This is a guest post by Kevin Cole of The Mental Playground
Building a lifestyle business sounds like a strange fairy tale.
“You mean I can travel the world AND make money? No way!!”
But a lifestyle business is not a unicorn. It actually exists.
In fact, a ton of people are building lifestyle businesses and the numbers continue to rise.
But once you discover this world is real, the simple question is: Where do I start?
The internet is vast. Too vast.
It’s easy to be overwhelmed and do nothing.
Not to mention the number of cat videos that are just waiting for you to click play. 🙂
I understand your frustration; it took me nine months to make my first dollar online.
I could have cut that time down to one week if someone wrote an article like this.
Traveling the world and making money is no fairy tale. It’s never been more real and I can show you how.
Let’s get to it.
1. Freelance Writing
Both Carlo and I got our start with freelance writing.
This business is so awesome because there is ZERO barrier to entry.
You don’t have to be a great writer and you don’t have to have any prior experience. As long as you can put sentences together and create something coherent, you can be a freelance writer.
To get started, you’ll spend a maximum of $15. This includes a domain name and hosting.
A freelance writer generally works for internet marketing companies. Content is the number one way to get websites ranked highly in Google so writers are always in demand.
Freelance writing is also a great place to start if you’re looking to do blogging or copywriting for a living.
Here’s a helpful resource to get started.
2. Social Media Management
Most jobs in social media management are extremely straight forward and simple.
As long as you know how to use social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus, then you’re qualified.
A typical social media management job will require you to post status updates on major social media channels once a day.
You can find these jobs on freelances sites like Elance and Odesk.
The best part is the cost to start this business is zero dollars.
There is also plenty of room to grow and improve your management skills so you can transition into more advanced and higher paying social media jobs.
3. WordPress Management
This requires slightly more knowledge and experience than the other two businesses, but not by much.
WordPress is a platform that allows you to bypass all the complicated code and make a website or blog.
Over the years, WordPress has grown in popularity and now businesses all across the world use it.
In order to start this business, you will need to play around with WordPress. This will cost a maximum of $15 as you will need a domain name and hosting.
Get a feel for the software and within a week you will be ready to find work.
These jobs can be found on freelance sites like Elance or Odesk.
A typical WordPress management job will be extremely simple. A client will generally want you to install a plug-in or post an article.
This business is so lucrative due to the large majority of people who refuse to learn simple WordPress features.
There is also plenty of room to build upon your skills and take higher paying WordPress management jobs.
If you truly desire a life of travel, any three of these businesses will get you there.
Bypass all the trial and error and utilize any of these three businesses to live the life you desire.
All you have to do is take some action, move forward, and prepare to book your flight.
About The Author
Kevin Cole is a writer & entrepreneur at The Mental Playground delivering practical advice on how to navigate the most complex organism known to man: Your Own Mind
Hey Kevin! Some great tips. It takes some confidence to just get stuck in and fail a little before the money starts coming in, I am sure.
Let the games begin !
Hey Razwana! It definitely takes a healthy dose of confidence to fail so many times and keep moving forward. But that’s what it takes to make this shit happen 🙂
Hey Kevin,
I gotta say, both you and Carlo are an inspiration. I’m a fellow Location Rebel and I’ve been taking the freelance writing path – so far so good. I’ve already made plans to visit Amsterdam in the Spring.
One thing I’m not sure I agree with is fishing for clients on Odesk and Elance. I can’t see how this is really useful to building your business. The clients on these sites usually pay low, don’t usually establish long term relationships and also you have to compete with tons of other writers. I don’t get it. Am I missing something about these sites?
I’ve had more luck just handing out business cards at meetup events and responding to businesses requests from direct online searches.
Anyways, keep up the good work guys.
Hey Valentine, great to hear you’re a fellow LR member.
I didn’t actually state in this article where you would find your clients for freelance writing. I just linked to an article of mine that details every step of the process. The way I found my freelance writing clients and the way Carlo did as well, was through cold emailing local internet marketing companies in the area.
The competition on Elance and Odesk is definitely tough for writing. It’s hard to compete with people who are willing to get paid $3 per article. But through cold emailing you will find more internet marketing companies who are willing to pay top dollar for solid content.
It’s wonderful that you are getting ideas from this post as well as from our dialogue
made at this time.
I blog often and I genuinely apppreciate your information.
Thee article has reallyy peaked my interest. I am going
to book mark your site and keep checking foor new information about once per week.
I subscribed to your RSS feed too.
Love your story Kevin.
I’m walking the same road now, as a freelance writer trying to build my skills, cultural exposure and write about all things fashion while traveling the world (someday hopefully:-))