How to Become a Digital Nomad Selling Products Online

You woke up today wishing you were somewhere else. Wishing you were somewhere new and beautiful, or maybe just anywhere other than the same worn-out town. And now, you’re ready to change everything by learning how to become a digital nomad.

Before you sell your belongings and start throwing darts at a map, you need a way to work from anywhere. Selling online can give you the freedom you need.

Building an E-commerce Business for the Nomad Lifestyle

Not all e-commerce business models work well for digital nomads. For example, people who just want to work from home can often buy up inventory and stash it in their basement. What you need is a way to sell stuff without being chained to a pile of products.

Luckily, there are a lot of techniques for selling online while working remotely. Here are a few of the best options:

1. Dropshipping

Dropshipping is the art of selling products without ever handling any inventory. It follows a simple process:

1. You find a dropshipping supplier—a company that has things to sell and is willing to ship them one at a time to your customers.
2. You and the supplier agree to work together. This may be as simple as creating an account or as complex as hammering out a contract.
3. You list the supplier’s products for sale online at a higher price.
4. A customer sees your listing and buys the product from you.
5. You buy the item from the supplier.
6. The supplier ships the item to your customer.
7. If anything goes wrong, you provide customer service.

That’s all there is to it! No boxes, no tape, no storage. You can dropship from anywhere in the world as long as you have a laptop and an internet connection.

What Skills Do I Need to Become a Dropshipper?

• Bargain Hunting: Because dropshipping is such an awesome business model, you’ll have a lot of competition! The most popular products will already be sold by tons of other dropshippers. You need to have a good nose for deals on less competitive products that you can still sell quickly.
• Marketing: Your main job will be selling the products you find. Sometimes, this is as simple as setting a lower price than everyone else selling the same thing on Amazon. But if you have the skills to build a great website or create amazing ads, you’ll have a big advantage.
• Customer Service: All dropshippers need to provide great customer service. If your supplier ships a package late or sends the wrong product, it might not be your fault, but you will take the blame! It will be your job to keep the customer happy, answer their questions, and solve any problems that arise.

Pros and Cons of Dropshipping for Digital Nomads

Pros:

• No inventory. You can run your entire business from a laptop.
• Low daily time demand. While there will be long days of hard work, as in any business, most days are simple. Just check in a few times a day to send orders to your suppliers and answer customer messages. This gives you the freedom to enjoy traveling while making money.

Cons:

• Suppliers can rip you off. Since you don’t see the item before the customer sees it, a bad supplier can do nasty things like sneak in counterfeits or just never ship the item. It’s critical to find trustworthy suppliers!
• Profit margins are thin. Suppliers charge less to companies that buy lots of items at once. Since you’re only buying one item at a time, they’ll charge you the highest price possible.
• Your competitors can easily beat your price. Say you sell an item for $30 and pay your supplier $25 per sale, making $5 each time. A big company might convince your supplier to sell them 10,000 copies for a price as low as $10 per item. Now your competitor can drop the item’s price to $20 and still make a ton of money—while you’d lose $5 on every sale! This happens all the time and often forces dropshippers to find new items to sell.

Despite the downsides, dropshipping is one of the best work-from-anywhere jobs for digital nomads. With all your inventory and shipping handled by your supplier, you can earn a living anywhere you can connect to the internet.

2. Amazon FBA Selling

FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon) allows you to store your inventory in Amazon’s warehouses. On top of that, Amazon takes care of shipping items to your customers and handling all customer service related to shipping and returns (which is most of it!). This means Amazon handles most of the day-to-day work for you and you don’t have babysit your inventory.

The main challenge while traveling? Getting your items to Amazon’s warehouses. Fortunately, there are solutions available to address this problem. Outsourcing a prep center with InventoryLab is a great way to get your Amazon FBA business off the ground without tying yourself down to one location where you send and receive packages.

What Skills Do I Need to Become an Amazon FBA Seller?

• Product Sourcing. In order to sell products on Amazon, you are going to need to have products to sell. There are a handful of excellent resources available that can help get you started. For example, you could scout for books on your travels and use a mobile app like ScoutIQ to check the value of the books that you find. Or you can use Tactical Arbitrage to find low-cost items online that you can then flip on Amazon for a profit.
• Inventory Management. Sending in too many units of a product can lead to excessive storage fees, and sending in too few can cause a loss in potential sales. You will need to develop a knack for understanding what sells and how well you should keep certain products stocked.
• Attention to Detail. There are many factors that go into being a successful Amazon FBA seller. You have to optimize your product listings, use advertising effectively, and keep up with things like promotions and pricing. This is definitely not a passive form of work for digital nomads.

Pros and Cons of Amazon FBA Selling for Digital Nomads

Pros:

• You can source on your travels. There are a lot of ways to do this while on the move. You can always source online, or use strategies like the used book scouting technique mentioned above or finding hidden Walmart clearances. And you might even be able to write off trips to some of the best Amazon seller conferences as business expenses!
• Logistics are handled for you. Thanks to the incredible service provided by Amazon FBA, everything from packing and shipping your products to handling most customer service and returns is covered by Amazon. As long as you can sort out a reliable way to get products to an FBA warehouse, Amazon takes care of the rest.
• Incredible exposure. Amazon is the largest e-commerce site in the United States and one of the largest in the world as well. When it comes to remote jobs for digital nomads, you won’t find anywhere with more reach than Amazon.
  

