How to make money online (With complete guide)

We have dedicated this page to help you learn how to make money online. It is very important, because the world has changed. Everything now revolves around the internet. As a result of this, there are so many opportunities to make money online. So, if you want to learn how to make money online, stay in touch with this page because we will be adding more content regularly!

Best ways to make money online

You can make  money online in the following ways:

1. Blogging 

If you are looking at how to make money online, then blogging is one of the most reliable ways. The amazing thing about blogging is that, you can be blogging about what you love, build audience, become expert in your field and make money even while you sleep!

Anyone can be a blogger! It doesn’t matter if you are young or old. It does not matter your area of focus. The internet is without border, you can reach any part of the world with your blog. Whatever you write about, you will find an audience for it.

Becoming a blogger is very easy. All you need is open a blog, write about topics you are good and passionate about. It is important to focus what you are good at. Connect your blog to social media like facebook, twitter and linkedin, share your contents there and you will get visitors. Keep building visitors and good content.

As you keep blogging, more and more people will get to notice and follow your blog. The bigger the audience you build, the bigger the potentials! So in summary, blogging is about connecting contents with people who needs it. Let your readers trust you. Research your content before publishing. If your readers trust you, they will keep coming and telling their friends about your blog.

Once you have had enough contents and many people reading your blog. You can look for reliable ways to make money from it. One of the most popular ways to make money from blogging is Google adsense.

Google adsense acts like a middle man for bloggers. They get adverts from many companies around the world. Then they show these adverts (ads) on various blogs. And pay each blogger depending on how many views, clicks or engagement the adverts generate on the blog. All you need is to go to google adsense and apply, if your blog is accepted, they will start displaying adverts on it. Then you can start making money even while you sleep.

Here is a famous photo of a blogger who received Adsense Check for $132,994.97 back in 2005!

Google Adsense check

This photo has inspired many bloggers. From then, till now, a lot has changed. People make far more these days. And you can receive your money straight into your bank account.

You can also make money from your blog through affiliate marketing. It is about referring your readers to products or services and if they buy, you get a commission. We will touch that along the way. Keep reading.

Sponsored posts is another way you can make money from your blog. Companies and different entities will want to put a post on your blog to reach your readers. They will mostly write the content, send to you and offer to pay you money to publish it. You can charger from $100 per post to over $1000 per post depending on how relevant your blog is.

Also, you will also get companies, individuals and even government organizations who wants to place direct advert on your blog. From there you negotiate a price with them and if you reach agreement, you make a deal. You can make from $200 to over $10000 from just one direct ads depending on the relevant of your blog and the advertiser.

One more way to make money from your blog is to develop your own product and sale on your blog.  You can write a book or an ebook, or any product that is related to what you write about. Then you sell it on your blog. A lot of bloggers are beginning to embrace this, because it puts them in control. They get 100% of everything!

If you are ready to start a blog, and wondering how to, we have got you covered. It will not take more than 20 minutes to start! Read this article: How to create a blog in less than 20 minutes

Blogging is definitely among the best options for how to make money online for beginners.

2. Freelancing

This one of the most underrated ways to make make money online. If you enjoy writing, or you love graphic design, editing, reading, browsing Facebook, posting on Instagram and so on. You can make money with those skills! There is no way you should be worried about how to make money online because you have the answer already, become a freelancer!

There are people all over the world looking for writers, graphic designers. Looking for people to proof-read their works, people to manage Facebook page. People to post on their Instagram account and so on! So why not put yourself out there and make some money?

The beauty of freelancing online is that you can even be on your bed, as long as you have your computer with you, you are working and making money. And you can be in your room and work for people in different part of the world! Freelancing is an international business.

I was shocked the other day while browsing through upwork and I saw a PhD holder doing freelance work. As at that point, she has earned over $100, 000 writing articles! You will also see people who have no educational background beyond reading and writing but skilled at graphic designs or other aspect making over $10, 000 a month doing freelance work online. There is no barrier as long as you are good at what you do.

A freelancer
You can freelance from the comfort of your home and make money

First thing you should do is pick what you are good at! Doing what you are good is important. Then take every job serious, so you gain good reviews. Negative reviews are bad. When you do a good job, you get good reviews, and with Good reviews, more employers will sort for you and you can charge more per task or per hour. So, if you are skilled in anyway and looking for how to make money online, consider this option!

