hey, i'm roman lillie and i'm so excited to have you here today i'm talking to carolina who is a digital nomad who's been out here making money working online for years she has so much information to share it's really, really amazing and if you're enjoying this video and this whole series of videos that i'm creating, which i hope you are you can join the team and support this by joining my patreon page and
what is bali, there's a lot of fun rewards that you can get as well with that and feel free to stay tuned to the end of this video because at the end. i'm telling you about all the fun and interesting chats that i have coming up next so see you in a bit alright, i'm so excited because today. i'm here chatting with carolina by the way
i practiced it saying it like rolling right are a little bit beforehand so i'm really proud of that anyway so we are here chatting today because she is a digital nomad and she is really getting things done so what we're gonna talk about today is some of the challenges that some digital nomads can expect to go through when building an online business and kind of what that process is like because she is always rocking it. like by the way, just so you know about carolina the first time i met her you know we had a mutual friend. i walk in to like a coffee shop she has like spread all her stuff out. she had like two laptops set up. i was like whoa
this girl is real. like this is a real dn. like we need to talk i need to figure out, she looks very important so here we are. so tell me, how long have you been doing this digital nomading, working online thing? um so officially three years so like from the moment that i sold everything in belgium started living in a suitcase three years but
traveling and well like moving around from place to place it's been more like five or six. wow, and now and by the way finally this is common for a lot of travelers where it's like you start traveling around and then eventually you realize okay i don't want to go back. i need to i need to downsize. it's doable. it's doable, right that's the process i'm in right now by the way i'm gonna put a link in my video where you can support my travels and help out with this event you can sign up for my patreon you can buy me some coffee, whatever we'll discuss that later but for now what do you find are some of the challenges that you had early on while trying to build online business?
so well, just for a back story. i'm a graphic designer that specializes in branding work. so she also builds, so she builds websites and also does logo. like i start with a logo and move out from there um but one of my biggest challenges that i've had when i started traveling is finding work, basically. like at least the first like in the early stages of my digital nomading because as a freelancer. sorry no no no well you're good cuz, of course like having the skills is great knowing how to get the skills that you're offering what's with those dogs in the background by the way? can you guys hear them? i just love it anyway today. we are in thailand
there are dogs roaming. anyway. but when you have skills it's great just to get your skills to the right people and you have to know also that they can trust your skills so, how did you, kind of do that? so it's a learning curve right um you start like you think i think a lot of us think that it's not so complicated to you know get clients, be able to sustain yourself, pay for your lifestyle, whatever. it's actually kind of difficult um because just friends passing by. you never know who you're gonna meet in chiang mai. who's gonna walk by digital nomads everywhere sorry for that um so yeah, so like there's one thing to have the skills to be good at your job basically but then you have to know how to market yourself.
get those clients. negotiate your deals. and you know you find me so most of your clients on what fiverr, upwork? so i do kind of half and half until like about a month, a month and a half ago i wasn't on upwork. i was finding my clients through my network and that was like kind of the most difficult thing because you're you're moving from place to place and you you have to like socialize, network, and do this over and over and over again for each new city. so you were finding local businesses and people in the cities you are in or just meeting people in city there? i mean exactly. meeting people in cities, and then kind of networking with them. hey, do you know anyone? i do web design.
exactly. that type of stuff. so cuz the thing is like my my work there's more one-off projects, so i do a lot of branding. branding packages and it's not really, it's not always repeat work, so yeah, it's it's harsh it's kind of hard because you have to kind of like force yourself to put yourself out there meet new people, network you know actively go for that next contract. so actually a month ago i decided to join upwork and like the quality of work that i'd give right now isn't up to my usual standards, but that's because you know upwork has a like you have to go through the whole strategy of
getting those first ratings and things like that, but it's so you mean you're setting you're doing lower price of gigs on upwork so that you kind of build your portfolio and then later you can move on and do bigger things. you build your reputation on the platform and then you move forward you like you move onwards right and you can get those high-paying clients but you still have to go through the steps. now when you say high-paying clients and you know what can people expect like what is a high-paying client? how much money do you think it's even reasonable to make, you know when you're starting out? let's say you're doing web design graphic design like, what's reasonable?
when you're starting out well, it's like it all depends on the level of skill you have like i know a lot of people who left their corporate job and went into freelancing full time as a digital nomad so they were already really really well skilled. they had a good network so it's relatively easy for them to just jump into i'm gonna say like for a web design portrait between anywhere between like 5 and 10 grand, maybe even 20 for the more, for more complete ones and someone could maybe conceivably get that in a month oh whatever, in a couple weeks. yeah, so it's it's totally possible to to travel and work and for people though who are just starting out like let's say you took a course online this is this is the reality for a lot of people say you didn't have any skills you took an online course
teaching how to make you know some kind of design you know you made your own squarespace page now you're willing to make it for other people, right? but let's say there is some skill there like i mean for an entry-level person though nowhat kinds of gigs what do you think is possible like as far as the money that people can have in their mindset as a target? so like i don't i don't want to put a number because it really depends on how much work you put in right um i think a lot of this lifestyle has been portrayed as you know, the four hour work week, kind of let's take it easy, and we make easy money and because we're earning i'm gonna say western standards
western salaries, it's easy to live in asia, but that's not the case tell it like it is, ok. yeah, most of us like if we're taking our careers and and work seriously we work like mad people yeah, yeah, i think there is this perception that once you become a digital nomad life is so easy, and it's so simple, and i think that's not the case it's definitely the case that you're gonna have a better life i think in a way that you're working for yourself right so the energy and the effort that you're putting into it it's gonna be something that you own, but in a way it's a lot more difficult like i was thinking about this with myself today, which is that when you're working for yourself
and you're working online a lot of times you're putting in all this effort but to know that anything's ever gonna happen with it you know like they're making youtube videos you know. it's a long term game it's a long-term game. you're making a course, you're like, does anyone care? will anyone care? and does anyone want my graphic design skills? question mark but the truth is is that the answer is yes. you know. it is. you can find people to watch our youtube videos, and you'll find a market and you can find people who need graphic design help as well but it's definitely not a get-rich-quick scheme although some people can't get lucky i think and get rich quick
but it's not but that's always like the exception that confirms the rule right. i mean if you're everything in life like whether it's your youtube channel or my graphic design work if you treat it like a business and you're ready to put it into hard work, then you'll make it right, but you have to be dedicated there's no ways around it right. so now what's the number one tip you would give if you could to people who might want to start digital nomading? they want to build an online business. what do they need to know? not one word. it could be a sentence, like just one thing, you know settle in. get ready, you know. like start hustling. i think hustle is a good word. it's like because it's kind of like you have to be book smart and street smart at the same time yes, you know like how those both worlds interact and and you just have to be ready to put in the hours
don't be afraid because and that's the thing like i worked i know that i work more than most of my friends back home that have like, you know careers and stuff, but i get to work from, you know, thailand, and my weekends are not you know hanging out at home and watching tv. it's going to the mountains yeah, so it's different like it's rewarding in a different way, but it really depends on what you want but you have to be ready to put in the hours yeah, and not be afraid she says, put in the hours, don't be afraid, and what i would add is is get organized. because i think when you're working for yourself it's so easy to lose track of what you're supposed to do and try to do too many things. that's what i do
i have a new system in place you guys at some point. i have to show you this but get organized because you know if you're gonna work for yourself, you don't have a boss telling you what to do you don't have other people on your back hassling you, it's all you you know no, that is no smart objectives is a good thing. smart objectives. manageable goals. so anyway, if you want to do this digital nomading thing it's certainly possible people are doing it. if you're in chiang mai, and you see like someone with a bunch of space five or six computers. that's probably carolina, just go up and say hi i only have one. she only has one now. when i met her that was not the case.
don't let her trick you one computer anyway thank you for chatting with me, and i feel like there's so much more we could have talked about and gone into some of the nitty-gritty detail, but maybe we'll have a second chat at some point oh, we're gonna like i can talk about this for hours. for hours. give the really the real aspect of what it takes. yeah but really i think we should plan some some deeper things because i think there is a lot to say and a lot of advice you've been doing this for a really long time. so there's gonna be more to come stay tuned
alright. i hope you enjoyed that chat. i love talking to carolina. she's so amazing we definitely have to plan more chats after this video. i'm gonna text her by the way cuz i need to set that up she's so phenomenal so much information to share and coming up i have a chat with a guy who is traveling and is a vegan and i talked to him about is it possible, and is it easy and convenient to make vegan healthy lifestyle choices while traveling we'll see what he says i don't know yeah, all of that and more coming up next so feel free to subscribe make sure you don't miss anything. that's coming
hey, i'm roman lillie and i'm so excited to have you here today i'm talking to carolina who is a digital nomad who's been out here making money working online for years she has so much information to share it's really, really amazing and if you're enjoying this video and this whole series of videos that i'm creating, which i hope you are you can join the team and support this by joining my patreon page and
what is bali, there's a lot of fun rewards that you can get as well with that and feel free to stay tuned to the end of this video because at the end. i'm telling you about all the fun and interesting chats that i have coming up next so see you in a bit alright, i'm so excited because today. i'm here chatting with carolina by the way
i practiced it saying it like rolling right are a little bit beforehand so i'm really proud of that anyway so we are here chatting today because she is a digital nomad and she is really getting things done so what we're gonna talk about today is some of the challenges that some digital nomads can expect to go through when building an online business and kind of what that process is like because she is always rocking it. like by the way, just so you know about carolina the first time i met her you know we had a mutual friend. i walk in to like a coffee shop she has like spread all her stuff out. she had like two laptops set up. i was like whoa
this girl is real. like this is a real dn. like we need to talk i need to figure out, she looks very important so here we are. so tell me, how long have you been doing this digital nomading, working online thing? um so officially three years so like from the moment that i sold everything in belgium started living in a suitcase three years but
traveling and well like moving around from place to place it's been more like five or six. wow, and now and by the way finally this is common for a lot of travelers where it's like you start traveling around and then eventually you realize okay i don't want to go back. i need to i need to downsize. it's doable. it's doable, right that's the process i'm in right now by the way i'm gonna put a link in my video where you can support my travels and help out with this event you can sign up for my patreon you can buy me some coffee, whatever we'll discuss that later but for now what do you find are some of the challenges that you had early on while trying to build online business?
so well, just for a back story. i'm a graphic designer that specializes in branding work. so she also builds, so she builds websites and also does logo. like i start with a logo and move out from there um but one of my biggest challenges that i've had when i started traveling is finding work, basically. like at least the first like in the early stages of my digital nomading because as a freelancer. sorry no no no well you're good cuz, of course like having the skills is great knowing how to get the skills that you're offering what's with those dogs in the background by the way? can you guys hear them? i just love it anyway today. we are in thailand
there are dogs roaming. anyway. but when you have skills it's great just to get your skills to the right people and you have to know also that they can trust your skills so, how did you, kind of do that? so it's a learning curve right um you start like you think i think a lot of us think that it's not so complicated to you know get clients, be able to sustain yourself, pay for your lifestyle, whatever. it's actually kind of difficult um because just friends passing by. you never know who you're gonna meet in chiang mai. who's gonna walk by digital nomads everywhere sorry for that um so yeah, so like there's one thing to have the skills to be good at your job basically but then you have to know how to market yourself.
get those clients. negotiate your deals. and you know you find me so most of your clients on what fiverr, upwork? so i do kind of half and half until like about a month, a month and a half ago i wasn't on upwork. i was finding my clients through my network and that was like kind of the most difficult thing because you're you're moving from place to place and you you have to like socialize, network, and do this over and over and over again for each new city. so you were finding local businesses and people in the cities you are in or just meeting people in city there? i mean exactly. meeting people in cities, and then kind of networking with them. hey, do you know anyone? i do web design.
exactly. that type of stuff. so cuz the thing is like my my work there's more one-off projects, so i do a lot of branding. branding packages and it's not really, it's not always repeat work, so yeah, it's it's harsh it's kind of hard because you have to kind of like force yourself to put yourself out there meet new people, network you know actively go for that next contract. so actually a month ago i decided to join upwork and like the quality of work that i'd give right now isn't up to my usual standards, but that's because you know upwork has a like you have to go through the whole strategy of
getting those first ratings and things like that, but it's so you mean you're setting you're doing lower price of gigs on upwork so that you kind of build your portfolio and then later you can move on and do bigger things. you build your reputation on the platform and then you move forward you like you move onwards right and you can get those high-paying clients but you still have to go through the steps. now when you say high-paying clients and you know what can people expect like what is a high-paying client? how much money do you think it's even reasonable to make, you know when you're starting out? let's say you're doing web design graphic design like, what's reasonable?
