If you’ve been reading TechPatio for a while then you probably know that I like the “Top 5’s” from HowStuffWorks, the latest one is a top 5 on ways to make money on the Internet.
In this post I’d just like to mention the 5 ways HowStuffWorks claims are the “top 5” ways to make money online and then I’ll comment on each one with my own personal experience. Later you can go on and read why HowStuffWorks things those are the top five ways to make money online.
The list is in no particular order.
1. Domain Name Flipping
Domain name flipping is basically the same as buying old undervalued houses, fix them up and make them look more attractive and then sell them for a (much) higher price. The same thing can be applied to websites and/or domains.
Buy an undervalued website, optimize it for SEO, users, customers, businesses etc. and sell it months, or years, later, for a large profit.
This is not a way I personally have tried to make money online with, but I’ve heard of several people who have done it, like Yaro Starak.
2. Freelancing
This one is easy. If you know how to do something that people would want to pay you to do, then you can probably become a freelancer within your niche. Like me, I know a few things about web development, so I have done some minor freelancing back in the days, such as creating small websites for small companies and updating them later on. It pays a decent buck and even today with WordPress and a ton of “get your own website in 5 minutes”-schemes, people are still willing to pay freelancers who knows something about websites, to do it for them.
But freelancing doesn’t stop with just web development, you can freelance in hundreds, if not thousands, of niches. Just think about what you’re really good at, maybe there’s somebody out there who’s not so good ad it and wouldn’t mind paying you to do it for them?
3. Designing and Selling T-shirts
I must admit, I didn’t see this one entering top 5 ways to make money online.
HowStuffWorks writes:
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 and SpreadShirt.com allow you to set up your own store, create your own designs and sell them yourself. If you 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.
I don’t know about you, but I can’t remember the last time I bought a t-shirt online, and if I ever did, it certainly wasn’t because of a catch phrase or a particular logo. Why pay to wear the logo of a company? Shouldn’t the company pay you, to advertise for them? 🙂
Well, leave a comment below and tell me how often you buy t-shirts online, so we can find out if this really is one of the top 5 ways to make online dough 🙂
4. Blogging
But there are other ways too, to make money blogging. You could take money for reviewing sites or products, the companies would then pay you to write a blog post about their product or service. There are even websites designed to bring together bloggers and advertisers, such as Social Spark etc.
Steve Pavlina writes in an excellent blog post on how to make money from your blog, that only 1 out of 100 will be able to generate a serious income from their blog:
Can most people do it? [make a decent income online]
No, they can’t. I hope it doesn’t shock you to see a personal development web site use the dreaded C-word. But I happen to agree with those who say that 99% of people who try to generate serious income from their blogs will fail. The tagline for this site is “Personal Development for Smart People.” And unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your outlook), smart people are a minority on this planet. So while most people can’t make a living this way, I would say that most smart people can. How do you know whether or not you qualify as smart? Here’s a good rule of thumb: If you have to ask the question, you aren’t.
Regardless of you being one of the 99% or the 1%, you will most likely still need some kind of teaching – at least to make sure you don’t waste too much time doing something that will never generate income, build traffic or add any value to your blog in general. For blog teaching, I can personally recommend the Become A Blogger program from Yaro Starak and Gideon Shalwick. I’m a member there and I’m certain that techpatio.com wouldn’t be where it is now, that fast, if I hadn’t decided to join their program almost 3 months ago. And I’m not even half-way through the program yet!!
Those two guys also run the successful Blog Mastermind program which is more expensive but goes more in-depth with the subjects that matters. I’m not a member there myself, yet, but I plan on joining once I complete the Become A Blogger course. You can also download their free Blog Profits Blueprint e-book right now, to learn some free tips & tricks!
5. Selling Stuff on eBay
I’ve never sold stuff on eBay but I’ve purchased a lot of stuff through eBay, anything from iPhones to flashlights and $2 iPhone silicone cases. You already know, that you can find pretty much anything on eBay, so I won’t go into further details on that matter.
