The New Nomad

Nomadic Matt Shares The Nomadic Network with Matt Kepnes | TNN58

May 30, 2022 Andrew Jernigan and Allen Koski Episode 58
The New Nomad
Nomadic Matt Shares The Nomadic Network with Matt Kepnes | TNN58
Show Notes Transcript

Traveling to a new country is a great time to start a travel blog so that you can share all your experiences with your friends and family back home. If you love traveling and want to share your experiences and tidbits with the world, you’ll thrive as a travel blogger. Passion is contagious, and it’s the most significant driver for building an authentic travel community. This is truly a dream job.

Matthew Kepnes, also known as Nomadic Matt joins our hosts, Andrew Jernigan and Allen Koski in another episode of The New Nomad. The three nomads share their experiences in places that would make your imagination run wild. They talked about the travel community and how it would help nomads in their journeys. Tune in and listen to why a travel blog is a good way to document and share your love of travel, also brings about the potential for income. 


[7:06] How to succeed in travel blogging

[9:02] A true-blue traveler's favorite place is everywhere

[15:55] The virtual world is here to stay

[18:24] Finding a travel group to explore with

[20:15] Exploring the uncomfortable

[23:44] Why do people gravitate toward nature



GUEST BIO:

Nomadic Matt (otherwise known by his real name, Matthew Kepnes) is an American travel blogger and one of the most experienced backpackers in the world. He’s visited over 100 countries and spent nights in over 1,000 hostels. His blog, the Nomadic Matt's travel site, attracts upwards of 1 million visitors every month, and he’s also written a number of books, including New York Times bestseller How to Travel the World on $50 a Day.


Matt Kepnes Links:
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/matthew-kepnes-949056137
Website: https://www.nomadicmatt.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nomadicmatt/?hl=en


Follow Insured Nomads at:

Instagram: @insurednomads

www.insurednomads.com

Allen  

Welcome to The New Nomad podcast. Here we are, we're going to be discussing another adventurous person. Matt joins us, Nomadic Matt, somebody who's been to more countries than just about anywhere else we've had on the podcast, who's also helping people tour and see the world, we're going to catch up many things. And to be honest with you, Andrew, I love his 61 Travel Tips. Well, I'm sure we'll get to some of those conversations, but even conversations on weird food, when I was reading his blog, and I was thinking when I was in Cambodia, and I had beef with black bean sauce and red ants. A lot of people have a cringe look, but it was actually marvellously tasty. And when I tell my wife that story to this day, she kind of decides to walk away. So there's some of us a little more adventurous than others. How about yourself, Andrew? Some of the adventures that we're going to share today, sure, you've had some strange foods, etc.


Andrew  

I have. But you know, the highlight of this really is having Matt on, you know, with the Nomadic Network, I've been exposed to it. But this is such a movement around the world, with chapters in major cities, all over with such a group of loyalist that it's gonna be fun to dive into this not just the locations and the people, but the truth, truly the movement behind it. And it's not an easy thing to start a movement and this is a movement maker that we've got on today. So you guys who tune in every week, I'm just honored to introduce to you and welcome in Matt. 


Allen  

So Matt, welcome to The New Nomad podcast. You've obviously started a movement, but about every movement starts with an individual journey. So why don't you share a little bit about yourself your individual journey and how it led to where you are today, and helping others understand, you know, how to travel this world?


