Why Make Money Online? : An Introduction and Some Tips.
I'll be honest with you - I came to online money-making late in the game.
I was even late cottoning on to using the Covid-19 year of Lockdown as a window to build my future income sources! What I hope I can prove to you, is that ANYONE can do this, and that IT'S NEVER TOO LATE!
It's also never been a better time to start - the pandemic has pushed huge amounts of shoppers online. There's enough demand to go round - for any niche you can imagine - and there are more channels through which you can work. Contrary to popular myth - you don't have to be on EVERY social media channel! some people do ONLY YouTube, or ONLY Pinterest. You can blog on your own website. Sell through pre-existing platforms like eBay or Etsy. If you feel the need for some support, there are INTERNET & AFFILIATE MARKETING COMMUNITIES - that are often free to join, and pr
A lot of bloggers and travel influencers write about how they travel for cheap, or make an income through their travel blog.
I'm doing that too - right here!
However, the thing we will ALL tell you - is that it takes:
🌍 a LOT of time.
🌍 a LOT of investment.
🌍 a LOT of work.
🌍 a LOT of skill and learning. (Tech expertise, Writing Style, Social Media)
🌍 a LOT of luck.
That's a LOT of LOTs !!!
What can we take off that list of LOTS and focus instead on a LOT of income for you?! Here's my top tips for Making Money Online.
1) Get Passive Aggressive.
Of course I don't mean snarking about people behind their backs! What I mean is that it is imperative that you get aggressive, or at least proactive about PASSIVE INCOME. This is how we are going to take the first LOT off our list. You only have so much time in a day. If you are selling your time, you will eventually hit a ceiling, at which point you have to start raising your value per hour - which can be very very hard to do.
2) Do Digital
It's a hard fast fact that you have to spend money to make money, so we can't eradicate investment from the list. However, it is definitely possible to eradicate the LOT from that line. Like selling your time, selling physical products has limiting effects. You have to source or manufacture the product, store it, pay postage to get it to your customer. By working in the digital sphere, you absolutely SLASH your overheads and outlay. You can store your products on a hard-drive smaller than a book, you can delivery it for free (or at most, a fraction of the cost involved in delivering physical items). You can trade in other peoples' product (affiliate marketing) or CREATE YOUR OWN! If you have time, and you can type (or talk into your computer's dictation!!!) you CAN create your own digital product! Digital products can consist of so many different things! It could be an e-book, an audiobook, a course, a video (or course of videos), digital consultation, audio products (music, hypnosis tracks, podcasts). It could be stock footage, photos or graphics. It could be a collections of Pre-sets for a particular program. It goes ON and ON and ON. What if the product you decided on turn out to be unpopular, faulty or low quality?? With a physical product - you'd be taking a serious bath. Refunds, redesigns, a new production run. With digital products - you can edit the file and update it as you and your product improves! If you want to pass on those edits and improvements to you customers - you're giving them extra value and customer care!! Not only that, but the Covid-19 pandemic plays into your court MASSIVELY here. More and more people are turning to online sources for learning and entertainment that can be enjoyed from isolation in their homes. I would also suggest that the recent trend in waste reduction means people are looking to fill their lives, not with STUFF (physical products), but with EXPERIENCES & KNOWLEDGE (digital products). The up-swing in YouTube visits to learn new crafts or skills, the rocketing of online learning. The number of people who want to evolve their careers and income to give them financial and geographic freedom (use like you do, just like I am) - all of these markets are ready and willing digital product customers!
3) Go (Ever) Green
Riding trends can bring sudden and overwhelming success... IF you have a LOT of Luck (on top of being trend savvy to the point of being cynical). You might hit on the latest trend fast enough to make a million selling fidget-spinners, but you might also miss that trend. Worse still, you might jump on it too late, invest heavily then struggle to sell as the craze dies off. I mean, seriously - what happened to fidget spinners?! Lets take LUCK out of the equation - grow your income like a (money) tree - deep, ancient roots. Take some time to realistically asses your passions, as well as what niches of business are considered 'evergreen'. Evergreen is a tree that has leaves in all seasons. If you think of your life as having seasons, you want you money tree to be evergreen - cash in all seasons of your life. It's digital equivalent of "one thing's for certain - death and taxes". Undertakers and accountants always have work because of this.
4) Invest in Your Future...
(Even if it means a few sacrifices in the Present)
If you're serious about Online Money Making, you need to think about it the way you thought about every other career you've had - not job, CAREER. Careers entail a little self-responsibility, and at least a little self-investment. If you were setting up your own brick and mortar business, the overheads would be huge. We've already discussed how working in the digital realm can save you a huge chunk of the costs. Take those savings and INVEST in your own education and resources!! Mentors, software and pre-proven systems. Yes you will have to pay some, but in the long run, by investing (in the right resources), you stand to save yourself time, unnecessary toil, and expensive mistakes. If I want to travel - I need fund that travel - I see investing time in my blog as funding my travel. Creating a good community of people who trust me to do my best by them... leads to being PAID to travel and to write. It also helps me create affiliate income by helpfully signposting readers to products that I truly believe in and recommend. The other way that I fund my travel (or indeed my career education) is to SAVE money away from things that just aren't that necessary, and re-direct it to my real passions and goals. I'd really prefer to actually VISIT Japan, rather than watch any number of films about it on Netflix. A year in lockdown has taught me how much clothing and make-up I just don't need. I have saved a year's worth of car tax and insurance during lockdown. I LOVE my car, and driving to amazing places with great tunes on the stereo, but if I'm not going to be using my car to MAKE MONEY this year - it's gone (at least off the road). I can research and read online for free - so my subscriptions are at an all time low. All of these savings can be used to fund travel... OR invest in my future income streams. I prefer the latter - because I want a sustainable, continuous income stream that provides me with the freedom to travel when and where I want. Passive income means my affiliate references and digital products are earning for me while I sleep, adventure, or sit and pick my earwax! Save on EVERYTHING you can do without - and put it into building an income that will give you what you WANT.