You can find freelance work from the following webistes: Upwork, fiverr, Freelancer and more.

We have some tips for you if you are planning to go into freelancing. Read: How to make money as a freelancer online

If you are looking at how to make money online fast and how to make money online without any investment, then this is for you. All you need is your skill and there are opportunities across the web.

3. Affiliate marketing

When it comes to how to make money online, affiliate marketing is up there. Affiliate marketing has the ability to make you good  money, I mean big money. Affiliate marketing is simply about referring people to products and services, you get paid a commission if someone buys  or sign up through you. As simple as that.

The process is, you look for an affiliate network, sign up with them. Search for products or services that your friend or audience will like, then get a link and share it with your audience. If any of your audience ever click on the link and buys, you get a commission. Depending on what you choose to promote, commission could rise from, $20 to over $10, 000 per sale or sign up.

Affiliate marketing model
This is the model of Ebay partner network and basically how all affiliate network, works..

This is very good for bloggers. Because it gives you the opportunity to make money from your blog. Let’s assume your blog is about finance, you simply look for affiliate that relates to finance, promote it on your blog and posts, as your readers click on it and buy or sign up, you get paid! Make sure you only promote services and products that relates to your niche and will be beneficial for your readers. As a matter of fact, most bloggers use affiliate marketing as their primary method of making money from their blog ahead of Google adsense and the rest. This is very good and productive if your blog is in a good niche. There are niche that affiliate marketing might not necessarily thrive, niche like gossips, news.

If you have a big facebook page, twitter profile or Instagram page. You can sign up with an affiliate network, look for products that your followers will like and share on your page. As they buy or sign up, you get a commission. People do this for a living! Yes, I mean, people combine their love for social media with affiliate marketing to make good money. If you spend so much time on facebook, twitter, Instagram and the rest, why not consider making money from there too with affiliate marketing?

It does not matter what country you are, you can create a blog or social media page targeting a particular country and provide quality content on your chosen niche, then monetize it with affiliate links.

Why not head straight to popular affiliate networks to sign up and make money? They include: Comission junction, Linkshare, Amazon Affiliate network, Impact Radius, Ebay Partner network, Share a sale, Konga Affiliate, Jumia affiliate and others.

If you need further reading, we have an advice for you: How to make money through affiliate marketing

If you are looking at how to make money online free or how to make money online without paying anything then affiliate marketing is for you. But you have to be ready to work hard though.

4. Digital marketing

This is one area that has not been fully utilized by people to make money online. Digital marketing is simply online marketing. It involves the use of blogs, social media, search engines and every available internet tools to promote a business online. That is it, as easy as that!

If you are so serious about how to make money online then consider giving this a try, especially if you are in an environment where businesses don’t build their presence on the internet. All you need to do is develop a digital marketing plan, approach small businesses and big businesses around you, offer to create awareness for their brand online and bring in more customers for a fee or commission. Depending on what works for you.

Digital marketing
You can make money as a digital marketer online from the comfort of your home

Handling digital marketing for business should be in steps. First if the business has no presence on the internet, build a website for them. Follow same steps you create a blog. If it already has, work on search engine optimization(SEO) to make the website more visible when people search for relevant keyword of the business. Then build social media pages on Facebook, twitter, Linkedin and other relevant social medias. Do some content marketing. Content marketing is writing targeted contents to boost the image of a business. Don’t forget email marketing. Create email marketing account for the business, where they can contact their customers, you get customer’s email automatically to the email list from website as they visit. Invest in optimized ads.

Read more, learn more and grow as a digital marketer.

If you are looking at how to make money online as a marketer then this is for you.

You can read our guide: How to promote your business and find customers online free

5. Buying and selling websites or domain names

Buying and selling websites or domain names is another popular way to make money online. If you have ever tried to register a website, you will realize that nearly all the names are taken. If you check, most of those names are not yet developed into a website, they have been bought and parked by individual for sale. These people are known as domain brokers.

They think of ideas and keywords for websites that companies or wealthy individuals will need someday, they register these domain names. And sell it later for big money to the companies.