Matt  

Yeah, a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I worked in an office, doing administration work for a hospital in Boston. And then I was doing an MBA at the time too. I knew I didn't want to work in the hospital, really didn't know what I want to do but it wasn't that. So like all Americans, I was like, Well, if I just go back to school and get a graduate degree like that will solve my problems. But in the interim, I did go to Thailand on vacation with a friend. And while we were there, we met backpackers and I never really met backpackers before. And they seem to have figured this secret to life out, you know, they were traveling long term and they were doing it with very little money. And my friend and I were traveling on a budget, but that's because Thailand is cheap, you know, comparatively, right? So, you know, we I mean, we weren't even doing it backpacker, like we were just you can just get a lot of value for your money back in 2004, Thailand. So I forced my friend to stay in like the backpacker area of Bangkok, Khao San Road, for a couple of nights and we met some people and I really dug it and we went to Koh Samui. And there I just decided, I had a day to myself and then just really loved it. And I was like, I'm gonna go quit my job and travel the world for a year. So I quit my job and I finished the degree. And then I went off, you know, they, I had enough money to pay the loans for like a year and I worked all the numbers. It was like, Alright, I'm gonna be gone a year and I'll come back. I'll live with my parents. I’ll get a real job and get my house in 2.5 kids, the American dream. I came back 18 months later, completely broke with no direction in life. But I started a blog because I was like, well, travel writers seems like a cool job to get not that I was like, in any way. Confident in my reading ability. I just wanted something to keep traveling one day more. So I worked on that in spring 2008. So we're actually April 1, I really launched my blog. So we're coming up on 14 years and went back on the road and never stopped. 


Andrew  

Awesome. Now, you wrote this blog, but you really over that period of time you mastered travel blogging, and I believe thousands, and I'm probably underestimating that have gone through your course and travel blogging by this point now, right? If I were to speed up in time?


Matt  

Yeah, we've had, you know, a few thousand people go through, maybe even more, you know, it's probably like five or six. So over, I started that program, back in 2013. And so in some form or another, it has existed, it's taken various shapes over the years as, as projects do. But yeah, I'd say that's about right.


Allen  

So if I was just a layperson wanting to start a travel blog, just a couple of helpful hints beyond coming to you purchasing the program, because we do have people ask quite a bit. And I also love your blog, how to travel the world on $50 a day and some of the different tips, just somebody listening, what's a little taste of what they should consider?


Matt  

Starting a blog, or anything really, in the travel space right now is so, so different than when I started. I mean, when I started, Facebook pages didn't even exist. You just had a blog. And then you'd submit your blog to those blog directories. And that's how people would find you. Nowadays, there's so many apps and social media programs and I mean, there's just a whole bunch of stuff going on. I think one of the best ways to succeed is to be super focused on what you want to do you know, I could be Nomadic Matt, general travel tips in an age where there were like 20 blocks. Nowadays, that’s not really unique, right? You know, and it's much better to be an expert in one small place than it is to try to be you know, a travel influencer going everywhere. Oftentimes that that influencing stuff that you see, and those people with those large followings Yeah, they're going everywhere. But it's just more like people are watching a show, then really coming to you for expert travel advice. And shows are good, you know, they're inspirational. But the really informative stuff comes from, as my friend, Clay says, you know, don't look at me, but learn from me. And so creating a website, where there's a learn for me aspect really helps if you're very niche now, and then I would also really try to pick one platform that's that you can own whether that's Instagram, tick-tock or YouTube or a blog. You know, don't try to just be everything. Because oftentimes now people just repurpose in their Tik Tok videos, to Instagram reels than to YouTube shorts without really, you know, you got to give people a reason to be on that platform with you. 


Allen  

Gotcha. Well, I mean, I think about if I came to Costa Rica, you'd be the person I would look to, given some of the content you've put out. Is that where you focus recently, or is there other locations that you find to be more interesting as you focus in on particular places?


Matt  

I find lots of places to be interesting. Costa Rica is just one of the many, many, many, many countries I have been to. I love Thailand. I have a strong affinity to the country since I lived there for so long. I mean, that that was a place where I decided to, you know, quit my job to travel the world. I'm big Francophile, spent a lot of time in Paris. Huge fan of Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, Japan. We're big Japanophile, too. So everyone always asks What's your favourite country? And that's like saying, What's your favourite kid? You love them all equally, but for different reasons. I'm assuming you love your children. I don't have children. Yeah, I don't know how that works.


Andrew  

Yes, I'm totally with you. There. It's hard. It's like saying, Oh, do you love it? They're like, Well, do you love that anywhere one day you one day, it's an amazing place. So the next day, it's okay, I'm already planning the next. It's, there's, there's that thing when you spend time in a place, you take a piece of it with you, and you leave a piece of yourself behind. It's a thing of I want to go back there because I left part of my soul there. So one thing I heard you say there was learn from you, not just listen and read and, and follow along, but learn from you. And one of the ways I think people can learn from you is, is you've got a Patreon program to where people can choose their level of expertise, and subscribe to actually get more dense material to take their skills to the next level. Can you tell us a little bit about that?


