1- Website Building
If the internet is a country, then websites are like real estates. I’m hoping by now you have a general understanding that real estates are valuable in the physical world – digital real estates work the same way. By building a website, you’re creating your own plot of online “land.”You can fill this land with whatever you want, but you have to promote it through social media (and anywhere else you can think of) for this to be successful. When you build traffic to your land, you can sell people whatever you have to offer. In order to build a website, you need a host (GoDaddy), a template (WordPress), and content.The first two parts are easy to find, and content is only as difficult as you make it. You can post blogs, items for sale, pictures, videos, or whatever you want. Opening up your own website gives you the potential to make money from the avenues I’m going to mention.
2- Google Adsense
If that sounds like too much technical information for you, there is an easy button – Google’s advertising platform is as simple as signing up, enabling (on Blogger) or pasting a small code on your website, and allowing the advertisements to automatically roll in. The problem with this program is that you don’t get any commissions – and you don’t get to control the ad content. This is useful for some, but powerful users will want something a little more robust.
3- Company Referral Programs
Speaking of the benefits of permanent ads, banners and links aren’t the only ways to earn a little bit of dough off your online endeavors. By having a website, you gain the power of emailing companies to ask them for things. I have no shame in letting the yoga company whose mat I’m looking into purchasing know that I have a blog and write for yoga publications – it sometimes gets me discounts.Other times, I gain a valuable business contact in PR, advertising, or other aspects of corporate sales. Sometimes I just get a free drink. Either way, money in and of itself is worthless. Ditch the middle man and use the internet to barter what you have and can do for what you need.
4- Upwork
Where Indeed excels at finding job postings across the web and acting as a search crawler for employment, maybe a full-fledged career is too big of a commitment at this point in your life. Elance is a site to find freelance work of all types. I’ve used it for quick writing, editing, copywriting, resume building, and other odd jobs and temp gigs. The experience has been great. Elance offers a wide array of technical, data entry, accounting, and other freelance and temp gigs. If you’re just looking for something short and sweet, log in, input and showcase your marketable skills, and begin searching through their job database, using any parameters you desire. Once you submit a bid, you’ll receive an acceptance or denial – you may get a few rejections, but don’t sweat it. Negotiate the terms of your bid, and get to work. You have money to make.
5- Blogging
I make the bulk of my money from blogging. In addition to the advertising revenue streams mentioned above, I also receive flat rate payments for blogging from various blogs throughout the web. I’m paid to write as a whistleblower, financial analyst, reviewer, commentator, and more. Writing for other sites builds traffic to my personal blog. The traffic for this blog gives me clout to present to advertisers.To create your own blog, you don’t even need a web domain. You can start a completely free blog on either WordPress or Blogger. Each of these sites has its ups and downs, but you can’t beat the price. You generally want to keep blog posts between 150-500 words until you have a few dozen under your belt. Links between your blog posts encourage people to stay on your blog once they find it, increasing traffic. Once your blog is up, promote it on social media for the greatest effect.
6- Social Media
No matter what you do to make money online, promote it on your social media accounts. You have a base of people who are already interested in you and have a vested interest in your brand – why would you not want to take advantage of that? By promoting yourself and your projects on your social media accounts, you’re greatly increasing the chances of people actually giving you money in exchange for your goods and services. Stop being shy and get out there.
7- Selling Stuff on eBay
Most of you are familiar with eBay and its concept. There is a big opportunity to make money by becoming part of the eBay seller community. Start selling unused things that you already have around your home. Check your room and look for things you no longer need or wear or perhaps have never even used. So, gather your goods, create a profile on eBay, start selling, and earn a handsome sum of income.
8- Selling Handmade Goods
Earlier, we talked about using sites like eBay to sell stuff that you don’t need. You can also build your own website or use third party online platforms which are dedicated to connect artists with customers who treasure and want to buy their goods.You can sell some traditional crafts like knitting, needlework, crochet, painting or sculpting and also advertise woodwork, glass-work, metalwork and anything else you’re capable of making at home.If you are running a small home-based operation then creating a site might be the best way to earn extra money. For many people, hosting and managing an entire website might be a full-time job by itself.
9- Freelancing
If you work from your own home most of the time; you can start doing freelancing which is similar in some ways to blogging. Some fields where freelancing is common include: journalism, publishing, screenwriting, photojournalism, , event management, copy editing, web design, graphic design, website development, consulting, video editing, and translating. If you’re passionate about writing on different topics like technology, travel or food, a freelancing job can provide you a good income.
10- Mturk
If you’ve heard of crowdsourcing (and even if you haven’t), Amazon’s Mechanical Turk program is a great place to get involved. Much like at Elance, you input your info and skills. You then are able to search for different menial tasks ranging from identifying inappropriate web content to transcribing audio recordings to basic data entry work.Just like at any other job, the more work you do, and the better your quality, the more opportunities you’ll have to make money. The payouts are often small, and your payment is received in Amazon credit, but Mturk is a great place to make mindless money while veg’ing on the couch watching TV.
Excellent write!
very interesting