10 proven ideas to earn money online
Every time they ask me what I do for a living, and I answer that I have a niche blog, or a website, the first thing they ask me is if it is possible to make money online.
The short answer is that yes, it is possible to earn money online, and the aim of this article is to explain how to earn money online .
The options that you will find on the web are very varied, in fact, if you search Google for how to make money online, you will find hundreds of articles that explain how to achieve it.
How is this article different from the rest?
On the one hand, I will share with you those ideas that have worked for me in my process and I will tell you about my personal experience.
Additionally, I will share other options to earn money online that we have investigated, since although we like those that we use a lot, we cannot deny that there are other very interesting alternatives that we wanted to include in this list.
Let's make something clear before we start:
The vast majority of people assume that making money online is fast, fairly, and easy. They even get the idea that all they have to do is create a blog from scratch , and start earning income overnight.
The reality is very different, to earn money online you will have to work intelligently, try new things, learn constantly, and dedicate yourself, as you would with any job, so that it begins to bear fruit.
Once this is clear, you will have the right mindset to explore all the benefits that the web offers you.
To begin with, these ideas to earn money online do not depend on where you live, your age or profession, nor does it matter where your customers are since your products become available 24 hours a day, and best of all, you only need two things to start:
- A computer
- An Internet connection.
Ideas to earn money online:
As you will realize, the investment for these businesses from home is minimal, since you really do not need to have a lot of money to access them.
Additionally, it is not necessary for you to quit your current job and dedicate yourself full time to developing this idea, since these give you the freedom to work on them during your free time.
So you can keep your job, and therefore your income, until you can make the leap and become one of those people who know how to make money online, no matter where they are in the world.
1. Make money with a niche website
There are many ways to generate income with a blog, and Starting Stories is proof of it.
If you are interested in starting to earn money online with a blog , I have created an online course that teaches you the methodology to achieve it from scratch.
Before sharing the methods you have to earn money online, I want to make you a very special invitation.
How to start a blog on the Internet?
The first thing you should do is choose your web domain, choose a hosting plan that suits your needs and start generating content.
To be honest, making money with a blog is not something that happens overnight; Although creating a page is relatively easy (with services like Bluehost or Hostinger , which can be done in a matter of minutes), the key is the perseverance and dedication that you put into your digital project.
Now, when you manage to break the inertia, you start to get traffic, you understand about organic positioning and you have your subscriber base, that's when the magic begins to happen.
Below I explain some methods to monetize a website, if you want to know more about each option, you can review this article on how to make money with a blog .
Methods to earn money online with your blog:
Here are some alternatives to earn money with your blog.
Google Adsense:
Google Adsense is perhaps one of the alternatives most used by bloggers to monetize their websites. This belongs to Google and is responsible for connecting advertisers with your website.
There are a number of variables that you must take into account to estimate how much money you can earn with Adsense.
Keyword planner: This service offered by Google Adwords allows you to calculate how much money is paid, on average, for an ad on a specific topic. Additionally, it tells you an estimate of monthly searches.
Here is an example of the keyword “Baking Cookies”
To estimate how much money you can earn with Adsense on your blog you must take into account three elements:
The theme of your blog: In this case of Baking Cookies, it would be a food blog, with healthy, varied recipes, which has a good cost per click that starts at 2 USD (9,923 Colombian pesos).
Blog traffic:
The second factor that determines the amount of income is the number of visitors your website receives in a month. For this example, let's say you have 10,000 monthly visits to your blog.
The click-through rate (CTR) of your blog: This indicator shows us how many people, or what percentage of your visitors click on the ads on your website. Let's say you have a 2% CTR, which is two ad clicks for every 100 page views.
How much money would you earn in a month in this example of Baking Cookies?
Revenue calculation = 10,000 monthly visits X 1.20 USD (2 USD – the percentage that Google keeps) X 2% = 240 dollars.
As you can see, for this alternative to be interesting you must have a very good number of monthly visits, and have a blog whose theme has a good cost per click.
Now, as you can see, Google keeps a good portion of the income, since they facilitate the whole process, you don't have to connect with advertisers, manage charges, or define the ads that appear on your site.
If you're willing to do this work, you can sell ad space directly to advertisers, set a cost per click, and send them link reports so they can pay you.
