Here are 10 tips on how to earn money and even your life while discovering the world! A livelihood like no other!
This is it! You’ve finally taken the plunge and decided to go on an adventure of your own. Whether it’s for a few months or a few years, earning a living by traveling can be a great way to extend your peregrinations around the world. Of course, it can be difficult to be self-sufficient right from the start. But whatever your chosen activity, you should soon be able to earn enough to offset your expenses. So, how do you earn a living while traveling? In this article, we give you some tips and ideas for living a life of adventure!
The different professions
If you want to earn a living while you travel, you can start by doing something locally, abroad, or during your trip. The web now offers a wide range of opportunities for earning a living while discovering the world.
On-site guide
An income-generating activity to do on the spot is, of course, guiding! Using your mother tongue or another language, you can help passing tourists visit monuments or the town where you’ve made your home. This activity is perfect if you’ve been at your destination long enough to know the place well. You can also do a bit of research on your own about your favorite places to learn a few juicy and relevant anecdotes.
Then you can apply for a job with the local tourist office or a specialized company. The other option is to canvass tourists directly on site. Find them and offer them a personalized tour, so you can show them your favorite places! Certain websites can also be used to offer your services, such as Airbnb or WithLocals.
Teaching French abroad
All over the world, you’ll find people wanting to learn a second language like French. Seasoned bilinguals can even teach English. Even without certifications or diplomas, it’s easy enough to find a job as a language teacher. If you have certifications, you can even be hired by official institutions, or find even more opportunities online. Yes, you don’t have to be a face-to-face teacher!
Thanks to Skype, Whatsapp or Hangout, it’s very easy to communicate across the world and therefore teach, no matter where you are. Sites like Italki and Superprof let you offer your services as a certified teacher or community tutor (without a diploma).
Web Editor
This is a very fashionable profession. Armed with your writing skills, you’ll be able to work for clients, often websites specializing in specific content. They’ll ask you to write articles or content for them, and you’ll be paid by the word, by the character or by the article. Of course, this work can be done anywhere in the world. It’s a great way to earn a living while traveling! Nonetheless, being a copywriter is a real job, specific and different from being a traditional copywriter. You have to adapt and learn to master the codes in order to be ready.
Community manager
Like web copywriting, community management is an excellent way to earn a living while traveling. This job can also be done as a digital nomad. All you need to do is find a few customers, and you’ll soon be earning enough to live on as you travel the world!
As a reminder, the community manager is the person who manages the social networks of one or more companies. Many companies outsource this job. So this job is perfectly suited to a nomadic lifestyle! Even more so than for web copywriting, a good Internet connection is essential to be able to post and exchange with your customer community quickly.
IT Developer
If you know how to code in any computer language, then you’ve got the key to earning an easy living while traveling. There are plenty of jobs for IT developers, and freelancing offers are plentiful! This job fits in very well with a life of digital nomadism. All you need is an Internet connection and a computer to work, build an application or a website and talk to your client.
Other professions can also be practiced on the web while traveling, such as translator or graphic designer. To find customers, all you have to do is create a showcase site, use your existing network or work with networking platforms such as Malt.
Sell photos/videos
If you’re exploring the world, there’s no doubt that you’ll be documenting your trip. So why not sell your photos and videos for money? After all, it’s a great way to earn a living while traveling, and give free rein to your passion for photography. Beware, however, that the photos and videos you take with your smartphone will probably not be of sufficiently high quality. If you’re not yet a keen photographer, you can buy a good camera. Think of it as an investment. If you want to learn the basics of photography or videography, you’ll find plenty of resources and training courses online.
If you’re already an expert, you could also consider selling your services as a photography teacher, either on-site or online. Sites like Udemy are ideal for this!
Where can you sell your photos and videos?
Obviously, we can’t ignore this question. Taking good photos is the first step, but you still need to be able to sell them to make a living from your travels! Fortunately, there are several online image sites, such as Adobe Stock, Foap, Getty Images Shutterstock. They’ll pay you for your best shots.
But the competition is fierce! Another tip: if you own a GoPro, you can submit your best videos to the Go Pro Awards. Amateur or professional, it doesn’t matter. And best of all, there’s no end to the competition. So keep submitting your photos and videos!
Publish an ebook
Like photography and video sales, ebook publishing is an excellent way to earn a living while traveling. It also allows you to build up a passive income. Indeed, once your ebook is published, you can technically earn money without having to work again. However, you’ll probably need to publish several ebooks before you have enough income to offset your travel expenses!
So how do you go about it? First of all, you’ll need to decide which book to write. Whether you choose fiction or non-fiction, you can maximize your chances of generating sales by creating an ebook on a niche subject. Once you’ve written your book, you’ll need to do a lot of self-promotion and then publish it. There are many self-publishing platforms. The best-known is Amazon’s Kindle. When you release your ebook, make sure you also get a few positive reviews, as comments help with referencing and sales. Then you can relax and think about your next ebook!
Create a blog
Travelling can become your business. For this, creating a blog is an excellent idea. However, you’ll need to build up a solid community before you can hope to make a living from traveling. So you might as well start now! Write about your adventures, network with other bloggers, make yourself known and attract traffic to your site.
Once you’ve built up your community, you have a number of options for monetizing your blog. For example, you can use affiliate marketing. The best-known way to do this is to add links to your content, redirecting visitors to a page where they can buy something. On this page, they can buy something. If they buy the item after clicking on your link, you earn a commission. Once again, Amazon is a reference in this field. But you can also call on other companies and offer them a partnership.
If you’re creating a travel blog, for example, you can monetize it with Doyoogo, a solution for Activities & Experiences.
Become an influencer
Whether you want to become a blogger or not, you can also become an influencer. This activity has become popular with the development of social networks, particularly Instagram. While it can be viewed negatively, it can be done ethically. Share your adventures, inspire a community and pass on positive messages!
To make a living from travel, an influencer will obviously need to offer products via partnerships. However, you don’t have to promote useless gadgets. For your adventures, you’ll need equipment: clothes, gear, transportation. You’ll also need to borrow transport companies, stay in hotels and use various online services. Once you’ve tested them, you can then contact the brands and services you use and offer to become an ambassador!
Applying for a Working Holiday Visa
It’s one of the most popular solutions. The Working Holiday Visa (WHV) or Permis Vacances Travail (PVT) is a residence permit allowing access to a territory while alternating tourist visits and seasonal work. The WHV is very popular with students taking a gap year, or simply with people in their twenties.
Go on an adventure, such as a road-trip, and finance your vacation by working for a local. Some of the most popular tasks include picking fruit and vegetables, or working in the restaurant or hotel business. The PVT also enables you to improve your foreign language skills, since you’ll be totally immersed in the workplace, working with local bosses and colleagues as well as with other foreigners, with limited use of your mother tongue.
Many countries have introduced this residence permit, and it’s quite simple for French nationals to obtain one. Under certain conditions, of course.
Are you a digital nomad? Have you ever been? Tell us what you do!