It really works because they make lots of money from it! In 2010, Carinsurance.com was sold for $49.7 million! in 2007 VacationRentals.com was sold for $35 million!

While these kind of big money is a one off, if you are good with predicting future trends, you can hit it this big! New inventions are coming, if you can see it before others, register a domain name for it! New industries will spring up, like bitcoin did, if you can forecast it, register a domain name for it. And when they become a hit, you never know how much you can sell it!

You can register domain names at NameCheap.com

Here is a list of the highest selling domains according to wikipedia.

Most expensive domains

You can also buy websites and sell them. This one requires good knowledge of what people want out there. All you need is go to Flippa.com, look for websites with potentials and low bidding or low buy it now. Buy them and resell them on same Flippa for a bigger money. People actually do this as full time job and are making money everyday flipping domains!

If you are looking for how to make money online flipping domains, this one is for you.

6. Video blogging on YouTube

This has to be among the best ways to make money online. If you fancy the camera, love talking, love the idea of being famous, not scared of so many people knowing about you  then you should not worry about how to make money online, get on Youtube!

All you need is to find a niche, an idea and make videos on them. You can decide to focus on make-up, football, movies, gossips, tutorials, politics, pets or anything at all you love! Just build an audience.

You can even upload music and videos that you have right to. Make compilation videos, comedy skits or anything at all that meets YouTube standard and upload! Understand your views. As more people watch your videos you stand a chance to make a fortune! This is a big industry and tens of thousands of people do this as full time job for a living and they are making big money!  Do you see those short videos you watch on YouTube and laugh uncontrollably? The owner of the YouTube channel is probably making thousands of dollars every month from it. You too can do it!

Video blogging
Video blogging on YouTube is a good way to make money online

People love videos! Humans love what they can see. These days, I like to think people watch more youtube than they watch traditional TV! With the Youtube Creator program you can learn, grow and make money.  You can make money from your Youtube Channel via Google adsense. Just integrate Google adsense with your channels and when people watch your videos, they will see ads. You can expect about $2 for every 1000 views. Now imagine having 2 million views on a video which is very easy when you become a guru! Checkout YouTube official guide: Learn how you can make money from Youtube from the official Google Youtube guide 

You can also make  money from your Youtube channel by advertising products that relates to your niche. Selling products yourself or even taking direct adverts!

Last year, Daniel Middleton made about $16.5m from his Youtube channel. This was very surprising because the year before, he was no where to be found on the top 10 earners!

This is definitely for you, if you are looking at how to make money online with videos.

If you want to really learn how to make money on YouTube, I recommend reading How to make money on YouTube (Complete Guide)

7. Become a Facebook partner.

If you do not know, you can actually become a Facebook partner and make good money from Facebook every month! Yes, understanding how to make money online with facebook is as easy as becoming their partner and providing contents. Facebook has a program called Facebook Audience Network Partner Program. 

If you are a video creator, a blogger or app devloper, facebook is willing to partner with you and create a mutually beneficial relationship where you make money from your Videos, articles and more while adding value to facebook.

The potentials of this is huge! Facebook is the biggest social network in the world with over 2 billion users! Imagine a partnership with them.

To apply for Facebook Audience Network Partner Program go here

If you are looking at how to make money online with Facebook, then  go for this

8. Sell online course

If you are very experienced or expert at a particular subject or skill, you can create a course online and sell it. You will make good money! There are so many people on the internet looking to learn new skills.

Whatever you are good at, whatever skills you master, you can teach people about it online and make good money.

A good course that you sell can earn you over $20, 000. That is when it is of top quality and people find it beneficial.

As you develop more courses and sell, you become a brand, and you may even get invited to different countries for training. It all begins with selling a course online!

To sell a course, go to Teachebale.com Udemy.com or Skillshare.com

Make sure you read: How to make money creating and selling online course

Teachable statistics
Teacheable reports that over $100 million has been earned by instructors on its platform

If you are looking at how to make money online selling courses, this is for you.

9. Drop Shipping

Silently and gradually drop shipping is becoming the biggest way to make good money online. Drop shipping is easy and straightforward. You can make money even while you sleep. If you are really serious about how to make money online and ready to put in some work to establish something big with the potential of massive returns, then this is it.

