There are indeed quite many travellers living on “passive incomes” during their trip. Halfway between envious and skeptical, we always curiously wonder how they can roam for years without any stable, regular job. Either they are already rich or they can generate revenue without having to depend on a fixed position. As a matter of fact, they can freely finance and enjoy their travels combining their skills with new and old technologies.
They can basically manage their mobile jobs like “digital nomads”, unattached to a specific place or office and motivated to pursue their independent lifestyle using all their creative resources.
Therefore, if you think to quit your current job and start a fresh, timeless adventure, you might find useful the following (not exhaustive) list of possible “nomad activities”:
1. CREATE YOUR ONLINE BLOG
It is not an easy task but with some preparatory work and user-friendly tools (e.g. Siteground, Bluehost and WordPress) you can manage to build up an attractive platform for your readers and monetize it later. You will firstly have to find your market niche and write interesting and amusing content about it. You will have then to place your ads, affiliates or products inside.
2. CREATE YOUR ONLINE WEB-SHOP
Similar to the previous, but with a more trading angle in mind. You will have to find the right products and / or services in line with your abilities and inclination. If you are not a web developer or you have limited budget, the are plenty of free or cheap e-commerce platforms out there to help you out with your website. For example, Wix, Shopify, Weebly or Bigcommerce.
3. SELL ONLINE THIRD-PARTY PRODUCTS
Once you have created your website and you have developed a good SEO in Google, you can start promoting third-party products using the so-called Affiliate Programs, granting you commissions for each sale generated through your website. Amazon is one of the most common examples. Nowadays almost any big online seller offers you a “reward” for each new customer you bring to them. Check on the Affiliate section of each website.
4. SELL YOUR BOOKS ONLINE
If writing is your strong point, you may publish Ebooks on platforms like Amazon Kindle at no initial cost. You will get a percentage on each sale.
5. SELL VIDEOS AND DOCUMENTARIES ONLINE
If you are a passionate video-maker, you may wish to record and upload your videos to Youtube, another social platform or your personal website to capture watchers and make money with ads or direct sales. You can also directly contact a stock agency to try to sell your videos. Some examples are Pond5, Istockphoto, Shutterstock or Clipcanvas.
6. SELL YOUR PHOTOS ONLINE
If you have photographic skills and good equipment, you could publish your photos online on social portals or on your website and attract buyers there to sell your art. Otherwise you can directly contact a microstock photo agency to offer your works. Here a complete list of microstock agencies possibly interested in purchasing your photos.
7. WORK AS A FREELANCE WEB-DESIGNER
You can basically offer your services to countless companies and individuals. You can sell the services on your own website or on different third-party job platforms. You may find some helpful hints here. Another recommended platform to search for home positions is Remote OK.
8. WORK AS A COMMUNITY MANAGER
If you know about SEO and social networks, you can become a community manager and work online for your customers.
9. WORK AS A FREELANCE TRANSLATOR
If you know at least two languages and have a bit of experience in translation, you can candidate yourself as a freelance translator and work for agencies or publishers. For more info, review my article about this topic.
10. BECOME A TRANSCRIBER
If you have good hearing, you could carry out transcription tasks for different topics. These tasks could turn out to be a bit demanding in terms of entry-requirements (and entry-tests) and time-consumption. In addition, you should first study and learn some universal signs. However, if you are fast enough, you could make some money out of it. Here you have some useful links:
11. TEACH ONLINE LANGUAGES OR OTHER SUBJECTS
With Covid-19 pandemic, this activity has become very requested and well-paid. You need to be confident with digital medias and have a very stable, unlimited Internet connection though. Furthermore, when trying to understand how much revenue I could get from that, I bumped into several “hidden” deductions (e.g. for the portal, to transfer the money to your bank, for the currency exchange rate, for the taxes, etc.). Sometimes you also need to pass some introductory tests, upload a presentation video or provide your teaching diplomas. The most free-access (no tests, no experience, no entry-requirements, no diplomas, no videos, etc.) the platform is, the more competition you will find; and vice-versa, the more restricted, the lesser competition. Depending on the spoken languages and your audience, you might be interested in one of the following portals:
- Verbalplanet
- AmazingTalker: for multi-purposes tutors
- Italki
- Verbling
- Preply
- Lingoci
- Justlearn
- Classgap
12. ONLINE TRADING AND INVESTING
Trading is one of the top most-lucrative “smart” occupations nowadays, allowing you to make a great bunch of money in short time. The downside, of course, is the risk and the related stress. I tested the thrill myself and in the end I had to give up a little bit. You may bet on so many assets, such as cryptocurrencies, ETFs, stock options, P2P lending, estate crowdfunding, robo-advisors, traditional currencies, commodities, futures, CFDs (very risky), etc.
Better anyway to get some (free or paid) preliminary online training to firstly understand the basics and the risks.
