Make Money and Travel – Tal Gur
I am living the dream…my life on my terms. Making a living, no fixed office and the freedom to move and work from wherever I like. So can you.
This Make Money and Travel series exists as a source of inspiration. By sharing examples of real people around the world making money from anywhere and living the lifestyle they want, proves where there is a will, there is a way.
Meet Tal Gur, an online entrepreneur and motivational guru. We first came to know Tal when he reached out to us for a feature on his website Below Zero to Hero. At first glance I thought “I’m not a Zero, and I definitely wouldn’t consider myself below zero” but after a quick look over the site I realized this motivational site was the perfect platform to share our story of leaving “everyday life” to satisfy our wear-out-your-shoes sense of adventure. We’ve been virtual friends ever since!
To say that Tal is a passionate person would be an understatement. He always seems to have a smile on his face and is eager to help others achieve their goals and dreams in life. He is a big what goes around comes around kinda guy and has even managed to turn helping others into a business. Here is how he sold it all, began his travels and more importantly how he funds it all.
The Job(s)
These days, you could label me as an online entrepreneur, a blogger, and founder of PassivelyFree.com, a site dedicated to those who seek more time, location, and financial freedom in their life.
2009 was the year I finally became a digital nomad; I quit a well-paying corporate job, sold almost everything I owned, packed a small backpack, left my beloved
I’ve not always had this freedom. In my previous life I was an (average) IT manager in a financial company but after racking up ~$30,000 in debt and becoming quite frustrated by my dependency to my job , I made some drastic lifestyle changes…
What made my dream a reality is creating multiple online income streams such as advertising, eBooks, subscription, coaching, freelancing, online courses, and recently software.
This online income allowed me to pretty much live and travel to anywhere I wanted. For four years I set my own schedule and made my own rules. I didn’t need to look for a job upon my return to my home country. In fact, I didn’t even have to go back home. I could choose to go wherever and do whatever I wanted to on any given day.
Needless to say, I’m extremely passionate about this freedom lifestyle and happy to share my journey with others.
The Hours
Creating my first website was a labor of love and exploration – I must have spent hundreds of hours on writing and designing. I launched it fairly quickly, in a matter of a week or so, and improved the content and layout as I went. While travelling I worked only when I wanted to, sometimes I did not work on it for weeks – travelling and immersing myself in new experiences were far more important to me than work at that point.
My life is currently structured around journeys so a typical day varies greatly. In a few months I’m starting the process of writing a full length book about financial freedom so I expect to put major hours into this journey.
The Pay
Pay also varies greatly. Last year I made 6 figures from online sales. This year will be in the 5 figures range. It really depends on traffic and that, as you probably know, can fluctuate greatly:)
My income is influenced directly by three things: 1. rankings on the search engine. 2. the direct marketing of my services 3. The content I produce and publish. Since some of my sites are ranked high organically, I hardly spend any time on direct marketing. I prefer to spend my time on producing valuable content that is useful and might be shared. From my experience, this is the number one factor for obtaining high rankings in search engine results.
Top 5 earners by order : Advertising , Freelancing (web design and coaching), eBooks, Affiliate, and Software.
The Tools
I’m only using a laptop. I don’t own a Smartphone or other mobile device with an internet connection as it helps me to disconnect from everyday life and immerse myself in the environment. Besides email, I use a little piece of online software I built for myself, called Goals Software. Goals Software is a powerful goal-setting tool that allows people to effectively set, manage and track their goals online. I don’t think I would have been able to achieve some of my goals this year without it – it really keeps me on track and focused on my dreams.
I used to use social media but nowadays I rarely use it because I find it to be a real time sucking ‘blackhole’. I even wrote a short eBook about how to stop Facebook addiction as I was quite addicted to getting ‘likes’ on Facebook 🙂
The Client
I have a few coaching and freelancing clients who mainly find me through my Below Zero to Hero blog. This specific site is positioned quite high for a few key search terms and that always help. Most of my other income is passive in nature so I don’t have direct contact with the clients.
The Up’s
Oh.. so many!
Here are my top three:
1. Waking up every morning knowing that I can work from anywhere, whether it be from the comfort of my own home, a local café while sitting at the beach, or even on a boat drifting down the
2. Being able to spend time with my loved ones, my friends, my family, whenever I need and without asking permission.
3. Being able to live anywhere I want and contribute to the world in whatever way I choose.
The Down’s
Well, I used to miss having a really good desk but that’s not a problem anymore. I guess the biggest ‘down’ part for me is the absence of sense of local community but that can easily be solved by spacing the amount of moving from place to place.
Hindsight
If I could travel back in time to give myself a piece of advice, I would tell myself to fully and completely believe in myself and my dream.
I waited too long to start my journey to freedom. Like many others I’ve been conditioned from an early age to believe that trading time for money is the safest way to earn a living, but the real truth is that there are much better ways!
I like Tal’s approach to income because it is so very broad. Not everyone has one specific revenue stream, idea or talent and this is an excellent example of not putting all your eggs in one basket.
If you want to read lots and lots of other inspirational stories of others who have made their dreams a reality, check out Tal’s Below Zero to Hero. If you are looking for some help in the passive income arena, check out Passively Free and if you just need some goal setting software to get you going, click over to Goals Software.
