Nomadic Narrative: The Remote Creative Lifestyle with Han Talbot

We're here for people who defy categorization , those who make a living and a life their own way in Europe and beyond .

Fortnightly , on Fridays , we're serving up expert tips , inspired insights and stories from the frontiers of freelancing and the remote work revolution To help you achieve success with your borderless business and liberated lifestyle , whatever success means to you , as you live life on your own terms . Welcome , remote work Europe listeners .

I know you're going to love today's interview with Hand Torbert because we so often get questions from people about whether it's really possible to live the dream , to travel the world , creating content , creating photos , videos to actually reflect the areas that you're visiting and showcase them and make a good living and a great life from it .

I know you're going to love what Hand has to share about the work that she does , how she evolved that career and what that actually looks like on a day-to-day basis .

Now , before we dive into the interview , one of the things that Hand and I are going to be talking about is , of course , your online profile and your presence , because these are the things that really matter when you're building this kind of remote , creative career . I just wanted to let you know that our famous LinkedIn challenge is running again in April .

I will drop the links to register and find out more about that into your show notes , along with all the links to connect with Hand and find out what she's doing around the world . But if you dream of aspiring to her lifestyle in the future , you could do a lot worse than jump on our level up your LinkedIn challenge this spring time .

So I would love to see some of our regular listeners there and in the meantime , let's talk to Hand . Hand Meets World . Hand Meets Remote Work Europe . So welcome , hand . It's lovely to have you with us at the Remote Work Europe podcast at last .

So I'd love it if you could start off by telling us a little bit about you and your remote work journey , about remote creatives , and give our listeners a bit of context about Hand .

My journey I guess it's funny when people say like , oh , where's your first realize you want to be additional , no matter , I always say like no , it's definitely been like an accumulation of , like several things across like you know , 20 odd years .

But I suppose you could say I've been on off remote officially for about 10 years , since I did a study abroad and I realized I got paid to write a blog while I was studying . I was like , oh , people can create money like while away and like from their homes and they don't have to go in office .

So , yeah , been testing and trialling that on off , like in London , went full time remote thanks to a little push from a little pandemic that we just had .

And yeah , I do marketing on one side , and then I also have the remote life on the other , which is a content creation business mostly focused on digital and my tourism , which also now is beginning to encompass the remote creatives . But that's a new project that I'm more than happy to talk about as we chat .

What does it look like your typical day or week or project ?

So , and it's been in response to the demand that I have had from my audience , from people in the industry . So there's that bit too . I think we could definitely talk more about the answer question . So , typical day of the life ? Oh , I guess I don't necessarily have much of a what you might call a routine , but I have no Negotiate .

So I will start the day very much relaxing . Into the day I will have my sit and have my first cup of coffee and I won't do anything official . You know that'll be my little meditation time , if you will , and that's not negotiable for me . I have to sit and just be with .

Like here's where I am today , today being I'm in Vlora in Albania , very beautiful for those who are curious about the Albanian river .

Then I will get to the laptop after a breakfast , got ready and then , honestly , I try to start the day doing things like emails and anything that requires a bit more brainpower , anything from emails to content creation to strategy . You know the things that my brain can do best in the morning . Then by the afternoon I will .

It's funny at the amount of people who I talked about on my podcast who are like , yeah , my brain's kind of dead in the afternoon . So I'll normally like go for a walk , or I'll like do something a bit more chill , or I'll go to the gym , and that's literally what I do the by the middle of the afternoon .

If I haven't kind of got some tasks that I can do , my brain's feeling a little bit more kind of in a little place . I will normally take myself off for a walk for half an hour or go explore , or like that's my time , that I'll go out and take some more content of like a city or whatever it is that I want to see that day .

That's a really good time to really get into like that creative side of things , things that don't need strategize as much , and then come back to the laptop , either in a cafe or a co workspace , whatever it happens to be , or like now , my apartment , and then , yeah , that could be anything from calls to more emails to documents , whatever's needed at the time .

It's a very big mixture .

