Recommended Resources

Everything on this page I personally use and pay for.  I will never recommend anything that I don't think is valuable, the only thing I ask is if you're going to sign up for it anyways, please use my links so I can get credit for referring you. All links on my blog are affiliate links whenever possible.

If you want to learn more about how to start your own blog and make money as an affiliate by earnestly recommending products that genuinely work check out my course Income Boss. Keep this page bookmarked as I continuously update this page whenever I start using something different or better. Results obviously vary but these are the things I personally use.  =)

As people keep asking me what to do about health or travel insurance as a digital nomad, the first recommendation i'll make is for Safety Wing as too many nomads are risking their health and finances by traveling without insurance. 

Below are my personal recommendations.

 Section 1: Business

Save a ton of money starting your own online business by using my exclusive partner links on this page, including 20% off All plans on Shopify, for life which is included in this Discount PDF here. 

Learn: How I learned how to pick niches, find and get approved by suppliers, get visitors and make your first sale with Anton's Course.

Sign up for the eCommerce program and watch the Anton Method training course videos here: It works, and you can get 100% of your money back within 14 days for any reason.  This is the course I took that has helped me build a business that has completely replaced my normal 9-5 income.  It works and I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to learn how to build an online business even if you have no idea how to make a website, or what eCommerce or dropshipping is.

This is the course that paid me back 200x return on investment.  Highly recommended.

www.AntonMethod.com

What other's are saying:

Proud to see hard work starting to pay off... Thanks @johnnyfdk & Anton for helping me out and showing me how! pic.twitter.com/x88ZdW3MV8

— Adam Jacobson (@ajmichaelsmusic) May 7, 2015

Bonus: 

Sign up for Anton's course using my link above and get the  Jump Start Success course for free!

How to get the bonus: 

1. Use this link to sign up for Anton's course. (It'll be the same price as going through Dropship Lifestyle directly and you still qualify for any discounts or sales)

2. Check your email, you'll get access to Anton's main course first, then in a few days access to the forum, then a few days after that access to the Quick Start course in a thank you message with a unique coupon to join the quick start course for free. 

(If you somehow don't get access within a week of signing up, just message myself or Anton the email address you used to sign up and we'll get you access.)

Dropshipping from Aliexpress

Recently a lot of people have started dropshipping from Aliexpress on Shopify as it's very easy to find products, you don't need to get approved by suppliers, and it works worldwide. I still prefer Anton's method of dropshipping if you're American, Canadian, Australian or from most parts of Europe as it's starting a real business that you can sell down the road. But for many dropshipping from Aliexpress through China is a good option to start right away.

If you want to learn how to dropship on Aliexpress, sign up for the free webinar training class presented by Shopify here. 

You'll want to save the following links to use as well:

1. 20% off Shopify Plans

2. 3 Free Months of Oberlo Standard Plans

Dropshipping on eBay

Even though Anton's course is overall a much better business model, especially if you are a citizen of the U.S., Canada, Australia, or most of Europe (especially Sweden, Norway, Holland, etc) for people who are citizens of countries in places Africa (including SA), Central/South America, Asia and India, or if you are just on a budget and want to learn how to start making money online without a big commitment, I would sign up for David Dang Vu's eBay Dropshipping course and follow it exactly as he teaches.

If you want to know more about the process and listen to David talk openly about the pros and cons of dropshipping on eBay, here's a review of his course. But I've met over 20 people in person who are making over $700 a month with his course so I know it works.

Join David Dang Vu's Dropshipping on eBay Course

Shopify for eCommerce:

Create: Sign up for the free trial of Shopify using my link! Shopify has recently ended all coupons and promos so the 20% no longer applies, but go ahead and make your account at Shopify.com/johnnyfd if you want to start an online store and they really are the best ecommerce host out there.

Use coupon at shopify.com/johnnyfd

Download the PDF:

Get all of my favorite resources and what I personally use to start and run my dropshipping stores in one easy to follow PDF guide, best of all, it's free!

Download the Dropshipping Discounts PDF 

Virtual Phone Number:

You can start with using Google Voice which is free, or you can try using a Skype number, although the call quality for Skype isn't very good.  But if you're ready to get a toll free number or want to have separate numbers for each of your websites like I do, I would check out $100 Free Credit with Grasshopper which is one of the services I use.

