The Truth About Working for Free in the Travel Creator Industry

Don’t work for free 👇 Its honestly wild The travel creator industry is the only industry in the world where working for free is glorified and with no promise of future pay. I mean people sell entire ebooks and courses on how to work for free. So if you’ve shot a few collabs and want to start getting paid, here’s what you need to know… 1. Free collabs are not a real job. Yes they are a lot of work, time, and effort, but at the end of the day if you don’t get paid, you can’t claim that it’s a gig and you certainly can’t pay your bills. I’m a big proponent of working for free where it makes sense but not in the traditional exchange for a free room sense. Work for free when you can get assets, a case study, or connection to get a paid gig. 2. Having a large audience is not a requirement. Many of my creator clients have under 10k followers and guess what. It doesn’t matter because it’s not even relevant! It’s not about how many random people follow you on the internet. It’s about if you can get the client the results that grow their business. 3. If a company wanted to hire a big name photographer they already would have. There’s lots of reasons brands would hire a lesser known (but talented) creator including less expensive, less ego, more availability/care, etc. 4. Clients dont care about your gear. Unless there’s a specific platform requirement or brand guideline it doesn’t matter. I recently shot inserts with my a7siii for a commercial that was shot a red and the client didn’t notice a difference (they also saved on rental fees) Also a lot of my clients are wanting more phone stuff these days anyway. 5. Pretty content doesn’t get you on retainer. It *may* get you hired, but if you want to continue getting paid, you gotta produce results. I talk about all this stuff and more on my page so make sure to follow @nashhagen for more creative business tips. 🛑 P.S. I also made a video guide on how to get paid projects in the travel industry. If you want it comment “997” and I’ll shoot it over! Be blessed and stay stoked 😎🤙