Cons:

• Initial investment. Whether you source products through arbitrage or create your own private-label product, it’s going to cost money. And sometimes that money will be tied up in inventory as you wait for your products to sell.
• Competitive marketplace. It has never been easier to be a seller on Amazon thanks to FBA, and that means that there are tons of sellers you’ll be competing with. This can lead to pricing wars on products that are readily available to multiple sellers, cutting into your potential profits.
• Compliance and regulation. Amazon’s rules and regulations can be complicated, especially when selling across multiple countries. You will need to be ready for this learning curve.

All in all, Amazon FBA selling is a great option for the nomad lifestyle. Those looking for a part-time digital nomad gig may want to look elsewhere given how hands-on Amazon selling is, but entrepreneurs looking to work hard and play hard as they travel may be happy with what Amazon selling has to offer.

3. Print-on-Demand

Another way to potentially make money as a digital nomad is through a Print-on-Demand (POD) business. It works like this:

1. Select products you want to sell that are easy to add designs to: t-shirts, mugs, hats, etc.
2. Create or source unique designs for them.
3. Connect with a Print-on-Demand company that aligns with your product range and integrates with your sales platform.
4. Establish your storefront or product listings on your chosen e-commerce platform.
5. When a customer places an order, your POD provider handles production, packing, and shipping directly to the customer.
6. You address customer inquiries and issues, ensuring a positive buying experience.

There are many different websites that you can set up your print-on-demand storefront on. Don’t just limit yourself to the best-known sites like eBay. Etsy is a great choice, and there are plenty of other eBay alternatives for sellers worth looking into.  

What Skills Do I Need to Become a Print-on-Demand Seller?

• Design Creation/Selection. Whether you are creating your own artwork, collaborating with an artist, or enlisting the help of AI, you will need to have an understanding of design and what will look appealing to potential customers
• Market Savvy. Knowing what's trending and understanding your niche market can make or break your print-on-demand venture. Keep your finger on the pulse of what people want.
• Marketing Skills. To stand out in a crowded digital marketplace, you'll need to know how to market your products effectively. Social media, email marketing, and SEO skills can be your secret weapons.

Pros and Cons of Printing on Demand for Digital Nomads

Pros:

• No inventory worries. Products aren’t created until they are ordered, so you’ll never have to worry about inventory.
• Low initial investment. Since you don’t have to invest in product up front, your costs of doing business will be very low.
  

Cons:

• Design challenges. Producing designs that stand out and sell can be extremely challenging.
• Saturated market. The ease of entry into print-on-demand as well as an influx of AI art has made POD storefronts extremely common. It is harder than ever to stand out.
• High volume of sales is necessary. The convenience of print-on-demand services comes at a cost, and you’ll need to price competitively to compete in this market. This leads to very low profits on each sale, requiring you to sell at high volumes to succeed as a digital nomad working in this space.

The success rate of print-on-demand businesses is quite low given the challenges listed above. But the risk is also very low, too, so if you are an artist or have a knack for design and trends, there’s little harm in giving it a try.

4. Selling Digital Products

Selling digital products like e-books, online courses or digital art has very similar pros and cons to those listed above in regards to dropshipping and print-on-demand.

The cost of entry is very low. Our comprehensive guide to selling books online includes details on how you can use Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) to publish and list an e-book for free. Setting up a website or finding a digital marketplace to sell other types of digital products is easy as well.

So if you have the talent or desire to give it a shot, selling digital products could turn out to be a great job to work remotely while traveling. But you will run into the same pitfalls as you do in those other industries with extremely saturated markets, and you may have a hard time standing out. In addition to producing high-quality work, you will need to have top-notch marketing skills to drive potential customers to your digital products as well.

For more info and inspiration, check out our guide to selling digital products on Amazon.

Getting Help with Customer Service

Regardless of whether you are selling digital products, dropshipping, printing on demand or selling on Amazon, customer service is going to play a huge part in your potential success. And while all these jobs for digital nomads may offer you the freedom to travel at will, there will be situations in which you need to handle questions and concerns. That isn’t always easy when you are on the go.

Setting up an e-commerce helpdesk is a great solution to this issue. With a helpdesk like Onsite Support or Zendesk, you can set up ChannelReply-powered autoresponders that can answer most ecommerce customer service questions. This can be a lifesaver while you are away from your electronic devices or on a long flight.

For digital nomad Amazon FBA sellers specifically, we highly recommend Onsite Support. Onsite is the only helpdesk option that integrates directly with the Get Product Support button on Amazon. This guides customers away from returning their item and instead to useful product instructions and videos that can help increase their understanding and enjoyment of your product. All this takes place automatically while you are out enjoying your life and making money as a digital nomad.

Getting Started as a Digital Nomad

Once you have your business model nailed down, you’ve figured out the hardest part of how to become a digital nomad selling online. But there are many more details to learn, from navigating international tax law to learning to compete on sites like Amazon and eBay. Here are a couple great resources to help you get started:

• Nomad List: Excellent site for deciding where to travel as a digital nomad, including info like living costs, friendliness to women and LGBTQ+ nomads, and most importantly, Wi-Fi!
• Threecolts Blog: Learn how to tackle the toughest challenges facing online sellers, like Amazon tax reporting and performing product research.

Once you’ve become a digital nomad, you’ll have the freedom to travel anywhere, work anywhere, and experience life in a way most people can only dream of.

Where will you go first?