Check Out Taylor Dustin’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Taylor Dustin.

Hi Taylor, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today. 
I’m a born and raised Michigander who loves traveling and is obsessed with showing people how great my home state is. When I was in high school, I wanted to get out of Michigan as soon as I could. I didn’t cherish or realize how many great things our state has to offer. In college, I started traveling a lot more – inside and outside the state. I learned how to find cheap flights, went on my first-ever road trip to the Upper Peninsula, and I also studied abroad in Italy! After traveling the world, I came to realize that we do have something special in Michigan, and my heart always feels at home along the coast of our Great Lakes. 

The lockdown in 2020 put a pause on my global travel and inspired me to explore my own backyard. I knew Michigan had a lot to offer, but I really hadn’t seen a ton of it still. My roommate and I decided to try and explore somewhere new every weekend or after work to make the most of our summer. 

It was at this time in 2020 that TikTok was becoming huge. But I swore I would never download the app because it was just some dumb app for dancing teenagers. At this time, I was also working in corporate social media, and part of my job was knowing the ins and outs of each social media platform. I finally got bored enough one night and decided I would download TikTok to figure out how it worked and why everyone was so obsessed with it. I noticed right away that the ability to go viral was a lot greater than any of the other social platforms, and I couldn’t figure out why all these seemingly random videos had millions of views. 

I started researching how to build a brand on TikTok and what it took to go viral. I learned how insanely powerful TikTok was and figured I might as well put it to the test and see if I could successfully build a brand. I’ve always had a passion for photography and had always wanted to be some type of travel blogger or share my travel experiences with people, but the market was so saturated on Instagram that it was incredibly hard to grow a following or gain any traction, so I never really tried. 

One of the biggest takeaways in building a brand on TikTok was to pick a niche. At the time, there weren’t a lot of people creating travel content on the app, and there was nobody creating Michigan content at all. One night it just clicked in my brain that I should share my story of traveling to a new place in Michigan every weekend on TikTok. I knew Michigan was a hidden gem and wanted to share all that the state had to offer. I changed my handle to @TheWanderingMichigander, and I started posting about my travels. Within a couple posts, I had gained 30,000 followers. I kept creating videos, and then one night one of my videos went viral, and I woke up to over 100,000 followers. It just continued to climb from there. 

About a year later, Instagram introduced Reels to compete with TikTok. I had never had much success on Instagram, and it was traditionally very hard to build a following and brand on the app because it was so saturated with influencers and photographers already. But I knew that Instagram would reward people for being early adopters of Reels, so I started posting exactly what I did on TikTok to Instagram Reels. There were already a lot of other Michigan bloggers and photographers on the app, but nobody was posting the type of Michigan Reels/video content that I was. I quickly began going viral and gained around 100,000 followers in one year. 

Within the next year, I was able to quit my 9-5 corporate job and become a full-time content creator. I never in a million years would have thought all of this would happen so fast and that I could make this my full-time job. I absolutely love that I get to inspire people to get outside and make the most of their lives, even if it’s just a little weekend road trip in their own state. I’ve always loved exploring, adventuring, and traveling on a budget, and I feel so blessed that I get to share that with the world now! 

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
There’s definitely been some learning curves along the journey. I had no idea any of this would happen when I first started posting TikToks. It was honestly just for fun. I quickly learned that when you go viral, you are way more susceptible to internet trolls and haters. For some reason, people love to make everything on the internet controversial, even if it’s just a video about a fun place to visit in Michigan. That was probably the most unexpected thing that happened along the way and that most people find hard to believe. I have had people personally attack me for the way I look, talk, say things, for choosing the wrong bucket list locations in Michigan, and more. It’s honestly crazy what people say on the internet, but I learned a long time ago that the way people treat you is a reflection of their own heart, so you just have to brush it off and not let it get to you. 

Another super real struggle was balancing my full-time corporate job with my basically full-time content creation job. I would work from 9-5, then work on my own business from like 7 pm-1 am or later. For a while there, I was running on 4 hours of sleep most nights. It was rough, and I really burnt myself out trying to work a normal job, create content, travel for my content, and still live a normal life. I knew that I had the potential to turn my side hustle into a full-time job, so that’s why I worked so hard at making that happen but looking back, I do wish I would have prioritized sleep and my well-being a bit more. 

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Some call me an influencer, some call me a TikToker, some call me a travel blogger or writer, and others refer to me as a photographer of some sort, but what I like to call myself is a travel content creator and photographer. I’m more than just an influencer or a blogger, and a content creator covers a multitude of different things. I’m creating content that provides value, I’m not just selling something to someone if that makes sense. 

I’ve always been a really creative person. Whether that’s art, photography, poetry and writing, or fashion. I started drawing and painting at a really young age and used to design all of the t-shirts for any type of event my school had growing up. I’ve also had a camera in my hand ever since I can remember. I remember carrying my little disposable cameras around on field trips and family vacations and getting my first digital camera in probably 5th grade. I documented all of my stuff in scrapbooks. 

I loved my creative outlets but also loved anything sports and exercise related. I ended up going to college for Exercise Science Pre-Physical Therapy for two years before completely switching my major to Marketing and Advertising. I ended up graduating from Grand Valley State University with a degree in Marketing and Business Administration. 

Right after college, I got a job at a big corporation in West Michigan. Within my almost three years there, I worked in digital analytics, marketing, and social media. The corporate life was definitely not for me, but it made me who I am today and has truly helped me a lot in my journey to this new career as a content creator. 

Looking back, it’s hard to imagine my life any different than it is right now. It’s crazy how I’m getting to combine my passions and things I’ve always been interested in to make a living. I get to use my creative outlet of photography and videography while also getting paid to be active, hike, exercise, and be outside. Plus, I get to inspire people and connect with so many great people. I never thought this was possible! 

We’d love to hear about any fond memories you have from when you were growing up.
My favorite childhood memory is going camping with my family and church every summer. We didn’t have to take fancy vacations to have fun, and I really think these trips made me who I am today. It was literally the best time as a child getting to camp in our pop-up camper, run around with the other kids, swim in the lake, go tubing behind our friends’ grandpa’s boat, make food on the fire, and just be surrounded by a great community of people out in nature. 

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thewanderingmichigander/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thewanderingmichigander
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@thewanderingmichigander

Image Credits
The Wandering Michigander