What could a collaboration with Stralend Schrijven mean for your destination or brand? Let me tell a bit more about me, my online platform Stralend Schrijven and how I collaborate with destinations and brands.
About me & how it started
My name is Sandra van Bijsterveld (you can find me here on LinkedIn) and after studying Slavonic linguistics and specializing in translation and copywriting, I started working as a freelance translator and copywriter. Tourism was one of my areas of expertise, and I provided native Dutch copy for airlines and cruiselines, but also for websites like Expedia and Skyscanner and print magazines like Meridian Travel and Cruise & Style Magazine.
After doing this for over 10 years, I decided to start my own travel blog in 2013, writing about our own holidays in the Nordic countries and Central Europe, plus our short trips in the Netherlands. Because of our interest in the Nordic countries, I also created content about how to bring a bit of Nordic lifestyle home to The Netherlands.
Stralend Schrijven attracted more and more visitors and I started getting invited to press trips, resulting in more new travel content. In 2016, I was nominated for the Scandinavia Press Prize, organized by the Danish, Swedish and Norwegian tourist agencies in the Netherlands. I was also asked to be a juror for the online entries of a major Dutch press prize, and to give presentations about travelling and blogging at travel events and a school for journalism. Newspapers, magazines and radio stations started asking me to comment on subjects featured on my blog.
By 2019, Stralend Schrijven had become my fulltime job and it still is today. My husband Maarten is also an important part of Stralend Schrijven – mostly in the background providing photographs, videos, transport, technical support and most of all great travel company 🙂
From blog categories to niche websites
Over time, I realised that a lot of my followers were interested in a specific topic. For example: they wanted to read about Sweden, but not about Croatia. This made me decide to switch from using blog categories to splitting up my blog into the following niche sites (you can click on the logos to see the websites):
In order to be able to target followers who are interested in a specific subject, every niche website has its own dedicated newsletter.
Stralend Schrijven on social media
My websites and newsletters are my main outlets. But you can also find me on social media:
- I use Instagram during my travels;
- afterwards, I share blog posts on Facebook and Pinterest;
- and I publish short videos on YouTube.
Target audience & numbers
All together, Stralend Schrijven has between 30.000-74.000 unique visitors/month (2024), around 3.000 newsletter subscribers and 6.500 social media followers. They are mostly active travellers from the Netherlands (and some from Flemish Belgium), interested in nature & culture and ranging from young adults to families with children and seniors.
Travel guides
In 2024, I started writing books for the Dutch publishing house Edicola:
- Denmark travel guide (published in 2024)
- Nordic-themed planner for the year 2025 (published in 2024)
- Southern Finland travel guide (to be published in 2024)
- Finnish Lapland travel guide (to be published in 2025)
How I work with destinations and brands
In general, these are the ways I work with destinations and brands:
- Blog trips (individual & group trips): I participate in press/blog trips to cities and regions in Northern Europe, Central/Eastern Europe and The Netherlands, sharing my experiences on social media, in blog posts and in my newsletter. (For examples of publications that resulted from press trips, please see the ‘Blog’ section of each destination website above.)
- Product reviews: I review products like travel guides, outdoor wear or Nordic food & design items. For more engagement, a giveaway can be linked to these reviews.
- Affiliate marketing: I am happy to do affiliate promotions that match my audience.
- Sponsored placement: would you like to be included in a blog post or page that is relevant to what you offer? Let’s discuss the options.
- Content creation for other platforms: do you want me to create content for a different media outlet than Stralend Schrijven (for example, your website or print magazine)? As an experienced translator, copywriter and travel content creator, there are various services I offer. Let me know what you need and I will be happy to provide you with a quote.
And of course, if you have a different idea on how we could work together, I would be happy to hear from you at info [at] stralendschrijven.nl.
I don’t publish guest posts and I don’t do link swaps.
