Technology's ever-pervading permeation into every last fiber and
morsel of society has caused a dramatic upheaval in the way we live,
work and entertain ourselves. Thanks to the disruptive nature of the
internet, the rate of change has only increased exponentially in recent
years.
Yet, with so much change in the world today, and a
nearly-instantaneous access to the globe's population through mediums
such as social media and online search, many people are still left
perplexed by how they can utilize the powerful technology inherently
available through the internet, to actually make money online.
The truth? It's not easy making money online today. With so much
competition and so many people and headlines vying for our attention,
sifting through and finding reputable sources to generate any
respectable amount of income through the web has become an
ever-increasing challenge.
Often, what happens is that we run into unscrupulous Internet
Marketers (IMs) who have less-than altruistic intentions of extracting
money from you rather than helping you to make it. However, this isn't
something new. People have been falling for networking marketing,
pyramid schemes, and affiliate marketing scams since before the start of
the net.
So, where are we supposed to turn to make money the legitimate way
online? This isn't just about generating passive income; this is also
about finding ways and means to create an active income through the
conveniences afforded to us by the internet that will not only help us
with our debt obligations, but also empower us to save, invest and get really rich in the future.
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It's not easy by any
means. Anyone that tells you otherwise isn't being transparent with
you. It takes an enormous amount of effort and authority-building before
you can really start getting rich through your online
income-producing activities. However, there are some basic methods for
making a respectable amount of cash in the short term.
Pain Versus Pleasure
Before I talk about some of the methods for making money online, I
wanted to address the role of pain versus pleasure. Every decision that
we make in life is weighed on a pain-versus-pleasure scale. We will
always do more to avoid pain than we will to gain pleasure, plain and
simple. However, this is also what holds us back from succeeding in any
endeavor.
Let me explain...
Now, making money online should seem like a pleasurable activity. Why
wouldn't we do just about anything to see things through, since it
would be a major source of pleasure, right? Wrong. In the beginning,
like anything else, we might get really excited about it. We might also
set our hopes very high. But that all comes crashing down when we begin
to fail.
The problem? In order to make serious amounts of money online, you
need to the most amount of work for the least initial return, not the
least amount of work for the greatest return. Translation — major
amounts of pain. That's also the problem with how affiliate marketers,
network marketers, and IMs attempt to sell you the "dream," so to speak.
When people buy into the hype, they set their expectations
extremely high. All they need to do is send a few emails out, and voila,
instant millions overnight. Well, clearly it doesn't quite work like
that. The issue at heart is that we will always do more to avoid pain
than to gain pleasure in the short term, not in the long term.
That's why it's so hard to quit bad habits or do anything else that
requires any semblance of struggle. The human mind is hardwired to avoid
pain in the short term, not in the long term. It's part of our survival
instinct. However, you can easily overcome this in the long term as
long as you set your expectations the right way.
What Are The Best Ways To Make Money Online?
As someone who's been immersed in a number of online industries for
quite some time, I know a thing or two about what it takes to succeed in
this arena. However, just like you, I started at ground zero with
little knowledge, but a great deal of passion. What I learned along the
way were some invaluable lessons from failure that hurt at the time, but
helped immensely in the grand scheme of things.
Today, if you're at all serious about succeeding in any endeavor,
whether online or offline, you have to deliver enormous amounts of
value. Yes, you have to do the most amount of work for the least initial
return. This is especially true online. Why? Because it takes time to
build authority and create an audience, two primary ingredients
necessary to succeed in the wonderful world of commerce on the web.
Every successful business and person has delivered a tremendous
amount of value at the outset. They did the most amount of work, and
they inspected every detail meticulously, to ensure that they were doing
right by their customers. As long as you keep that in mind, and you
don't look for a quick buck, you'll succeed in the long term.
- Find your niche — Figure out what you're good at
or what you want to be good at. You don't need to be an expert right
now, but you do need to decide where you're going to fit in if you're at
all serious about making serious cash in the long term.
- Build a blog on a custom domain — Your blog
is your virtual home. Without it, you've no place to filter all that
traffic and people interested in what you have to say. But don't build a
blog on a subdomain like yoursite.wordpress.com, create a blog with a
custom domain like www.yoursite.com.
- Always add value — Adding value over time
creates authority, and authority breeds trust, which in turn helps to
grow your audience and readership. Without a significant following,
you'll find it hard to gain any traction online. It simply takes time.
- Create an email list and treat them right —
One of the best ways to make money online is by marketing to an
actively-interested group of email subscribers. While most people think
that email marketing is dead, that's far from the truth. This is your
greatest potential source of income online. Think of it as your money
tree.
