How Does Owen Keep Travelling?

How the hell does he do it?!

How does Owen get to travel ALL THE TIME?

God... he must be one of those entitled millennials from a rich family who doesn't have to worry about any responsibility, right?

Nope.

It took me 4 years of painstaking work to get to where I am.

You are at the right place. I’m gonna share with you my “secret” on how I keep doing it. Once you understand it, you’ll realize it is not actually a secret at all.

You see, when I first started this travel blog, my motivation was to inspire people to travel as much as possible - hence the name ‘my turn to travel’. It’s not just about me, it’s about you saying ‘my turn to travel’ too.

But I realized posting travel photos on Instagram or blogging about the places I’ve been to can only do so much. The problem isn’t inspiration; it’s the money and time freedom.

So I thought: Instead of just showing you my travel photos, why not show you how I do it?

The truth is: I do not have a job.

I’ve long realized that the only way you can achieve both financial and time freedom is to be your own boss. Set your own working hours, answer to yourself, and have an income that is proportional to the amount of value you bring to the world.

Not by the amount of hours you clock in, at a place you probably hate.

So, what is it?

In case you’re thinking, it is NOT travel blogging.​

It is NOT exchanging work for accommodation just to extend my travels.

It is NOT freelancing.

After all, freelancing is still trading your time for money. It is not scalable. How many hours can you work before you run out of hours to take on more clients?

The answer? Building niche sites.

What’s that, you ask?

Niche sites are websites you build on a particular topic (a niche), and you monetize them with affiliate marketing and display ads. The basic gist of it goes like this:

1. Research a profitable niche
2. Find low competition keywords
3. Produce content
4. Rank them in Google
5. Add an affiliate link/ads, or sell a solution
6. Profit

Affiliate marketing simply means someone buying something (on Amazon or other marketplaces) through your special link, and you earn a commission. You do not need a product. You do not even have to show your face. If you hate writing, you can simply outsource all your content creation.

The Rant Against Travel Blogging

Yes, a travel blog is a niche site. But compared to building exclusively buyers-focused/problem-solving niche sites, travel blogging pales in earnings for the same amount of traffic you get.

Don’t get me wrong. There are many people earning 5-figure/month from travel blogging. It’s very possible if you work extremely hard.

You’ll need a LOT of traffic before you can start displaying worthwhile ads on your blog, and even then, the earnings are minimal.

I’ve also heard about all the horror stories with hotels not paying bloggers their hard-earned affiliate commissions.

Personally, I feel that travel blogging is supersaturated.

Think about it: when you are researching for an itinerary, isn’t it always the same few places that every blogger recommends?

Is someone really an expert when they visit a place for 3 days and write ‘20 best things to do in this city’ posts?

Also, what can you sell besides travel guides? Do people buy travel guides anymore?

There are many travel bloggers who go on sponsored trips and write about it. Which also means you’ll have to work on your trips.

But to me, even though it feels great to be sponsored, it kinda takes the joy away from travelling if I have to constantly take notes, take photos and record every single detail of the trip.

If that is your dream, by all means, go for it.

For that to happen, you’ll need to have a large enough audience for brands to want to work with you.

I don’t. Which is also why I’ve stopped updating this blog.

That being said, I have mad respect for travel bloggers because I know the amount of effort they put in to earn a decent income. Even more so in a super competitive industry like travel blogging.

I prefer to have income flowing in whether I work or not. That’s called truly passive income.

Before I continue, know that I can only share with you what I’ve personally tried. I’ve not done E-commerce, or Forex trading, or cryptocurrency - or any other methods of making money online.

Now, you might be thinking: Passive income? Make money online? That must be a scam!

First of all, change your mindset. Just because something is not taught in school doesn’t make it a scam.

Secondly, I’m not saying this is a get-rich quick.

I started learning about this during university and my studies got a hit - which I didn’t regret.

Later, I got a USD $440/month internship and even though I’m tired as hell, I hustled from 8pm - 12am every single night, even on weekends.

Just like a rocket burns the most fuel during the launch, building a niche site takes up the most time and effort at the start. Once your rocket leaves the Earth’s atmosphere, the flight is pretty automatic and requires only a little bit of maintenance every now and then.

The ‘passive’ part only comes later.

But it definitely is real.

