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Either way, people are willing to spend money for something that adds value to their life. Grow Your Inheritance You might think a relatively small inheritance — e.g., $25,000 to $75,000 — won’t go too far, but you can really cash in by allocating the funds wisely. One of the best things you can do to make money fast is to invest in your networking at work, spend time learning as much as possible, and get a raise or promotion. This alone could help you to make an extra $100 a day in no time.
© Tetra Images | Getty ImagesWhether you're looking to make some fast cash, or you're after long-term, more sustainable income-producing results, there are certainly ways you can make money online today. The truth is that making money online isn't as difficult as most make it out to seem. It does require some discipline.
However, if you're looking for realistic ways you can start earning money online now, then it really truly does boil down to seven paths you can take towards profit. Some will provide you with immediate results, helping you to address your basic monthly necessities such as rent, utilities and groceries, while others have the potential to transform your life by revolutionizing your finances in the long term.
Related: 8 Ways to Make Money Online Without Quitting your Day Job
No matter what method you select for generating your online income, there's one very important thing to understand. Money can be earned and spent, saved and pilfered, invested and wasted. Not time. That's why time is far more valuable than money. You can't recreate time. Once it's spent, it's gone forever.
When you lack the luxury of time, making money on or offline can seem like an impossible task. How are you supposed to do that when you're working at a life-sucking nine-to-five job? While the stability of full-time employment might allow most to sleep well at night, it doesn't empower your creative juices to search for new income-producing strategies.
No matter what method you end up using to generate an income on the web, you need to adjust your mindset to help empower rather than discourage you. The truth is, making money online can be fraught with avoidable pitfalls. Cancel the noise by keeping a few fundamental guiding principles in mind.
If you're at all serious about generating a full-time income and possibly more from your online activities, then you need to focus on passive income as opposed to active income. Sure, the active income will help you survive. That's the scarcity mentality at play. But it's the passive income ideas that will help you thrive.
Related: 2 Ways to Make Money Online This Month
Considering that you have a finite amount of time, passive income should make up a large part of your work. If you're serious about generating any semblance of income online, then passive income should be one of your sole goals and ambitions. Why? Wouldn't you prefer to do the work one time and get paid repeatedly as opposed to relying on your time to generate that income? Invest the time at the front-end so that you can reap the benefits on the back-end. This means putting in a bit of sweat equity and not getting paid today. Rather, you'll get paid somewhere down the road. And you'll continue getting paid whether you keep building that passive income stream or you stop.
Anyone interested in making money online should be pursuing passive income, while also working on active income. There are loads of ways to generate an income passively on the internet, many of which start at the foundation of having a blog, generating substantial traffic and building an audience and a list. It's not easy, but it's worth it.
That doesn't mean you need to start a blog to make money online today. You could opt for a non-blog-starting route, but if you're looking for longevity in your income-producing abilities on the internet, then a blog should be your primary aim.
1. Leverage the app economy
If you're looking to address some immediate financial needs, then the app economy is likely right for you.
Uber or Lyft: If you're in a locale where you can find Uber or Lyft, or one of the many competitors around the world such as China's Didi, the hours are flexible and you can work as you see fit, making it perfect, even if you currently have full-time employment but are looking to make some money on the side.
Postmates: You don't even need a car in some locations to make money with this app. In some major metropolitan areas like Manhattan, a bike would suffice.
iBotta: Earn cash back rewards by purchasing featured products at major retailers. All you have to do is add rebates, go shopping, then snap a photo of your receipt to earn your cashback. Simple and effective.
Task Rabbit: Another simple and straightforward app for making a bit of side-hustle income is the Task Rabbit app. Tasks can be anything from simple repairs to more exhaustive undertakings. The app carefully vets each service provider to ensure the highest quality, and it's a great way to make some extra income on the side on your own terms.
Ebates: This app offers a simple way to make money online by buying whatever you're already buying and then getting a cash-back reward. With eBates, there is no scanning receipts. Simply click a link in the app and buy it from the store. You'll automatically be credited with your cash rewards upon purchase along with receiving an email confirmation.