But you still know , I think a lot of the people who were most successful at managing these kind of remote lives , these very self directed lifestyles , are people who have a very clear knowledge of themselves and how and when they work best , how , what sort of zone they're in .

I'm similar in a way the morning is for writing , creating , editing and the kind of door closed head down stuff , whereas in the afternoon I'm more likely to be having this conversation , interviewing a source or doing something . That's more . I need the door open in the afternoon because I won't focus on the head down stuff , yeah , yeah , yeah , it's funny .

So , some people at night hours , you won't get anything productive out of me by , like you know , eight , nine o'clock in the evening . My brain is not , my brain is dead , I just , for some reason , from one to four . You aren't going to get anything of particular use out of me , and I know that other people have said the same .

They're like no , I might as well go take that siesta and come back strong again and like so , yeah , I think it's an interesting lifestyle , but it definitely takes like a couple years just to kind of get to know yourself and work for sure , yeah , it's very interesting , especially going on from last week's episode with Pilar Odi and her book on time management

for remote .

Can you talk a little bit about that mix and how that looks right now ? What , what sort of specific activities are you working on and how does that break down ?

So I guess they kind of go hand in hand in a way in that , like one side is obviously me helping other people build their brands and campaigns and the other side is me being the face of the content itself . So it can be anything from consultation calls with their clients or say , like their personal brand that they're trying to build .

Other days it could be , for example , me sourcing some influences for a campaign or for speaking engagements .

Sometimes it's creating strategy for , like , a particular product launch for somebody , and then on the other side , it can be editing and putting together photos and videos for , or posts for , a particular campaign that I've just been on with a destination , for example . So it honestly varies .

Or like , for example , I'm currently potentially looking to put together a course on remote life . So it's very much like varies , and then all while building on also the remote life , so , again , sourcing potential guests , as you know , like it could be at the moment I'm trying to build up a new website . So it really varies on so many levels .

But yeah , it varies from those taking contents and things and going out and about to being on the laptop on Excel and having the best day ever , you know , with the formulas . So it's .

Do you ever find any tension or conflict between the two , such as sometimes comes up between the realms of , say , journalism and content marketing ? Are you an impartial observer ? Or at what point do you put your participant , your influencer , hat on if you're comfortable with that word , and we can find another one if you don't like it . But do you ever ?

Do you think you're crossing a line ? What do you reckon ?

.

But first of all , it's funny because people was like , oh , I roll my eyes at the term influencer now because , having worked in marketing before the term influencer became the word of the day , I used to get asked , as a marketer , to go find influencers right , but that could be anybody from , like the head teacher in a village to the mum that runs the school

newsletter . And now this was pretty like 2018 , when the term influencer really took off as something who , like , has a TikTok or Instagram following . So I'm always like I roll my eyes because on the one hand , it feels cringe to playing that I'm also an influencer in that way , but then that's the most palatable term .

So you call yourself an influencer even though you don't yeah , so that's what I find that word is very contradictory for I don't yeah .

It's a conflict for me to say that I am an influencer , but I know that a lot of people the most palatable term , I guess , if I'm understanding your question correctly , I guess it journalism versus content creation is a conversation that has been coming up for years , but what people forget is a lot of journalists are also content creators .

So many people who I come across , have a journalism degree , have a background in journalism , and then have decided that actually content creation . They can get sponsorships to make more money as well , though , and within the same trip , so a lot of them will actually have take both and put them hand in hand .

A lot of people , and their destinations , for example , are looking for content creators because they are able to do photos , videos , be the face , do the journalistic research Like they are a package and they have the following , which I know frustrates a lot of traditional journalists , if you will , and it still does , funnily enough , I'm sure .

So it's not that I think either one is like better or worse , because , at the end of the day , you know journalism , like you know actually .

We live in a more blended way today and we can balance the kind of thought , leadership activities that come from knowing something really well to have your own expression and ideas about it as well as those you're writing about other people .

But I can understand where the tension comes from when that's the main focus . But at the end of the day , like you can't stop content creation from coming , it is not just the fact that it's a you know look at me kind of activity or pastime . You know people are making money from it .