Matt  

Yeah, so we actually rolled off Patreon recently into our own program called Nomadic Matt plus. And that was born out of the pandemic, when you know, all our revenue just disappeared, you know, and trying to figure out what can we do to create a community experience and a community support system. And so originally, we're on Patreon, as everyone does, but they have a lot of fees. And there's limited ability to just do a lot of things. And since I have my own tech guy, we realized we could basically create our own Patreon in-house. And that would give us more versatility and control over the experience. So we did that. And so being a Nomadic Matt Plus member gets you free guidebooks, monthly calls, a private Facebook group, early access to anything we do. So we launching tours, so they get first dibs on that, added discounts, exclusive travel discounts for a number of companies out there, as well as just content that's only available to them. And so the goal is to create a community experience that gives them more information that we don't share elsewhere, as well as like free books, and a sense of involvement in the community. You know, for example, when we have site redesigns, or, you know, we're testing new things, they're the people that get to test this and decide how it's gonna go.


Andrew  

That's amazing. So that's Nomadic Matt Plus and you hit on something that I know is powerful in your world. And really I participated in when was living in Rio, and that is, is the community platform that you've built the Nomadic Network. Can you tell us more about that? Because having you know, so many people look at InterNations and Facebook and all these different places, trying meetups, trying to find those people in the different cities. I go to tell us what you've what has happened over the last few years is Nomadic Network has taken such a strong shape around the world.


Matt  

Yeah, yes, the Nomadic Network is born out of a desire to no longer be in a red ocean. I don't know if you know the book blue ocean theory. There's two businesses in the world. There's a blue ocean, red ocean, two business environments. A blue ocean is something untapped, not a lot of competition. A red ocean red because there's blood in the water is a super competitive saturated field. And for me, that's you're trying to fight everyone in their mother in search results. So you know, ranked number one for Best Travel insurance. So I want to do something that was different that we had a competitive advantage on. And that was just more fun than optimising keywords on blog posts day in day out, right. So we created this idea of just doing events, you know. I was I had always been fascinated by my friend, Scott Densmore. He used to when he was around have this thing called Live Your legend Local. And it was small chapters meetups around the world, but his readers have always been intrigued by that and how we created it. When I was thinking about how we take things offline, that was sort of the thing I was trying to emulate a lot was what he built. And so we built this local chapters at like a meetup.com, for travel, as sort of a way to bring this online community we have offline and do something that a lot of people were doing. And something we could do really well without having to, you know, sit behind the computer and really fight for views and pay no eyeballs, and everyone likes to meet other travelers, travelers are really a fun, sociable group. And so that's how we started it. And then, of course, you know, it was right before the pandemic hit. So we went in virtual. And now we're starting to do in-person events again. But on the flip side of that, you know, people love these virtual events. And I don't think I ever would have thought about hosting virtual events, had it not been for COVID. And even as we transition out of COVID, and into real in-person events, again, we are going to keep the virtual events.


Allen  

I mean, it's interesting, too, that you're, you're rolling out tours. So just a couple quick questions. Tell us a little bit about if I'm interested in joining you on one of your tours, where you're identifying where the tours are going, a little bit about the people that are going. Andrew and I've talked about this a lot, the pent-up demand for actually in-person travel post COVID is so immense that is going to be like a firehose opening up. Your thoughts on that too?


Matt  

Oh, definitely. I mean, there was pent-up demand last year, I think as the delta wave. You know, came late summer, early fall that, that shut that door really quickly. I think if there had been no delta wave, summer fall would have been huge. Because early summer, people were like, I don't know, it's so so crazy. But then by mid-July cases had really collapsed. So as hospitalizations and deaths, especially here in the States, and I think people were like, Alright, let's get out there and boom, there's like another variant. But I think after Omicron and just I feel like everybody I know got Omicron I think this year is, is really shaping up to be immensely huge in travel, especially as countries open again, I mean, Australia and New Zealand have reopened. Most of Southeast Asia is open. Japan will probably open soon. So I think just man is crazy.