Promoted content:
This advertising model consists of creating content, whether in the form of articles, videos or images that seek to promote a brand, or a characteristic of it.
This model is quite famous worldwide and is used by large media such as the New York Times, Buzzfeed, among others.
This is an example of the New York Times, where the advertiser Netflix paid him to do an investigation of the current situation of women prisoners in the United States, in order to promote the launch of a new season of his series Orange is the New Black .
Even due to the legislation in the United States, the medium must indicate if it is sponsored content, as it does in the URL and in the content (see the red boxes in the image).
If you want to earn money online by creating sponsored content, you can sign up for platforms that connect you with advertisers interested in posting content on your blog. Here are some:
Other ways to make money with a blog:
When you position yourself on the web as an expert, or someone who is proficient in a specific subject, you can offer services around your knowledge.
You can offer personalized advice, which you can do through Skype and Hangout. Here's an example:
Another alternative is seminars and events, thanks to the creation of so many tools to offer digital events, or webinars, you can monetize your knowledge, and even invite other experts, to create robust events around a theme.
2. Affiliate Marketing, a 6-figure business
Recently, in an entrepreneurship talk, I asked the attendees if they believed that it was possible to earn amounts that exceed 6 figures online, that is, to invoice at least 100,000 dollars in a year.
You think it's possible? I tell you that today there are blogs and people who not only know how to make money online, but are building online business ideas that bill hundreds of thousands, and even millions of dollars a year.
Here's the example of Patt Flynn, whose Smart Passive Income blog made more than $2 million in 2017, primarily through Affiliate Marketing.
Personally, we use several affiliate programs at Entrepreneurship, which leave us commissions for each sale, lead or conversion that is generated on the merchant site.
However, before telling you about the affiliate marketing programs that you can use to earn money online , I first want to explain what it is and where you can learn in depth about the subject.
Affiliate Marketing consists of selling a product belonging to a third person and taking a commission for it. It is something like the work of commercial 2.0.
If you want to learn more about the subject, there are several programs that explain how to create automatic systems, which includes courses, videos, guides, and training to start billing thousands of dollars a month.
Most recognized affiliate programs on the Internet:
Below we will share some of the programs with which you can earn money online by recommending third-party products.
One of the most famous is the Amazon Affiliate program .
In our case, we use the affiliate program to recommend books to our community that we feel add value.
For every book sale on Amazon, we receive a commission. If you want to learn more about this program, we have created an Amazon Associates guide . For example:
Recommended books:
ClickBank
.
nother of the most famous and used affiliate networks is ClickBank . Here are some of its advantages:
- Wide variety of products, both physical and digital.
- Their commissions are quite attractive, you could earn up to 70% commission with a large number of products.
- Payments are relatively fast (every month the payment is sent) and,
- You can receive your commissions through Payoneer anywhere in the world.
Other Affiliate Marketing networks that work very well, and that you could explore to find products to recommend and earn money online are:
3. Paid surveys
You are probably thinking, “yet another site that recommends these surveys” .
Do paid surveys work ? Can you make money online with them?
Let's get one thing straight: The problem with surveys, just like other methods of making money online, is that fraud and scams have sprung up around them.
What you should know is that companies need to do market research to evaluate and test their products or services, and thanks to the appearance of the internet, paid surveys have become a powerful tool to achieve this.
So, as long as you use reliable platforms that have a track record and have a good reputation, it is possible to earn money online with surveys .
Pages to earn money online with surveys:
To start you must register on the following pages, usually you receive an email where they ask you to confirm that it is you, and then you start receiving surveys.
These pages are not exclusive, that is, you can subscribe to all of them and earn more money depending on the number of surveys you fill out. The most important thing is that you subscribe in your country of residence, otherwise the page will not work for you.
Here is a list of platforms to get you started:
– Lifepoints
– Toluna
– Opinion
– Surveytime
– Ysense
4. Offer your services as an independent worker or freelancer
Thanks to globalization and the internet, today there is a wide range of online jobs that you can do from anywhere on the planet.
Where can you offer these services?
There are a good number of pages where you can offer your services as a freelancer. Some of the most prominent are:
These types of platforms open the doors to new opportunities and clients around the world, to which you would not have access otherwise and that can help you earn extra money.
