For many people, the dream is to make money online. Luckily there are endless ways to make money online. Some strategies will earn you a few extra bucks when you need it, others can provide a steady monthly “bonus” to supplement your full-time income, and some can transform your finances and annual income.
It’s not necessarily hard to make money online, it just requires some discipline and strategy.
Here are some realistic ways to make money online, even while working full-time.
Start a blog
You’re here to learn about how to make money online, so I recommend you should explore ways to pursue both passive and active income. Many of the strategies to build a passive income online start with a blog. This can be done easily and for less than $3 per month with a WordPress site and website hosting through BlueHost. Creating the actual blog is relatively easy. The part that requires more work is growing your traffic and audience. However, once you have a list, there are literally endless opportunities to build a profitable blog.
Be sure to check out my post How to Build a Profitable Blog in 2020
Webinar training
Creating and publishing webinars is one way you can make massive amounts of amount of money online. You do need some sort of online presence, could be blog traffic or social media followers, and something to talk about. You could offer some mix of paid training, or free training with a product or service to upsell at the right time. Don’t worry about it in the beginning. There are standalone webinar platforms, but I recommend using YouTube or Facebook Live inside a Clickfunnels page.
Haven’t heard of Clickfunnels? Clickfunnels is a platform that helps entrepreneurs and businesses market, sell and distribute online products. The software essentially makes it completely painless to build high-converting sales funnels and compelling landing pages. This is literally the number 1 product I promote because it works, and helped me personally build and grow a six-figure online business. Check out this 14-Day Trial Here.
Become an affiliate
Affiliate marketing is the process of earning a referral commission for promoting a business/advertiser’s brand or product. Basically as an affiliate marketer you earn money for your marketing efforts to send traffic or help convert visitors to customers. There are tons of platforms to source new affiliate products. I personally prefer ClickBank and Maxbounty. There are also quite a few recurring commission affiliate programs to look into here:
The Ultimate List of Recurring Affiliate Programs
Clickfunnels always tops my list as I have had massive success with their affiliate program. To get started as a Clickfunnels affiliate I highly recommend joining the Clickfunnels Affiliate Bootcamp.
You may need an active blog and a certain blog traffic threshold to get approved in some cases. If you have an audience, affiliate marketing is one strategy for long-term, sustainable (and full-time) income.
Sell high ticket coaching
If you have a blog, odds are you are considered somewhat of an authority on….something. Sell high-ticket online coaching through your blog! You’ll need a sales funnel (another reason to check out ClickFunnels) and a a way to accept payment, but your efforts could be rewarded handsomely.
Create a membership site
If you have a blog, you can fairly easily create (via Clickfunnels, for example) a paid membership section on your site. In this section, you might post exclusive content including videos for paid members only.
Take online surveys to make money online
There are a ton of survey sites out there. My top picks are SurveyJunkie and Inbox Dollars but for the full rundown check out my post:
12 Legit Survey Sites that Pay
Sell coupons on Ebay
Are you constantly receiving coupons in your mail or email? Why not convert those to cash? You’ll have to create a listing on Ebay, and most often send the e-code once someone buys.
Fast cash loan
Boost your bank account with a small (or large) loan. Sometimes the situation calls for financial assistance. A cash advance is nothing be ashamed about and FastLoans.net is great at connecting people with cash advance loans that work for them.
Rakuten
If you’ve heard of Ebates cash back, Ebates is now Rakuten. All you have to do is install the cash back button on your browser to earn money for your online shopping from thousands of online retailers. You’ll need to visit your browser store to download the cash back button and download it. You will then see it appear in your browser bar. When you visit an e-commerce site that is a Rakuten partner, you will get a drop-down notification of cash back available at that store. You’ll need to activate Cash Back and carry on with your shopping. I’ve earned hundreds of dollars in the past year just for shopping online. Sign up here. Then can also refer a friend to get $25 bucks!
Resell Ikea products on Amazon and Ebay
I don’t know a single person that likes making the haul to Ikea, only to spend an hour in the warehouse maze looking for that desk lamp. There are several (smart and) enterprising entrepreneurs that sell Ikea products for a huge markup on Amazon and Ebay. Make sure your margins also cover any shipping costs! For instance, I just purchased this Ikea ottoman that is only available for pickup in store for over 60 bucks on Ebay.
To me, paying this markup is worth avoiding the hassle of Ikea. There is definitely a market for this. The seller’s margins on smaller household and kitchen products seem to be even better, so those products might be a better strategy to save on the overhead of storage and additional shipping costs.