Andrew  

Matt, on that, you know, as people is travel is opening and people are thinking, Okay, I'm gonna go, people more and more are, are looking for time back in the community. Again, they're looking for immersion experiences with others, I think rather than saying, you know, I'm gonna go, go and explore Prague by myself. They're thinking how can I find a group and do this? You know, with remote year and hackers paradise and these that have done this so well over the past decades? There's a new wave of it for these group immersion experiences. Do you think there's validity in that and what's what do you what are you doing in that regard? If you're doing anything among the Nomadic Network and your ventures?


Matt  

Yeah, I mean, we started our tours going to Europe, because back in the day, I used to lead tours for Europe. So we're like, oh, let's do that Europe again, in the summer. We've done these routes before we know how to do them. Let's start that. They did not really go over well. And I think that is because AI wasn't leading them. So before it was Europe with Matt, this was just Europe, you don't really need to go on a tour to Europe. You know, why this peak summer, nobody wants to go in the you know, no one's going to Spain in August. So we've swapped at those dates into the fall. And we've already seen a lot more interest but we're also adding, again, based on feedback from our Nomadic Matt Plus and Tina and community members, Jordan, Turkey, Morocco and Wahaca. And a lot of people are excited about that. And so those will, we're looking into September, October, November for all that stuff. So yeah, I'm gonna be reading a lot of tours during that time. But we're working with a company to give for the guides and everything. So it's just not like knee racing from tour toward tour. You know, there's, we're, we're working with an actual tour company to process this.


Allen  

I think you hit upon something just by the naming of the countries. So to your point, I don't think people need a guided tour to London, Paris, you know, etc. because they feel very comfortable with those locations. You've mentioned Jordan, Turkey and Morocco, just off the top of my head, I've been in each one of those locations, and I come back and I say to the average American, or the average non big traveler had been to Jordan, Turkey, Morocco. And they're like, whoa, that's so exotic. And it really isn't, we've all been there, you know what I mean, but you giving a tour will give people the confidence to go find out that when you go to Petra and the Dead Sea, this is a completely different experience than people think I love it, the fact that you've picked some of the locations that I think an average person might see is a lot more exotic than the places that they're very comfortable with. And it just makes me think of, you know, one of the things I love is, Rick Steves wrote a book called Travel as a Political Act. And it's all about getting to different places, and that the average person tends to only go where they're comfortable or not leave the bubble. And what I think you're doing there is you're helping expand people in that comfort zone. Is that how you identify those countries? Or is it just kind of Kismet that you're working with a group that has the capabilities to help you?


Matt  

A little bit of both. I mean, you know, the team, and now we're discussing where to go, you know, where people are interested in. You know, Morocco is one of those places, we were also looking for a destination that, you know, you'll need like a week for NBA days. Jordan kind of fits in that. And so the company was like Jordan. Wahaca, I love Wahaca. I wanted to run towards there. You know, I think it's, there's a lot going on there. And it's an easy, you know, it's two hours from the States. There's direct flights from Dallas and Houston in LA. You can do it in like, six days. So and then Turkey, the they suggested to Turkey, and I was like, oh, yeah, let's do Turkey, that's another place. The goal is to also actually go back to Costa Rica and Thailand a bit to add those in. But those probably won't get added until early 2023. There's only so many tours that can be run at once.


Allen  

That's tremendous.


Matt  

That's where we're going for that. But I do we'd love to have, you know, maybe a two week Costa Rica. And then like a two or three week Thailand, it's kind of long, but maybe like two weeks, and then an add-on option for three if you want to do an extra. 


Allen  

Well we got you and you've you're somebody who spent time in Costa Rica to our audience, for people haven't been there, the biodiversity, etc. Can you give a couple quick points of why Costa Rica is so awesome, because I completely agree. I enjoyed the surfing and seeing the parrots, and the food was great. And people were wonderful, but it is an incredible place to visit and would love you to share with the audience, your thoughts about Costa Rica as a destination.


