travelledmatt

TravelledMatt - Miyajima Island (deer) 1

What Is Japan’s Miyajima (Deer) Island?

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A visit to Japan wouldn’t be the same without visiting Japan’s Miyajima (Deer) Island!

If you plan on going to Japan and you want to immerse yourself in an environment that is full of tame deer and Japanese culture, then Japan’s Miyajima (Deer) Island is just for you!

When I heard about Miyajima Island I knew I had to go… and I’m so glad I did.

Imagine being on an island, completely surrounded by hundreds of tame deer.  They are everywhere! Sitting in garden beds, sleeping in the middle of the roads, splashing around in the water – you can literally cuddle, sit with and interact with these deer without them running away.  I don’t really have to say much more because that’s amazing in itself.  And if the deer don’t entertain you, then the island’s history, shrines and temples will.  It sounds too good to be true right?

TravelledMatt - Miyajima Island Deer

(Just hangout out with Bambi)

What is Japan’s Miyajima (Deer) Island?

Essentially as the title suggests, it’s an island full of deer.

Japan’s Miyajima Island is most renown for it’s abundance of tame deer, the floating Itsukushima Shrine and of course, the giant orange Torii Gate which sits in front of Itsukushima Shrine.  This big, majestic Torii Gate is almost an icon for the island.  Whilst in the ferry and arriving to the island it’s definitely this Torii Gate which sticks out.  You can even see it from the mainland!

TravelledMatt - Miyajima Island - torii gate and shrine 1

(The beautiful Torii Gate from inside Itsukushima Shrine which you MUST visit)

How to get to Miyajima Island?

It’s easy!  If you have a Japan RailPass it won’t cost you anything either!  The best way to get to the Miyahima Island is via ferry.  You can catch the 10 minute ferry covered by the Japan RailPass (if you haven’t got a Japan RailPass yet, you can use my affiliate link HERE to purchase it.  It won’t cost you more, and it’ll help support my blog 🙂 ) from Hiroshima Port (right next to Miyajimaguchi Station).  In order to get to Hiroshima Port, you can catch a 25 minute train from Hiroshima station. It’s very easy to do!!

What to do on Miyajima (Deer) Island?

Besides playing with and hanging out with the deer on the island you can also check out Itsukushima Shrine.  Just like the Torii gate, the shrine is built over the water!

TIP – If you plan on seeing the giant orange Torii Gate at the Itsukushima Shrine, which you should, try to get there in the evening as it is absolutely magical to watch during the sunset.  The deep orange colours of the gate become illuminated as the final minutes of day-light come to an end.

TravelledMatt - Miyajima Island - Sunset 1

(The Torii Gate at sunset)

If you’d like to stay on the island then that is definitely a possibility!  There are a wide selection of hotels and Ryokans available.  If you’d prefer to just go to Miyajima Island as a day trip, then that is fine also!  The last ferry out of the island leaves well after sunset (around 9.30/10pm – maybe just double check upon arrival) so you’ll have plenty of time to explore the island, play with the deer, watch the sunset over the Torii Gate and get something to eat at one of the restaurants available.

As always, feel free to reach out if you have any questions or want to get in contact with me about Japan or any of my other adventures!  You can find me through here – Contact TravelledMatt

Happy Exploring!!

 

travelledmatt - how to effectively boost a facebook post

How To EFFECTIVELY Boost A Facebook Post?

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If you’re reading this blog then you’ve probably experienced a few problems with trying to reach your target audiences on Facebook.  Never to fear though, for that very reason I’ve created this blog on ‘How To EFFECTIVELY Boost A Facebook Post’

It can be VERY frustrating trying to run your page and get interaction, especially when facebook only shows your posts to LESS than 16% of your fans!! This is why the need to develop strategies to get your content out there and seen!!

Firstly, before we get into this – I’ll be explaining specifically how to effectively BOOST a facebook post, not how to do adverts.  There’s a difference! And depending on what you’re trying to achieve, one may be better than the other.

Know your audience

You need to first ask yourself some questions like WHO your target audience is going to be? WHAT will be the best way to reach them?  And WHY will they want to interact or engage with your post?

This part can be a little difficult to figure out but if I get enough people writing to me and asking how to figure it out, I’ll definitely write a blog on it.

What are you reasons for boosting your posts?

Are you trying to generate facebook likes?  Post interaction?  Page interaction?  All the above?  Then great! Because that’s EXACTLY what we can achieve.

Ok! So…

How To EFFECTIVELY Boost A Facebook Post?

1.   To begin, you’re going to need something which you think your target audience will engage with.  Perhaps a photo or a video?

