Girl on a Zebra: How Oliver and Carae built a travel blog with 156K monthly readers

Oliver and Carae had no shortage of business ideas. Over the years, the travel-loving couple experimented with everything from an eco-friendly swimsuit brand to plans for opening a bed and breakfast. 

Some ideas got off the ground, others quietly faded away, but none turned into the businesses they hoped to build. Ironically, the answer had been right in front of them all along.

As freelance ghostwriters, they had spent years helping travel bloggers grow. They wrote destination guides, optimized articles for search engines, and watched the websites they worked on attract readers from around the world. Along the way, they learned what made a travel blog successful.

Eventually, they thought to themselves, if they already knew how to build a successful travel blog, why were they still doing it for someone else?

But turning that idea into a business meant betting everything they had on a dream that wasn’t guaranteed to work.

Building someone else’s dream

Carae began traveling in 2020, as international travel slowly resumed. When her savings started to run out, she looked for a way to keep going, and she found it in freelance ghostwriting.

For the next four to five years, she wrote articles for established travel blogs, helping other creators publish destination guides and grow their audiences. 

Along the way, Oliver joined her, and together they gained an inside look at how successful travel websites actually worked.

Aside from sharpening their writing skills, the experience taught them how to research topics people were actively searching for. 

They saw how search engines rewarded genuinely useful content. They watched travel blogs evolve from personal journals into sustainable businesses.

Despite spending years helping other blogs succeed, they never imagined starting one themselves. Until freelance work became less reliable, and the couple moved to Australia for more stable jobs. 

It worked okay, but they couldn’t just stop thinking about the blogging experience they had. The industry knowledge. The things that made readers click, stay, and return.

“Why are we writing for them and not for ourselves?” they thought.

Taking a leap into an uncertain future

When Oliver and Carae started thinking about launching a blog, many people were already questioning whether blogging was still worth it.

Social media dominated online conversations, and AI was beginning to raise new questions about the future of written content.

But their years of freelancing gave them a different perspective and the confidence to leap.

Working behind the scenes for established travel blogs, they had seen firsthand that travelers were still searching Google for detailed guides. Long-form content continued to attract readers – and generate revenue.

Determined to give the blog their full attention, they saved enough money to support themselves for several months while traveling around Southeast Asia, where a lower cost of living would allow them to focus entirely on growing Girl on a Zebra.

Seven months of uncertainty

The first month after making their blog a full-time venture, Girl on a Zebra earned about $70.

Over the next several months, income rarely climbed above a few hundred dollars.

Meanwhile, their savings kept shrinking.

Traffic, however, told a different story.

In one month, the blog attracted around 2,000 readers. Then roughly 4,000. Then 8,000. Before long, traffic had climbed to around 40,000 monthly visits.

The audience was growing. Revenue simply hadn’t caught up yet.

Those middle months proved to be the hardest.

As their savings dwindled, Carae even started applying for jobs again, unsure whether the business would become sustainable before they ran out of money.

Around seven to eight months into that full-time, savings-funded stretch, the turning point finally came. The traffic they had spent months building began translating into consistent income, allowing the blog to replace the savings they’d been living on.

That growth also unlocked multiple revenue streams. Display advertising became the most passive source of income, generating revenue as readers visited their articles. 

Affiliate partnerships added another layer, with commissions coming from hotel bookings, tours, and other travel services booked through their recommendations.

As Girl on a Zebra gained visibility on Google, brands also began reaching out directly, after discovering their articles ranking for relevant destinations and wanting to be featured, too. 

Oliver and Carae have also pursued outbound partnerships on their own, though that side hasn’t taken off in the same way yet.

For the couple, it was proof that long-form travel content still held real value. Even in an internet culture dominated by short-form video, readers were still searching for detailed travel guides – and businesses were willing to invest in reaching that audience.

Creating content people actually need

Nearly all of Girl on a Zebra’s readers still discover the blog through Google.

Search algorithm updates have become a regular part of running the blog. A major update in January 2026, for example, prompted Oliver and Carae to revisit parts of their content strategy. 

These days, they’re also thinking about optimizing content for AI SEO as another way readers might discover their work. 

Alongside staying on top of algorithm changes, they continue to focus on creating helpful, well-structured travel guides that answer the questions readers are actually searching for.

Instead of treating the blog like a personal travel diary, they begin with the questions travelers are already asking. Every article is designed to answer those questions clearly, drawing on their own experiences while staying practical enough for someone planning the same trip.

Authenticity matters just as much. Readers aren’t looking for a perfect version of travel. They want advice from someone who’s actually been there – someone whose experiences feel achievable rather than aspirational.

That balance between personal experience and practical guidance has become one of Girl on a Zebra’s defining strengths.

Building the right technical foundation

At first, Oliver built the website on WordPress.com, not realizing how different it was from running a self-hosted WordPress.org site. As they tried to grow the blog, they found the platform limiting and eventually hired a web designer.

The designer’s redesign didn’t work out – the couple ended up scrapping his work entirely. But he did recommend that they migrate both their website and domain to Hostinger and switch to WordPress.org.

Then, that migration happened early on, back when Girl on a Zebra was still pulling in a few thousand readers a month.

With Hostinger’s managed hosting for WordPress, Oliver and Carae spend less time administering the website and more time creating content, even as their monthly readership climbed toward 156,000.

The couple says the website has required very little day-to-day maintenance. During the early months, they occasionally turned to Hostinger’s Customer Success team whenever technical questions came up, helping them get the site running exactly as they envisioned.

The migration itself went smoothly, and they’ve hosted Girl on a Zebra with Hostinger ever since.

Today, the website largely runs on its own, allowing Oliver and Carae to focus on creating content and scaling their business.

Looking beyond the blog

Today, Girl on a Zebra attracts around 156,000 monthly readers and supports Oliver and Carae full-time.

But as they begin thinking about the next stage of life, including starting a family, they’re also expanding the business beyond written content. Instagram, TikTok, newsletters, and even additional travel websites are all part of the long-term vision.

Rather than treating each platform separately, they want to build one cohesive brand that reaches travelers wherever they choose to discover new destinations.

Looking back, the question that started it all still feels simple:

If they could build successful travel blogs for other people, why not build one for themselves?

Two years later, Girl on a Zebra is proof that they made the right call.