Do you want to make money online? Too many websites offering products for making money from home overpromise and underdeliver. Here are some techniques for making money online honestly now.
1. Affiliate Programs
Affiliate programs offer a way to make money online by promoting products for people or companies. You do not need to have your effect, and when you enable the company, and sales are made, you earn a commission on the sale (either a percentage of the profits or a flat dollar amount). You can promote the product by writing about it on your website, blog, Squidoo, or Social Networking Websites. If you want to find some affiliate programs to join, you can look through Clickbank, CJ, and ShareASale to start.
2. Build It & Sell It – Or Buy It & Build It
If you build up a niche website with high-quality content related to the topic of your site – you can either keep the site as it is or sell it for a profit. I’ve made numerous niche websites over the years, and many are receiving targeted traffic but not making much money. They may have Google AdSense ads on them but are still not making the type of money I would like them to. If I don’t want to work on marketing that website, I could sell it to someone with a product related to my site’s topic. I recently sold a website I had built for three years (it was not profiting at all, and I didn’t have time to market it) and got a quick $3000 on Flippa. Some people call this “Blog Flipping” or “Site Flipping.” It works to make a short chunk of money, but it is not sustainable unless you are driven to create numerous blogs, build them up, and resell them. Alternatively, you could buy a website on Flippa, build it up, and profit from it.
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3. Membership Websites
Residual income is the way to make money online. People sell books and products online all the time – but to make a real sustainable, lasting income by having your membership website or promoting (as an affiliate) a membership website you believe in. The key here is to promote a membership website or program you have tried or are currently a member of – and vouch for it 100%. With so many scams online these days, it can be tough to find such a membership program. As of now, I can honestly tell you that I do believe in a few programs out there. Blog Masters Club is one – by David Grimsley.
It is currently not open to the public (just filled all slots), but if you direct people to sign up on that page and they later make a sale, you will make a residual commission on their membership. You can still join and promote David’s other free products – and his affiliate signup page is here. Yaro Starak is also an honest marketer with a great membership site called the Membership Site Mastermind, and strangely enough, it is currently not taking on any more students. It is good that they are not taking on every new person who wants to sign up because they truly provide individual training and help through their membership sites. Like the other program – if you direct traffic and they sign up to be notified when the program is available, you will still receive your commissions. Yaro also has other free reports you can promote as an affiliate, so sign up here. Lastly, a membership site I am a part of is Easily Answered – a program that allows members to join and ask questions directly to experts in related online marketing fields.
4. Product Creation & Sales
If you have your product, you will make more money by selling it online. You will profit even more if it is a digital product that can be downloaded (i.e., software or e-book). Product creation is not for everyone. But if you are an expert in a particular field and want to share your knowledge, creating and selling a product online is a fantastic way to profit. You can sell your product and use Paypal, Clickbank, or CJ (to name a few) to process payments securely. To benefit even more, you can sell that digital e-book as a paperback through Lulu’s Self-Publishing program.
Once you go through the Lulu process and your book begins to sell, it will be picked up and sold by other major book chains, such as Barnes and Noble, Amazon.com, and more international bookstores online. Alternatively, if you want to make more money and have a great idea, you can create a software program and sell it repeatedly for constant profits.
All you need is one good idea that might save a user time, provide entertainment, or solve a problem. You can pay a programmer on Scriptlance a minimal amount for them to create the software (make sure you own full rights to it), and then you can sell it or provide it for free online. Examples of software program types include iPhone applications, WordPress plugins, or any other general software that can be used on one’s computer.
5. Banner Ads
If a website receives decent traffic, you could make money from banner advertising. This technique can cost a person much money, but only if their website receives heavy traffic. You can use Google AdSense ads, Text Link Ads, or BuySellAds.com for banner advertising. You join one of the sites and put a small piece of code onto your website. People can purchase ads on your website, and you can charge a set amount per month for certain ads to be placed in certain places on your website.
6. Pro Blogging
This is an option if you enjoy writing and want to make money online as a professional blogger. Being a professional blogger is tough for many people because a person needs to know how to attract a wide audience, provide fresh content daily, and direct readers to take a certain action. I read a report written by David Risley about blogging, and he explained his thoughts on how bloggers don’t understand internet marketing enough, and internet marketers don’t understand bloggers. A lot of cash can be made if someone can incorporate internet marketing into their blogging efforts. It is true. David is a prime example of this, and I believe his statements about bloggers and marketers are true.