To start, here I explain the steps to become self-employed .
Here are some jobs you can do from home to earn money online working for third parties.
Write articles on request:
People who find it easy to write, especially journalists and people involved in social communication, have a very good opportunity to earn money.
Content has become a fundamental pillar of the internet, so many possibilities have been opened up for independent workers who know how to write.
We have created a guide with four simple steps explaining how to make money writing ; It does not matter if it is for a personal blog or selling articles for companies.
In the event that you master English, there are several pages that pay you up to 100 dollars for writing articles in this language. Here are two sites you can explore:
Listverse : This platform pays you $100 per approved article. The content must be a list of 10 points, at least 1,500 words.
Matador Network: This platform pays you up to $60 for each approved article. The most common payments are between 20 and 25 dollars and there is no minimum number of words. It just can't be more than 1,500 words.
You should know that the internet has changed the way of writing, and it is key that you learn not only to create content optimized for the internet, but also how to get your first clients, how to present articles and know how to add value to those who buy your content.
LINK: HOW TO GENERATE INCOME WRITING
Become a virtual assistant:
The work as a virtual assistant covers different functions that depend on what your client requires. Your activities can range from answering emails and scheduling agendas, to creating articles, making calls and managing clients.
The attractive thing about this way of making money online is that, to learn how to be a virtual assistant , you do not require extensive prior knowledge or experience.
Of course, it is vital that you learn how to attract new clients, know the tricks to differentiate yourself from the competition and offer added value to the companies that hire you.
In addition, working as a virtual assistant is quite flexible and adapts to your commitments, so you can work in parallel for various companies or entrepreneurs, and thus increase your income .
If you are interested in turning your skills, experience and knowledge into a career as a virtual assistant, we leave you a course to learn how to achieve it.
This course also includes notions to manage your online identity as a personal brand, position yourself on the Internet as a professional in virtual assistance and how to find your clients, all explained step by step and from scratch.
Transcribe audio:
If you are fast with the keyboard, then audio transcription will be a good idea to earn money online. At Atexto you can receive up to €315 per month for transcribing one hour of audio per day, from Monday to Friday.
However, it is very important that you take care of your spelling because the transcriptions should not have errors.
In addition, you must comply with the transcription guidelines that are detailed on the page so that points are not deducted or money is deducted from your payment.
Translate articles and content on the web:
If you speak two languages, be it Spanish together with English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Chinese, or any other language, you can offer your translation services and earn money online.
This service has become an interesting source of income for those who learn how to get clients, know the most important aspects of the business, and understand what clients are looking for through translations.
5. Sale of products and services over the InternetThere is a wide variety of products and services that you can offer on the Internet.
In Undertaking Stories we sell, for example, our ebook about personal finance that we mentioned earlier.
In the event that you have a blog you can sell physical or digital products depending on the theme of your website; for example you can create books, courses, mugs , or any product that you see that fits with your community.
If you want to sell your products online, the most natural thing would be for you to have an online store. Today there are very robust tools like Shopify , which allow you to create online stores in a matter of minutes.
As we have seen that this is a topic of interest to our community, we created a guide where we explain how to create an online store in a few steps.
So what can you sell online and how to do it? Here are some ideas to start earning money online.
Write and sell books:
If you find writing easy, have good spelling, and have the ability to connect with people who read you, you can learn to write and sell an ebook and start making money online.
Although there is a saturation of the market with so much offer of digital books, the key is to create valuable content that meets an objective, or that helps your audience in some way.
What should you look for with your book? Teach something, solve a problem or make life much easier for those who read you. The power of word of mouth and the spread of social networks will help you make sales very interesting.
One of the advantages of ebooks is that you have to do the work only once, that is, the work of sitting down to write it, edit it and publish it is done once, and from then on, you must dedicate yourself to promoting it in your communities.
Where can you sell your ebooks?
In addition to having it published on your website, you can use these five complementary platforms to sell your books and get exposure to a much larger audience.
The appeal of selling books online is that it is one of those businesses that requires little investment and the barriers to entry are minimal. However, this does not mean that it is easy, since you need to spend time writing and promoting it.
Sell audiobooks:
Like ebooks, audiobooks have been growing in popularity due to the ease of listening to them, the new platforms available and their prices that have become very accessible.
