February Rocked It Out at Beers and Beans.

Here’s a little tip I picked up from my friend Erica at OverYonderlust.com – make a running list of your blog accomplishments for the month.

Seriously, it helps. We all know the sky high feeling we get when we open our inbox and out pouring comes emails from readers & advertisers telling us they love us. How about when Google Analytics goes through the roof? It’s amazing right?! Unfortunately blogging is like everything else in the world – a rollercoaster. Some days are amazing, others just kinda blah. Looking back on the great times makes the boring days seem a bit less slow.

I kept a Beers and Beans ‘diary’ for February and I just looked at it and all I can say is that we rocked it out! We were blessed in the month of February and I really feel like 2011 is going to be our year! Here’s a little run down on some of the really cool things that went on behind the scenes at BeersandBeans. A friend of mine actually tried to buy shares in our blog last month, convinced it was only a matter of time before it takes off for good. Of course, it doesn’t hurt we had just watched the Social Network. ahhhahha.

Let’s hope she is right!  Anyway here you go:

1. Two of my images from the Salton Sea were used for an LP that is coming out in the next few weeks – YIPPEE! When it is officially released I can put more info up here, including some tracks. I’m pretty psyched about this!

2. We posted almost every single day. This actually wasn’t on purpose but it just so happened there was always something to write about! We aren’t planning on posting every day in the future (unless of course, you, the awesome readers want that – if so, let me know in the comments) but I have to say it is pretty exciting getting new travel information up several times a week even if some of it was in the form of some great guest blogs we had.

3. We were noted on the Huffington Post as a top travel blog to watch. Thank you Michael from Go, See, Write for including us! Not only are we extremely flattered but it has made a huge difference for us!

4. Like David Hasselhoff, we’re big in Asia! Erica from OverYonderlust wrote a guest post for us about her top 5 eats in Japan. This seemingly innocent post made it on the front page of Searchina.jp.net. What the heck is that you ask? Well it’s the #1 Chinese search engine in Japan. The English translation was not only hysterical but we gained a ton of new readers and I’m not gonna lie, it was awesome watching Analytics fly through the roof in just a couple hours time. Best part is they were quality hits with a bounce rate of under .1%. Yes, I’m serious. Pretty, pretty good as Larry David would say. Thank you Erica for what must have been a key-worded wonder!

5. Randy interviewed Travis Katz, the mastermind behind GoGobot.com and the previous head of International Relations at MySpace. Turns out not only is GoGobot pretty awesome, he’s also one heck of a cool guy – even met his wife on a camel ride!

6. We had 3 guest blogs published on other sites that we were quite proud of – Almost Fearless, NomadicMatt & Travel With a Mate.

7. We became the official travel writers for San Diego Uptown News – sweet! Although Randy and I worked together on published stories in the past, this is the first time we are in print together for our travel work and we are pretty psyched. We will be writing for them twice a month in print and online -yah! Our most recent article is about the Italian Riviera if anyone is interested in checking it out.

8. We were contacted by the wonderful ExOfficio to review some kickin’ underwear for their blog. Randy decided to do a video for his review and this one is his funniest yet as he put his underwear to the test in New York City at the New York Times Travel Show. Not only was ExOfiicio awesome to work with but once they post the reviews on their site I will be able to post them here so stay tuned!

10. We hosted our first ever contest! And it was a good one too – FlyThomasCook.com came through with $100 cold hard cash for the winner! A lot of people participated but Amanda from A Dangerous Business was the lucky winner. Thank you Lawrence for giving us the chance to host such a great contest!

11. We went to the NY Times Travel Show. We not only made some excellent PR contacts but we were lucky enough to meet Andi from My Beautiful Adventures, Charu from Butterfly Diary & Gary from Everything-Everywhere. It was a pleasure meeting all of them and Charu gave me one of the greatest compliments ever by telling me that BeersandBeans is a household name in her home. She said her and her husband are trying to learn their way around Photoshop and he frequently says “You want me to get all BeersandBeans on that? I don’t know how to get all BeersandBeans on that!” – ahhh so awesome – Really Charu you made my day, no my year, no my life! Just knowing people see something special in my photos is really, really mind blowing for me. Meeting this handful of great bloggers was a great way to close out the month – especially considering it was Randy’s first time in New York City! And Charu if you ever want any editing help don’t hesitate to ask. 🙂

12 & 13. On two other notes, we hosted our first ever blog carnival which was a lot of fun and led to some great stories that I would’ve missed otherwise. I also discovered that our blog really does help people with their trip planning – which is really exciting! I helped a reader plan their trip to Iceland and two other readers contacted Cerreto Libri (the farm where we wwoofed in Tuscany) to volunteer on the grape harvest for next year based on our recommendations. Getting hard, concrete evidence that what we do matters to other people and has an effect on their travel planning is a pretty fantastic feeling!

It seemed every day I opened my email something awesome popped out! It was such a great month and to top it off we had a record number of advertisers contact us. I definitely did not want February to end but I am pretty psyched for the rest of this year! Did someone say press trips? Pretty please! That’s where we are going to focus some of our efforts this year so we are open to all suggestions. 🙂

The honest truth is that we really would not be where we are today without the support of our readers – Thank you so much for reading and enjoying our blog and for using us as a source for your travel planning! As always, don’t hesitate to contact us if you want some travel advice or photo tips.

Here’s to 2011 off to a bang! I think I’m gonna celebrate with a Guinness for the upcoming St. Paddy’s Day!

*Please remember all photos on this website are copyrighted and property of BeersandBeans.com, NarikosNest.com & Bethany Salvon. Please do not use them without my permission. If you want to use one of them please contact me first because I do love to share and I would be flattered. Thanks!

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