Top 10 Ways To Make Money On The Internet - HowStuffWorks

28.01.
2020 Top 10 Ways to Make Money on the Internet | HowStuffWorks
HowStuffWorks Tech Electronics How-to Tech
Top 10 Ways to Make Money on the

Internet
BY JOHN FULLER & NATHAN CHANDLER
Browse the article Top 10 Ways to Make Money on the Internet
Whether you're looking for some extra cash on the side or a full-time job, you can use the internet to help you make money. KIDSTOCK/GETTY IMAGES
Unless you're a freegan and have found a way to live entirely off the grid, you probably need some sort of steady income in
order to survive. The traditional way to earn money, of course, is by having a job. You work for a company or start your own,
and the work you do earns you money, which you spend on things like a mortgage, rent, food, clothing, utilities and
entertainment.
Most people typically work from their company's central location, a physical space where everyone from that organization
gathers to exchange ideas and organize their efforts. But many folks have found ways to make money within the comfort of
their own home, thanks to the internet. Some of these gigs are best for those looking to make a little extra money on the
side, while others can lead to full-time jobs and big success.
Many web-based jobs require you to be your own boss, which will tap into your sales, marketing and customer service skills.
However, some companies will hire people to work from home — which means you either take a salary or give them a
percentage of what you make.
We've put together a list of our top 10 ways to make money on the internet, in no particular order. On the next page, we'll
start with an old favorite.
10 Selling Stuff on EBay
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28.01.2020 Top 10 Ways to Make Money on the Internet | HowStuffWorks
Selling stuff that you don't need or picked up at a discount is a popular way to make money over the web. FRANK VAN DELFT/GETTY IMAGES
Most people today are familiar with the concept: You have things you don't necessarily need but others are willing to buy,
and you can auction off the items on eBay or other online auction sites. Simply gather your goods, create a seller's profile
and start selling.
It sounds simple, but it takes some practice to sell successfully. You need to create persuasive and legitimate product pages
for the goods you're selling to get buyers interested. It's also important to set reasonable minimum bids to ensure that
people will buy. And remember to deliver the kind of customer service that will garner positive feedback ratings and to
communicate with buyers to let them know you're reliable. The more positive feedback you receive, the more people will be
willing to do business with you. And that, of course, means more money. (EBay takes a 10 percent cut of anything you sell,
plus a 30 cent fee for any item listed beyond the 50 free listings you get per month.)
You can be the best garage sale of the 21st century, or you can evolve your eBay side gig into a full-time business if you
really try. In fact, many people start off selling unwanted stuff around their house and progress to actually looking for
goods, say at thrift stores, to resell. It's all about finding the right niche (maybe antique vases) and then building trust with
your regular customers. As with everything online, competition is fierce, and you'll have to fight to survive, but many people
make it work.
9 Blogging
If your food blog is successful, you could use it as a platform to offer cooking classes, e-books or to lead food tours. WUNDERVISUALS/GETTY IMAGES
If you have a particular passion for something, and you have a lot to say about it, blogging could be a profitable way to
pour out your endless stream of thought. The key here, as with many other services on the internet, is being consistent (in
this case blogging several times a week), selling advertising and using your blog as a platform to promote other businesses.
After starting up a personal blog, many writers sign up for ad services like Google AdSense, which post those familiar
sponsored links you often see at the top and on the sides of websites (like HowStuffWorks). The more times your blog
readers click on those ads, the more money you'll make through the ad service. This works fine if you're a casual blogger,
and you may make some extra spending money. But if the blog is consistently interesting, well-written and really takes off,
you may be approached by companies who want to reach your fan base with graphical advertising around your blog. You
can also sign up for affiliate links. Affiliate links allow you to get a cut of any product sold via a link from your website to the
advertiser's site. So, if you write a blog entry and hyperlink to a product in the entry, if a reader clicks on that link and buys
the product, you get a percentage of the sale. Shareasale is just one place you can sign up for links.
But advertising can only take you so far. More money can be made by thinking of your blog as a springboard to other gigs.
For instance, the blog Digital Photography School has close to 900,000 subscribers and makes money from advertising,
affiliate links, e-book sales and photography courses [source: Sparring Mind].
A travel blogger may start out documenting the highlights (and lowlights) of their trips around the world. They buoy the text
with video clips, lots of hashtags, and of course, appropriate shareable social media links. From that, they may decide to lead
tours to places they have been, do speaking engagements or create e-books with travel tips and sell them from their sites.
They may even lead workshops teaching others how to make money from a blog. (Nomadic Matt's and Adventurous Kate's
blogs are good example of these principles in action.)
8 Designing and Selling T-shirts
If you come up with your own T-shirt designs using editing software, some sites will press the shirts for you and share profits when they're sold.
HESHPHOTO/GETTY IMAGES
As you walk around most high school and college campuses, you're likely to come into contact with lots of words. But it
won't be material from textbooks or term papers -- those are probably in backpacks or sitting unfinished at home. Instead,
they're the simple phrases or logos -- most of which are ironic or amusing -- printed on the T-shirts on the backs of the
students.
Usually, the more unique and offbeat the design is, the more desirable the T-shirt is. The growth of the internet has made it
possible for vendors to sell T-shirts all over the world. In fact, sites like CafePress.com, SpreadShirt.com, and