An example of this is Amazon's Audiable program , which gives you a free 30-day trial to listen to two audiobooks of your choice.
This shows that people have much wider access to this type of material, so if you like to narrate stories, tales or novels, you can create your own audiobook and sell it through different digital platforms.
Sell your photographs in image banks:
On the internet there are many image banks that, in exchange for a small fee or under the royalty business model , allow you to upload your photos to their libraries so that their users buy them and you receive a commission. Among the most popular image banks are ShutterStock , iStock , and Depositphotos .
Sell your crafts:
If you like to create arts and crafts, you can sell your products and earn money online. It's totally free to open an Etsy shop , just create your account, take good quality photos of your products, and start selling.
The costs are variable and depend on your sales, they usually charge you 3.5% for each sale plus a fixed cost for displaying your products. As for payment, there are several alternatives including Paypal.
Unlike the face-to-face or Etsyphysical sale of your products, when you sell through this type of virtual store, you have access to customers around the world, you do not need to be present to generate a sale and you can develop business relationships beyond your city.
This idea represents a very good opportunity if you are looking for jobs from home that make your life easier.
Purchase and sale of web domains:
Buying and selling domains is one of the most common practices to earn money online .
What does this idea consist of? Basically a person can buy a domain cheaply, make it have special added value, and then sell it for a higher price.
To measure the size of this business, here is a list of the 20 most expensive domains that have been sold.
You must bear in mind that it is a complicated and expensive process to carry out, since contacts and a lot of time are needed to correctly position a domain.
If you want to start this online business you can use platforms like Sedo and Whois .
Sale of used products:
Do you have your university or school books stored in a closet? Normally when we finish the year of study we usually put away the books that we will no longer use in the future.
A practical way to make money online is to sell these used books to people who will need them next year and who are interested in paying less for the book you already used.
You can use Amazon that gives you gift cards in exchange for your books and other products, or search for customers through OLX, Mercado Libre and social networks.
Now, not only can you sell your books, you can also offer clothing, accessories, appliances, technological devices, among others. This is also an invitation for you to stop accumulating things and opt for a minimalist lifestyle .
Dropshipping, sell without inventories:
Dropshipping is a practice that consists of selling products without having inventory to earn money online. The person works as an intermediary between the client and the seller, who sends the purchase directly.
The principle of Dropshipping is simple. It is about opening an e-commerce store in Shopify , WooCommerce, Wix or PrestaShop, for example, where people will get various products of their interest.
Here is a guide for you to understand and start making money with Dropshipping .
Salehhoo:
If you want to start this business you can check out Salehoo , one of the best platforms to start your dropshipping business. It is basically a supplier directory that allows you to find suppliers, prices and online stores in a matter of minutes.
It can even tell you the profit margins, comparing your suppliers and other useful information to start importing from China.
Some of the platforms to start in this business are (dropshipper):
- aliexpress,
- DHgate,
- SheInside,
- Tmart,
- DealExtreme,
- MiniInTheBox,
- bigbuy,
- BangGood.
The good thing about this idea to earn money online is that you can dropship from practically any country; It's easy to start, requires little investment and expense, is run from anywhere, and you can sell any type of product you want.
6. Create online courses and monetize your knowledge
Another very good idea to earn money online is online courses .
Nowadays people are looking to deepen their knowledge, learn new skills or develop a hobby, and with the ease of access to knowledge, online courses have become a very good option.
With tools like Skype, Google Hangouts or FaceTime, you can offer your personalized classes to students around the world.
You can even explore platforms like Superprof to offer your services.
Now, the other option you have is to create an online course and sell it on educational platforms like Udemy , where you access more than 30 million students in more than 190 countries in the world.
Depending on the price of the course, the type of client that comes to the platform and if there are promotions, the commission charged by Udemy may vary. Here you can review their instructor payment policies .
7. Create a YouTube channel and generate income
YouTube is one of the fastest growing platforms both in users and in people who generate income there. And this is largely due to the consumption of videos by online users.
Before explaining how the platform works, you should review the income policies since to start earning money online with YouTube, you must meet certain parameters and numbers.
This platform also works with Google Adsense, and the income will depend on the number of visits you have and the number of subscribers.
