When I first met Kristin, she was teaching in a classroom full-time and completely exhausted.

Fast forward just two years, and after joining Scale Your Travel Blog, her main blog, Tiny Footsteps Travel, now gets over 160,000 monthly pageviews and earns her a six-figure income.

She’s fully replaced her teaching salary and built a business that gives her freedom and creativity back.

And she’s not stopping there (because once you know.. you KNOW)..

She now runs a second blog, The Misfit Teacher, where she’s helping others find more fulfilling, passion-driven careers (something she wished she had when she was stuck in the classroom).

Here’s how she made it happen, and the lessons you can use to grow your own blog:

Breaking Through to 160,000 Monthly Pageviews

At first, her goal was to hit 50,000 sessions to get into Mediavine. She made it there in about a year.

Then came the next big milestone: 100,000.

With the turbulence of Google updates in late 2023 and early 2025, that felt scary and a bit out of reach.

But she kept writing, stayed focused, and not only reached her goal… she blew past it.

💡 Laura’s Tip: Don’t ever let Google updates stop you from starting, writing, or growing your blog. Updates have been happening since the beginning of time, and bloggers have always found ways to thrive. The key is to diversify and build your email list so you’re never fully at the mercy of any one platform’s algorithm.

The Growth Secret You Might Overlook

A lot of people start blogs, but very few actually thrive.

And it all comes down to mindset.

Yes, strategy matters, of course.. but if you give up after three months without seeing results, you’ll never see what’s possible.

Kristin made the choice to step away from negative spaces (like subreddits and Facebook groups full of “blogging is dead” talk) and surround herself with things that would actually move her forward.

She picked up money mindset books, joined Denise Duffield Thomas’s Money Bootcamp, and started treating herself like someone worthy of success.

💡 Laura’s Tip: Protect your thoughts. Protect your energy. The voices you surround yourself with (online and offline) directly impact how much you grow and succeed.

The Post That Sparked Her Ah-HA! Moment

One of her very first posts was called “Tobermory With a Baby.”

When she plugged the keyword into an SEO tool, it showed no search volume, basically telling her no one was searching for it.

But inside Scale Your Travel Blog, she learned that low or no volume keywords (I call them hidden keywords) can actually be gold.

She wrote the post anyway because she knew it would be helpful.

And sure enough, readers found it, and it quickly started bringing in traffic.

That one post proved that when you write from real experience and lean into topics few others are covering, you can carve out your own corner of the internet that people are actively searching for.

💡 Laura’s Tip: Don’t dismiss keywords just because the tools say they have low or no search volume. Relying only on keyword tools is often a recipe for a lot of work with little reward. Learn to spot valuable keywords on your own first before you ever lean on a tool.

Her 6-Figure Blogging Income

Almost anytime I send out an email about success stories, I get the questions: "How are they making money though?"

So here's a quick breakdown of her income. Her main income streams include:

• Ad revenue (thanks to her high traffic)
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• Affiliate income (accommodations, tours, and experiences she’s personally vetted)

Together, these have replaced her teaching salary, and then some.

Reinvesting in Her Blog

She also outsources repetitive tasks like Pinterest pin creation so she can focus on higher-impact projects like writing ebooks, building new posts, or launching second blogs.

💡 Laura’s Tip: Aim to reinvest around 20% of your blogging profits into outsourcing simple, time-consuming tasks. Freeing up that time lets you focus on the big-picture projects that really grow your business.

Building a Second Blog: The Misfit Teacher

Teaching may not have been Kristin's forever career, but her passion for helping people find fulfilling work never went away.

That’s why she launched The Misfit Teacher, a site dedicated to helping people find alternative careers, build businesses, and escape burnout.

Some of her most popular posts include:

• ​How to Start a Tutoring Business​
• ​How to Become Self-Employed​
• ​Passive Income Jobs from Home​

Her goal is to get The Misfit Teacher into an ad network as well, and eventually help thousands of people realize they can create sustainable, fulfilling careers outside the traditional system.

Laura's Note: This is the kind of work I love. More than ever, people need to see that working for yourself or online is possible, and that’s exactly why I started teaching others how to grow their blogs. If you keep thinking it’s “too good to be true,” you’ll never experience what we experience. But the moment you shift to “this is possible for me,” everything changes. The freedom and flexibility that comes with it is *chef's kiss*.

Kristin's Advice If You Want to Reach 100K+ Pageviews

Don’t make writing a chore. If you don’t enjoy it, you won’t stick with it.

Write about the things you’d text your best friend about in detail.. the topics you could go on and on about.

That’s where your best, most helpful content will come from.

💡 Laura’s Tip: Start with solid, helpful information, then layer in your own style, tips, and personal stories to make it memorable and unique.

Ready To Replace Your Current Income with Blogging Income?

That’s exactly what I teach inside Scale Your Travel Blog.. how to turn your experiences into posts people actually read, and then layer on income streams that grow with you.

It’s the same approach that helped students like Kristin go from burned-out teacher to six-figure blogger with 160,000 monthly pageviews.

👉 Join the waitlist here to be first to know when doors open in January 2026.​

Coming Up Next..

Mike (the other half of Mike & Laura Travel) launched his own non-travel blog back in May. Just four months in, it’s already earning around $900-$1,000 per month.

In upcoming newsletters and workshops, I’ll be pulling back the curtain on what’s working for him, so you can apply what works for your own blog.

Have a great week,

Laura

P.S. If someone sent you this newsletter, and you want to receive more from me, click here to join 30,000+ bloggers already subscribed!​

Scale Your Travel Blog is currently CLOSED for enrollment until January 2026. To join our waitlist, please click here!​

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