If you’d claimed it was possible for
the average guy on the street to make millions of dollars online
just a decade ago, the chances are good you’d have heard nothing but laughter
in response. Today, though, there are countless Internet millionaires
who turned a great idea into obscene profit, used the power of the web to
promote their offline business or simply worked their butt off to sell their
skills online.
While it’s unlikely that you’ll ever
earn enough to buy your own private island, there’s nothing to
stop you from using your skills to make a comfortable living online.
In fact, while the media would have you believe that online success stories are
limited to just a few lucky, hard working people who stumbled on a great idea
that went on to make millions, the reality is that there are tens of thousands
of people who make a living exclusively online. Here are just ten ways you
can join them.
How
To Make Money Online
1. Sell Stock Photography
The Internet has caused an explosion
in the demand for stock photography. As the number of media and commercial
outlets has increased dramatically with the growth of online media there’s an
enormous need for high quality stock photos.
Yuri Arcurs is the man everyone turns to for their stock photo needs.
As the world’s top selling stock photographer he sells an image every 8
seconds, 24 hours a day (that works out to over 4 million images each year).
Arcurs makes millions of dollars each year simply by being the best at what he
does. There are lots of great photographers in the world and the barrier to
entry is as low as ownership of a camera, but Arcurs has managed to build a
reputation online for consistent, high quality and imaginative images.
If you’re a professional
photographer (or even just a hobbyist) you should consider the possibilities of
selling stock images online.
2. Tweet For Sponsors
SponsoredTweets.com is an online platform
that allows you to make money on Twitter by charging
sponsors for communicating their advertising messages to your followers. You
set the amount you want to get paid for every tweet you make, choose a category
and select keywords you want to work with. You then wait for advertisers to
contact you and take you up on your offer, paying you the amount you specified
for each tweet that you make.
All throughout the process, the
tweeter has full control over his or her account, and may choose the wordings
of the tweets, or may choose to reject the tweet altogether.
3. Blog for Ad Revenues
If, however, you already have a blog
with a devoted following it should be easy for you to leverage your readers
into hard cash. Ad networks such as Google AdSense pay big money
to place their ads on your site, and you’ll receive a payment every time a
reader clicks one. While it’s easy to go overboard and fill every spare pixel,
if you place your ads well it’s possible to make a comfortable income from your
site.
One of the most successful
bloggers around today is John
Chow, a Canadian blogger who
makes more than $40,000 a month through ad sales and other revenue streams.
Ironically, his blog is about ways to make money online.
4. Sell Affiliate Products
If you have a flair for sales copy
you could try your hand at selling products for affiliates. While many people
take the seedy route of selling diet pills and penis enlargement products, if
you want to keep your conscience clear you’ll find that Amazon runs a very
successful affiliate program that allows you to make money advertising any of
the products for sale on their site. eBay also have a pretty good affiliate
setup, with their top affiliates earning $1.3 Million a month, WOW!
5. Write an e Book
In recent years the self-publishing
world has exploded online to the point at which you don’t even have to run your
own site in order to promote a book. Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Kobo are
just a few of the sites on which you could self-publish today, with commission
rates of around 70% available on every sale.
The number of eBooks on Amazon
reached 8 million last year, and Amazon stated that eBooks are outselling hard
backs 2 to 1, 62% of ebook sales fell into the Thriller and Mystery genre, so
if you feel that you could pull this style of genre off then you will be in for
a good chance of sales.
26 year old self published author, Amanda
Hocking from Minnesota makes more than $2 Million a year from her
ebook sales. Amanda Hocking’s stories about, trolls, vampires and zombies
and ‘supernatural teen romances’ sell for $2.99 or for as little as $.99.
6. Become a Virtual Assistant
Every small businessman would love
to hire a full time assistant to take care of the little things, but many
simply can’t afford one. Thanks to the Internet, though, they can now hire part
time assistants who work for a whole host of clients, and all at a much lower
cost than a full time staff member.
If you work from home
this may be a perfect opportunity to make a consistent income. Virtual
assistants can earn $20 an hour in return for booking travel tickets,
interacting with clients and dealing with the daily needs of small businesses.
7. Lease Your Skills
Most people have at least one skill
that carries a market value, though until now that skill may have been
impossible to monetize in the traditional job market.
Sites such as 99Designs, Elance,
Freelancer and iWriter allow people to hire out their skills as writers,
coders, designers, translators and lots more on a contract basis. Freelancing
sites are a great way to boost your income in your free time, and with enough
motivation and hard work you could find yourself earning a comfortable full
time income from them.
8. Selling on eBay
eBay is a great way to turn your
unwanted things into a little spending money, but it isn’t just a place to sell
your old Star Wars action figures. In fact, eBay’s global marketplace can offer
a great way for canny traders to buy and sell their way to profit. By buying
wholesale you can sell anything with a mark up. Even better, if you have the
skills to make things people want to buy you could start your own home-based
craft business, selling to customers around the world.
Matt &
Amanda Clarkson are a successful
couple who so far have managed to make over $8 Million in
eBay sales.
9. Become A Mobile App Tester
People that are rather uncertain of
their application development potential can still make some money
through the usage of iPhone apps.
People that have the time and desire
to test iPhone apps and discover bugs can be rewarded
payments for their efforts. uTest is
one such application. Individuals that have signed up will also build some
reputation on the basis of the testing they have done so far.
Better reputation signifies access
to more profitable app testing opportunities.
10. Designing T-Shirts
Finally, if you have something of an
artistic streak you could kick off the next viral sensation with your own range
of funky, arty t-shirts. Sites such as CafePress allow users to upload their
own t-shirt designs and sell them on their personal online store.
You can also contact distributors
such as threadless.com or designbyhumans.com to
release your t-shirt designs to the masses.
If your designs catch the eye you
could be looking at enormous profits when they take off in a big way.
Checkout our article The Top 10 Tips On Starting Your Own Successful Clothing Line,
this should give you an idea on how to kick things off.
Conclusion
As you can see, to make money
online you don’t have to be particularly skilled with computers. You
don’t need to be know how to build your own website from the ground up, and you
don’t have to be a mogul with millions of dollars to invest in success. If you
have any kind of artistic skills, creativity or business savvy you can turn it
into profit.
In short, you should understand that
the online world is just like real life. The same opportunities are there for
the taking, but instead of drawing your customers from just your home town you
can reach out with your great ideas to the far reaches of the earth.
So why not start today?