- Don't sacrifice morals for a quick buck — At
the outset, you'll want to do all sorts of things to make money online,
but don't sacrifice your morals for a quick buck. Not only will you put
people off, but you'll lose Google's trust. You also shouldn't concern
yourself with things like Adsense or other ads on a blog before you have
around 100,000 visitors per day. Yes, per day.
The point? Think about the long-term results of your activities. It
will seem frustrating in the beginning. Then again, everything
worthwhile is going to be difficult. It will take time. Stick it out and
don't give up. In the meanwhile, here are some of the best and most
legitimate ways you can make money online in the short and long term.
#1 — Write And Sell An Ebook
If you have a propensity for writing and you can slay with your
prose, consider writing an ebook. While the market has certainly become
saturated as of late, books that help teach people about a technical
topic still sell extremely well. This is a great source of passive
income but does require a large amount of effort at the outset before
any money is generated.
You can sell your ebooks through Amazon's Kindle program or Apple's iTunes Connect,
which gives you access to a large majority of the digital-book reading
market and the barriers for entry are incredibly low. You don't need to
invest lots of money to make this happen, but you do need to invest lots
of time, not only in writing the ebooks, but in marketing them as well.
#2 — Sell Audiobooks With Audible
I've been in the audiobook-selling business for some time now and have over 3 dozen titles to my name.
I know a thing or two about audiobooks. And, what I've noticed recently
is that audiobooks are growing in popularity as their digital-ebook
counterparts are becoming less and less popular.
People are turning to audio and visuals when it comes to technical
subjects. However, you should consider doing an ebook first and turning
it into an audiobook through a resource like Audible's ACX
platform. You can hire a producer either through a royalty share
program, so you don't have to shell out upfront cash, or you can do a
pay-per-hour hire as well.
#3 — Create An App
Yes, this is far more technical. Unless you have the right
app-development skills, doing this is going to be a significant
undertaking. But, apps are also a great source of passive income when done the right way. You can reach a massive audience of smartphone users by building a great app.
However, like anything else truly worthwhile, apps require a
significant investment of your time or money upfront. If you don't have
the skills, then you have to hire someone who can assist you in creating
a great app. But first you need to come up with an idea that will sell.
Do the proper market research and analytics to come up with the right
app.
#4 — Use Mechanical Turk
Mechanical Turk
is Amazon's take on micro-jobs. These are small miniscule-jobs that you
can do for other people, which they call HITs, or Human Intelligence
Tasks. These are super simple tasks that anyone can do. Some examples
are listing off some URLs with certain kinds of images for one cent, or
recording a few phrases with a microphone for 6 cents.
Yes, they don't pay much, but if you string together hundreds of
well-paying HITs, you can make a bit of money quickly online if you're
in a crunch for cash. Also, it's important to note that you can also
employ people with HITs to help you with whatever micro-tasks you might
have.
#5 — Offer Gigs On Fiverr
If you have some professional experience in graphic design, accounting, social media marketing, web development or SEO training,
for example, you could offer gigs on Fiverr starting at $5 per job. You
could perform a valuable service that you could also up-sell to make
more money per gig.
Fiverr is one of the biggest providers in the gig economy on the web
and you can sell a wide variety of services and products through this
medium. Do the research and find out what you can offer. However, keep
in mind that like any other money-making task, it takes time to succeed
here. And stellar reviews will help you generate more and more income
over time.
#6 — Sell Professional Services On Upwork or 99Designs
Upwork and 99Designs are two of the biggest resources for selling
just about any professional service under the sun. If you have extensive
experience in a field, you might want to consider selling your services
through one of these sites. 99Designs only applies to graphic design
while Upwork applies to nearly every other professional service.
However, like anything else, the beginning will be difficult. Before
you have a significant track record and extensive reviews, sourcing work
in one of these highly-competitive platforms will be difficult. Find
the most successful people in your niche and try to model your approach
and online profile after theirs.
#7 — Build A Blog
One of the most exhaustive endeavors when it comes to making money online is to build a blog.
But we all know that building a blog with real readership is difficult.
It takes a lot of work. And I'm speaking from experience. However, once
you reach a certain point, the progress and momentum sways in your
favor and it becomes far easier.
Blogs can easily generate tens of thousands of dollars to hundreds of
thousands of dollars per month when done right. Yes, that much. But it
won't be easy to get there. However, looking back on it, a year from now
you'll wish you started today. So why wait another moment?
#8 — Email Marketing
Email marketing is at the heart of every successful endeavor on the
web. For those serious about making money online, email marketing is
certainly where it's at. But it has to be done the right way. Before you
even try to market anything to anyone via an email list, be sure that
they're people that subscribed and opted in directly to you.
When you try to market to people via email out of the blue, you won't
find as much success. But, if those email subscribers are actively and
keenly interested in what you have to say, and they signed up directly
through your blog or site, your success rates will be much higher.
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