Why I use AWeber for my Email Lists:

I started with Mad Mimi because it was easier to use than Mail Chimp but now pay for AWeber because they have a great autoresponder built in and it's what the pros use.  But either way, you can use either one and simply transfer the contacts when you're ready.

Start Your Free Trial Today

Great, Easy to use Free Option

Website Hosting:

For this blog I use Blogger which is Google's free service, it's easy to use, easy to setup and requires no software or updates. The downsides are you don't actually own the website and are at the mercy Google's ever changing terms of service as well as a ton of other downsides.

For Travel Like a Boss Podcast I use Weebly which is a drag and drop website builder just like Squarespace. I've overall been very happy with them but my site is often down, and there are tons of limitations, I'd honestly switch to Wordpress if it wasn't such a hassle to transfer the content.

If you are going to use Wordpress or any other hosting, I would recommend using SiteGround  over the commonly recommended Bluehost. They both are cheap and give you free domain names which are awesome, but Siteground has better customer service as they are smaller, and they have automatic wordpress updates which makes your life a ton easier.

Here are my thoughts on SiteGround:

Why I recommend SiteGround over Bluehost

This is the service I use to hire my Virtual Assistants:

Ever since reading the 4-hour Workweek I've wanted to hire a VA, but never really had a reason to. Now that I've actually running real businesses online and can afford to pay someone to do data entry, accounting, fulfill orders, and send out shipping tracking info, I used OnlineJobs.ph to hire an English speaking VA.

Update: I no longer recomend OnlineJobs.ph, they used to be great, but as of 2017 their service and the quality of their VAs suck. I'll update this spot as soon as I find something better. Let me know in the comments if you know of one you've personally tried. 

I chose to hire a Filipino assistant verses one from another country because of their high levels of education, English comprehension and low pay.

This is the VPN I use when Traveling:

I tried the free ones but they all suck.  Just sign up for the lowest priced option of Witopia and use it to make your computer think you are back in the US so you can use Netflix, do your niche selection research, make sure your ads are running correctly, and secure your connection if you're on public shared wifi.  

Use this link to save 15% on any VPN 

This is the company I used to form my LLC:

You can start your dropshipping business or any online business by using your own social security number or getting an EIN as a sole proprietorship but eventually you'll want to start an LLC to protect your assets, especially when you start making a lot of money.

It's also good for people who are not US Citizens but want to sell in America and for people like me in California who don't want to have to charge California customers sales tax. Choose either Wyoming or Delaware and get a Tax Exemption Certificate if you're dropshipping. I chose WY.

Use this link and use coupon code JOHNNYFD0924

Optimize and setup your store for more customers and more sales:

The video course on how to optimize your eCommerce store to make more sales, step by step tutorials.

Increase your customer trust:

Increase your conversion rates with added trust, includes a 60 day double your money back guarantee if your sales don't increase after installing.

Free Trial of Trust Guard

See what your customers see:

Figure out what the heck your customers are doing when they come to your site, what they are looking at, and why they aren't buying. Sign up for inspectlet for free and start seeing how your visitors interact on your website!

Retarget Customers for Pennies:

Instead of waiting for customers to click your expensive google ads again, why not retarget only people who have visited your site wherever they go?  This is great for facebook and web retargeting and is the company that I personally use.

Get a free trial and $100 in free credit to get started

Barclay Arrival Rewards Card:

I used to use the Capital One Venture Card which has a similar rewards structure, purchase eraser for travel and actually has better customer service and online bill pay interface than Barclay.  However, Barclay currently gives 10% extra when you redeem so it's a no brainer as that'll save me hundreds of dollars more a year on airfare and travel.

Update: It looks like Barclay changed their card recently to Arrival+ instead of just Arrival.  The only difference so far is the added security chip feature, but if you sign up make sure you get the following 

• 40,000 Bonus miles if spending $3k in the first 3 months
• 2x Reward Miles
• 10% Back on Redemption Miles
• $89 Annual Fee Waived the First Year.

Section 2: Motivation

Listen to weekly interviews with entrepreneurs who I've personally met while traveling.  

TravelLikeaBossPodcast.com

Read the book that started it all for me.  Tim Ferris made the digital nomad movement snowball and thousands of unhappy workers quit their jobs to move aboard and start a location independent life.