Some channels sell advertising directly to brands; many times using the products in the videos, or making them part of the natural environment of the video.
This option is quite good since you will avoid intermediaries, so the money derived from advertising is almost full for the user.
To give you an idea of the income that can be generated on YouTube, the CNBC medium revealed that the top 10 youtubers generated more than 180 million dollars in income during 2018.
And just to surprise you, 8-year-old Ryan ToysReview has the highest-grossing channel with a total of $22 million in 2018.
8. Podcasts, the new wave of content
Podcasts are audio recordings that can be downloaded from the Internet, or listened to on certain platforms such as iTunes, iVoox, Stitcher, Spreaker, AllPodcasts, Spotify, among others.
Currently podcasts also include videos, but their original concept is that they are audio recordings on various topics, distributed in different episodes.
It's like having a radio program saved on your smart device, and being such a popular format, it is being used to earn money online.
To start making money online with podcasts, you must create interesting content that attracts the attention of your users and manages to capture a good subscriber base.
Once you learn how to make a podcast , you can monetize it in several ways:
- You can offer them your own products or services.
- Using affiliate marketing to recommend third-party products
- Sell advertising so that brands have mentions or exposure in front of your subscribers.
- Finally, you can charge a small fee to your subscribers to receive your podcasts.
To finish, I would like to share the different options you have to earn money online through social networks.
There are several quite profitable alternatives to earn money with Facebook and other networks, if you manage it well while investing in the different channels.
Manage social networks for third parties:
If you like social networks, are an expert in the digital world or have taken digital marketing courses , you could create a digital-based business where you manage the social networks of other people or businesses.
Due to the boom that social networks are taking, and the importance of digital presence for the growth of companies, this has become a great business opportunity that does not require a considerable investment.
To start this business you can offer plans to your clients where you charge for the number of published pieces, number of followers gained or handling of complaints and claims.
Another alternative is to charge a fixed fee or monthly payment for developing certain key activities for the business. These activities will depend on the client's objectives and must be defined jointly.
How to get your first clients:
To get your first clients you can post an offer on the aforementioned freelance platforms.
Another faster way would be to work with people you already know and are interested in creating a personal brand, or small businesses in your city that do not have a digital presence.
Visit several of the businesses that are close to your home and check if they have communities on social networks; If you don't find them, you could offer your services and if they do, explore what improvements you could implement with these networks to increase their sales or customer numbers.
Remember that the key is to offer a service, through social networks, that allows your client to earn more money, obtain higher profits, or reduce their costs.
Become an influencer:
Thanks to the rise of Instagram, a new and very profitable way to earn money from home has appeared: become an influencer for different brands.
This work consists of advertising company products in exchange for financial remuneration or, in exchange for products from the same company.
The important thing here is to promote products that you agree with, since promoting anything simply to make money will make your audience stop trusting you.
So to begin with, the most important thing to learn how to get followers on Instagram is to be original, develop a style and start building an audience that is attractive to brands.
Many people think that being an influencer is an "easy" way to earn money online, however, to turn your social media account into a business, you must be constant and have a long-term vision.
10. Web programming services
Thanks to growth, and the diversity of ways to earn money online, knowledge regarding web programming, mobile development, application creation, among others, have become highly demanded services.
This is why today there are so many programming courses , since these skills are becoming a source of considerable income due to the demand for these services.
So if you have this programming knowledge or skill you could have a very lucrative chance to make money online.
From services like freelancing for companies around the world, to creating your own applications to earn money , you have various possibilities to monetize your knowledge. Among the options you have:
- Create an online programming course to train other people.
- Work remotely for businesses from home.
- On-demand programming services for entrepreneurs, businesses, or companies.
- Develop your own products and services and then sell them.
Conclusions
The options to earn money online are very varied. In fact, we can continue this list and keep mentioning other ideas such as:
- Earn money reviewing websites
- making sports bets
- Trading on the stock market , currencies, shares, derivatives, among others.
- Play video games that pay you money
- View advertisements on websites.
Even before finishing, I leave you a video with profitable businesses to start online without large sums of investment:
As I mentioned at the beginning, making money online is possible, however, it is not something that happens immediately.
You will have to work, try new ideas and build knowledge that allows you to work in an intelligent way and allows you to earn money online no matter where you are in the world.