But – there’s also money to be made from eBay. I haven’t tried it myself, but I did something very similar on a Danish auction site a some years back. I found some cheap products that I believed I could re-sell for a profit, and I could. I was still in school so the small amount of money I made on the side were great to support my need for tech gadgets 🙂
You don’t have to buy products to re-sell though. If you have stuff of your own that you don’t need any more, you could put it up for sale on eBay. Even if you wanted to throw it out, consider the possibility that it might be worth some sort of money for some people. Think twice about throwing stuff away, unless of course it is garbage.
eBay is such a popular marketplace that you can even buy products that will help you get started with eBay. I’m affiliating the “eBay Auction Success Kit” through my Social Spark membership, here on TechPatio.
The eBay Auction Success Kit will show you:
- How you can start selling in under 10 minutes.
- How to get the highest bids and maximize profits.
- How over 25 successful Powersellers have generated easy profits from eBay.
- Savvy buying, selling, and business advice from eBay Experts.
- Numerous verified and proven tips to faster eBay profits.
Feel free to check it out, it might be worth something to you?
6. Competitions
This one is not part of the HowStuffWorks Top 5 Ways series, but I just thought I wanted to mention that it’s also possible to make money online by participating in online-based competitions. For instance, the TechZoomin blog is having a monthly $100 contest for commentators, so you can win your share of $100 just by leaving comments on their site.
For more information on how HowStuffWorks describes the top 5 ways of making money on the Internet, click here.
And if you liked this article, you could do your thing and tweet it, digg it, stumble it or whatever it is that you great people do nowadays 🙂 Just click on any of the icons in the “Sharing is sexy!”-toolbar an inch below this text – thank you!!
Affiliate marketing (where you sell products and gain commissions) is a great way for newbies to get started. The expenditure can be cheap to start with, its just a matter of having patience, and sticking with it since it can take a little bit of time to see results. If you have money to invest, you can see results quicker but may lose some money at first as you learn what products convert well.
I really hope that you’re a human and not just a bot, submitting that comment and wasted your time doing it while trying to sneak in a link to your site with tons of pictures that all links to an affiliate membership site.
Bottom line: Link removed. Feel free to come back and comment again but don’t leave links to such sites.
Klaus, Great Post. Thanks for such an informative article.
Well Tiffany although Affiliate Marketing does seem like a good source of income, but from my personal experience I do believe Freelancing is probably the best of the lot. I have been a freelancer for more than 3 years now, and have had a lot of success.
Thanks for all the suggestions! I don’t buy T-shirts off the internet myself 🙂 but I do think it’s cool how we could “create” a product these days and not even have to get it manufactured ourselves thanks to Zazzle and others like that. Stumbled and Tweeted!
.-= christie´s last blog ..9 mm SFX Custom Contact Lenses – MiscBytes Niche of the Month! =-.
Thanks for the stumble and tweet 🙂 I wouldn’t mind having some cool and geeky t-shirts to use every now and then, like those worn by Roy in the UK tv series “The IT Crowd”.
I Stumble, tweeted your post, and add your blog to my favorite technorati. Hope it helps!
.-= Benjamin Cip´s last blog ..Learn How A 17 Years Old Newbie Made $2,389 In Just One Month =-.
It sure does – thank you very much 🙂
You know, I can do at least 3 of the method you mentioned above at once : You can use your blog to offer your freelance services, promote ebay products using phpbay, selling t-shirts and promoting the domain name you want to sell. 🙂 definitely like your article anyway. Thanks for sharing!
.-= Benjamin Cip´s last blog ..Learn How A 17 Years Old Newbie Made $2,389 In Just One Month =-.
Oh yes, that’s very clever. I never thought about combining them though, I just wanted to base my article on the top 5 ways outlined by howstuffworks 🙂
You have some great ideas here. I’ve thought of implementing a couple of these suggestions (I’ve been asked about doing some freelance writing, and I have these grand dreams of doing some website design). The hard part is finding time, especially when this isn’t a full time job. But a guy can dream, right?
.-= Evan Kline´s last blog ..10 Firefox Extensions to Die For =-.
Dreams are great, sure, but it’s when you *take action* that you’re being rewarded 🙂 So fire up your word processor and become a world known freelancer writer!