4-Hour Workweek on Amazon

Read my book living the 4-hour workweek in Thailand.  This is the story of how I quit my job, figured out how to live cheaply and pursue my passions and discover new hobbies while living the good life on the cheap.

In the second book find out how fast life can change if you follow the simple 7 steps to setting goals and getting everything you've ever wanted out of life.

Book a hotel room and plan ahead.  I've been using Agoda to book all my hotels and have found that they constantly have the best rates and lowest prices.  I've even used Agoda to book hotels in the lobby on my laptop as the Agoda rate was often cheaper than the walk in rate.

Agoda.com Discount

Section 3: Diet and Health

I really believe that getting my diet and health in order has given me the energy, strength and mental clarity to keep motivated, explore the world and spend hours in front of the laptop to work on my online businesses.  The  easiest book to follow is Mark Sisson's Primal Blueprint which is a good intro to the Paleo lifestyle and diet.

21 day Total Body Transformation Diet

If you just want a summary of Mark's 21 day diet, you can find it here but I highly recommend just paying the $12 for the book as it explains the diet in more detail and whenever you actually buy something, you are taking the first step in commitment.  

It took me almost two years after reading about the Paleo diet to actually apply it correctly.  The version of paleo that finally worked for me is by Dave Asprey and is called the Bulletproof diet.  The reason why I recommend the bulletproof diet is because it's the "ideal" diet that I strive for, even though most of the time, it just involves having Bulletproof coffee and adding grass-fed butter and other healthy fats into my diet to keep myself sane while dieting.

Bulletproof Diet Book by Dave Asprey

To truly know 100% how your new high fat diet is working for you and to conquer any fears you have about your cholesterol, I recommend getting blood tests before you get on the diet so you know your baseline, and then every 6 months afterwards so you can track your results. 

I use Dr. Alexis Shields both when I'm in the U.S. as well as traveling internationally as she can order you blood tests from anywhere in the world, and if you're in the U.S. her cash discount through LabCorp is actually less expensive than what you would pay through your co-pay even with insurance.  Best of all, she will Skype with you and go over your results, talk about your diet, lifestyle, exercise habits, and really go into detail for up to an hour over Skype instead of the quick 10 minutes you normally get with a doctor.  

Schedule at: DrAlexisShields.com

As for fitness, what has worked best for me is finding a good Crossfit gym with coaches that focus on mobility, functional movement and proper form and technique rather than weight and hitting new numbers and records.  Go for an intro course and do the fundamentals classes before committing.  

Aside from CrossFit, the best workout anyone can do is to a program such as Stronglifts 5x5 which is a full body compound exercise program consisting of Squats, Deadlifts, Bench, Overhead Press and Barbell Rows.  Don't know how to do those correctly?   Hire a personal trainer and have them watch you for the first few weeks to make sure you are doing your form correctly.  

I highly recommend the Stronglifts 5x5 program for people looking to build a base of strength.

StrongLifts.com

Download the Stronglifts App for free in the App Store.

I know this is a bit random, but I've been wearing Luna sandals for over four years now and can't live without them. They're a bit pricy but trust me, they're worth it. If you travel you need a pair of good sandals. These are super lightweight, supportive and are way better for your health than flip flops plus you can hike and run in them.

Edit: As of 2017 Luna has discounted making sandals with elastic backs which makes me no longer able to recommend them as the new 2.0 versions aren't as comfortable, minimal or easy to put on or take off. =(

Discounted. =(

Section 4: Productivity

My favorite app which is actually a Chrome extension for the google Chrome browser is called Momentum.  It replaces the blank new tab page, with the background of the day, an inspirational quote, your todo list, and a focus of the day which you can fill out.  It's beautiful, and it's free.

Get Momentum here

My other favorite app are simple timers that I have set to pop up and lock my screen every half an hour so I am forced to take a 1 minute break.  During that minute I stand up, walk outside to get some air, do some pushups and/or air squats, get some water,  stretch,  and refocus.  The best thing is even though it seems like it is a bother, it increases my productivity.  I never would have finished writing either of my books it wasn't for these apps, best of all, they are free.

Time Out Free for Mac

For PC and Windows

Section 5: Keep in touch

You can find me on at:

facebook.com/JohnnyFDK

twitter.com/JohnnyFDK

instagram.com/JohnnyFDK

Best of luck to everyone, I've given you the tools above that worked for me, now its your turn to take the reins and go after your dream.

Johnny FD