TIP – if you use some ‘call and responses’ you might find that you’ll begin to encourage your target audience to engage with your posts.  This could in any form;

**Tag a friend you would go with

**Who wants to be here NOW?

**Would you do it?

2.     Press ‘ Boost Post’ and follow along

3.    Select the sex and age range you’re going for – I recommend trying to go for a range of up to 10-15 years.  For example, 18 – 30 … 25 – 35 etc etc

4.    Here you can see all these options we have to boost your post.  What I recommend is trying to be specific rather than too general.  Instead of choosing 4 or 5 countries, try choosing one country or even just a few cities.

TIP – the majority of this is trial and error until you find what’s right for you – try being specific, select only a few different locations and if these don’t work, we’ll try other ones on the next post

(This is an example of an audience that I’ve used)

TravelledMatt - How To EFFECTIVELY Boost A Facebook Post

5.     Select your audiences interests

So with these interests we can begin to be a little broader.  If what you’re trying to do is create engagement and interests in your posts, then making the interests a little broader will be ok.  Try to choose 4-6 things here.  I’ll show you an example that I used.

TravelledMatt - How To EFFECTIVELY Boost A Facebook Post

5.     Choose the duration and budget for your boost

TIP – don’t over invest here – try adding just $1 or $2 for the first day – if this is working, awesome!! Keep adding $1-$2 each day until the popularity of the boosted post begins to taper-off.  If I feel as though my posts aren’t performing after the first 24 hours, I’ll just cancel them and ask myself questions like “why it didn’t work?” and “what I can do next time that might work”

(This is one which I recently boosted)

TravelledMatt - How To EFFECTIVELY Boost A Facebook Post

(For example I boosted this one for 5 days and spent $8)

REMEMBER – it’s obviously important for you to explore the reasons as to why your boosted post didn’t receive the amount of attention which you were expecting, but DON’T forget to also explore the reasons why it did succeed.  Try to notice a pattern or a trend and stick to it.

ALSO REMEMBER – you’re not going to get it right every time and don’t stress out when it doesn’t work out.  I’ve had posts that I’ve boosted which haven’t received as much attention as some which I didn’t boost!

FINAL TIP

KEEP IT RELEVANT

If you start boosting posts about your favourite things to eat, when all your organic posts have been about travel, facebook will give your post a lower ‘relevancy score’ and not show it to as many people.  You need to make sure food and travel are a theme of your page before you just do a random posts about food.

Need more proof that all this stuff works?  Check out my post why my first 1,000 facebook fan page likes were the easiest.

Like always if you have any questions feel free to sign-up to my email list and I’ll send you tips as well as respond to all your messages!

Happy Boosting!!

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - TravelledMatt

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America

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People always ask me why they should travel to South America, and so instead of giving them reasons to go, I decided to create these 10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America.

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America

1. The coffee isn’t imported

In most of the countries you’ll go to in south America; Colombia, Brazil, Ecuador etc – you’ll find that you can’t even get a good cup of imported coffee.  You’re limited to only having what grows locally.  It’s strange adapting to something so fresh – my taste buds never did know what to do.

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - TravelledMatt

(This amazing coffee farmer in Colombia showed us around his plantation before making us an awesome cup of coffee – you can see his tours HERE)

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - TravelledMatt - Colombia

(Collecting coffee beans)

2. Too many potatoes

Peru alone has over 4,000 types of potatoes!! That’s ridiculous.  What could one country do with so many potatoes.  I think that as a means of getting rid of some of them, the country has people who make chips on the side of the streets.  As you walk up to them, they’re cutting the potato, frying it, and then selling it to you cheaper than the price of a single potato at home.

3. Too many ancient ruins

It’s true.  The place has so many ancient ruins AND they’re everywhere!! You can literally see ancient ruins in whichever country you go to.  Most people think it starts and stops with Machu Picchu, but nope, there’s more! So be prepared to be overwhelmed.

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - Bolivia - TravelledMatt

(Located on Bolivia’s Isla del Sol – Sun Island is a whole bunch of ancient ruins.  I wrote a blog about it HERE)

4. Too many mountains and waterfalls

It’s starting to tire me out thinking about it, but yes, the country is prodigiously packed with waterfalls and mountains that you’ll get sick of seeing them.  Foz do Iguaçu, which sits right on the border of Argentina and Brazil is barely even enjoyable due to the amount of noise created from the force of the millions of litres of water (per second) falling from a height of 82 meters.  And then we have the Andes.  This mountain range is EVERYWHERE.  It stretches from down south in Argentina and right up to Colombia (In the north).  So if you think you’ve seen it enough times, think again, because it’ll be there, waiting for you in some other country.