If you have a little nest egg to invest, my biggest tip is to KEEP IT SIMPLE. Don't take on more than you give your time and focus to! It's a mistake I made when I was getting started! Luckily, most courses, products and income streams can wait - and they'll still be there when and IF you are ready to look at them (perhaps after getting your first income stream up and running). What I do know for sure - is that, though the destination is passive income, building the foundation works better the more time and focus you can invest in it. Even if you have an empty schedule of 7 days - I'd honestly say anything more than 3 projects is just going to spread your energy too thinly. Let's imagine you do have a 'start-up' budgets and a week of days to learn and progress...
I'd be tempted to look at maximum 3 income streams: 1 x Done for You - A commission system that is entirely pre-built and automated system. This will cost you the most - but usually brings back the best commissions with the least amount of knowledge and effort. You simply send traffic (clicks and eyes on your page) and see how many visitors convert into subscribers and sales. This has the added bonus of building you an email list - which you can then contact with future affiliate offers (or your own products) you may promote in the future.
1 x Non-Affiliate Skill or Product - Learn a skill or create a product that doesn't rely on commissions. Sometimes these are called 'Business in a Box'. There's plenty of different things you can learn to do. You can write your own (digital) course or eBook. Sell your pre-loved items or home made crafts through eBay or Etsy. For the tech-friendly, there are softwares that help you to boost Search Engine Rankings - a service that many companies with pay you well for! You could perform voice work recordings, design services, or consultations on your area of expertise.
These usually cost a bit less than the Done For You above - but will cost you a bit more time and effort in learning how, and laying the foundations, on top of which, you also have to get your product or service in front of potential customers. In the Done For You, driving eyes to your site (which already has the affiliate product and follow ups built) is your only job. The reason for spreading your bets here - is that the Done For You work to start generating income while you learn your Non-Affiliate Skill (or create your digital product). Once THIS project is up and running - you have TWO income sources. So if you meet a problem with one, the other has got your back. They can also feed into one another. The Done For You project can build your email list - to which you can then start contacting to market your Non-affiliate Product, Skill or Service.
1 x Affiliate work ALWAYS with a Support Community - The great thing about affiliate marketing is that invariably it's FREE to get started. The drawback is that you are now charged with finding potential customers and marketing the companies offers to them, in order to earn your cut. This can feel completely bewildering if you're new to online marketing. It can take a long time to build a list of leads. Don't forget, though, that by now, you have your Done For You covering that base flow on income. You may also have begun selling your Non-Affiliate service, skill or product. While they cover your coffers - you can take your time to organically build your affiliate super-powers. You might learn how that Done For You site was created - so you can set up future marketing workflows for yourself (and so not have to pay someone else). You can learn how to grow your reach in order to advertise your Non-Affiliate service or product to. You will DEFINITELY improve your Affiliate Marketing skills! These can range from content creation, sales techniques, how to host webinars, getting more traction on social media - there's plenty to go at! This 3rd option ENHANCES your success with the first two, AND can be a third stream of income in and of itself. That's why joining a support community is ESSENTIAL. By participating in an Affiliate network such as OLSP , you gain access to training, courses, webinars, Facebook groups, mentors and hacks to help you grow your online presence, email list and your EARNINGS! OLSP is my support network of choice - and you can JOIN FREE HERE to find out why!
5) Every Little Helps
While it's sensible to focus doing a small number of things and doing them right - you may want to 'spread your bets' at least a little. If one income stream has a sudden mishap (urrrr Covid and performing arts, anyone?), it's very reassuring to know there are other steams from which to sip. There's no reason why your affiliate links can't be earning you a nice little flow while you take time to create a digital product or build a list for email marketing. It's also a great way to 'try and test' different income streams for yourself, and build confidence if you're new to making money online, as your own boss. It can take a little time and experimenting to find the ways that feel right for you. If funnels, email lists and Pay Per Click feel like jumping off at the deep-end... you're not alone! When I got started it felt like a minor miracle that I could even sell my pre-loved stuff on eBay! I'd highly recommend getting some easy, early wins in to get yourself accustomed to the digital-dosh mindset before you begin to explore if the Internet Income Industry is for you. You can make some nice little fun-money bonuses in a variety of ways, with little to no upfront investment. There's money to be made filling in surveys, selling on eBay, matched-betting, small gig digital jobs, cash back schemes, referral bonuses and more...