Swagbucks: With Swagbucks, there are a number of ways you can make money. You can shop online, watch videos, answer surveys and surf the web. The app gives you both cashback and gift cards as a reward for your efforts.
Inbox Dollars: Another app you can use to make money online is Inbox Dollars, which pays you for watching television, taking surveys and shopping. There are cash offers here and it's relatively similar to some of the other apps in this arena.
Related: What You'll Really Earn on Uber, Airbnb and TaskRabbit Every Month
2. Use existing websites
You could also opt to use existing websites for making money. These include both active income and passive income methods. For example, you could sell some used items or invest in creating some digital designs that then can be sold on merchandise. Again, devote a sizable portion of your time to passive income so that you can slowly build up earnings that will arrive on autopilot without any extra added effort.
Of course, a large portion of these sites do have their own respective apps. But these are certainly less involved in the gig economy, and more so in the longer-term projects that exist in the fields of photography, online marketing, graphic design and web development, for example.
Craigslist: This site has been the go-to resource for over a decade now for people that are looking to make a bit of extra money online. You can easily sell your used stuff, rent out a spare room in your home or apartment, and offer up your services to the world.
Gallery: 19 Digital Product Ideas for Generating Passive Income (Money Talks News)
Upwork: This website offers a great marketplace for selling just about any professional service. You don't need a merchant account, a website of your own or anything else for that matter. All you need to do is be able to provide a high-quality service at a reasonable price. But be informed, you will have to compete with many others that are constantly bidding on open jobs.
Cafe Press: This website allows you to create digital designs that can then be sold on the platform. You'll earn a commission for everything that sells and you'll never have to deal with logistics like printing, warehousing and customer service. If you have some graphic design skills, then this is a great potential source for your web-based income.
Fiverr: Israeli-based Fivver was started in 2010 by Shal Wininger and Micha Kaufam. You can offer gigs as low as $5 but also get paid much more for upgrades and add-ons.
Mechanical Turk: Amazon's Mechanical Turk is a resource for doing human-intelligence tasks, or as the site commonly refers to them, HITs. You get paid a very small fee for any given HIT and you'll need a good deal of volume to make a substantial amount of money. But it is a resource you can use in your spare time to generate a small income online.
Flippa: If you have a penchant for buying and selling, you could use Flippa, and its higher-end counterpart, Deal Flow Brokerage to buy and sell websites for a profit. You'll need to know what you're doing here, but you could easily make a sizable income by flipping income-generating websites for profit.
Etsy: While Etsy's popularity has declined recently, it's still a great resource for selling handmade items online. No need for complex ecommerce sites or merchant accounts or any sort of automation. The company takes a commission of every sale and charges a small listing fee per item. But many still use Etsy as their primary source of income. The best part is that you can also sell digital products such as poster designs.
Shutterstock and iStockPhoto: Have a keen eye for photography? Why not sell photos on some of the leading photography sites. You'll need some design software skills to tag along. But if you do have skill in this arena, it's a great potential source for passive income.
Threadless: Similar to CafePress, Chicago-based Threadless also allows you to sell digital designs in the form of t-shirts and other merchandise such as phone cases, mugs, beach towels and so on.
Zazzle: Another great resource for selling online is to use Robert Beaver's Zazzle. The site is somewhat similar to Etsy and virtually anyone can make money online selling a variety of items here. From art to handmade items and customizable products, you can pretty much sell anything here.
Related: 5 Ways to Make Enough Side Money to Eventually Quit Your Job
3. Sell your own stuff
If you're ready to enter the ecommerce fray, you could sell your own stuff. Of course, along with selling your own stuff on your own website comes a whole slew of both responsibilities and technical configuration and requirements. For starters, you'll need a website and a hosting account. You'll also need a merchant account like ones offered by Stripe or PayPal. Then you'll need to design that site, build a sales funnel, create a lead magnet and do some email marketing.
