Photo by Luca Bravo on Unsplash
Having online sources of income is a good financial safety net for anyone in the 21st century. If you become very successful, you not only have additional sources of income, but you can quit your 9–5 job and live financially free, with the choice of pursuing whatever else you are passionate about, whether that is entrepreneurship, travel, writing, creating music, etc.
As our world becomes ever more digital, there are ever more opportunities to make money online. Here are 3 effective ways that I use to make money online that are accessible to everyone.
1. YouTube Ad Revenue
YouTube creators who join the YouTube Partner Program can earn money from the advertisements shown on their content. At the time of writing, the split is 55/45, with creators taking 55% of the ad revenue and YouTube keeping the other 45%.
The caveat to this opportunity is that in order to join the YouTube Partner Program, you need at least 1000 subscribers and 4000 public watch hours in the past 12 months, which is no easy feat to achieve.
I started my YouTube channel very recently and I personally haven’t reached these two requirements at the time of writing, but am working towards them. However, it doesn’t cost me anything (besides time and buying camera equipment) to create videos, so if I succeed there’s a big reward and if I don’t there wouldn’t have been much to lose.
YouTubers who do end up reaching 1000 subscribers and 4000 public watch hours often see their channels, and ad income, grow exponentially. From what I’ve seen, those who make it to the tens of thousands of subscribers range often make a few thousand dollars every month from YouTube (enough to sustain yourself and quit your day job), and those who have hundreds of thousands of subscribers make tens of thousands of dollars every month. The top YouTubers make millions of dollars a year.
So for anyone interested in making videos and growing an online presence on YouTube, there are large rewards if you succeed, and not much to lose if you don’t. You can also learn a lot from the process of creating videos, and depending on the type of content you want to focus on you could dramatically improve your speaking skills, your video editing skills, your online marketing skills, etc., which can be useful to you in other areas of your life.
2. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is the business of promoting other people’s products or services and earning commissions from their sales. For example, you could post a link to a product you want to promote, and every time someone buys the product through your link, you earn a commission, usually a percentage of the total sale.
The most popular affiliate marketing site that online entrepreneurs use is Amazon Associates. Signing up for Amazon Associates is free, and once you’re in you have access to product links to almost everything Amazon sells. These links are generated individually for you, and every time someone buys the products through your links, you earn a commission.
Different categories on Amazon Associates have different commission rates that you can earn. Some categories, like luxury beauty, offer as high as 10% commissions. Most categories offer commission rates of a few percentage points.
In order to stay on Amazon Associates, you need to make at least three qualified sales within the first 180 days. That’s half a year to make three sales, so it’s pretty achievable.
Moreover, you also need a platform, such as a website, YouTube channel, blog, etc., to post your links. Amazon has rules against posting links through emails and in any offline manner, so you must have an online platform to participate.
In addition to the regular Amazon Associates program, there’s also the Amazon Bounty Program. You automatically have access to the Amazon Bounty Program if you join the Amazon Associates program, and it functions similarly in that you earn a commission by posting links to Amazon’s services, such as Amazon Prime, Kindle, Audible, etc., and getting people to sign up through your link. The only difference is you get a fixed fee every time someone signs up.
There’s also the Amazon Influencer Program for social media influencers. This program gives you your own Amazon page where you can list recommended products. It is an extension of the Amazon Associates Program in that you earn the same commissions for sales of the products through your page, but it can be helpful as an additional way to drive traffic. In order to qualify you need to have either a YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook and you have to apply. Amazon considers the number of followers and the level of engagement when evaluating applications.
So far, I’ve only used the Amazon Associates Program, including Amazon Bounty and Amazon Influencer, for my affiliate marketing business, but there are also other affiliate marketing programs you might want to check out. Programs such as eBay Partners, Shopify Affiliate Program, Clickbank, etc. are all ways to make money through affiliate marketing.
3. Writing For Medium
The Medium Partner Program gives writers the opportunity to monetize the articles they publish.
Signing up is for free, all you need is a Medium account (signing up for that is also free) and a bank account to connect to so Medium can send you money.
In order to earn money, you have to write articles and publish them behind the Medium paywall. To do this, when you click publish on an article, make sure the box for monetization is checked.
The box for monetization is located on the right hand side just above the “Publish now” button
Articles behind the Medium paywall are reserved for Medium Members. Non-members can still read three articles behind the Medium paywall per month, but they won’t directly earn you any money.
That’s because the way you earn money from the Medium Partner Program is from claps from Medium Members. Each Medium Member pays a $5 per month subscription fee, and a portion of that fee is distributed to the articles they clap for.
So every time your article gets a clap from a Medium Member, part of their $5 subscription fee goes to you. This amount varies depending on how many articles the member claps for, as well as other factors related to the Medium algorithm. Thus, success depends on generating high-volume traffic from Medium Members and delivering value for them so they clap your articles.
I hope this article was a helpful guide for you and gave you ideas on ways to earn money online. These are the online business ideas I have personally been using, and I wanted to share them because they are both effective and accessible.
Thank you for reading and make sure you subscribe to see more articles like this.