In drop shipping all you have to do is open an online store, go to big manufactures and suppliers such as Ali-express, Ebay and copy their products and items and put on your online shop. Promote your online shop for people to see. Once someone comes to your store and orders for the product, the item is shipped to them from the supplier and you get paid. As easy as that

If you open your online store with shopify, you will have the privileged to automatically copy products from Aliexpress, ebay and others into your store.

If you dont know how to create an online store, you will find this article very helpful: How to create online shop very easily with shopify

It has been reported that up to 30% of products sold online in 2017 was through drop-shipping.

Shopify dropshipping
Platform like shopify gives you the opportunity to excel as a drop shipper

Try this if you are looking for how o make money online daily, but first it will take lots of work to build the foundation to help you stabilize.

10. Completing Surveys

If you are looking for lazy way of how to make money online then this one is for you. All you have to do is answer few questions and earn money, recharge cards or gift items.

Research community use online survey to gather information to better their product. Research is very important for companies so they can know how best to channel and develop their product, that is why they pay people to get their opinion.

The money you will make here will be for past time. It is also possible to make good money as we have read some reviews. Anything is always possible.

The major obstacle is that, most online survey sites is restricted by countries.

For example, if you are in Africa, your best bet will be Ysense and SwitchedOn

PaidViewPoint is another option. They really pay! And you also get to refer friends and earn $25 when they withdraw. They are available worldwide.

Toluna is another popular and dependable online survey website you should try. They have many users and big clients. They are available almost in every country.

SurveySavvy is also a very renowned online survey website that actually pays. It is available world wide

PointsPrizes.com is a good option too. It is available to every country not just USA and top wealthy countries alone. With PointsPrizes, you can join and make money from anywhere in the world. Founded in 2016, they have over 1 million users. Apart from surveys, you can also make money watching videos and doing daily poll. Once you gathered enough points, you can decide to redeem cash or via bitcoin or gift cards.

List of Survey websites that accepts most worldwide participant include: Swagbucks, Global Test market, PrizeRebel.

If you are looking at how to make money online free then this one is surely for you but it may not make you rich, you never know though.

Read more on this: Best online survey websites

11. Online Trading

Warning: Please note that this is a very risky venture. You can lose all your capital. You may put in money and gain immediately and try again and lose it all. There is no guarantee, so proceed with caution.

Online trading is one of the long-standing ways of making money online. It has the capacity to turn out big returns if you are good at it but it is high risk. This is only for people who are not afraid of risk and who are using spare money to trade.

This involves trading online from Forex to Bitcoin and all forms of trading.

When it comes to online market trading, the number one choice is Deriv. One of the reasons it is preferred is because it has a copy trader, which allows you to see and copy the trading pattern of top successful traders. Another reason Etoro.com is preferred is because there are over 4.5 million users worldwide. That is a signal of strength.

This is for you if you are looking at how to make money online trading.

12. Social media

If you are a social media regular and you are wondering how to make money online, the solution is right there in front of you. Beyond posting, commenting and having fun on social media,  do you also know you can make money from Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, WhatsApp and the rest? While it is possible to make money directly on platform like Facebook through the Facebook Audience Network, it is also possible for you to make money from all social media through a carefully planned strategy.

For you to make money from social media. You need to have a strategy. It requires commitment and consistency. People are making good money from social media. There are two things you need, you need to build good follower-ship on social media and you need to be active in groups (pages) that relates to your area of interest.

Social media
You can make money online from social media

You need to pick a niche that you will focus on your social media  and join groups and pages that relates to that niche. It could be fashion, gaming, cars and anything at all. But have a primary topic so people know you for this and brand can approach you directly, you never know.

Next step will involve deciding how you want to proceed to make money from social media accounts. There are many options for you.