Yeah , Gen Z and like all the younger generations , they are making money from it and building really great , solid businesses from this thing which , in this current climate , why would you not want to encourage ?

I'm not now not saying don't do a PR degree either , but at times are changing and at the end of the day , like we have so much more available to us and so many more resources that enable us to build these presences , but they're used for good or bad is obviously up to the individual , but at the end of the day , I would never quite understand why one

would pick a fight with the other .

There can definitely be a lack of transparency around the boundaries between being an analyst or being a journalist or being a content creator , but provided people are transparent about it and it's very easy to be transparent , right ?

I mean , with that's the world we live in you can just declare referral links or sponsorships and things , and you know , we all recognise that's how the world goes around and this is what people do for a living a lot of us anyway .

You know , they might go on the same , like press trip , for example , and they're right for , say , the Guardian , but then they don't necessarily have to declare anything on their Instagram . So it's just . So .

And , yeah , there is a risk of a lack of transparency , even though you still hear people , particularly on the journalism side , being very purist about it . And I could never do content , you know that's that would be selling my soul to do .

Well , really okay , but if maybe you have to sell yourself to keep the lights on if you don't work for a tier one publication , because it's very hard now to get started , I think .

You know you can make quite a bit of money sometimes , like from tech sponsorships , from tourism sponsor well , not from tourism , not so much , but unfortunately but you know you can find ways of making money outside of your main focus , like journalism .

But then also it comes down to what I think is why they both come hand in hand is because I've seen them work with different desks . We're talking with focus just on travel . For example , I've seen destinations who , like , are very interested and heavily focused on like wanting to bring in the Guardian . We've talked about the Guardians , like the Guardian writers .

They want them to come in and review the destination and write a , however many pages spread . That's for them their focus for that quarter , for that month , for that campaign . So they will then want just journalists . Other times people you know . For example , I've worked on digital nomads programs where they'll go right .

We want content because we want to find the digital nomads for a digital nomads . They are on social media . They're not going to be necessarily picking up a hard copy of the Guardian , especially if they're not from the service .

So if one of those things again , people forget that different destinations , different companies , different campaigns , different times , no matter what scope , different scopes , are always looking for different things . So yeah , I don't think it's necessarily a battle of journalists versus content creators . It's all about what the client wants at the end of the day .

I think you can best fit into that too .

They like telling a story visually or in words or a mixture . What would you suggest to them now ? What would be the best route to get started if it's not go to school , or what kind of tactics might you suggest they try ?

It took me years and years and years , but at the end of the day , I had to start building from somewhere and I did a language disagree , so it was again very like nothing to do with marketing , whatever . I literally said on my study abroad that I'd what , after watching a few youtubers that we didn't call youtubers back then .

We're just weirdos who created videos online . I said . I said to my friend I'm going to create a career from social media , and she was like , how do you mean ? Like , what does that mean ? Which ? Now it's like duh .

But back then no one could see the route , and so for me it was really funny then sitting with her a couple years later and her going oh , that made sense . And so basically , I would say the same to this , to the whoever wants to start it now .

It'd be like right , okay , you want to come into this creative career , you want to have a remote career , you want to live this what looks like best beach life , like with coconuts cool , but you've got to have a strong why . Why are you doing it ?

For example , like to me , like I just want to be , like I love the freedom , I want to be the owner , in control of my own time , and I know that . Yeah , yeah , there's just several reasons for me that keep me going , even like in the dark , the dark times if you will say , you've got to have reason , in my opinion , to want to go remote .

That above anything else . If you think like I want to go work on the beach I joke about as in keynotes when I did it done if you just want to go sit on the beach and pretend you're working on your laptop , you need a holiday . You don't need a remote , it's a holiday . Then come back . So that is first and foremost . Why do you want to do it ?

The second thing is yeah , you're in this for the long haul . You're . This is not an overnight thing . So if you think you're gonna make like a quick buck , yes , you hear a lot of people who make successes of posting something on tip talk and they get like a million dollars in sales , but that's not guaranteed .