(An incredible view of Foz do Iguaçu from the Argentinian side)

5. It’s too bloody big

The continent is massive!! And seriously, how are you going to be able to travel it and see everything in a one or two week when the continent in almost twice the size of Europe! You’re going to need a LONG time if you want to see it all 😉

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - TravelledMatt

(Incredible view of the Andes Mountain Range in Peru)

6. The people make you feel bad

I have honestly never met so many nice people in my life.  The South American locals have got to be some of the most humble, sweetest and endearing people I’ve ever met.  How can they be so kind, altruistic and positive when they barely even drink imported coffee??  It’s honestly the worst – if you do go there, be prepared to leave feeling jealous of their dazzling charisma and wonderful charm.

7. Too many beautiful beaches to choose from

What’s wrong with this continent .. why can’t it just stick to having a couple of nice beaches?  It doesn’t make sense to have SO many beautiful beaches and then to scatter them ALL over the continent.  I mean seriously, they’ve decided to fill the east coast with the Atlantic Ocean.  The sunsets are perfect and the glare from the water hurts your eyes … and don’t even get me started on the West Coast.  The Pacific Ocean runs right up until Colombia, and then to add insult to injury, Colombia throws a Caribbean Coast into the mix!! What’s one to do?? The waters on the North part of Colombia are so clear that anyone with a phobia of fish wouldn’t even enter as you can see them everywhere!!

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - TravelledMatt

(Cabo Polonio – Located in Uruguay and home to a tiny beach village – see it HERE)

8. Weird Animals

The animals that I saw in South America were amongst some of the weirdest animals that I’ve ever seen.  Without even mentioning the amount of caiman, snakes, tapirs (look HERE if you don’t know what it is), monkeys, birds and dolphins (yes, dolphins) that infest the amazon, the Galapagos Islands are just swarmed with strange creatures.   Without fail you’ll see these crazy iguanas that resemble something from an Alien movie.  And don’t even get me started on the tortoises and turtles.  Honestly, why do they even have to be that big?? These things are crazy.

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - TravelledMatt

(Some aliens/iguanas on the Galapagos Islands)

9. You won’t want to return home

It’s true, once you’re there, you are trapped.  You will not want to leave.  You’ll discover what an amazing continent it is and you’ll never want to leave!! It’s ok though – because like all great things, everything has to come to an end … for now.  If you’re anything like me, and you’ve experienced these 10 reasons why you should NOT travel to South America, then more than likely the travel bug will have set in, and you’ll find any means possible to return to this truly incredible continent.  By the way … If you liked this blog, have a read of one I wrote on catching the travel bug, and if it’s curable or not.  You can read it HERE!

10. ALL THE ABOVE

And so that about wraps up my 10 reasons why you should NOT travel to South America.  I hope I’ve managed to demonstrate the absolute love that I have for this continent.  Also this list sits right at the tip of the ice-burg with the reasons why you should NOT travel to South America.  There are plenty more out there which I will be writing about 🙂

10 Reasons Why You Should NOT Travel to South America - TravelledMatt

Safe Travels!

travelledmatt - hardest thing about travelling

Hardest Thing About Travelling?

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I guess many things come to mind when you hear the question “what is the hardest thing about travelling?”.  Maybe your first thought is that there’s nothing hard about it.  I guess from a very superficial point of view there is nothing hard about it, and that could be applied to lots of aspects of life.  However, on a deeper level there are a few things that some people really struggle with.

In this blog I want to focus on just one of those things as I believe everyone who has travelled will have experienced it, and everyone who will go travelling will definitely experience it.

So, what is the hardest thing about travelling?

Firstly, I want to make a quick mention on friendships gained during your travels.  A lot of the time, the friendships  you form with the people you meet when travelling are very different to the friendships formed with the people you meet at home.  It’s actually really interesting.  It’s as if there are no barriers.  You seem to connect straight away!

For example when I was travelling through Chile I had met this amazing person named Rodrigo.  After speaking with him for only 1-hour we were about to part ways and he told me that I should stay with him in his apartment in Santiago (the capital of Chile).  I was completely flabbergasted.  After knowing this person for only 1-hour he had invited me to go stay with him in his home.

One-week later and I was welcomed with a bed in his apartment, food in the fridge and a cold beer.  I stayed with Rodrigo for 10 days.  And it was amazing.

This small example happened to me a lot.

What’s so hard about it?

Saying goodbye.

Like Rodrigo and like everyone else I have met on my trips, there always comes a time when you have to part ways and say goodbye.  And for me, this is the hardest thing about travelling.

You honestly realise just how many amazing people there are in this world, and if you’re anything like me, you probably want to bask in their presence as much as you can.

I guess though, throughout the amount of times I’ve had to say goodbye to someone on my trip, it has NEVER gotten any easier.  It’s one of the only things in life that you can’t practice for and it’s one of those things that won’t get any better with the more times you do it.  If anything it becomes harder and harder…

How to make it easier?