  • Short-links: This one of the most dependable ways to make money on social media especially of you have many followers. This method is pretty easy! All you need to do is look for a link or story you want to share on your social media, go to one of the URL shorteners, put this link there and shorten it. Then copy the shorten link and share on social media. As people click on the link you make money. Let me explain, let’s say you see a news story on CNN website you want to share or a good fashion product or a link to breaking news, it could be anything , just go to the url shortener website, shorten the link, copy the shorten one and share. When people click to see the news or whatever you are sharing, you make money. Those news you read from social media, people are probably making money from it! You have to register with the companies that provides these services. Here are the best picks and you can click on them to go register and make money from social media: Ouo, LinkShrink, Adf, Shortest.
  • Affiliate Marketing: You can post products or services of companies that relates to your niche on your social media profiles and get paid each time someone makes a purchase through your link. If you are looking at how to make money online in a big way, this one has that potential depending on what product or services you promote. Some offer big commissions. You can find those companies easily via Affiliate networks like Cj.com, linkshare.com and more. Remember to read our guide on affiliate marketing.
  • Sell your product: You can choose to sell your own products if you have any. Market them on social media pages. If you do not have products, you can create an online shop, copy products from big suppliers and put in your online shop. Then post these products on your social media, whenever anyone orders, the supplier will ship to the buyer and you get paid. Don’t forget to read our guide how to create online shop easily with shopify.
  • Partner with brands: You can always approach brands for sponsorship or to place direct ads on your social media pages. Websites like Tapinfluence will give you opportunity to partner with brands.
  • Sell your social media accounts: You can decide to sell your social media accounts and make money. People do this a lot. Website like Viral Accounts will help you sell your accounts.

Certainly this one is for you if you are looking at how to make money online with your social media accounts.

13. Sell books/ebook online

If you love writing and you are searching for how to make money online, well, it is time you look at your writing skills again. You can make big money creating and selling ebook online! Ebooks are electronic books which can be read on computer and handheld devices. You can also decide to publish traditional books.

If you are confident of yourself and you have great story to tell, great concept to share or anything to add value, it might be time to create that ebook/book online and make money.

There are many success stories of those who have made it. One of them is a 26-years old who made millions of dollars from a single ebook.  She was living in poverty and struggling to survive until one day she set up a store in Amazon and decided to start writing. And she used her social media profiles and word of mouth to market the book. It turned out good, she was shocked by the outcome. Millions of dollars. You can read her story here.

To sell ebook online, you need to have a good idea, then publish and market them. You can use your social media pages and word of mouth to do the marketing. If you have a few penny to spare, run some Facebook or Google adsense ad.

Here are list of places you can publish your Ebook/books online and make money: Amazon Kindle, Lulu, CreateSpace and others.

14. Build websites

You can build websites for business and make money. A lot of business do not have online presence. You can offer to build them website for money. Thanks to technology, you do not need to know about coding to build website. Just to go ThemeForest, buy a theme, upload it on WordPress and customize it. You can even register a lifetime membership of MyThemeShop and have access to many themes you can use to build websites.

15. Teach your native language and any langue you are excellent at

If you are looking at how to make money online and you can speak your native language and any other language fluently, then you can make money online from that. You should also have a passion to teach and impact. Thanks to the internet, there are millions of people out there interested in learning different language. You can teach them and make money! Very easy!

Teaching online
You can teach online and make money

If you are interested, go to italki and register, teach and start earning. There are over 3 million people there waiting to learn.

16. Buy and sell Bitcoin on Quidax

Quidax is a platform that makes it easy for people to make money from Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency. The truth is that Bitcoin and other leading one of the best ways to make money online.

When Bitcoin suddenly became very popular, a lot of people were expecting it to phase out but after many years, Bitcoin is still doing very good. Many countries are now accepting Bitcoin. A lot of merchants and shops are accepting Bitcoin as a form of payment.

This can only mean that an investment in Bitcoin has the potential to make you reach. But the problem might be understanding how to trade and make money from it. That is where platforms like Quidax come in. All you have to do is Sign up with Quidax and you are on your way trading and making money.

You an read more on this: How to start investing in Bitcoin

In Conclusion:

Learning how to make money online is a continuous process even if you are making income already because new ways spring up everyday. You have to be up to date. Whatever direction you choose, make sure that you update yourself on a regular. There are many resources online like this page.

Note: We will keep updating this post always to include new ways to make money online. Bookmark it so you can check back later. You can also sign up for our newsletter to stay up to date or click here to follow us on facebook and Click here to follow us on Twitter

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Mfon Abel Ekene

Mfon Abel Ekene

Internet scientist and blog expert. Loves writing, researching and helping people reach their dreams. Speaker and authour.
Follow me on Twitter @mfonabel

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