Create Personalized Alpaca Maps to Share Your Travel Stories

Zoe Manderson, Co-Founder of Alpaca Maps, helps travel bloggers and tourism businesses harness the power of maps to display and share their journeys along the way. 

Zoe is a part of the Travel Massive Melbourne chapter and excited to show all the travel bloggers, writers, tour operators, publishers and tourism bureaus of Travel Massive exactly how you can bring life to your stories. Alpaca is allowing travelers to create, share, and embed interactive, immersive maps, displaying itineraries and routes.

What inspired you to create Alpaca Maps? 

Alpaca is where our passions for travel, exploration and maps come together. Between us, we have traveled to over 70 countries, and spent countless hours reading stories from other travelers, only to notice that there was a lack of beautifully simple, and visual ways, for travelers to display and share their journeys.

What makes your startup different from other similar startups out there?

The concept of maps for travel is not new, but in recent times, digital maps have failed to give content creators and travelers what they need. Maps are not simply a one-dimensional platform for directions, they are the foundation upon which human stories, photos, and tips are layered. Maps should be interactive, taking the reader on the journey.

How did you get your startup off the ground and gaining traction?

We have sparked lots of curiosity from travel bloggers around the world, who were desperately searching for a better way to display their journeys on a map. They understand the power of maps as a form of reader engagement, and are looking for new ways to make their content stand out. We started by making contact with travel bloggers and involving them in the process early on, we’ve also attended events, and word-of-mouth spread from there.

How is your startup changing the future of the industry or helping to make travel better?

Alpaca Maps is empowering anyone, to create and share their inspirational story in a beautiful way. We are providing the content producers with the tools to make their content amazing, and publish content that becomes a practical planning tool for travelers.

Do you have any tips for new entrepreneurs who want to create a successful startup?

A genuine passion for what you do has got to be at the core of everything. It’s also incredibly important to take the time to talk to users and find out a little bit more about their world so that you can better craft your product to suit their needs. I strongly believe in building and maintaining personal connections with early users.

As a startup, what benefits have you seen from being a part of Travel Massive meetups? 

I attended my first Melbourne Travel Massive meet up earlier this year, and when I’m traveling I always look out for events – having recently attended events in both Manila and Singapore. Everywhere I go everyone is so welcoming, and I’ve made lots of friends and business contacts along the way.

Lastly, why Alpaca? 

Beyond our aspirations to be a superhero (Alpaca fiber is flame and water resistant), we think their qualities beautifully embody what it means to be a global traveler — curious, culturally adaptable, tough, social, friendly, and sensitive to the world around them.

Travel Start-Up is a monthly series that profiles unique online travel start-ups in the Travel Massive community around the world. You can connect with Zoe and Alpaca Maps on Travel Massive, Facebook, and Twitter.