Today I wanna tell you a little about how I accidentally grew an RV community by sharing my experience.
Back in 2013 my family decided to scrap the typical version of the American dream and hit the road in search of adventures. That meant we were going to sell off or donate our belongings, buy an RV, and then live and travel in it on a whim of some magical transformative adventure- as seen in my dreams…
Let me tell you, not only did our family think we were crazy, but so did most people we encountered on the road, even the ones who were doing their own version of the same crazy adventure!
We were young and full of dreams and we desperately wanted big adventures!
RV Life Was All That & More
Adventures can come in all shapes and sizes. And as you can imagine as a family of 6 we had all the adventures one could ever dream of both good and bad while traveling full-time in an RV! There were ups and downs, and all around, but overall it was an incredible experience that I wouldn’t have changed hardly anything about.
We traveled for 8+ years and went from East to West. We worked along the way both seasonally at random places and campgrounds we found in great destinations as well as did a ton of freelance work and then ultimately went remote and down the path of entrepreneurship.
It was a journey- see what I mean!
Live Camp Work Was Born
At some point early on, it was made very clear that while yes, people were living, traveling, and working on the road full-time- they were retired. We were the fish out of water in more ways than one…
But we saw this as a chance to embrace thinking outside the box and a fun test to see what exactly would come from the opportunity to ‘pioneer’ a space that was almost untouched.
I registered an EIN for Live Camp Work in 2013.
I started working on my book about how we made “work + camping” work and how other people regardless of age, could also do it in July of 2018.
So my website LiveCampWork.com was officially founded in 2018, during the launch of Book 1 Live Camp Work: A Beginners Guide to Workamping, in what is now a 2 part (and growing) series. The main goal was to stay connected to my book launch team with updates and general information that centered around the creation and editing of the book.
With a team of over 300 people, I decided to slowly incorporate additional posts on this starter blog, from my own personal experience and knowledge of the world of Workamping.
They seemed to really love the mix of personal experience and just really helpful insights- so I hoped the book would do well!
The Early Days
Trying to provide great information to as many people as possible, I offered my book for FREE to the members of an RV job board and ended up capturing thousands of readers through an opt-in for them to provide their email in exchange for an advanced reader copy.
This head start, in addition to offering a freebie inside the front cover of the final published book on Amazon was incredible at getting my new hobby buzz started!
I now had an audience, a published book, and an email list. I had a Facebook Group that was small but super targeted around working RVers. And I also had content on my website that was helping people find answers and real solutions.
And while this little starter site, would soon grow into a full-blown RV community with multiple income streams it wasn’t there yet! I was still working full-time and just blogging on the side.
Then everything changed when I was fired (read more about that here) and I found myself without an income stream and a very real need to make cash…
Growing An RV Community of Digital Nomads
Yep. So I was fired from my day job, which was pretty traumatic… but I did;t take long to sit and stew on the whole mess- I just jumped straight into pivot mode!
I knew I needed to replace my income and I knew I need to do it quickly. So I took an inventory of what I had that could make money- and first on my list was this little starter site!
It had a product, a website, and an email list of active users.
They had a very real need for information on how to work and travel- and now I did as well! So it was no longer just about sharing my experiences, it was about finding new ways to make money that would allow my family to continue to travel and have our big adventures…
I had a great idea.
I’ll host a virtual summit that’s focused on how to make money and travel!
GENIUS!
So I started putting together a plan on how I would get this virtual event planned, who would speak at it, and what we would cover.
The Make Money & RV Virtual Summit.
It was called The Make Money & RV Virtual Summit.
I planned it in less than 60 days with over 2 dozen speakers. Most of the sessions were interviews and everything was pre-recorded. I sold tickets for replay access and ended up making $10K in sales by the 1st day plus growing my email list by 5K registered attendees!
Once I saw the power of virtual summits (and virtual events in general) I was hooked!
From this point moving forward, Live Camp Work has continued to gain traction and grow to a community of over 20K Working RVers who need and want genuine information about income opportunities.
I feel super proud to say that I helped grow this community and produced multiple virtual events over the following 4 years! I focused on providing much need information and inspiration to fellow digital nomads, and I’ve created something that is at this point very sellable to the right buyer.
Stay tuned for my reasons for wanting to sell this brand and where I hope to see it go in the future!
