Nomadic Matt
Back in 2008, Matt Kepnes started NormadicMatt.com, a blog giving his ideas on low budget adventures around the world.
Kepnes 28, got the idea after taking 18 months off his M.B.A. in Boston, to backpack around Asia. While today he makes his living solely through his online blogging adventures.
His blog idea came half way through his Asia experience after wanting to become a writer, a long cry from his early dreams as a child of becoming an archaeologist. He set out to create a living resume.
He initiated some help from friends with HTML, and things such as the cost of a server, and how to get things up and running, and through their help learnt along the way to build his own websites.
For $250.00 he got his own domain name, which he updates every three years at the same cost.
He started the blog at home initially giving tips about travelling, with things such as hot to find cheap tickets where to find free accommodation and such.
Around September 2008, the website started building momentum and really took off for him. About a year ago it had gotten so big that advertisers started asking him to allow them to put ads on the site, and since then it has allowed him to devote himself full time to the site.
He says to start your own website, and to have advertisers interested enough to want to place ads with you, it would need to be generating around 800 to 1000 visitors a day.
He also stresses the point of including photographs, as it will draw attention and traffic. He has also just started to include videos on the site.
And Matt has also just released his own book, on how to start a successful travel blog.
And it might be worth taking a look at, as he now makes around $7,500 to $8,000 a month after only a year and a half of doing it.
He even now gets offered Press Trips, but often turns them down seeing they are not part of his budget travelling idea.
From the start Matt would spend every waking hour doing his sites, in which he has now gotten down to only 15 hours a week. He even now has an Intern who does most of the hard yards for him.
So it looks like a dream job and something i am sure any of us would love to do.
Hmmm maybe i need to grab Matt’s book and take a look.