Become a transcriber with SpeakWrite
This company will pay you as much as $15 per hour to transcribe information. Set your own schedule and make money online from home.
“Get paid to” sites to make money online
There are a bunch of these sites out there and the idea is that companies pay people for brand feedback in several ways: watch videos, take surveys, search the web, play games, and more. You complete the task, whatever that is, and get rewarded for your time and feedback. Inbox Dollars (free $5 bonus at sign-up) and Swagbucks are the two I’d recommend.
Design and sell products on Cafe Press
Cafe Press allows you to create digital designs for a unique product that may then be sold directly on their platform. When site visitors purchase your product, you receive a commission without all the hassle of logistics, storage of inventory, and customer care. If you have a great idea or an eye for graphic design, this is worth a look. You will simply come up with the design to have printed on a wide selection of products from mugs to t-shirts to frisbees.
Design and sell products on Threadless
Threadless is a similar alternative to Cafe Press. The difference here is is that designs are created and chosen (via public vote) by the online community. The advantage is that the exposure (by vote) could feasibly bring more sales if your design is approved.
Drive for Uber and/or Lyft
Leverage the app-economy to make some money on the side with flexible hours.
Create an online course
I suggested creating a webinar series, but there are also options to create and sell courses online using existing websites. Create an educational course on platforms like Udemy.
Become a clickworker
Clickworker.com or Amazon’s Mechanical Turk are both platforms where you can perform simple human-intelligence tasks (HIT) for a small fee. You can generate a small income online depending on the volume of HIT’s you are able to perform in your free time.
Write and publish and e-book
Did you know that literally anyone can write and self-publish a book these days? If you have a blog, you may want to consider simply formatting blog posts into chapters to convert to an ebook. The average self-published author makes around $1,000 per year, although it’s possible to gross more with the right strategy. Many internet marketers (including myself) using ebooks as a “lead magnet”, offering the book for free in exchange for contact info to market higher ticket products and services.
Sell your photos
If you are good with a camera, one idea is to turn your creative work into cash by selling your photography to leading stock photo sites online, like iStockphot and Shutterstock. You may want explore several hubs for stock photography beyond these leading sites as you will find there is greater degree of competition and it can be more difficult to get approved (with a lower commission rate). Alamy might be a good option as they offer a 60% commission rate for photographers and do not require exclusive rights to the photos. This means you can list your photos on other stock photo sites.
You will need to know or learn some technical signs to upload and optimize the photos, but from there you could have a nice passive income stream. Once you upload the photos, you will be required to assign metadata tags. Once someone purchases your photos, you will receive a royalty on the sale.
Babysit
Care.com and Bambino are two popular apps that you can join. If the NextDoor app is available in your neighborhood, that might be another good place to find families in need of care.
Review apps for cash
On Usertesting.com you can get paid for your feedback. You’ll have to sign up and watch a few intro videos to start earning as much as $10 per 20 minute video.
Deliver Food
DoorDash and UberEats are two of several (depending on where you live) food delivery services that will allow you to set your own schedule making food deliveries. Door Dashers earn an average of $15-$25 per hour.
Be a Pinterest Virtual Assistant
We already talked about becoming a virtual assistant, but how about more specifically a Pinterest virtual assistant. There are bloggers out there that are so focused on writing content that they have not even set up a Pinterest account. As a Pinterest VA, you will want to establish and grow their online presence by creating Pinterest images (create multiple for a single post!), join group boards, repin relevant content, schedule pins, and keyword optimize pin descriptions. Beginners Pinterest managers can charge somewhere in the range of 15-20/hour. I recommend coming up with a packaged service offering (play to your strengths!) and propose an hourly rate from there.
Become a freelancer
This is a bit of a broad category as there are freelance opportunities to be found in many different categories. The question is, what do you want to do and where do you find these opportunities. While I can’t answer the first question for you, I recommend checking out sites like Flexjobs as well as Upwork or Freelancer.com to see what’s out there and what looks interesting that aligns with your skills and experience.
Fiverr
Fiverr is another freelance site, although it’s typically a platform for more creative (sometimes odd) jobs all for five dollars. The difference is that just about anything goes on Fiverr. There are freelancers offering everything from blog design, to SEO services, to custom voiceover videos, to batman impersonation.