You'll also need ecommerce software, fulfillment software, worry about warehousing, customer service and refunds. But that's not all. You'll also need traffic. Think search engine optimization, Facebook ads, and other social media campaigns. It is hard work, especially on your own. You could opt for Amazon's platform, which might be an easier route. But, then again, at the end of the day, this is a serious business, which could produce significant profits. So you're either all in or you're not.
Shopify: Want to build your own storefront? You could opt to create a Shopify store. You could also install WooCommerce as a plugin and run your ecommerce store from your blog. You'll need an SSL certificate and a way to process payments, but you might find this easier to get up and running fast to start selling immediately.
Fulfilled-by-Amazon (FBA): You could start selling on the largest online store in the world and not spend the time to build out your own infrastructure or worry about traffic. You will need to pay a commission, but most of the other processes will be automated for you.
Drop-shipping: Amazon offers one form of drop-shipping, but there are other resources for drop-shipping products that you'll never actually have to see or handle yourself. You'll simply need to close the sale. Providers like SaleHoo, Worldwide Brands, and many others, offer you a resource for drop-shipping your products.
High-ticket consulting or coaching: You could sell your own high-ticket consulting or coaching products from your website. You'll still need a website, merchant account, sales funnel, lead magnet and many other items. But you can easily earn a substantial amount of money from each individual customer, making it well worth the arduous setup required.
Related: Making Money Online: 5 Major Online Selling Opportunities for Any Entrepreneur
4. Sell as an affiliate
There are loads of resources for making money online as an affiliate. You could source products from ClickBank, Commission Junction, Rakuten Marketing, Share-a-Sale,Impact Radius and many others. Plus, many of the larger companies have their own affiliate programs as well. Do your due diligence and find the right company with a relevant product or service to your audience that you can sell as an affiliate.
In some cases, you will need an active website with substantial traffic to get approved. Draftkings mobile betting indiana. Selling as an affiliate isn't easy by any means, but if you do have the audience, it can definitely amount to a substantial amount of income.
Related: Why Affiliate Networks Are So Important to Online Affiliate Marketing
5. Start a blog
If you're serious about making money online, start a blog. Blogging is one of the easiest and most sustainable income sources. As long as the blog is setup the right way, in the right niche, with the right content targeted at the right audience, and the offer is complementary to the content, you could make a tremendous amount of passive income from a blog.
While some might think that starting a blog is an arduous effort, when you understand the precise steps you need to take, it becomes far easier. It all starts in the decision of choosing a profitable niche and picking the right domain name. From there, you need to build your offers. You can easily sell things like mini-email courses, training sessions and ebooks.
Related: 6 Ways to Turn Your Blog Into a Money Maker
6. Email marketing
If you're interested in online marketing, setup email software and create a lead magnet that you can use in your sales funnel. Then, build up that list. It's often said that you can expect to earn about $1 per subscriber per month. If you have a list of 10,000 subscribers, that means you can earn roughly around $10,000 per month. You will need to deliver value and not pitch them on every email, but it is a very achievable goal in a short period.
There are many ways to get people onto your list. Lead magnets are one such resource. For example, you can build ebooks, checklists and cheat sheets. But you can also do content upgrades, such as PDF versions of an article with added resources in them, four-part video training series, and more. Think about your audience and what you can offer them to better serve them, then treat them with some respect and you'll eventually reap the rewards.
Related: One of Facebook's First Employees Explains Why Email Marketing Is Better Than Social Media Marketing
7. Webinars training
Webinars are quite possibly one of the most potent ways you can make an exorbitant amount of money online. You'll need an audience to train and you'll need to know what you're talking about. Of course, this usually requires having a website and some semblance of an online presence. However, people can still do webinars without all of that. For example, you might have a sizable social media following and you train them every week on something to do with social media. But you will need a product to embed and sell at some point. Don't worry about it in the beginning. In my experience, the best webinar platform out there is GoToWebinar.