So the next thing is , again , how many followers that they have to build up first , like how many , like years they've been posting on tip talk , like just this all these things to consider as well . So once you understand that you are in this for the long haul , you've got your .

Why I would then , honestly , I would do exactly the same now as I did 10 years , 11 years ago . Now I would open the blog , because blogs last forever . They might seem old school , they might be the same me all , blogs , all , but why just a personal blog ? They're the ones who survived the meta outages . They've survived the tip talk ban .

Yeah , so I would open a blog and I would start writing , I would start putting videos and putting them up on my blog , putting my on YouTube and my on tip talk , instagram , whatever , and I would start holding my voice and I would start like creating that presence online .

Yeah , just , and developing your voice and what I , what I did back and back in the day if you will probably have to say back in the day , but it would I would start learning how to create good look post . So I would start this is what this is why did I use my log to then create a marketing portfolio ?

Because everyone was saying to me all the kind of content creator , you get it , and I was like I don't know what that means . So I then use that to then build a portfolio , then take to companies and say , hey , I can help build a social media following .

Hey , I can help do a website , but this is pre all the crazy Google updates and SEO updates , so we have to keep up . But I then was able to , as a graduate , go . I might be like one or two years into my career , but I've got a solid portfolio that I can start like actually showcasing you and it got me into these jobs .

Other people who had but yeah , I would . Then I would start building this online presence myself . I would start honing my voice . I would start commenting on different things . I would start interacting with people who are in similar fields , like as you and I do on LinkedIn .

Now I would start building my network and Really building that voice so that I can go to employers . But it depends on what you want to do . You want a full time marketing job ? Cool , great . Do you want to be a contractor ? Do you want to be a fractional CMO like what . Do you want to watch your ultimate goal there ?

And I would start honing my voice and honing my skills into that what that looks like from there , using that portfolio . So again , yeah , I'm sure social media is going to be around for another , however many long years , but I would always have my blog . My blog is my .

You don't need anybody's permission , you literally need . You know , $20 worth of domain wasn't state name on your little corner of the internet . Only . You don't have to have it all figured out . You can evolve as you go . I'm sure both you and I had . If we look back at the earliest things we published a decade ago or whatever , we wouldn't .

You know that was completely on brand and aligned in my very best work , but the fact is we were putting it out there , we were starting conversation , we were starting to build that reputation , that authority , and even if we pivoted , even if we shifted , we had that track record .

And , as you said , when you were a new graduate , you were going up against people who just spent their time Acquiring that degree and good for them and whatever else you did on campus , but you had a portfolio of real work and a presence and it's kind of a self evidential thing that people look at it .

So actually , this goes back years and this is , this is . I can see this . This following is authentic because it's been built Steadily . It's not one of these . Suddenly somebody hangs out there shingle is a social media consultant and they've suspiciously got 4000 followers in one day , but no engagement .

You know , you built that from scratch and that's a really powerful thing and you didn't need anybody's permission to do that . You couldn't have bought that and you didn't have to go and to us a special university , of course , or anything else to do that .

So it should be within everybody's power right to do this absolutely , and there is so much free information .

And it was , honestly , it's everything from like okay , how do I write a blog post ? Okay , how do I like survive the next Google update ? Like how do I like tweak this widget on my blog ? Or like , how do I get the best , where I find the best mics in 2024 ?

Like it's crazy , every single piece of your content creation journey you can learn from the internet and all you've got to really hone and find yourself is your own voice in that . And that goes on to my second point , which is the internet is not saturated . I know I just said there's a load of information , but there , the internet is not saturated yet .

Yeah again , like you want to , you want to be like the same as your favorite I don't know Tik Toka , who does , I don't know dances , maybe . Yes , that's saturated , but if you , what's not saturated is your voice , because only you can bring your voice to the internet .

You can only bring your experience , your expertise , like you know , your life , yeah , whatever to the internet . So again , don't tell me the internet is saturated , post that thing .

If you try and copy them direct , yes , it's already too crowded because that space is taken , whereas if you bring you to the situation , nobody's ever done that before and it is all out there . And I agree wholeheartedly with what you said about the wealth of information and what you can teach yourself . I mean , I'm older than you had .