Buy and sell online businesses
If you know what you’re doing or think you have ID’ed a possibly clever (and available) website domain, Flippa is a site that allows you to buy and sell web domains for a profit. Of course, there are other options available like Deal Flow Brokerage. You can also buy and sell app and online businesses for a profit.
Become an FBA worker
If you have a product to sell or resell, one option is to leverage the Amazon platform. In exchange for eliminating the hassles of inventory management and shipping, you will pay Amazon a commission for your sales. You sell it, Amazon ships it.
Build rental property income
Now this idea requires some initial investment, but once you own some property you can make a significant amount of passive income. Many are even able to replace a 9-5 income solely with the revenue from rental properties! Keep in mind this will require a significant upfront financial investment so make sure to do your research.
Run a call center from home with LiveOps
Set your schedule, and work from home taking calls. You can expect to make around $10/hour with opportunity for bonuses (with commissions).
Sell on Craigslist
Craigslist deserves a place on this list, mainly because it’s been around for over ten years and it’s still a great place for people to buy and sell just about anything from old dishes, to handy-man services, to a spare room to make some extra cash.
Monetize your social media following
If you have a sizable social media following, Izea is the largest social media influencer marketplace. Using their platform you can connect with brands and sponsorship opportunities to share content in exchange for profits.
Become a writer for Listverse
Listverse is a site built on top 10 (or more). And they will pay you $100 for any accepted and published content. Your article must be a list (duh) and at least 1,500 words for consideration. Beyond that you can get really clever with your content ideas. As I write this post the front-page list is titled “10 Ways a Kitchen Can Hurt You More Than a Torture Chamber”.
Freelance writing for iWriter
Another option is iWriter that will pay you $15 for every accepted article. iWriter is far less strict than other sites, and will accept virtually any topic, and as many articles you would like.
Freelance writing for the Penny Hoarder
The Penny Hoarder offers an option to make some serious cash, as much as $800, depending on the volume of traffic or page views for your article. However, the pay starts at $100 for 50,000 so no guarantees unless your article generates sizable traffic.
Write about your travels
….and get paid $75 per accepted posted about your international experience. This site is more interested in your experience (and recounting your experience) than your actual writing skills.
Rate sites for Leap Force, now Appen
Appen offers flexible, home-based jobs including the opportunity to rate websites (used for search engine ranking). There are also flexible job options in linguistics/translation and microtasks. Pay can vary, but the average rate is at least $11 per hour.
Make money from home online as a travel agent
As a remote travel agent you will spend your working hours planning itineraries, flight plans, and activities for clients travelling around the world. You can find plenty of remote travel agent positions (or “travel agent consultants”) on sites like Indeed. Expect to make anywhere between $12.50 to $50 per hour.
Work from home as a medical transcriptionist
Most transcriptionists work for hospitals but are able to work from home. You will need to transcribe recorded medical dictation. You will mostly likely need to a complete a postsecondary medical transcriptionist program. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, medical transcriptionists often earn about $17 per hour (median, in 2016).
Make money online as a remote salesperson
If you have a high school degree (college degree preferred), you’re driven and ambitious there is a remote sales job out there for you. Large companies, especially web-based, hire a significant amount of remote salespeople. If you think you’re a fit, especially if you have any prior sales experience, look for remote sales jobs on sites like Indeed.
Become a graphic designer
If you are more of the creative type or you have experience in the graphic arts industry, why not take your work online? You will be in charge of creating virtual displays of graphics and images for published, printed, or digital media. You could be in charge of anything from designing logos to brand advertisements. Ideally candidates will also have experience in typography and design software will like Adobe Photoshop. Check out open positions on sites like ZipRecruiter or Indeed.
Online tutor
There are quite a few online tutor platforms, or you could always build your own tutor business on your blog! Build a flexible schedule of tutoring kids (or adults!) for 30 minutes to an hour. If you decide to go the freelance route or build your own business, you may want to consider marketing your services to local elementary schools or posting on sites such as NextDoor.
Remote Nurse
Do you have a nursing degree? Did you know that you can make on average $70,000 a year as a triage telephone nurse? Health insurers hire remote nurses for case management and patient education with complete flexibility of working from home. Check out listings on sites like MedicalJobsOnline.com.
How will you get started making money online?
Working from home is a major professional goal, even dream shared by many. Thanks to technology and the internet, it is a viable path for just about anyone these days! In particular blog platforms offer complete control of your schedule with endless monetization opportunities if you are willing to take the leap. Regardless, it is critical that you research, develop any necessary skills, and come up with a strategy that works for you.
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