As you know I have been making money online for the last 9 years, some years successfully other years not so much. However in September of 2012 I was able to give up my full time job as an addiction worker, working with people with alcohol and drug issues, to go full time online.
Since then I have never looked back and the business has grown from strength to strength with last years sales at $128,000 and this year I want to double that. That includes income from all income streams from products, google adsense, affiliate commissions, solo ads, services, membership sites etc.
I truly believe that anyone with a huge dollop of determination and a passion to help others can make money online, but there are a few things required to do this:
- Determination
- The right mindset
- Belief
- A plan
- A willingness to learn
When you have all of the above I think anyone can make it. One of the most important is the willingness to learn as there is a huge learning curve involved in making products and the subsequent marketing of those products. Buy courses to help speed up the learning curve and attending masterminds or seminars can be a huge help and is one of the things that got me from $10k per year in sales to $100k per year in sales. One of the courses I would recommend is Anik Singal’s course Profit Academy (affiliate link), but there are many great courses out there, so have a look around and search for reviews on the products you’re thinking about buying.
Here are 10 New Ways to make Money Online
1. Independent publishing
The traditional world of publishing has almost gone forever. No longer do authors have to accept poultry royalties from their publishing house. The biggest ebook self-publishing platform is Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) program. If you upload your manuscript to KDP, it will appear for sale on Amazon.com, where readers can download it to their Kindles. KDP is free to use, and KDP authors keep up to 70% of revenue from the sales of their books. Similar self-publishing services are offered by Barnes & Noble (through Nook Press), Apple (through iTunes Connect) and others, but Amazon’s is one of the most widely available platforms and is easy to use.
I decided to try this back in 2009 by writing an expanded version of a blog post: 100 Ways to Develop Your Mind. I turned it into a physical book with Amazon’s Createspace service and then in 2011 I turned it into a Kindle Book at 100 Ways to Develop Your Mind
It wasn’t a best seller but I managed to get it ranked as high as 441 in August 2012, and obviously made some money as well, not bad from a blog post. I tried this with a few other blog posts, but they didn’t do quite as well.
2. Selling a product
If you have an idea for a product and you can write, or record video or make an mp3 you can have a quality product set up ready for sale on your website or blog. This includes ebooks, downloadable mp3s, software, memberships sites, and selling your teaching. One of the products that set me on the path of becoming an online entrepreneur was an ebook calledAdvanced Early Riser
This one ebook has brought in sales of over $15,000 over the last few years, and it gave me the confidence to go on to do bigger things.
3. Selling your services
If you have a particular skill such as being a prolific writer, good at admin work, life coaching, programming, web design and a host of other talents, you can sell your services online for an hourly rate. Places such as elance.com, odesk.com, freelancer.com, fiverr.com are good places to start looking to see what is available.
4. Your blog with adsense
This is how I got started online and is one of the best ways to monetise your passion. If you have something you really care about and have a lot to say on the subject you can start a blog. It’s almost impossible to think of a topic that you couldn’t blog about and for you to become an authority in your niche.
I have seen blogs on knitting, on scrap collecting, baseball cards, book collecting, anything you have a passion for I am guessing you can write about it and make money form it using the likes of google adsense, or placing ads on your site. You might think you’re only paid a pittance from adsense, but if you become an authority you can earn some good money. At the moment this blog and another blog of mine 99PositiveAffirmations.com/blog brings in around $6000 per month, that’s $72,000 per year passive income.
On the back of this, if you stick at building your blog, there are huge opportunities for interviews, speaking at seminars, running your own workshops, and of course making your own products.
5. Advertising
Advertising on your website is a good way to bring in money from your site, but I would start your own advertising program instead of letting a company take half your earnings. There’s a host of great plugins to help you manage your advertising program, but it’s best to do a search for an updated list.
6. Membership sites
There’s nothing better than running a membership site which has the beauty of giving you recurring income. If you have a subject that a lot of people need and want to know more about, and your niche is constantly being updated you can run a membership site to satisfy the hunger of your crowd.
7. Selling solo ads
You can make a lot of money selling solo ads, which is basically advertising a free or paid product to your email list. The thing to do here is make sure all the products you are promoting are quality and not just any old crap, as it can be tempting to take the money and just send out anything to your list. remember your reputation is on the line as well.
If you are going to do this it is best to build a list which is separate from your regular readers e.g. your blog subscribers.
I have to admit to falling foul of this and have sent out a lot of emails to all of my lists instead of limiting it to just a list for people who want free stuff.
8. Become a teacher
If you are great at teaching a particular topic sites such as udemy.com can be great for beginners to make money online, indeed there are some full time udemy teachers out there who make a lot of money on the site. I have tested Udemy, but not in any great depth, but know a few good friends who make a regular income from sites like this.
9. Affiliate marketing
If you find a great product that you like and it aligns with your niche you can start to promote it by placing ads on your site, or to your email list. If you are regularly promoting one product and champion it, becoming a raving fan, you might actually get better affiliate commissions because of it.
10. Becoming a virtual assistant
A lot of people are now making money online by becoming virtual assistants. I have a great assistant who helps me with a whole host of things online and she is brilliant. The beauty of this is you can become a virtual assistant and work around your home schedule, or even use it as part time income if you have another job. It’s quite difficult to find really good virtual assistants, so being good at what you do and really treating it like a business will help you stand out from the crowd.
A great place to learn about this for hiring and becoming a virtual assistant is Virtualstafffinder.com run by a great guy Chris Ducker. Chris has taken the hassle out of the whole process and goes into detail about the ins and outs of hiring a VA.
I hope this gives you some ideas about how to make money online and the potential earnings that can be made. If you are looking for inspiration there is a great site by Jonny Nastor calledHackTheEntrepreneur where Jonny interviews some great entrepreneurs.
I truly believe the world is changing and we no longer need employers, and poor working conditions. I think we are seeing a major shift and there is an entrepreneurial revolution taking place right now, and you can be a part of the revolution.
