beautify your website. If you want to add features, all you have to do is install the plugins you need.
– WordPress Has a Huge User Community
You can find various tutorials and guides for the WordPress platform easily from websites, communities, online groups. This is inseparable from the very large number of WordPress users.
– Easily Optimized for SEO
Of course you want to make your website easy to find on search engines. For that you need Search Engine Optimization (SEO). With WordPress, you can optimize easily. Plus, WordPress has a lot of quality SEO plugins, like Yoast SEO.
– Easy Installation and Updating
The installation and update process in WordPress is very easy and fast. This also applies to the process of installing themes and plugins. Hosting service providers like Niagahoster even provide a WordPress installation feature in one click.
– Thousands of Themes for Customization
WordPress has more than 8000 themes for customization. For the travel theme itself, WordPress has more than 500 themes that you can choose according to your wishes.
4. Choose the Right Name for Your Travel Website
You already know the travel website you want to create. You also already know the content that you will load on your website.
Next, you have the challenge of finding the right and unique domain name for your website.
The website name is very important because it is the main way for potential readers to get acquainted with your website.
For that, we have some tips on choosing a domain name for your website:
– Choose the Shortest Domain Name
The shorter the name, the easier it is for people to remember your travel website address. A short name also creates an interesting impression.
– Use .com Extension if Possible
The .com extension is one of the most popular domain extensions for many people. That means this extension has the opportunity to bring in a lot of readers and visitors.
– Create a Name that Represents Website Content
Customize your domain name with the content of your travel website. By creating a name that represents your website’s identity, trust will arise from readers and visitors.
For example, the name “Cheap Travel” seems to have more specifics and focus than “Matt Berninger’s Travel Notes”. It can take a long time to become popular if you use your name as the domain.
If you have found several names that are suitable for your website, then please check the availability of these names in the domain name search feature on Niagahoster.
If the domain name you want is available, don’t hesitate to buy it quickly before someone else takes it.
5. Choose Hosting from a Trusted Provider
Hosting is a storage medium for your website data and content. If analogous, the domain is your home address and hosting is the house.
With the development of the digital world that is increasingly widespread, finding a quality web hosting service provider is not difficult. We have some tips on choosing a web hosting provider for your travel website:
– Affordable prices
It is very important that you choose a web hosting provider that offers the best price. With the same web hosting specifications, of course you prefer a service provider that provides a lower price.
– Good Quality Server Performance
You must pay attention to the server specifications offered by web hosting service providers. For example processor speed, memory capacity, hard disk, network speed, and security systems.
– Easy to Operate
For those of you who haven’t mastered coding, the availability of easy-to-operate hosting will make it easier for you to manage your travel website.
– Dedicated Customer Support
This is no less important, considering that support from customer support will make your experience in developing a travel website easier.
Make sure your web hosting service provider has customer support 24 hours every day. This way, you can always ask for help if you have a technical problem.
6. Installing WordPress
For those of you who took the WordPress Auto Install feature when buying a domain and hosting at Niagahoster, there is no need to install WordPress manually.
But for those of you who missed it, we will explain how to install WordPress manually
Make sure you have bought the domain and hosting first, OK?
– Enter cPanel
Log in to cPanel with the username and password you received via email.
– Install WordPress
Open Softaculous Apps Installer. Once logged in, search for WordPress and hit the Install Now button.
Fill in the required data, then press Install.
– Login WordPress Admin Page
Finished the WordPress CMS installation process, it’s time to enter the admin page, by adding /wp-admin behind your domain URL. Enter the user and password that you created when installing WordPress earlier.
7. Install WordPress Themes
Your WordPress is already installed. Now is the time to choose a theme for your travel website. This feature functions to change the appearance of your website, including layout, typography, colors, and other design elements.
Choosing the right theme makes your travel website attractive, easy to use, and increases visitor engagement.
To install your own theme, you need to enter the WordPress dashboard, select Appearance -> Themes -> Add New.
Choose the theme that best suits your needs.
Oh yes, so you don’t choose the wrong theme, you should pay attention to the following things:
– Received Lots of Positive Reviews
The easiest way to see if a theme is good or not is to look at user reviews. The more positive reviews the better the theme.
– Has an Attractive View
An attractive theme display will make visitors feel at home for a long time on your travel website.
– Mobile Friendly
In 2019, 58% of website visits were made via mobile devices. This shows that mobile devices dominate more than desktops. Therefore, you must pay attention to this aspect.
– Developer Support
A good theme will also be supported by a good developer, from regular theme updates to assistance when the theme encounters problems.
– Loading Speed
In simple terms, the more features in a theme the slower the page loads. It is very important that you choose a theme with attractive features while being fast.
You can use tools like Pingdom and Google PageSpeed Insights to check the speed of the theme you choose.
8. Install Plugins
The final step in how to create a travel website is installing a plugin. This feature is useful for adding certain functions to the website. With plugins, you can easily manage your travel website even if you don’t know coding.
To install other plugins, you can simply go to the Plugins tab from the WordPress dashboard.
Type the name of the plugin you want to install in the search field, then press enter.
Installation is successful, you simply select Activate Plugin to activate the plugin.
Then, what plugin is suitable to be installed for your travel website? We have some recommendations:
– WP Travel
WP Travel is one of the most popular travel plugins for travel websites, especially travel agency and trip planning businesses. This plugin has many features that support your travel website, including settings to create unlimited travel packages, an easy ordering system, to ratings and review features.
– Yoast SEO
For travel websites, especially travel blogs, this plugin is perfect for you. This plugin makes it easy for users to implement basic SEO, such as meta descriptions, XML sitemap creation, and keyword checking.
Yoast SEO is a plugin you can rely on to correct mistakes when entering titles and descriptions. This plugin will also display meta descriptions as well as title tags in search engines.
– LiteSpeed Cache for WordPress
Travel websites will certainly contain lots of pictures, photos and videos. How to make a website with lots of content have fast loading? The LiteSpeed Cache plugin will help you lighten the load on your website.
LiteSpeed has many features to support the performance of your website, including Image Optimization; Minify CSS, JavaScript and HTML; Database Cleaner and Optimizer; and PageSpeed Score Optimization.
This plugin is also compatible with other popular plugins like Yoast SEO, WooCommerce and bbPress. Which means, using other plugins will not affect LiteSpeed’s performance, and vice versa.
– BackUpWordPress
As the name suggests, this plugin backs up WordPress data practically and easily. You can set the backup schedule as you wish.
Another convenience is, this plugin is available for Windows and Linux. In addition, any data you back up can be sent to an email.
Conclusion : Ready to Create Your Own Travel Website?
Is it true that creating a travel website is as easy as the guide above? You certainly need to try it yourself, right?
Most importantly, your travel website must have good performance so that visitors can easily access it.
[hurrytimer id=”247″]