13. CONTENT EDITOR OR REVIEWER
You can remotely work for big websites or blogs and offer them your writing services to draft and / or improve the contents of their sites. Be careful that in many cases you need to submit a preliminary test or you get paid only after your work has been published. Again, as for the online teacher or tutor, you need to take into consideration withholdings (transfer charges, currency exchange rates, taxes, etc.) curtailing your hourly wage. Some suggestions below:
- Freelance writing
- Online writing jobs
- Upwork
- Freelance Writing Gigs
- London Brokers
- Hire Writers
- Pro Blogger
- Blogging Pro
- All Freelance writing
- iwriter
- Writer Access
- Writer Bay
- Textbroker
- Verblio
- Constant Content
- Great Content
- Word Gigs
As a final note, for more detailed info, you could read this exhaustive post about wages you may get for plenty of hiring websites.
13. SELL YOUR CREATIVITY IN FIVERR
In Fiverr.com you can sell any disparate product or service, everything is basically accepted there ! The minimum hourly wage is 5 US dollars. As an example, just for the writing/translation field, you can candidate yourself for 31 subcategories!
14. MAKE SURVEYS / TESTS
Fairly repetitive and alienating, this activity allows you notwithstanding to round up your monthly income. Essentially, you just need to answer marketing or commercial questions about new products, softwares, video-games, apps, etc.. Some helpful websites:
15. SELL YOUR MUSIC ONLINE
If you are a musician, you can upload and sell your MP4s to any site like Bandcamp, Reverbnation, SoundCloud, CDBaby, Sellfy, Itunes or Amazon.
16. WORK WITH CAD, CAM AND 3D PROGRAMS
If you are an architect or engineer, you can probably exploit your CAD, CAM or any 3D program skills and work remotely. Most of the freelance portals will offer you some related projects, for example freelancer.com.
17. SELL YOUR PRODUCTS ON ETSY.COM
“Etsy is a global online marketplace, where people come together to make, sell, buy and collect unique items.”
18. BUY AND SELL WEB DOMAINS
Halfway between trading and high-tech development, you could buy a domain name and sell it at a higher value. Domains may be acquired on the biggest Internet providers’ websites or on platforms like this one. The more technically skilled you are, the more you may add value up to the domain before selling it.
19. BECOME A TIK-TOKER, YOUTUBER OR INFLUENCER
Nowadays so many social networks related “jobs” have mushroomed. Not plenty, but some people manage to live on advertisements and benefits paid by commercial brands to promote their products and services. It might however be very time and personality-consuming. Even the platforms themselves can pay a user if a certain amount of subscribers have been reached.
20. AMAZON MECHANICAL TURK (MTURK)
You only need to execute simple tasks to get gifted with Amazon vouchers. Tasks range anything from conducting simple data validation and research to more subjective tasks like survey participation, content moderation, and more.
21. JUST WORK ONLINE FOR ANY COMPANY OR BE A FREELANCER
In the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, more and more companies just hire people to work from home. Of course, until a certain extent connected with the time zone, you are free to roam anywhere, as long as you commit yourself for a minimum weekly working schedule and stable Internet connection. Among all options, start-ups might turn out to offer a more dynamic and loose environment. You might wish to have a look at Angel website.
22. INVEST YOUR CAPITAL IN A HOUSE OR A PROFITABLE ESTATE TO GET PASSIVE INCOME
If you have some capital stashed away, why not to go for the traditional long-run investments…You may receive monthly allowances (like a rent) to stay afloat while travelling.
23. WORK IN A HOSTEL
You can start asking for a job in the hostels you encounter in your way, either by improvising or by registering in specialized websites like workaway.info or helpx.net or worldpackers.com which offer an international database of short-term jobs (generally the minimum stay is one month).
Sometimes you may be offered free food and accommodation in exchange of a few hours spent as a receptionist, translator, interpreter, waiter, barman, cook, etc. It is even possible to get “pocket money” if you carry out some extra hours.
A nice idea to meet a lot of people !
24. WORK IN A FARM
You may find benevolent farmers willing to offer you food, free accommodation and pocket money for a few hours per day dedicated to the rural and healthy activities ! Again workaway.info or helpx.net or worldpackers.com offer plenty of temporary jobs to cover your stay or even to get a pocket money on top.
25. WORK IN THE CONSTRUCTION SECTOR
Along with the farm activities, the simple construction jobs offer you short-term solutions to round up your budget.
26. WAITER / COOK IN A RESTAURANT OR BAR
You may find a lot of bars and restaurants searching for occasional staff.
27. TEACH YOUR NATIVE LANGUAGE OR ANY OTHER DISCIPLINE
You can start offering your services to private schools for example, always in need of native speakers or competent teachers. A “plus” (almost compulsory nowadays) factor could be the TEFL certificate for English teaching. I easily got mine here.
28. SELL YOUR PHOTOS OR DRAWINGS ON THE STREET
If you are an artist, you can try to spend some time on the street to sell your art and make a lot of new friends !
29. PLAY YOUR INSTRUMENT OR PERFORM THEATER ON THE STREET
If you have some artistic talent, don’t be ashamed to make passers-by happy and grateful : )
30. SELL FOOD OR HANDCRAFTED PRODUCTS
Whether you are good at baking or manufacturing original objects, try to maximize this underestimated source of income. It might turn out to be surprisingly lucrative.
In short, you have plenty of ways to finance your trip and extend it to infinity.
“Find your skills, find your talent, find your way !”
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