No matter what method you choose to make money online, understand that you might be able to make some money fast, but for the sizable returns, you'll need significant sweat equity. However, a year from now, you'll be happy you started today. Remember, time is far more valuable than money. Focus on creating passive income streams that will free up your time so that you can quit the rat race and focus on the things that matter.
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One thing that successful entrepreneurs have in common is that they’ve all found ways to make money while they sleep. They’ve mastered passive income and probably have several streams of it coming in.
If you’re struggling to master one stream of income, even an active one at that, this whole make money while you sleep thing might sound like the most unattainable thing possible. Not going to lie, it can take some work. But, earning passive income is possible, for anyone.
Back up a little… What is passive income?
When people talk about making money while you sleep, they’re talking about passive income. It’s money you are earning while you aren’t actively working for it. You have to set it in motion, but once it’s going, it can continue moving with minimal effort.
For most people, your job, right now, is not earning you passive income. You are trading time for money.
When you only work like that, you end up capping your earning potential because time infinite. There are only so many hours in a day, days in a week, weeks in a month, and so on…
Warren Buffet said it best, “If you don’t find a way to make money while you sleep, you will work until you die.”
That’s a hard truth, but that’s why you’re reading this article right now.
Before we go on, let’s get one thing straight – all passive income requires some initial investment. That investment comes in one of two forms:
- Money
- Effort
You have to put forth one of those things before you see any gains, and don’t trust anyone who is trying to sell you a magic pill. They don’t exist. You have to work to get paid, but with the right work, you can earn money while you sleep.
You’ve got the gist of it. You know it’s time to work smarter, not harder. So here you go…
Real, legit, non-scam, honest, wholesome ways to make money while you sleep
1. Invest your money in the stock market
I’m starting with this one because it’s probably the most obvious source of passive income. Investing takes money to get started, and you can do it through a traditional brokerage, like Fidelity or Charles Schwab. But if you feel like you don’t have much money to get started. There is now a wealth of micro investing apps that eliminate that barrier.
Micro investing produces micro results, but it’s one way new investors can start earning small amounts of passive income. To boost that income, you’ll have to start making larger investments.
2. Rent out a room in your house
Perhaps this isn’t the most glamorous way to make money while you sleep, but it’s a good first step if you feel like you don’t have a ton of time or money to invest in other ideas.
Airbnb is one of the best options for renting a room (or your entire house) to out of town visitors. Living in big cities or tourist destinations open you up to a higher earning potential. Besides passive income, this can be a nice way to offset the cost of your mortgage payments.
3. Start a blog and earn affiliate income
Big bloggers, like the ones with six-figure income reports, make blogging look super easy. They write, post photos, share stuff on social media, and live dreamy lifestyles on boats or while backpacking through Europe. These people are real, and they’ve put a lot of work getting to where they are now.
Not all bloggers are going to get to that point, like the vast majority aren’t going to reach a six-figure a month paycheck. Part of that is because they quit right before things pick up, and the other part is because, well… not everyone can make that much money from a blog. Just like not all coffee shops will turn into massive corporations like Starbucks.
But, the average blogger, who puts time and energy into growing their blog, can earn passive income from this it.
Bloggers can do this in a few different ways, but affiliate marketing is what most people think of first.
What is affiliate marketing?
This is one of several different blog monetization methods that bloggers use to earn income. It’s when you place a special link in your blog posts for a certain product or company, and when one of your readers clicks on that link and makes a purchase, you earn a little money, or affiliate income.
Weeks, months, and even years after you publish those posts, people can still click on those links and drive your income. That’s the make money while you sleep part of it.
Before you can start earning with affiliate marketing, you will need to make a major time and energy investment in your blog. You will have to grow your audience and page views to a certain point before you can use affiliate networks. There’s not one number to shoot for; a lot of this depends on your blog.
Actually, some of the bloggers earning high amounts of affiliate income don’t have massive numbers of page views. One great example is our good friend Michelle Schroeder-Gardner at Making Sense of Cents. She regularly earns around $50,000 a month with affiliate marketing, and she teaches her exact strategy to other bloggers in her course Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing
You can read our full review of the course here.
