How to become an Instagram influencer? What I learned from traveling with influencers

If there’s one thing I can say about Instagram its that Instagram is a great uniter. It’s the one social network, that has lead me to find MY people. Women who inspire me to be both a better woman and mother. This virtual community of super moms has given me the push I need to listen to my own voice. A few of these epic mamas are certified Family Travel Instagram Influencers with followings in the tens of thousands and a digital reach into the millions. I’ve been lucky enough to have the pleasure of meeting and subsequently traveling with a few of these women this year, and my mind is completely blown. As someone just stepping her toe into the digital influencer realm it has been a complete eye-opener to witness the amount of effort it takes for you to see the final product on your Instagram feed, these women are a skilled visual alchemist. Here are the things I learned about how to become an influencer while traveling with certified Family Travel Instagram influencers.

Family Travel Instagram Influencer Meaning…

Travel Instagram influencers are people who travel often and document it heavily. a Family Travel Instagram Influencer does all of that with children in tow. All of the women I have traveled with so far travel with at least one child under 6 years old, a few of them travel with multiple children. They travel far and often, with or without their partners, showing their small children the world. These women don’t just travel for fun but they have mastered the art of turning their passion into a business and travel on the dime of brands and establishments, tasked with showing off the beauty of a destination or service and make good money from doing it. Their skills and expertise command big money and they often sign four and five-figure contracts with brands, sometimes at the dinner table between helping kids with homework and preparing for bake sales. These women are modern marvels of epic proportions creating their own lane in the field of Influencer marketing.

How to become a Travel Influencer

• Master many trades | What they do takes skill and a lot of it. They are producer-director and star of their own show. They frame shots and direct often novice photographers to take the perfect shot to display not only their brand but the brands that are paying them to their large audiences. I’ve spent 10 years in school studying photography and am still completely blown away by
• Have a unique voice | Even as a travel influencer you don’t have to travel far. Becoming a travel influencer is about how you capture the world around you. There are people who make streets I’ve traveled my whole like come alive and look new
• Prepare for the worst | These trips are not leisure trips. They’re work, putting food in their kid’s mouths and on their tables, these women don’t play. The time it takes me to scope a place out and stage something to perfection they have already meticulously documented minute aspects of an establishment or experience that escape the naked eye. These women are multitaskers often

• Do it for the gram |There is such a thing as doing it for the gram, and travel influencers are those that have this down to a science. What I’ve realized though is that in all honesty, it’s no different than the Sears photo studios of our youth. Every year no matter how much misery you had in your soul five minutes prior to stepping in front of the camera you gathered yourself for the millisecond it took to get the perfect family moment immortalized on film and printed to any measurement you could imagine. with the invention of the smartphone, Family Travel Influencer have taken this show on the road. The key to becoming an Instagram Influencers is bottling up that photo studio magic and taking it on the road. Every kid screams and cries and throws tantrums, even the children of Family Travel Influencers. Many tantrums are had in between those screen perfect shots and honestly, it doesn’t matter. When done right there is this moment in the heart of a tantrum where a head held back in anguish, and eyes shit right in despair breaks and if you click the camera, right there, at that moment you would think it was the smoke of an angel
  
• Do your JOB | Being an influencer is not about lounging by the pool in exotic locations, it’s about the art of capturing the pool you’re lounging by in the most come hither way. Family travel Instagram influencers must constantly reimagine a place that hundreds of people have seen before, to present it to their virtual community in a new light. Their job is to get you to WANT to experience the things they have the privilege of experiencing themselves. To be an effective travel influencer constantly toe the line between enjoying a new location and doing the job you came to do, creating content that

What I think many people don’t realize is that education is at the heart of these travels. The family travel influencers I’ve vacationed with, are mothers first. Education about new countries and cultures is deeply ingrained into their travel experiences. Sit down and talk to the child of a family travel influencer and prepare to have your mind blown. I once traveled to Kenya with a three-year-old who upon meeting a group of fellow vacationers and learning they were from London, responded with “London, I love London, we go often.”

The ability of these children to not only travel far and often but to retain information about the places they have been, continues to amaze me. All the children know how to say hello in at least three languages. Their parents may have curated Instagram feeds, however, the reason they travel is not entirely for content creation. These Instagram Influencers travel to expose their children to the infinite possibilities this planet has to offer us.

Lost on Mother Earth, found in Motherhood
xx
Warmly
Sunshine Abou Bakar

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