Matt Kepnes is a young twentysomething from Boston who fell in love with Thailand in 2005, decided to leave his job and go traveling for a year in 2006, and well, never came home!
He put all his energy into finding a way to support a long-term traveling lifestyle and now he runs the hugely successful website NomadicMatt.com, where he shares his travel adventures and helps others learn how to live the nomadic life too. Matt recently got back from a long trip to the US for his birthday and then traveling through Spain, France, Belgium, Holland, Sweden and Austria, and I finally had a chance to sit down with him here in Bangkok to get his story about living the mobile lifestyle.
Matt also runs How to Travel and Backpack the World on a Budget and shares how you can earn a reliable income while you travel in his recent ebook How to Make Money with Your Travel Blog, released in May.
In the video below, Matt shares more about his book, as well as:
- What he was doing before he started living a nomad lifestyle & what inspired him to travel
- His travels throughout Thailand, why he loves it here, and some favorite spots
- His favorite city in the world
- How NomadicMatt.com generates $3000+ per month in income
- His philosophy on how to make money online with ebooks, affiliate sales, private advertising and Adsense sites
- About the June 2010 Travel Blog Exchange
- La Tomatina festival in Spain
- and more!
If you’re interested in Nomadic Matt’s ebook, How to Make Money With Your Travel Blog, now is the time to get your hands on it—it’s on sale through Christmas for just $17 (rather than the normal $27). He breaks it into six sections:
- Starting a Blog—Basic but necessary information about picking a niche (what are you an expert in?), choosing what kind of travel blog to have (there is more than one), and the number of websites to run.
- Installing Your Blog—All about choosing the right website name, picking a WordPress theme, and installing SEO plugins.
- Getting Traffic—How to use sites like Stumble Upon, gain followers, find other bloggers, and use Twitter and Facebook to your advantage to build a community around your blog.
- Search Engine Optimization—Detailed information about SEO, how it works, site optimization, link building, and where to find those valuable links.
- Monetizing Your Blog—Covers the main types of advertising, which work best for different sites, how much to charge, and where to find willing advertisers.
- Putting it All Together—What to expect from all of this and how to best utilize your time.
Or if you want a simpler guide to starting your first site, download his How to Build a Travel Blog guide for just $4.
Find Matt at NomadicMatt.com, on Twitter, and on Facebook. If you have questions, please leave ‘em in the comments, and thanks for watching.
Cool interview. I agree more sites is better (I have 200 now) when starting out and just grinding through it.
One piece of advice I give to newbies is this:
Jump in from the deep end and work harder than anyone you personally know.
Nothing beats learning from experience, and time/effort will separate you from the rest in your niche.
Awesome! I don’t necessarily agree with the more sites is better, just for the sheer fact that I think it’s boring, but if it resonates with you then go for it! Have an intention, jump right in and start taking action and you’ll go a long way.
Great interview. I like the two bits of advice…
1. Anyone can do this, it’s not rocket science.
2. It takes patience.
#2 is really the key, isn’t it? I think too many people expect IMMEDIATE results. You have to have patience and expect that you may not make any money for 6 months or even a year. Don’t let that stop you though. Keep working at it and learning. I also like how he has a good diversification strategy doing some affiliate sites and adsense sites. I’ve heard so many people bash adsense so I’m kind of curious how he actually makes money doing that. At any rate, great interview!
Well done. Thanks for sharing!
Another great post. I like how you are networking all these sites I didn’t know about.
Matt has some pretty dope photos on his site.
Will check video soon.
- MPM
Great interview Cody and Matt!
Thanks for the video interview.
Like Henri, I’m not a big fan of building lots of sites as I find it a bit boring as well. I’d rather focus on a few sites that I’m passionate about. Although, I recently experimented with outsourcing for the content writing, which makes it a lot easier to get a site up and running (if you’re comfortable with WordPress.
Awesome interview, what I expected really
Nice interview guys! Matt how much longer are you going to be in Bangkok?
Finally watched the video. Good work. I have seen a few of your interviews and I liked this one because you both were in the same location.
As far as the multiple sites thing, I think it is difficult as well because there are only so many things you can focus on and it spreads out your passion.
I have so many ideas for great sites, but it is hard to focus.
But if you have the time, the help and the passion, two sites is better than one.
- MPM
Mate, you do get around. And it is awesome
Great interview! Totally looking into Travel Blog Exchange right now…
I just ran across your blog today through twitter. Love what I see as I’m starting my journey in blogging for a living.
I look forward to seeing more.
Thanks…
Nice video guys. Interesting to see what your work/play balance is. It’s something I’ve struggled with from time to time and I think the two month to one week thing is doable for the tech stuff.
Having a lot of sites is a pain in the arse when you’re setting them up but, once they’re up, they’re up for good and generally take little attention (beyond some initial SEO and the occasional addition of content) so they’re not as much of a burden as you might think.
Matt is everywhere! Proof of his success. I enjoyed his ebook and reference it often. Nice interview guys.