Still need to start a blog?
We got you! Anyone can start a blog, but remember it’s a labor of love (and sometimes frustration), but it’s mostly a lot of fun.
If you need help getting started, like with the technical aspects, Launch That Blog is a free service from Millennial Money Man that:
- Helps with the installation and set-up process of a WordPress blog
- Teaches you how to use your brand new blog
- Helps you make it look awesome
- Makes sure you have the essential tools ready to go
The only thing you need to pay for is hosting, which is just $2.95 per month through Bluehost. Learn more at How to Start a Blog with Launch That Blog.
4. Create a product to sell
If you have a blog, creating your own product is another really great way to earn money while you sleep. The initial investment is the time it takes to create and market the product. You also have to build trust with your audience so they know they’re going to get their money’s worth.
Bloggers can sell all sorts of things through their blogs, like:
- Printables
- Swag
- Ebooks
- Courses (read more about this in the next point)
Our friends Cody and Julie over at Gold City Ventures are super side hustlers that make money selling printables on Etsy! They’ve had so much success, they even created a course sharing their best Etsy hustle secrets. Check out their Etsy course here.
After you’ve created your product and start marketing it, there is some general upkeep required to continue driving visitors to your site. Having an email list is another must have to market any kind of product. These two things will continue to passively convert visitors to your site into paying customers.
One of the best parts of selling your own product is that you are in complete control of it – from the creation, marketing, and selling process. You are your own boss here.
5. Create an online course
Selling online courses is a way to share valuable knowledge with others. Your course should be something you’re an expert on, and it should be something that you know people will benefit from.
That’s why Mike Yanda and Bobby Hoyt, founders of Laptop Empires, created the Facebook Side Hustle course. Those two are basically Facebook ads gurus, have earned decent money running them, and realized a course would show others how to start this profitable side hustle.
When you create a course, the investment is definitely effort, but course sales are a lucrative way to engage your audience and offer them some genuine, real-world help.
6. Real estate
Investing money in real estate is likely always going to be a serious source of passive income. That’s because, like time, land is finite. People always need places to live, brick and mortars need a place to set up shop, and so on.
Here are three ways to make money while you sleep with real estate:
- Rental properties. This can increase your monthly cash flow with rental income. This can be residential or commercial.
- Fix and flips. Here you are purchasing properties that are in need of work, then fixing them up and selling them at a higher price.
- REITs. That stands for Real Estate Investment Trust. It’s investing in commercial real estate for average people (non-millionaires). Fundrise is a great platform to check out.
7. Drop shipping
By 2021, it’s expected that 2.14 billion people will be shopping online, and that will be the highest number ever.
That’s why starting your own e-commerce store with a platform like Shopify can help you earn passive income. The way drop shipping works is:
- Start with building a website (you can do this through Shopify).
- Add products to your website that come from certain manufacturers.
- When a person purchases that product, it ships from the manufacturer, not you.
- You pay for the products, but earn more than the sales price.
Drop shipping is unique in that you don’t have to source and store inventory. You just build and manage the site. Once your site is built and marketed properly, you can start selling products and earning money while you sleep.
Realistic Ways To Make Money Fast
8. Start a YouTube channel
Like bloggers, not all YouTubers are going to get rich. That’s just the reality. But, YouTube is a fun way to tell stories, create DIYs, offer tutorials, and more.
You earn money on YouTube with:
- Ad revenue. Links on your videos bring viewers to products and services they can purchase.
- Sponsorships. Not entirely passive, but you can get paid to promote products and companies you believe in.
- Creating your own products. This could be swag, courses you sell through your website, etc.
Listen to Episode 34 of the Laptop Empires podcast to learn how Talaat McNeely of His & Her Money started and grew their YouTube channel.
9. Sell stock photos
7 Realistic Ways To Make Money Online
For professional and amateur photographers, you can sell your photos to stock photo sites like Shutterstock, SmugMug, iStock, and more.
