40 Ways to Make Money Online

I keep mentioning the words ‘unique’, ‘creative’, ‘interesting’ throughout this site. That’s simply because that is what will make you money online. That is the trick to make money online and that is in a nutshell what every site out there will tell you.

A custom designed site will sell for more than a standard one using a free template. A custom script will sell for more than a free one. A custom or unique idea, will get more traffic than a cloned one.

So if you outsource design and programming for a site, you have instantly raised the value of your website. Why not outsource the writing a content too…

You have just created a niche site which will have potential buyers falling over themselves to get their hands on it.

Whether it be a custom designed and programmed image hosting site or celebrity rating site, if some of it is custom built, that instantly adds value.

The key is of course to keep the costs down. Don’t pay a designer $100 to design a site for you. Start a thread on a popular forum asking who can design a site for you for x amount. You may get slammed by top designers, but screw them – there are guys out there who will work for peanuts and be more than happy to design a site for $10 – a quality design too. Let people fight it out in a price war whilst you wait for a quote you can afford.

Same with programming… head over to elance or rentacoder and post your request. Cheapest quote wins (provided of course they have a decent reputation). Combine the design, programming and domain name and you have almost certainly created a site you can sell for at least double what it cost you

First of all, you can’t sell vouchers if you don’t have vouchers, right? So we need to get vouchers.

Google Adwords often give away $20 vouchers or $50 vouchers… so do Yahoo and Msn. There are certain sites/links who will give you a voucher for free;

http://services.google.com/marketing/links/awo-fr-oa-jdn07-mktg1
http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/en_GB/arp/sponsoredsearch_v1.php?o=GB0283&AID=10396887&PID=2494994&SID=QualityNonsense
http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/arp/choose.php?o=US2258
http://startadcenter.com/inexpMar%5Faff/

*note: all links were working when this ebook was published, they tend to change/re-direct to homepage every few months.

If you’re in any way tech savvy and know you’re servers from your scripts, then you may be able to help those who aren’t so tech savvy.

Loads of people don’t know how to move sites and databases from one site to another or install a script they’ve bought.

It can be tough work and complicated at times if all isn’t as easy as it’s been described, but again it’s easy money if you know what you’re doing. In some cases, it’s just a matter of transferring stuff from A to B using your broadband connection.

You can advertise your services or keep a lookout on the major forums like DP & sitepoint.

Ebooks, if written with care, thought and effort can be great resources – just like all good books. Anyone can write an ebook. You don’t have to be a writer to write and ebook however, and that’s why ebooks generally tend to be inferior to real life books – because more often than not, the quality is poor or just re-hashed from other ebooks and flipped for a few dollars profit by some 13 year old in his bedroom.

I’ve started writing ebooks, as they’re a great way to pour your heart out on a certain subject. This ebook, for example, was created by myself, over a few days in my bedroom and at college in any free time I had. All it takes is a PC, a brain and the ability to write fluent English. That’s what it boils down to. Of course you need to know you’re market and if there is a demand for what you’re writing about – assuming you’re going to sell your ebook. If you want to keep it free, all the better!

If you believe the ebook is of value and contains quality content that can save people time and dumb down things for them, then you can sell it. Who knows – you may end up with few grand’s worth of sales.

You could also end up with nothing, so be sure to price your ebook competitively and give out a few free reviews so you can get feedback and let other people see the feedback.

If you’re really adventurous you could add your ebook on clickbank and start an adwords campaign, plus maybe a separate referral program where people get paid 50% of all sales they earn you.

To sell a small ebook (or give it away for free) about tech related stuff, you’re best bet is to hit digitalpoint or sitepoint and create a new thread making a sales pitch. If a few people buy it and like it, it has a snowball effect and everyone starts buying it as they’re curious. So although you may be able to sell a poor quality ebook once or twice – don’t expect to do it again as you’re reputation will be shot to hell.

Article writing is one of the easiest ways to make money online. It’s also the most time consuming and definitely not everyone’s cup of tea.

If you think about it, webmasters are always looking for content… whether it be in forums, in new sites on a specific niche topic, movie reviews or even editing existing content and making it search engine friendly.

Information gets traffic and the more unique content added to a site, the higher it’s value, hence the reason why there will always be money to be made from writing.

Check out rentacoder or elance to name just two of many places you’ll find people looking for writers. You’ll also see people wanting article writers on digitalpoint forums or sitepoint (two of the largest webmaster community forums).

If nothing tickles your fancy, create your own thread, set your price and list your experience. You may only get offered peanuts, but it’s a start.

Ever hear of yahoo answers or bitwine? These are just two of many question & answering sites out there. People ask questions, and other people answer them.

