Vacationing Tips While Making Money Online

I just came off my first real vacation in the year that I’ve been making money through affiliate marketing. I’ve gone to a few seminars but that’s not a vacation and I spent a couple hours every night on my laptop still. This time the goal was all out relaxation and I wanted to spend as little time as possible working. That worked out even better when for the second half of the week I had no internet connection (only my iPhone). Here’s a quick collection of tips that come to mind when I take a look back at my first vacation :

  • Prepare before you leave. Answer all your emails, write up your blog posts, make the phone calls you need to make, etc. The goal of the vacation is to spend as little time possible working, although you still probably will work anyways. We want to limit this, and preparation is the best way.
  • Don’t start testing new campaigns. New campaigns and testing requires a ton of attention and time. You’ll either blow away your vacation working on your laptop, or forget about it and lose a ton of money. Your choice, I’ll just stick with not testing.
  • Still get on for 15 minutes a day to just make sure nothing insanely bad has happened. If something bad has happened, just pause it for a few days and worry about it when you get home. I actually did this.
  • Limit business phone calls as much as possible, but I made probably about four of them on my trip. I had to check the progress of things (offers) to make sure everybody back home was doing their job and working still. The calls were only about 10 minutes each.
  • Re-lax. I know it’s hard, but just forget about all the stressful campaigns that you can’t get to work, or the money you just lost in the past week. Leave that all behind, trust me it’ll be there when you get back. Taking this vacation is supposed to psych you up to work hard when you get back, and if you’re crying about your campaigns the whole time you’ll still be crying when you get home.
  • Spend some money. Who cares, it’s your vacation do what you want. It was my first vacation since I’ve made money online, so I didn’t care about spending money. Take your dame out to an expensive dinner and get appetizers galore and huge desserts. Find a watch you really like and buy it. Go get a massage.
  • Appreciate your industry. Seriously, what other job lets you go on vacation and still make a shitload of money while on it? If you think about it that way, you’re probably getting paid to go on the vacation. Just that thought should make you enjoy things all the much more.
  • Expect insanity when you return. Taking a load off on vacation is really nice and made me not want to leave, because I knew what I’d be coming home to. My advice is : wait until you’re all unpacked and all that jazz before you sign online. IMs and phonecalls galore. I was talking to like 20 people, unpacking, working on campaigns, making phonecalls, all at the same time. That’s how it was for the last 48 hours, but it’s cooled down some now.

Just a few of the tips I can give while trying to balance a solid vacation with affiliate marketing. If it’s been a year since you’ve gone on vacation – take one!


16 Comments

  1. April 18, 2008

    Totally agree. Hope people realize they need more vacations in their life.

  2. April 18, 2008

    Great tips, but I gotta make some money first!
    Its been a couple weeks into this affiliate marketing thing and I have learned more here than anywhere. Signed up to networks, studying how to make a landing page and learning to build a ppc campaign. Thanks!

    I will let you know how i do with my first one. I am just going to throw it up and learn the ropes that way…

  3. Hunmik
    April 18, 2008

    I have been wondering how anyone with several big money making campaigns can go on vacation an actually relax. Thanks for the great post!

  4. April 18, 2008

    Good luck! Sounds like your on the right track.

  5. April 18, 2008

    Hey,,,

    post up some photos of your trip.. :)

    wondering how a uber affiliate actually spends his holiday…

  6. April 18, 2008

    Welcome back from vacation. Sounds like you had it coming.

  7. April 18, 2008

    It sounds like your vacation was a success. Congrats, I know how tricky it can be when you have a lot of internet operations to manage. I took a big family vacation last year and literally on the drive down the crap hit the fan on my biggest offer :(

    With all the conventions, etc. to go to sometimes the last thing I want to do to relax is travel more. Good luck catching up :)

  8. April 18, 2008

    Whenever I go on vacation I always tend to take my laptop with me, but I still always manage to have a great time and not worry about work. Sometimes I will have a friend back home keep track of certaint things.

  9. Joe
    April 18, 2008

    Dame?

  10. True confessions: I went online full time in 2001. I was making the proverbial 6 figures by 2003 and I still struggle to not check emails when I am on vacation. The problem isn’t the business, it’s me. This year one of my big goals is to have capable enough people running things that my wife can refuse to let me see a computer (or iPhone) while we are on vacation.

    Hi. My name is Aaron and I am an online-biz-aholic.

  11. April 18, 2008

    your girlfriend or wife! lol

  12. April 18, 2008

    Hehe so true. Internet marketing = the best job. You make money even while you’re gone… hehe

  13. April 18, 2008

    hey buddy try and show us some vac pictures what the heck are u still doing? Me wanna see some pics come on!

  14. April 18, 2008

    Lets see here here here!:D Oh now you would be able to have sex with your girl full day non stop! LMAO hahahahahah!

  15. April 18, 2008

    OMG!! I found a way to drive traffic with ease. I spent $19 and made $98 in one week, nothing crazy but this method is city specific, so $98/week x all major cities = BALLIN!

    Thanks for the inspiration to keep on keepin on!

  16. May 23, 2008

    Thank you! Finally i can take my holiday :p

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