Undergroundshirts.com allow you to set up your own store, create your own designs and sell them yourself. If you can
create your own shirt design with a clever catchphrase or come up with your own unique statement and people like it, you
can start making money.
It's not an instant gold mine for most users. In the case of CafePress, for instance, you create a snappy design that finds its
way on to T-shirts, hats, pencils, or whatever other doodads the customer might want. Because you're not paying for the
physical product and simply providing the design, CafePress does all of the production and shipping. You get a small
percentage (about 10 percent) of the sale. Some users wind up making a few bucks – but those with an especially clever
idea (and good marketing skills) may make a lot more.
7 Freelancing
You can freelance write from anywhere, as long as you have a good internet connection. DAMIRCUDIC/GETTY IMAGES
Freelancing is similar in some ways to blogging. For one thing, you get to work from your own home most of the time. But
there are a few important distinctions. With freelancing you're generally selling your writing to another publication as
opposed to just putting it on your blog (although some bloggers do both.) Many freelance writing positions cover
specialized topics for online publications and may require expert knowledge of the subject. Of course, seasoned journalists,
who may not have specialist knowledge, but are good at interviewing and researching to get that knowledge, also have
careers freelancing for various newspapers and magazines. You could specialize in writing about food, health care, business
or just be an all-rounder. However, it helps you get more work if you can point to expertise or experience in a particular
niche.
To get started, you may have to write for free. Many small websites are looking for free writing help. Once you get some
clips, you can show them to someone who's offering paid work. Check general job sites like Indeed.com or the "About"
section of your favorite publication to see if they are hiring and what the requirements are.
You might also consider self-publishing your original work rather than working on contract-driven tasks. Self-publishing
offers many of the same benefits as freelance writing. This additional step is risky, though, because it requires marketing
work to your target audience so they'll buy your work.
As with any sort of real career, networking is key. Freelancers are keenly aware that at any given moment, one gig might dry
up, and if money's tight, that's a problem. Developing a group of consistent clients is a way to ensure that you're actually
making (and saving) money as you work.
Writing's not the only way to make money freelancing, of course — anyone with graphic design or programming experience
can find contract jobs that pay well and provide challenging work, too.
6 Social Media Manager
Knowing how to craft a clever message and understanding metrics will help you in your career as a social media manager. FILO/GETTY IMAGES
Whether you're talking about Instagram, Twitter or Snapchat, social media is a trend that's not going away. From major
corporations to mom-and-pop shops of all kinds, absolutely every business owner must grasp social media basics — or find
themselves floundering. A lot of big companies have entire departments dedicated to managing social media issues, but
many medium- and small-sized businesses don't have time to do it themselves. Instead, they hire out many of these tasks to
people who better understand the challenges and rewards of Twitter and the like, and that's where you come in.
You already know that your smartphone lets you see (and post) reviews of just about any product or service on the planet.
Those reviews – and the way companies address them – can make or break an enterprise. After all, when was the last time
you intentionally bought a one-star product? Savvy social media managers know that there is a plethora of ways to harvest
great feedback from customers, and that there are a lot of paths to negative feedback, too. They understand that in many
ways the web is a double-edged sword, one that can boost profits or lead to public relations ruin [source: DeMers].
Success in this field requires understanding the ins and outs of various social media platforms and how they intersect not
only in a technical sense, but in a cultural sense, too. Savvy social media managers know who uses Snapchat versus who
uses Facebook. They can craft engaging messages for their shareable content and take good photos and videos. They also
understand metrics (why a particular post got this many clicks) and are good at multitasking.
5 Financial Services
Accountants, bookkeepers and the like often set up their own financial services businesses using specialized software. PEOPLEIMAGES/GETTY IMAGES
Financial services include accounting, tax preparation, bookkeeping and payroll processing – they are the kinds of services
that few people want to pursue, but for their own peace of mind, they're often willing to pay an expert for help in balancing
the books and dealing with the complexities of tax law. And today, you can accomplish most of these services using
specialized software. For businesses, this means hiring fewer people to handle these tasks. For individuals, it means doing it
on their own and hiring a consultant online when necessary.
These cost-saving opportunities for consumers mean money-making opportunities for you. You can create your own
website or work with an existing web-based services group to advertise the financial services you offer. Then, you can
correspond with clients through that website and via email.
First make sure you're either trained or experienced in the services you're planning to provide. If you're advertising
accountant services, you should have a degree in that field, though a tax preparer may just have completed a short course.
Having a niche (like entertainment accounting) will help you stand out from the pack. In addition, make sure you know
whether you'll need government licenses to offer certain services, and refrain from misrepresenting yourself or working
illegally to avoid getting sued for fraud.
Although this is an internet-based business, chances are you'll have to leave home at least sometimes to meet with clients
or to network to get more clients.
4 Customer Service
Many companies allow customer service agents to work from home. PEOPLEIMAGES/GETTY IMAGES
For every company, customer service is a real – and time-consuming – concern. Many businesses support their products