when you're starting out well, it's like it all depends on the level of skill you have like i know a lot of people who left their corporate job and went into freelancing full time as a digital nomad so they were already really really well skilled. they had a good network so it's relatively easy for them to just jump into i'm gonna say like for a web design portrait between anywhere between like 5 and 10 grand, maybe even 20 for the more, for more complete ones and someone could maybe conceivably get that in a month oh whatever, in a couple weeks. yeah, so it's it's totally possible to to travel and work and for people though who are just starting out like let's say you took a course online this is this is the reality for a lot of people say you didn't have any skills you took an online course
teaching how to make you know some kind of design you know you made your own squarespace page now you're willing to make it for other people, right? but let's say there is some skill there like i mean for an entry-level person though nowhat kinds of gigs what do you think is possible like as far as the money that people can have in their mindset as a target? so like i don't i don't want to put a number because it really depends on how much work you put in right um i think a lot of this lifestyle has been portrayed as you know, the four hour work week, kind of let's take it easy, and we make easy money and because we're earning i'm gonna say western standards
western salaries, it's easy to live in asia, but that's not the case tell it like it is, ok. yeah, most of us like if we're taking our careers and and work seriously we work like mad people yeah, yeah, i think there is this perception that once you become a digital nomad life is so easy, and it's so simple, and i think that's not the case it's definitely the case that you're gonna have a better life i think in a way that you're working for yourself right so the energy and the effort that you're putting into it it's gonna be something that you own, but in a way it's a lot more difficult like i was thinking about this with myself today, which is that when you're working for yourself
and you're working online a lot of times you're putting in all this effort but to know that anything's ever gonna happen with it you know like they're making youtube videos you know. it's a long term game it's a long-term game. you're making a course, you're like, does anyone care? will anyone care? and does anyone want my graphic design skills? question mark but the truth is is that the answer is yes. you know. it is. you can find people to watch our youtube videos, and you'll find a market and you can find people who need graphic design help as well but it's definitely not a get-rich-quick scheme although some people can't get lucky i think and get rich quick
but it's not but that's always like the exception that confirms the rule right. i mean if you're everything in life like whether it's your youtube channel or my graphic design work if you treat it like a business and you're ready to put it into hard work, then you'll make it right, but you have to be dedicated there's no ways around it right. so now what's the number one tip you would give if you could to people who might want to start digital nomading? they want to build an online business. what do they need to know? not one word. it could be a sentence, like just one thing, you know settle in. get ready, you know. like start hustling. i think hustle is a good word. it's like because it's kind of like you have to be book smart and street smart at the same time yes, you know like how those both worlds interact and and you just have to be ready to put in the hours
don't be afraid because and that's the thing like i worked i know that i work more than most of my friends back home that have like, you know careers and stuff, but i get to work from, you know, thailand, and my weekends are not you know hanging out at home and watching tv. it's going to the mountains yeah, so it's different like it's rewarding in a different way, but it really depends on what you want but you have to be ready to put in the hours yeah, and not be afraid she says, put in the hours, don't be afraid, and what i would add is is get organized. because i think when you're working for yourself it's so easy to lose track of what you're supposed to do and try to do too many things. that's what i do
i have a new system in place you guys at some point. i have to show you this but get organized because you know if you're gonna work for yourself, you don't have a boss telling you what to do you don't have other people on your back hassling you, it's all you you know no, that is no smart objectives is a good thing. smart objectives. manageable goals. so anyway, if you want to do this digital nomading thing it's certainly possible people are doing it. if you're in chiang mai, and you see like someone with a bunch of space five or six computers. that's probably carolina, just go up and say hi i only have one. she only has one now. when i met her that was not the case.
don't let her trick you one computer anyway thank you for chatting with me, and i feel like there's so much more we could have talked about and gone into some of the nitty-gritty detail, but maybe we'll have a second chat at some point oh, we're gonna like i can talk about this for hours. for hours. give the really the real aspect of what it takes. yeah but really i think we should plan some some deeper things because i think there is a lot to say and a lot of advice you've been doing this for a really long time. so there's gonna be more to come stay tuned
alright. i hope you enjoyed that chat. i love talking to carolina. she's so amazing we definitely have to plan more chats after this video. i'm gonna text her by the way cuz i need to set that up she's so phenomenal so much information to share and coming up i have a chat with a guy who is traveling and is a vegan and i talked to him about is it possible, and is it easy and convenient to make vegan healthy lifestyle choices while traveling we'll see what he says i don't know yeah, all of that and more coming up next so feel free to subscribe make sure you don't miss anything. that's coming