I remember my traditional learning was took place using things like libraries and books . I wanted to learn something . I had to go and buy a book about it . I had to go . You know , I couldn't just go on the internet and get a book , never mind a YouTube walkthrough of it or a Udemy course or LinkedIn learning or something .

It's all out there and I do have to kind of remind myself and other people sometimes that you can learn anything . It's out there . You might need to pay to filter the quality of that information , because the first Google will bring you a whole load of paid for prioritized stuff .

You might have to drill down , but it's all out there and it's all a tap away and it really is quite mind blowing to think about that sometimes . And maybe that's too scary , I don't know . Is it easier for people to think well , I'll just go and be a whatever traditional career I can put in a box because I can't cope with all of that .

That's out there .

But even things like you know , tiktok is becoming the highest place , the highest search engine , almost sorry , most use search engine for Gen Z because , again , like TikTok is bite sized information . Yes , okay , maybe check your facts .

We have a different app or a different platform for all learning needs . To now , like you want to get on a course , there's probably a course . Like you want to find a tutor , there is probably a tutor , though you can chat to virtually . Now you don't even have to travel to the . So I think that there is .

If you're with , if you want our wanting to learn , if you are willing to learn , there is a way for you to learn .

The podcast that was really started to help people who are looking to really get into the integrity of what it means to have a remote life , to become additional nomad , to have a remote job because , again , like you don't have to be traveling the world with Just your backpack and a job to yeah , be cool yourself for a remote worker , you can be based somewhere

and work remotely . So we've got all different things for different people . So the podcast you want to go learn from Mediavine and how to monetize your blog on Mediavine ? We've got that . You want to learn how to scale your blog into a full-scale business when they're mad at me ? We've got that as well . Says that side of things .

Then now I currently have a new goal of building up the remote creatives which began newsletter which , as I said before , like earlier on , like honestly came about from people asking me loads of questions about how to Create a personal brand , how to do affiliate marketing , how to build a community , um , and is now turning into , like slowly , more and more

different pieces in own right . So I now have a WhatsApp channel so people who want to connect with fellow content creators around the world . You can join that . I've got a new website that I am determined to sit and fully Build out that is going to have destination guides for create additional nomads .

So so far We'll have Istanbul , tbilisi Hopefully Laura will see , I'll keep you posted and then also definitely gonna have to go back and revisit places like Mexico City . Yeah , so there'll be a few destinations to keep up with . There . There'll be kind of your guides for specifically a little bit more tailored towards create additional nomads .

So like where the artsy places go hang out , like where the good places take photos , where where the groups to come and meet people , the WhatsApp group , but yeah , so it's just that that's kind of my focus for 2024 . But you can still find a lot of general topics on the podcast , hand-meets world as well .

I've also got some of the more like the weather , remote , where to remote work , articles to , and then LinkedIn .

It's because there's a lot of different places to connect with her , depending on what's resonating with you right now . Is it the creative side of things ? Is it the ? Is it the podcast ? Is it the remote life and I love that hands podcast is the remote life because that comes before the work or anything else . It's about that completely integrated lifestyle .

So what ? It was the one place that you would suggest people go first hand if they just want to get into your world .

Early March , and already I've had to change my plans , like a couple times . So , yeah , and I think I mean , yeah , the website wasn't , didn't exist about a month ago .

So lots of changes is a thing like you've got to be slightly insane to want to take on this lifestyle , because , yeah , but in a good , most excited is to get this website off the ground Properly

. I'm really , I'm honestly just loving the response that the remote creatives has had so far . Then , also , I've got few destinations coming up and projects coming up that create additional nomads and aspiring creative digital nomads will hopefully be Super interested in as well . So stay tuned .

Yeah , I think , honestly , the biggest thing for me is just I'm excited with where the projects that I've been developing . You know , like the remote creatives , they're just taking on a life of their own and that is both terrifying and Super exciting , and I think that's that's what I'm excited for to see where that goes fantastic .

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