Previous collaborations
In the past, I have collaborated with destinations and brands such as:
- Travel to Northern Europe: Visit Sweden, Visit Dalarna, Visit Malmö, Visit Umeå, Visit Sälenfjäll, SCR Swedish Camping, Visit Denmark, Visit Aarhus Regionen, Visit Vadehavskysten, Visit Middelfart, Visit Fyn, Destination Sydkyst Danmark, Visit Norway, Visit Bergen, Destination Trysil, Lofoten.info, My Helsinki, Visit Espoo, Visit Tampere, Visit Levi, Visit Ylläs, Visit Oulu, Voigt Travel, BBI Travel, Nordic, StenaLine, Viking Line, Finnlines, Feriepartner Danmark, Landal Greenparks (Denmark), Dock C Cruisepartners (HAL cruise to Norway), Danibo, Visit Jakobstad, Visit Kokkola, Visit Vaasa, Visit Kimitoön, Visit Lahti
- Travel to Central/Eastern Europe: Visit Czech Republic, Go To Brno, Visit Pilsen, Central Bohemia, Gate to Bohemia, Landal Greenparks (Czechia), Polish Tourism Organisation, POZnan Travel, Croatia Full of Life, Visit Split, Visit Hungary, Experience Serbia, I feel Slovenia, Latvia Travel, Live Riga, European Sleeper
- Travel within The Netherlands: Visit Utrecht Region, Beleef Woerden, Toerisme Veluwe Arnhem Nijmegen, Laag Holland, Visit Noord-Limburg, Visit Zuid-Limburg, VVV Texel, Berg & Dal, Het Andere Friesland, Vechtdal Overijssel, Geldersch Landschap en Kastelen, Visit Flevoland, Visit Brabant, Keukenhof, Corpus, Citizen M Rotterdam, SS Rotterdam, Landal Greenparks
- Nordic lifestyle: Scandinavian Outdoor Academy, Fjällräven, Ilse Jacobsen, Revolution Race, Urtekram, Estrid, A&C Oslo, Organic Basics, Stronger, Scandinavische Woonwinkel, Jotex, Moose Färg, Danish Design, AW Bruna, Spectrum, Carrera Culinair, Lumière/myLum, September Film, Noordelijk Film Festival, Nordstil, Fikat, Northern Delight, Gammal & Ny, De Witte Eland, Studio Kvinna, Hairlust, MARIA ÅKERBERG
I booked us a stay next week! Thanks for the tip!
Reaction on Instagram after posting about our stay in a Nordic-themed holiday home in the Netherlands
I thought I had this Saturday off, but I was busy sending out orders most of the day. So happy! Lots of visitors and customers in the webshop. The giveaway was definitely a success.
Feedback from the owner of a Swedish-themed webshop after a review & giveaway on scandinavischleven.nl
Over the past weeks, we followed the route through Norway you described so enthusiastically. We met several families who brought a copy of your blog with them.
Reaction to a blog post about our camping trip in Norway on stralendnoorwegen.nl
Why work with Stralend Schrijven?
Some reasons why working with Stralend Schrijven might be interesting for you:
- Specific target audience: content is published on the relevant niche site and reaches a specific target audience. This increases the chance of readers actually booking or buying (compared to a more general blog or website).
- Broad age group: readers are families with children and teenagers, but also seniors.
- I am more than happy to give you an indication of what I will be publishing in advance, so you know what to expect. (Interested in this? Contact me via info [at] stralendschrijven.nl.)
- Publications do well in Google and are found by people who are looking for inspiration and information online. Most of my traffic by far comes from organic searches. Contrary to channels like Instagram of Facebook, this creates a long term effect: publications are being found and read for months and years after being published. Traffic often even increases over time.
Poland is still on our bucket list. This travel guide about Krakow can help us make our travel plans.
Reaction to the review of a travel guide on stralendpolen.nl
De trip around the lake was great. And we visited that wonderful bakery in Kajaani. Thank you for sharing, we found this blog post very helpful.
Reaction to a blog post about a day trip from Vuokatti on stralendfinland.nl
Thank you for the smooth collaboration. Hopefully we can work together in the future again.
Feedback from a Nordic cosmetics brand after doing a review + giveaway
Terms & conditions
Full transparency: these are my terms & conditions for collaborations.
- What I publish is my honest and personal experience, focusing on positive experiences.
- I own the copyright of all text and images I create. Sharing my posts on social media is great, but if you would like to use my text and/or images for your own content, please contact me in advance.
- I always disclose collaborations at the bottom of my publications.
- Links inserted in exchange for a fee, commission, trip or product are marked as rel=sponsored. (Readers won’t see this and the links work as usual. It just lets Google know I was somehow compensated – which they require.)
- Publications may contain affiliate links. Again, these links work as usual, they just register that the person who clicked came from my website, so I can get a commission if they buy/book something as compensation for my work.
- As the owner of my websites I can update and edit the content after its publication. In some cases it may even be necessary to delete content after a while, for example if an accommodation ceases to exist. But I always aim to create content that will remain online and guarantee that collab publications will stay online for at least a year.
Ideas? Questions? Let me know!
Would you like me to promote your destination or brand? I would be happy to create a proposal of what we could do. Or maybe you have a proposal yourself – please let me know! You can reach me at: