Travelers Talks: How To Make Money While Traveling?

Are you tired of constantly saving money for your next trip? Would you like to explore the world on a daily basis? If so, then you’re in a good place! In this episode of Travelers Talks, you’ll discover how to make money WHILE traveling, and not FOR traveling. Thanks to our fellow traveler friends, who agreed to share their stories, you’ll discover that making money while traveling is very much possible and just waits around the corner with plenty of ways of doing that. Ready? Let’s inspire ourselves and discover how to make money while traveling!

Table of contents

Created by Sonia & Wojtek

One day, we packed our lives and slowly rushed into the unknown with smiles on our faces. We’re full-time digital nomads traveling in Europe who inspire to live, travel, and discover differently. Sunny coastal destinations are what we love most. We share travel guides, tips, and know-how to make planning your next trip a piece of cake. Real human experience and verified facts only!

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How do our traveler friends make money while traveling?

Some time ago on Twitter, we asked our fellow travelers about that, and below you’ll find what we got in return.

Claire from The Detour Effect

The Detour Effect | Twitter | Instagram

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

I am a nomadic female solo traveler. When I’m in the States, I work remotely from my truck camper and mostly live in the car. I base myself near national parks so that I can go hiking on my days off. On my work days, I use solar panels to charge my laptop and wifi hotspot. Sometimes, especially when abroad, I’ll get an AirBnB for a month or two in each place I visit. I find that with extended stay discounts, this is still a cheaper option than paying regular rent on a studio apartment, which is what I would be doing if I wasn’t nomadic.

When I travel, the main objective is outdoor adventure. I have hiked around the world, including the Tour du Mont Blanc, The Kerry Way, West Highland Way, Hadrian’s Wall, Alpe-Adria, Rim to Rim to Rim, and done shorter hikes in parks like Snowdonia, Big Bend, Smoky Mountains, North Cascades, etc. Sometimes I’ll do a city break as well; surprisingly some of my most popular content on my site is about the Loire Valley, Lisbon, Leadville, and Bisbee.

I blog about my adventures on my website The Detour Effect. My philosophy is that you often have better experiences on “detours” from the main plan, so it’s best to be flexible about your travel itinerary and your life script. In fact, my lifestyle itself is a complete detour from my first career in the music industry.

I write for risk-takers, hitchhikers, and drifters.

How do you make money while traveling? 

I work 9-5 remotely for an outdoor adventure tour operator. I’m not a guide, so the traveling I do in my own life is unrelated to my job. I make reservations and do customer service, so as long as I have a wifi signal I can work from anywhere. I do have to talk on the phone a lot, so this limits my ability to work in public spaces or shared accommodations.

My blog makes a bit of affiliate income, but it’s just enough to cover the costs of running the blog (hosting, etc) and not nearly enough to fund my lifestyle. I have also been paid for writing articles for more legit publications on a freelance basis, but this is also not something I rely on for income. I would love to be more independent one day; my dream is to scale the blog. I like my job, and it’s a blessing to have a regular paycheck, but working for yourself opens up a world of possibilities. I would be more eligible for visas to move abroad, for instance, if I was self-employed.

I used to work seasonal gigs at national parks, hostels, and ski resorts. This was also a really fun way to make money while traveling, but there was a compromise when it came to healthcare, lower wages, and privacy. I also like to move around more often than every 6+ months, which is the amount of time I had to stay put for seasonal gigs on average.

Gabi from Gabs Explores

Instagram | Twitter | TikTok

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

Hello! My name is Gabi and I’m a travel blogger, content creator and digital nomad. I have always had a true love for traveling and experiencing different cultures. In 2021, I was working in an unfulfilling toxic corporate 9-5 so I decided to quit and move to Thailand to work in an addiction treatment supporting others on their recovery journey. 

After a few months working in an addiction treatment center, I still felt unfulfilled so I decided it was time to put myself first and take the time to slow travel and figure out my true passion. That’s when I really fell in love with solo travel and started sharing my travel knowledge through my Instagram blog. I saw social media as a tool in helping other travelers to see the world. Now, I’m on a mission to help other women confidently solo travel the world.

How do you make money while traveling? 

As a travel blogger and digital nomad, I have multiple streams of income which help fund my travels and my lifestyle. I started freelancing as a social media manager – offering my services to manage other businesses’ social media pages. I also create content for brands to use on their own social media pages otherwise known as user-generated content. I still do this today as I find that it brings me lots of joy! 

Aside from being a freelance social media manager and creator, I am also growing my own business as a travel blogger and working with brands in a paid capacity to promote their services/products to my loyal audience on social media.

Since I am a full-time traveler, I have also become a bit of a hotel guru. I create content for hotels such as photography, reels/tiktok creation and promotion of their property on my social pages! This allows me to stay in hotels for free or get paid for creating such content for them. I have now released a 6-step guide ebook teaching other travelers how they can do the same! 

Cory from You Could Travel

You Could Travel | Instagram | Twitter 

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

I’m Cory, the co-founder of You Could Travel. I started traveling with my husband in 2013 and we’re mid luxury travelers. We love remote areas, luxury deals and because we’re big foodies we tend to splurge on fine dining experiences. 

How do you make money while traveling? 

We finance our travels thanks to our 6 figure income from our travel blog, You Could Travel. To complement this income and ensure we avoid a similar loss of income as during Covid, we created a vegan food site which now makes mid 5 figures a year. We started blogging professionally in 2016 and it has been our full time job since. The blog has several income streams which includes, ads, affiliate, its own products, eco clothes, sponsorships and partnerships as well as investments. 

Some upgrades on flights and hotels are done via points. Since we do get paid for sponsorships, some traveling is being paid for by companies and agencies who seek advertisement on our platforms.

Cecilia and Samson from Spontaneous Backpackers 

Spontaneous Backpackers | Twitter | YouTube

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

We are Cecilia and Samson, a digital nomad couple from Finland. Recently we rescued and adopted Floki, an Ecuadorian kitten. He’s now a full time nomad as well.

Back in 2019 we decided to break free from the rat race.

We have traveled to 39+ countries since. We love off the beaten path adventures, and living like locals and really getting to learn about new cultures. We share our journey to help make traveling possible for 8 billion people. 

How do you make money while traveling? 

In the beginning we didn’t even know that being a digital nomad was a thing. We worked offline in Switzerland. Had 6 jobs each and saved up as much as we could after 1 year of full time traveling. That’s something that works well for some travelers. Working as you travel but offline. But then there’s the whole headache with work visas. 

This year we finally gave digital work a chance while still living as nomads. Recently we started earning our first dollars from our digital products. At the moment our main income sources are through our online Travel courses, Newsletters and digital resources. 

We are working full time on building our free Travel community that will also include paid memberships in the future. Our dream is to start earning from our youtube videos as well. 

A few months back we also got our first paid partnership. Affiliate marketing is also something that has brought us little extra income as well. 

For us the best thing we have done to start earning is by building relationships online. Connecting and genuinely wanting to help others, that has opened many doors we had no clue existed before.

Joanna from The world in my pocket

Twitter | The world in my pocket | Andalucia in my pocket

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

I like to take spontaneous trips throughout the year, every time I find a cheap flight. They usually go for one weekend to around a week. I travel at least once a month. At the end of the year I also go on a longer trip, for 3 to 4 weeks. 

How do you make money while traveling? 

I make a passive income through my websites. I own five websites which I monetise through ads and affiliate marketing. I am a full time content creator and I use my websites to generate the income I need for traveling. Because of my websites, sometimes I go on paid trips as well, to create specific content for my clients. I specialize in SEO and my main goal is to develop my portfolio of websites in the next year and expand to more niches, to generate passive income year-round, no matter what is happening in the world, or what time of the year it is. 

I also do social media and SEO consultancy for a few small businesses. With some of my clients I have retainer contracts, which means that I can do the work needed whilst I am home, and I have the freedom to travel whenever I want. I am not bound to a 9 to 5 schedule. With my other consultancy clients, I can run the workshops no matter where I am, as long as there is a good internet connection. 

Meeka from The Wandering Afropologist

The Wandering Afropologist | Instagram | The Goddess Shop

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

My name is Meeka and I’m from the Bronx with Antiguan ancestry. I’m a sexologist and entrepreneur. I usually travel every month but in the future, I would like to do more slow travel. I love traveling to lesser known destinations and exploring tropical waters. 

How do you make money while traveling? 

I’m a sexologist and Intimacy Wellness brand owner. I love helping people build confidence and tap into what really makes them happy. Traveling as a sexologist is super cool and makes for an interesting introduction. Since I’m always on the road, I work with a fulfillment center to ship my products.