Depending on the site, you can make between 20%-60% of the cost of downloading content.
10. Write an ebook
With Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing, newbie authors can write and sell ebooks to earn passive income. The investment here is obvious – you have to actually write a book!
When you self-publish, you are in complete control of your book. But, it’s not as easy as it sounds. It requires knowing what readers want to read, learning how to market your book, and more. Fortunately, there are people offering great, real-world advice on how to get started.
11. Sell on Amazon FBA
FBA stands for Fulfillment by Amazon. It’s a service from Amazon that lets individual sellers find products they’d like to sell, have them delivered to Amazon, then letting Amazon take care of the selling and shipping of the product to customers.
You can sell all sorts of things through Amazon FBA, like:
- Books
- Retail arbitrage
- Wholesale items
- DVDs
I have a relative who recently quit their day job as a licensed CPA after making over $25,000 in their first year of selling used books through Amazon FBA. This was by working just a few hours a week sourcing books (Amazon has a tool to make it easy to find ones to sell). When you consider that Amazon handles selling, shipping, payments, and customer service, you can see how it’s pretty passive.
12. Buy an existing website
From what you read earlier about starting a blog, you can tell that it takes a lot of work and time. It can take months before your site starts earning you a profit. Some people expedite this process by purchasing existing websites, which can run $1,000+.
You can find existing blogs and websites for sale on Flippa, which gives you information like:
- Name and link to the site
- Age of site
- Type of website
- Monthly net profit
Just like any monetary investment, you’ll really need to research each site before proceeding.
13. License music
Just like selling stock photos, selling music you create is another possible source of passive income. Websites that sell your music do charge a commission, and you earn money when someone buys your music to use in YouTube videos, video games, ads, etc.
7 Realistic Ways To Make Money Online
Here are some popular sites for selling your music:
14. Design and sell custom merchandise
For creative people looking for an outlet that allows them to earn passive income, you can design images to sell on shirts, posters, coffee mugs, hats, phone cases, and more. Once you do the design work, the following websites can create and sell the products for you:
15. Sell an app
For those of you with coding skills, creating and selling an app is another option to make money while you sleep. You invest with your skills and the time it takes to create the app, but once you’ve made it, you earn passive income when the app sells.
Even sales of mobile apps listed for a buck or two add up over time.
Realistic Ways To Make Money From Home
The step-by-step guide to making money while you sleep
Realistic Ways To Make Money From Home
Now that you know the options, here’s a quick look at how to get started.
1. Know what kind of investment you want to make
Remember the beginning of this article? Earning passive income takes some kind of investment, monetary or time/energy.
- If you want to invest your time and energy… Take what skills, passions, or interests you already have and use that to inform your choice of passive income. Take blogging, for example, think about what you’d like to blog about, read blogs on that topic, and start engaging with those bloggers.
- If you can make a monetary investment… Understand how much money you have to work with and which projects are interesting to you.
2. Research your options
Starting any business or investment should only come after learning as much as you possibly can about each option. You should understand the risk, initial investment, earning potential, etc.
Research takes time, but it protects whatever type of investment you make.
3. Starting working
Even investing in the stock market takes some work. That’s finding a brokerage, purchasing shares, etc. For other sources of passive income, again blogging as an example, you have to start your blog before you can start earning.
For passive income requiring effort up front, this is where you’ll spend most of your time. It can get daunting, but use your goals for motivation.
4. Maintain your source
All passive income requires occasional maintenance and upkeep. Whether that’s growing your online traffic, adjusting your stock portfolio, or tweaking your courses. This is minimal work considering what you’ve already done, but it ensures that you continue to make money while you sleep after that initial investment.
5. Repeat the process
It’s been said that most millionaires have seven sources of income. This isn’t all active work either… remember there are only so many hours in a day.
Ways To Make Money Online
Your first source of passive income is the starting point. Keep finding new things to invest your money and time in. Keep turning that wheel to see your wealth grow.