As I said, I have come to realise that with each goodbye it does become a little harder to do, however my solace that I found in that is; that with every hello and every greeting of a new person, it becomes much easier.

Make sure you really cherish the moments with anyone new you meet.  You never know what could eventuate from it.  And yes, the goodbye will be hard, but just keep in mind that world is a MASSIVE place and finding someone new and incredible to spend time with won’t be hard to do again.  Use the prospect of meeting someone new to help you overcome the feeling of emptiness after you say goodbye to someone you cherished.

And remember – you never know where you’re going to meet that new and amazing person.  It may even be a big group of them, 4600m high on a mountain!

travelledmatt - hardest thing about travelling

If you’re like me and have developed another problem known as the ‘travel bug’, check out this blog here which I’ve written about it.  Let me know if you can relate!

Happy friendships!

travelledmatt - affiliate marketing

What is affiliate marketing?

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What is affiliate marketing?  It’s essentially your ticket to freedom! Well depending on what you refer to as freedom.  It’s more so a means of using your computer, from anywhere in the world, to make as much money as you creatively can.

For example?

For example, I made my first affiliate sale within 3 weeks after writing a blog on how to start a blog.  After this first sale, I’ve had many other ones come in which have covered all my expenses that i’ve used in marketing / creating my blog … AND I’m only a few months in.

How do you do it?

To get into affiliate marketing is easy!  But firstly, you need a blog! (It makes things a lot easier as you’ll have your own site/blog to refer people back to)

You can use this tutorial that (here) I put together on how to start your own blog today !

Now that you’ve set-up your own blog it’s time to start finding companies that you can partner with begin promoting their stuff.  Don’t think ‘sales’ either.  Think more so recommending to others things that you like, trust and use and would want them to use also.  It’s a big mistake to just sign-up to whichever affiliate program without using their product.  You need to maintain a level of integrity or your audience will think you’re just trying to sell them things.

I’ll give you an example of one affiliate program;

BlueHost (affilate link) –

I use BlueHost as my web hosting company.  I know they’re great and I’ve researched a lot of companies out there.  For what I want to do and achieve, they’re perfect.  Now it would only make sense to recommend to others wanting to creating a website/blog that they use BlueHost.  And this is what I do.  I’ve created a whole tutorial on it HERE!  And people are very appreciative.  Just like I was really appreciative when I used another travel bloggers tutorial when I created my blog.

How does it work? – Once successfully registered with BlueHost’s affiliate program here (it’s free), they will give you a special ‘tracking link’ which essentially tracks people that click the link – This is what it looks like – http://www.bluehost.com/track/travelledmatt/

NOTE –

Be sure to look out for your name or code in the link as you want to make sure it tracks back to you!

Ok so now, wherever I put this link i.e. in photos, hyperlinks or banners, and if someone clicks it and then signs up to BlueHost, I’ll receive $65!!

Crazy hay?  And all I’ve done is recommended something that I use and trust.

After that it’s only a numbers game.  Image if you start signing up 10 people each month.  That’s $650 for not doing anything !!

AND it even gets better.  If you maintain a good record with BlueHost and get them enough signups per month (usually 10/15) they will raise your bounty and even pay you more per sign-up.

Last year BlueHost paid over $5,000,000 to affiliates.  Crazy hay!!

Other affiliate marketing programs?

So I’ve registered with various affiliate programs and I’ll put them below so you can see.  Just Google your favourite brand or product and then find out if they have an affiliate program.  Literally Google ANYTHING you’re interested in.  It could be certain brands of make-up, travel products, camera accessories, watches or jewellery, food, clothing brands, pet supplies etc…  ANYTHING

What if your favourite brand doesn’t have an affiliate marketing program?

You can always ask them.  You’ll be surprised how many will want to partner with you! And if not, just keep searching.

You can even use companies such as travel insurances companies, web hosting, travel search engines (SkyScanner, Expedia etc), Amazon .. and the list goes on !!

These are just a few of the ones I use;

Shopify (ecommerce store) – https://www.shopify.com/?ref=travelledmatt

BlueHost (internet hosting)– www.bluehost.com/track/travelledmatt/

1Cover (travel insurance)– http://titrk.net/au/85122

You can also use sites such as CJ Affiliate and CLICKBANK.  They’ll allow you to apply for multiple affiliate marketing programs.  Many companies register with them and you can choose and apply for the ones which you think you’d like to do affiliate marketing for! (MAKE SURE you choose a company you know, trust and use – that’s my piece of advice)

And there you have it!!

By now hopefully you’ll have realised that you can be achieving whatever you want, as long as you put the necessary actions in place in order to achieve it.  Stop doing things which aren’t helping you to get to or achieve what you want to achieve. Set a goal and work towards it.

As always let me know if you have any questions about this and I’ll help you out!!

Happy Affiliate Marketing!