Wellness and self-care are very important to me. I learned at a young age that no matter where you go, you will find yourself. Booking a flight to a tropical island will not cure your depression or solve all your problems. True self-care is showing up for yourself. For me, it means going to therapy, finding pleasure in everyday things, and taking care of my mind, body, and soul.

Running a business while always being on the road can be stressful. One of my favorite things to do when I travel is to learn about how wellness looks in different cultures. I’ve enjoyed Moroccan Hammans, spent hours in the hot springs of Iceland, and engulfed myself in the richness of Sudanese Duhkan smoke baths. It keeps my creativity fresh and is a great way to relax after a long day of eating copious amounts of food and trying to brainstorm how to make today’s reel actually interesting. 

If I had to give someone a word of advice, I would say to start where you are and do what you can. You can make it perfect later 🙂

Russ from Travel Banana

YouTube | Instagram | Twitter

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

Hi my name is Russ and I travel any way that I can! My first opportunities for traveling came from teaching English in Asia when I graduated college. Teaching in Japan allowed me to travel internationally pretty easily to other neighboring Asian countries such as South Korea and China. After doing so I discovered that traveling is actually pretty easy and not as expensive as most people think it is. I am a minimalist and pretty much an expert on budget traveling at this point. I’ve also had some incredible travel experiences as a volunteer working on farms in Costa Rica and on a round-the-world cruise ship meeting incredible people along the way. I try to avoid tourist destinations and I prefer to take things slow and experience the local culture. 

How do you make money while traveling? 

My main source of income while traveling has been teaching English. I do a mixture of both in-person and online teaching which has worked out great for me so far! Unfortunately last year many of the Chinese online tutoring platforms shut down so I was forced to pivot my strategy a bit. Now I’m doing a mixture of online teaching and freelancing on Fiverr with my video editing services. In 2020 when international travel was pretty much shut down I ended up taking a road trip across America and I completely funded the journey by being an Uber Eats Delivery person in all the cities I stopped by 😂. Nowadays my focus is on building my travel-themed Youtube channel and gaining some traction for my brand on social media, which will hopefully be another source of income to fund my travels. On top of the free tips & tricks and sharing on social media, I also offer consulting services for anyone who is interested in ditching their 9-5 job and starting a new life as a digital nomad.

Tania from Slower Travels

Slower Travels | Twitter | Instagram 

Tell us a few words about yourself and how you travel 

My partner and I have been traveling South East Asia full time since March 2022. We travel slowly, generally spending two months or longer in each country. So far we’ve been to Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines.

How do you make money while traveling? 

I work as a freelance community and marketing manager. Which means I help organizations talk with their customers. I have one large client, who is based in Australia and runs events. Then around the events I pick up freelance work to supplement the income. I get this work from a recruiter, a freelancing website, Facebook groups or past clients who have a new project that they’d like me to be a part of.

I worked in in-house marketing roles for ten years before we left and it’s taken a while to transition to a point where I earn enough to support us. I have a pretty broad range of skills so some days I’m a copywriter, or I’m building online courses, or I’m looking after a community, or I’m managing social accounts. I like that I’m not super niche and have a lot of variety in my work. It also helps me to be able to pick up work as I can look for lots of different opportunities. I have a lot of experience to bring to a client to help them out.

How do we make money while traveling?

We don’t want your head to explode from all the options mentioned above so we’ll keep our answer short and strictly to the point. Since August 2021 we’re full-time digital nomads and slow travelers. Currently, our main source of income comes from providing consulting services for IT companies. A bit of it also comes from our mobile games studio – Crazy Oyster Games. Not that long ago we used to make mobile games for the App Store and Play Store. We wrote “Mobile games marketing for indie developers” ebook, and also ran a gamedev blog with affiliate links. We still make some money from all of this. Also, not that long ago we started to monetize this website but it’s still in the early stages. 

How to make money while traveling? – Summary

We felt so inspired after reading all those stories, hope you do too! As you can see there are plenty of ways to make money while traveling, and we’re sure that it’s just a drop in the ocean of all possibilities. So now it’s your turn to create your own story, of course, if only this is something that you want. 

Are you making money while traveling? Please share in the comments below, we would love to hear more inspiring stories!