through a customer service department. This usually means people who answer phone calls from customers, as well as by
email or online chat. To use the latter, a customer clicks a link requesting to chat with a live person, and a customer service
representative answers the request and speaks with the customer through a chat window. For email customer service, the
customer fills out a form at the website or sends an email directly to a particular address.
Since these services only rely on having a reliable phone, internet connection and web browser, businesses have looked
increasingly at hiring home-based workers. This can be a great opportunity for someone looking to work when the kids are
in school or have gone to bed. Customer service contracting firms like Talk2Rep cover email and live chat support in
addition to inbound and outbound phone calls. Other companies (like Amazon, Alaska Airlines or U-Haul) hire home-based
agents directly. The pay rate may be low, but the companies usually offer bonuses if the agents meet certain targets.
There are also home-based positions for reservationists, sales agents, travel agents and virtual assistants (these do executive
assistant work for people or companies). You can easily find jobs in all these areas by searching a major job board like
Indeed.com or Monster.com.
3 SEO Reviewing
SEO reviewers generally perform searches to assess ranking results, and may be asked to use services like Google Analytics to gauge the progress
of their clients' efforts to improve their web presence. WILLIE B. THOMAS/GETTY IMAGES
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a means of improving the results from a search engine so that they represent the
closest matches and most reliable resources for the user's desired results.
As a contract SEO reviewer, working through a company like Leapforce, you can aid in this optimization. You start each
evaluation task by judging a user's intent based on the keyword combinations provided and your own knowledge of
popular culture in the user's locale. Then, you use a set of given guidelines to evaluate how particular search results match
that user's intent.
Basic SEO, like link building, is fairly easy for most companies. But as more companies go global, competition has altered the
way search engine algorithms find and display results for billions of daily searches, so only professionals with tech
backgrounds really have the time and energy to perfect best SEO practices, like proper URL structure. These people really
know how to best implement special tags on a website, and how to maximize tools like Google Image search to their
advantage [sources: Hunt, Muller].
SEO reviewing can offer a steady income from home, but there are some risks. For one, an SEO reviewer must be willing to
view potentially offensive material, such as pornography. And as a reviewer, you may be asked to check whether a given site
contains malware or pornography, so you're putting your computer at risk as part of the job description.
2 Tutoring
An online tutor might have clients from all over the world. PRASIT PHOTO/GETTY IMAGES
With each passing year, there seems to be increasing pressure for elementary, middle and high school students to make
good grades and prepare for a path to higher education. For some kids, this means getting help from a tutor to bridge any
gaps in understanding in certain subjects.
Since most families have reliable high-speed internet connections at home, internet-based tutoring services are growing.
When you apply for these jobs, you usually have to take tests in your selected subject areas and submit to background
checks. Though you could start your own online tutoring service, sites like Tutor.com have already done the legwork for you
in terms of marketing. These sites match thousands of kids (and adults) with tutors each week, both in your country and
abroad. However, they may also determine your hourly rate or take a cut of what you charge, so you can decide whether it's
better to work for them or go on your own.
While many internet-based jobs offer flexible hours or multiple shifts, tutoring services might require you to be online
during a specific block of time or reward you for doing so. This encourages tutors to be available during the heaviest
demand. For example, when Tutor.com has more tutors than tutoring requests, it places tutors on a waitlist and gives
preference to tutors who work at least five of hours per week in the 4 p.m. to 11 p.m. ET time slot Sunday through Thursday
[source: Tutor.com].
1 Selling Handmade Goods
Sites like Etsy provide an easy setup option for creative types who want to sell their wares online. MARC ROMANELLI/GETTY IMAGES
Earlier, we considered using sites like eBay to sell stuff that you don't need. But you can also use websites to sell your
original creations. Certain websites like Etsy.com and ArtFire.com are dedicated to matching the artists who create things by
hand with the customers who appreciate and want to purchase their handmade goods.
If you're like most people, the word handmade probably brings to mind some traditional crafts like knitting, crochet,
needlework, quilting, painting and sculpting. Handmade items don't stop there, though. You can also market woodworking,
glasswork, metalwork and anything else you're capable of building at home. Be sure to focus on projects that you're already
good at or that you have a passion for so you don't burn out producing each new item.
Etsy, ArtFire and the like usually let you set up your own shop for free or for a very small fee for each item you list there. If
you have a small home-based operation, this could be a better deal than setting up your own site. For many people, hosting
and managing an entire website might very well be a full-time job by itself.
The biggest challenge for selling homemade goods is making back the cost of what you put into it. Not only do you want to
be reimbursed for materials, but you also want to be paid proportional to the time you put into it. Keep track of your sales
and purchases carefully in the first few months, and make adjustments as necessary to maximize your profit.
Last editorial update on Jul 13, 2018 04:18:16 pm.
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28.01.

2020 Top 10 Ways to Make Money on the Internet | HowStuffWorks

HowStuffWorks Tech Electronics How-to Tech

Top 10 Ways to Make Money on the

10 Selling Stuff on EBay

8 Designing and Selling T-shirts

6 Social Media Manager

1 Selling Handmade Goods

Last editorial update on Jul 13, 2018 04:18:16 pm.

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