In fact, I earn quite a 'decent' amount that I recently just incorporated my business as a private limited, not a sole-proprietorship.

Because of the way taxes work in Singapore, once you earn over a certain amount, the tax rates are in your favour as a corporation. Go figure.

Yes, my company is called My Lifestyle Biz Pte. Ltd.

A lifestyle business supports my lifestyle - be it travel or otherwise, and not the other way where I am tied down to my brick-or-mortar shop or startup.

A lifestyle business allows me to book a flight spontaneously without having to get my boss’ approval.

A lifestyle business allows me to fetch my 4 year-old niece from daycare when my mum isn’t around.

I am grateful to have this freedom to set my own working hours and working location. I get to go for Muay Thai classes in the afternoon when the gym is empty. And it’s been a loooong time since I’ve experienced peak hour public transport.

What does freedom mean to you?

Environment is Destiny

Now, if you are interested in having this type of location-independent business too, you’ll need to learn how to do it.

Yes, you may be able to find information online across hundreds of blogs and Youtube videos, piece everything together and try to figure things out by yourself.

That’s what I did, and that’s why it took me SO long to ‘crack the code’.

4 years of trial and error - not to mention, money wasted - to finally have something substantial that I could have had in a few months if I simply asked for help.

Guys, it’s 2019. We are in the information age. But if information is all we needed, we would all be billionaires with 6-packs by now. But we’re not.

What we need is a roadmap, accountability and personal mentorship.

It’s like working out. You could do it yourself and eventually - maybe - get your ideal physique, but don’t you think with a personal trainer planning out your workout regime and nutritional intake, you could reach your goals much faster?

There IS a reason why all professional athletes have a coach.

And no, I’m not gonna be your coach. I am still learning and improving everyday. In fact, my girlfriend and I recently just paid $3000 EACH on a property investment course because we know that if we pay, we pay attention. If we pay, we’re more likely to take action.

Your Own Lifestyle Biz

So just for you, I’ve weeded through the multitudes of courses online and found one system that shows you the exact steps I (and thousands of people) took to build their own niche sites.

I bought this course and have seen the lessons. I liked how they covered the basics of affiliate marketing, an overall strategy, then an in-depth look into the processes. It really is a step-by-step system laid out for you.

The icing on the cake for me would be the advanced KGR keyword technique, to find low competition keywords, which I personally use to build out my niche sites. Most other courses do not teach this.

Also, there is a Facebook community of students and teachers helping each other out. Look at this detailed reply from a senior!

Surely, something like this is gonna cost you a bomb?

Don’t worry, you’re not going to pay $3000 like my girlfriend and I did for our course.

You're not even going to pay 10% of it.

The Human Proof Method is selling for only USD $7 for a two-week trial. Yes, $7! With access to the ENTIRE course and community.

After your 14 days, you can choose to cancel or continue the membership for a relatively affordable monthly fee. Either way, 2 weeks should be enough for you to complete the course and take down enough notes.

I wish something as affordable and comprehensive as this was available when I first started. Every other course out there costs hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars.

The once scarcity-minded me spent YEARS reading blogs and watching tutorial videos, trying to figure it out by myself. I chose the free route, which ended up costing way more, because y’know, time = money.

$7.

If you can’t invest $7 in yourself, then perhaps, starting a business is not for you.

But if you dread the rat race as much as I do, here is your chance to finally escape it. Disclaimer: You WILL have to work hard at least at the start (remember the rocket launch?).

I don’t suggest that you quit your job immediately. Instead, treat it like a side-hustle and build it up. When you are ready to take the plunge, by all means, go for it.

No more annoying bosses who doubt your ability.

No more incompetent colleagues pissing you off.

No more giving up your travel plans because of insufficient day offs. 

Even if you don’t intend to quit your job, how would an extra $1000 a month sound to you? How about an extra $2000? What would you do with an extra $5000?

If you've always felt like you're at a crossroad in your career, click the button above.

Let me know if you sign up for the course. As a bonus, if you have any questions on your affiliate marketing journey, feel free to ask. I’ll try to help as best as I can. Don’t worry, I won’t sell you anything (I have nothing to sell!)

Here’s to replacing your rat-race income with laptop income.

Here’s to having your own lifestyle business.

Here’s to you saying: “my turn to travel”!