I’m learning how to incorporate the two together on my blog here. So, if you want to be a full-time blogger and make tens of thousands of dollars per month from your blog, then being a Pro Blogger is the way to go. If you want an excellent resource and free report about what it takes to be a Pro Blogger – Read the Six Figure Blogger Blueprint by David Risley. Another wonderful resource on Pro Blogging is Darren Rowse’s Pro Blogger website here.
7. Free Reports & One-Time-Offers
An internet marketing method that can take your income from zero to thousands in this one. You must create a free, high-quality report on a topic or idea. The information will help people in some way or another. You will also need a domain name and a hosted website. If you need a good web host, I recommend Bluehost. This technique, which I employed on one of my websites several years ago, increased my income by an extra $36,000 for that year. As soon as I took it off my site, that income disappeared.
So that means this can dramatically increase your revenue the very instant you put it online and set it up on your website. It will take some work to set it up initially – but once that’s done, your only job will be to increase traffic to it. I will write a special report or article about creating a free account and a one-time offer shortly. I will provide you with every resource needed to do this. If you want to be notified when that is posted here, please subscribe to my RSS Feed. As of now, though, I thoroughly explain the entire process in Book 3 of Honest Riches. Here are the basics of this technique:
Create a free report on a niche topic and get traffic to that free report. The user will fill in the email address to download their information, and immediately after filling in their email address, they will be redirected to a special one-time offer page. Your OTO page will provide many high-quality e-books and software programs at a special low price if they take advantage of their one chance to get it at that price. They can cancel that and go directly to their free report download page if they don’t buy.
8. Social Media Marketing
If you haven’t joined Twitter, now is the time to do so. Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, and YouTube (and many others) are all social networking websites that can help you increase targeted traffic and build up your reputation and income online. Social networking websites can drive targeted traffic to your website or blog. My main website receives about 10%+/- of the total traffic from Twitter, with Facebook trailing closely behind.
One method to increase visitor satisfaction is to create a simple welcome page for users who are visiting Twitter, for example. Instead of linking to the homepage of your site from your Twitter account, link to the special page created specifically for Twitter followers. You can give them a gift or downloadable product to thank them for visiting. Whatever you do, try not to bombard fellow Twitter users with ads and sales pitches. Use these venues to build a network of trusted friends and business partners. It’s a great way to interact with like-minded people while increasing your website traffic and building your list. Perry Belcher created a short video explaining how to use Social Media Marketing for your online business.
9. Clothing & Brand Creation
This method is for the creative who enjoys graphic design and creating stunning graphics. If you are not innovative or familiar with creating graphics, you could pay someone to make one. Once you do that, you can join Cafepress for free, open a shop, and upload your picture. You can then choose which types of shirts and other products you want to be sold with that graphic on and set the prices. Anything above the fixed Cafepress base price will be your profit – per shirt or item sold. If you have a niche website, you can take advantage of that, create a graphic, and sell some things that relate directly to the niche product. This can make a nice income stream, especially if the topic of your clothing is popular or controversial.
10. Mailing Lists & Email Marketing
Email marketing encompasses tactics that are used to correspond with possible clients and website visitors. Traffic your website receives from social networks and other venues will, ideally, join your email list. Some Internet marketers use email marketing as their main method of profiting online. It is highly profitable if you are tactful and do not spam people. Email marketing is also integral to the other money-making methods listed above.
It goes hand-in-hand with other marketing techniques. In basic terms, when targeted website traffic visits your website, you do not want them to read a little post and then leave (and never return). You want to direct them to join your “list.” You may offer them a gift; in return, they fill out their email address, and their details are automatically stored in your autoresponder email management software. In the future, you can send out mass mailings to your list if you have more free information or a product you want to tell them about (either yours or an affiliate product promotion). This can be very profitable.
I use Send Studio’s Email Marketer software to manage my list. There are no monthly fees, and there are a lot of great features. With a high-quality list, sending out one email and making thousands of dollars from that single message is possible. Creating a short series of high-quality, useful messages related to your website is an important tip.
Do not try to sell the reader anything in the first five messages. If your readers are loyal and enjoy what you provide, they are more likely to buy from you in the future if you promote a product to them. I’ve seen Internet Marketers take email marketing too far by sending spammy-type emails every day, trying to make a few quick bucks. Those tactics will annoy your readers, and they will unsubscribe – it will also damage your reputation, and word spreads fast online. So, if used tactfully, email marketing is highly profitable.