Very interesting ways to make money online. While I am familiar with most of the tips you give here (specially domain and website flipping – my personal favorites), I have never heard of designing and selling t-shirts. Although I do not see muself buying one, I am curious, I must admit. If these companies exist, they exist for a reason and perhaps it can be rewarding. Would not hurt to give it a try. Thanks
.-= DiTesco´s last blog ..The Most Annoying Things On A Website =-.
If you haven’t done so already, it would be cool if you blogged about your experiences with domain and website flipping. I’ll link to you from this post (might not be too interesting the longer you wait as this post will not remain on the frontpage of my site forever, you know what I mean 🙂 ) – but I would still like to read about your experiences of course.
Hi Klaus. Thanks. Anyway, I actually have not blogged about any concrete experience (good idea for a next post), but I do have something posted about Flipping, that might interest you for reading. It is a two part series. here’s part 1: http://www.iblogzone.com/2009/02/make-money-online-blog-flipping-part-1.html
.-= DiTesco´s last blog ..DiTesco’s Weekly Echo #3 =-.
I like the blogging part. At first I was intimidated by what Steve Pavlina’s statement but now I took it as a challenge. It took me 3 years to prepare myself and now I’m on my way. 🙂
I haven’t read much from Steve Pavlina myself, but that very long article that I link to, was very interesting to read – I can understand why new bloggers might be intimidated by him/his statement, but looking at it as a challenge will surely help you get started on the right track 🙂
I know all four ways aside from domain flipping (which I’m really interested in right now since a lot of friends have been telling me to venture in there). Hopefully I’ll run across a good program teaching effective domain flipping
I wish I could point you in a direction, but I have no clue about any program teaching on domain flipping 🙁
I wish you best of luck 🙂
.-= Klaus @ TechPatio´s last blog ..Do You Want To Pay For Using Twitter On Your Mobile? =-.
Hmmm I guess those are some additional ways to make money online, I like to think of some of the larger scale things like creating your own affiliate marketing company and things of that nature.
I have always had that “Big Business” mentality, all though now that I have a big business I hate it 95% of all days. haha
.-= Extreme John´s last blog ..Extreme John $250 Fan Sign Contest =-.
I’m currently learning about domain flipping.. it is like a cool game.. !
And I really like to earn through indirect advertising ! 😀
Many of us are bloggers! Also I am interested in Domaining! I hope it brings me money in future. I have started investing in it, but I haven’t yet sold a single domain name.
.-= Tech-Freak Stuff´s last blog ..Find Invisible or Offline people who are infact online on Facebook! =-.
That’s a great set of list you have there.
I was especially drawn to the Ebay one, as I have not got the adequate knowledge to dwelve into it at the moment. I have plenty of stuff to sell, but am not sure how to go about it and don’t want to spend my energy into this experience as of yet.
I will take a listen/view into the “eBay Auction Success Kit” and take it from there, when am ready to get acquainted with this new experience.
For now, I’ve requested my Ebay Expertise friend to sell off my products through his account. (Not yet happened)
Who knows, I may even start selling something soon.
Good to be back! 🙂
.-= Ana´s last blog ..The deeper message from within =-.
eBay is quite popular in the UK too, right? Or are there other sites that are bigger than eBay for selling your own stuff or maybe buying and selling for a profit?
I hope you make it and feel free to contact me if you want to put up a guest post about your eBay experiences, with a link back to your site etc., of course. Just in case you would like to share your experiences but don’t think that Expressive World would be the right place to post eBay stuff 🙂
Klaus,
Yes, it is very popular. I think it is the top leading places to sell goods. That’s a very nice thought, and I shall take you up on that, when I engage in the experience.
Thank you. 🙂
.-= Ana´s last blog ..The deeper message from within =-.
Sounds great – you just let me know if/when you want to post your experiences, then I’m sure we can find out something.
.-= Klaus @ TechPatio´s last blog ..Google Removes The Pirate Bay From Search Results =-.
Excellent content, it’s very helpful!! Thank you for sharing such a nice and easy to read & understandable article . Your blog is thoroughly amazing and illuminating.Looking forward to your next insights!!!