Simple. Believe it or not, you can actually get paid for answering questions. Most of these sites pay for some answers, if they’re deemed to be high quality – you can’t simply answer a question with anything and expect to earn money.

So for the sake of a bit of thought and a few minutes of your time, not only can you earn money, but you can also help people. If you think like me, you can also answer ‘affiliate-friendly’ questions as I call them. These are questions which should immediately trigger alarm bells in your head… for example, if someone asks

• “How do I set up a site and make money on the internet?”,

you could give an answer like this

• “I make x amount per month from my domaining blog. To set up a site all you need is a good host like Lunarpages pages or Thinkhost, a domain name (I get mine from name.com because they’re the cheapest) and an idea. That’s how all websites start.

And despite that answer giving out 2 affiliate links and a link to my own site, it is in fact a useful and legitimate answer to the person who asks the question. Hopefully he/she might sign up with some of those hosts and also check out my site…

You can see how this can be profitable after a while… If you answer loads of questions like that, it won’t be long until you start earning as an affiliate. Just Answer is another.

If you have contacts and a reputation, why not use them? Why not approach a webmaster trying to sell a site or domain name and ask for a 10% slice of the profits, should you find a buyer for him?

Tyler Cruz did exactly that 2 years ago and netted over $23k just for his brokering services – and that was just on one domain name which he helped sell. Not bad, that’s what a lot of people earn in a year!

Lots of people don’t like selling – they don’t know how to sell or what to price things at or where to start. If you have a knack for selling and have the balls to approach sellers and buyers and contact them, then this game could be for you. You’re anonymous on the internet to an extent, so you really have no excuses – just approach people, talk to them and offer them a deal. Worst they can say is no – and even then it’s by email or IM, it’s not like you’re being shunned in front of an audience or face to face.

Just like a real estate agent, if you can master this art, you’ll always be in demand and you’ll always earn good money.

Youtube is now a household name. 3 or 4 years ago, it was nothing. That’s the speed at which these sites take off, and how technology develops.
Video is fast becoming the latest craze in advertising. You’re going to see more and more ads before and after videos online.

Fortunately, you can now earn money from your videos. Metacafe and Revver are two well respected video hosts which will pay you if your video is popular.

Youtube have recently introduced their partner program for video uploaders in the US, Canada and the UK.

Some people are making thousands of dollars per month from this, and unless you are some sort of Steven Spielberg in disguise, it’s difficult to get 1 million views on your homemade video of you eating your dinner…. But if you have a funny or interesting video, it will spread virally on the net and you can always turn to digg or stumbleupon for a little boost up the ladder

Youtube as I’ve pointed out above will be introducing this sort of ‘paid for views’ system internationally, but for now, Metacafe and Revver are your best bet as they’re tried and tested.

Ever see those simple, but cool t-shirts saying things like ‘Slavery gets shit done’ and a picture of a pyramid on the t-shirt? Or maybe the classic ‘If you read this you’re gay’?

Well those little sayings sell. Why? Because they’re bold and funny. Certain people like to be controversial and unique and so they’ll buy that sort of stuff and wear it proudly.

There are free sites like cafepress, spreadshirt and threadless which allow you to design your own t-shirts, jumpers, mugs etc… then sell them online. They take the majority of the sales price and you get a slice of commission. For example, if a standard t-shirt costs $10, you can bump it up to $15 and take $5 for yourself per sale.

If the t-shirt is worth it, and it is unique and funny and all the rest, people will buy it. Same with mugs and teddy bears and underwear… you could even approach an offline business and offer to set up a shop for them selling t-shirts, jumpers, fleeces etc… (a school or local club for example would be a good bet). Imagine having a few hundred students buying those $10 $15 t-shirts

These sites take care of everything from orders to packaging and delivery and even customer service, so all you do is spread the word and watch your sales rise.

One way you can get creative and make a little cash in doing so is to register and submit all your pictures to sites like Fotolia, Dreamstime, Shutterstock, and Big Stock Photo.

These sites PAY you to give them pictures. In return, members of those sites get to use your images on their sites for free or for a small membership fee. So again it’s a win, win situation for everyone.

Taking pictures is easy. We all have cameras nowadays on phones, webcams on laptops, digital cameras… so why not get out there and take as many pictures as possible, then submit them to the sites above… who knows, you may have just taken a million dollar photo.

Essentially, the more people who use your photo on their site, the more you get paid. If you happen to catch a celeb on camera, you may just have hit the jackpot as sites like mrpaparazzi.com pay small fortunes for any exclusive snapshots of high profile stars you may have.