Matt  

The nature, and people are really nice. I mean, it's really like tea goes are just a lovely set of people very happy, very welcoming. But you know, you have great surfing, you have the biodiversity of mountains, you have waterfalls, you have incredible beaches, you have, you know, you go up to the Tortuguero and it's like their own little Amazon, right with all the turtles up there, and you get to get around by boat. Caves is just really great. And then yeah, on the west coast, you have the surfing and, you know, the whole hippie, you know, lifestyle thing and the yoga and all that jazz. Food's okay, I mean, I haven't been to Costa Rica and many moons but I was never impressed with the food. It's not like it's not like Mexico. You know, what the food is just blows your mind. But yeah, that's pretty good.


Andrew  

Yeah, you know, you say Costa Rica and Thailand. Allen jumped on Costa Rica. Here I am thinking Thailand and the diversity of, you know, spending a week in the mountains up near Chiang, Mai, Chiang Rai, etc You know, the up north and spending a week in Bangkok just because you got to and then down in the beaches, whether it's Phuket or Hua Hin, you know those places just definitely three weeks in Thailand just because of the diversity there but the mango sticky rice, the just the great food there, you know just getting away from the tourist traps and the immersing in some of those things I line up with Thailand. Whereas we each have the different places we gravitate to. So it's it's fun to see some of these things happen is as the group's route planning, develops more and more with you guys.


Allen  

So that leads us to our final segment, which I think we're gonna get a really great answer is, we always ask our guests to name an overlooked person or place experience that you think our adventurous nomadic audience might be missing. I know we hit upon quite a few areas here but anywhere a little bit deeper in the archive mat that you'd like to share with the group?


Matt  

Overlooked, so much of the world is overlooked. I think Madagascar you know, I mean terrible infrastructure there but definitely overlooked place. I mean, it's difficult to get to but it's worth it. Great biodiversity there. Something not so further afield, Oman, Georgia, Romania. Taiwan, I love Taiwan. I don't think it gets enough visitors. I mean, it gets decent amount. But I still think it's sort of overlooked for other parts of East and Southeast Asia.


Andrew  

Okay, so Wow, my list just got expanded there. Where do you want people to find out more about you? Well, links in the show notes. But if there's one place and somebody is only listening to audio right now, they open their phone and open a tab where would it be?


Matt  

nomadicmatt.com My website that's got everything and then on all social network we are at Nomadic Matt. So if you type in Instagram, and then Nomadic Matt, Pinterest, Twitter, whatever it is at Nomadic Matt, you'll get me.


Allen  

Fantastic. Well, thanks. Thanks for joining us today. And I learned a lot I also took a quote down, which that you shared, don't look at me, learn from me, I thought that was tremendous. Once again, a wonderful kind of overview and ultimately, as your audience as they look. You know, Matt's got some tremendous things, the late 61 Travel Tips, which I think are looking something for people look at packing list, traveling the world and $50 a day, I mean, the list goes on. We don't want to wax too poetic here. But we commend you know, Matt, for getting this group of people excited about traveling. Andrew, your final thoughts today. As we took a little bit of a journey around the world I got I tried to during the podcast write down all the countries named I have a very long list today. Wonderful conversation.


Andrew  

Well, we're in luck, there will be a transcript, those who are looking for links for books, for people, for places that were mentioned, the Nomadic Network, etc. Just scroll on down and you'll see those in the notes. If you're not listening on Spotify, or something like that. They're right here. If you are just go to thenewnomad.net and you'll see everything that we've been talking about today. You know this is one of those things where I need to go to his sites more often. Because the information that he and his team put out really just spurs me and I want to check out the travel guides. I'm going to a new country here pretty soon as well aside. Ah, Matt, that's one to where I actually hope we get to meet in person will be at running remote. So I've actually never been to Canada, and it will be in Montreal. So even more of a special city for Canada.


Matt  

I will not be at Running Remote, but have a blast. Yeah. 


Allen  

And that's a wonderful city


Andrew  

one. Yeah. So yeah, this is one of those things where I come out of this conversation thinking okay, I need to need to turn to his resources more frequently. 


Allen  

Fantastic. Fantastic. Well, thank you for listening audience. Once again The New Nomad's not a podcast, it's a community of people. All ideas and spirits so we really want to keep you travelling look forward to hearing from you next week enjoy and travel safely cheers.


Matt  

Cheers, thanks for having me.