5 ways to boost your income

Discover the best ways to earn some extra money online. Many of these methods can be started without capital, while others require a modest amount of capital.

There are millions of people earning a full-time income online. You can also earn a part-time income as an employee, a student or even as a teenager. The freedom to set your own hours will allow you to attain and maintain a healthy work-life balance.

The pandemic and the resulting economic upheaval have shown us that income diversification is extremely important. These online opportunities will allow you to supplement, or even eventually replace, your current income streams.

There is at least one money making method here for you, regardless of which skills you possess. You could always take a short course to gain new skills or improve existing skills in any area that interests you.

1. Freelancing

Becoming a freelancer is one of the quickest ways to start earning a consistent income online. Working online means that freelancers are not limited to only clients in their immediate vicinity. We live in a global village, where service providers can connect with clients from all over the world.

Think about which marketable skill or talent you possess. Is it something you could package as a service and charge clients for? It would be a good idea at this stage to do some research to ensure that there is enough demand for your service.

Services

Some examples of services a freelancer could provide are:

• Copywriting
• Graphic design
• SEO
• Software development
• Transcription
• Translation
• Tutoring
• Virtual assistance
• Voice acting
• Web development

Freelance marketplaces

The next step is landing your first client.

There are freelance marketplaces that bring together clients and freelancers. Fiverr and Upwork are two of the most popular of these platforms. You can sign up for free.

On Fiverr, freelancers post gigs (service descriptions) and their fees. Clients browse the gigs and choose the gig that they determine is the best fit for their particular project.

On Upwork, clients post job descriptions and their budgets. Freelancers browse these job listings and apply for the jobs that interest them.

Other marketplaces include:

• 99designs
• Freelancer
• Guru
• Outsourcely
• PeoplePerHour
• Toptal
• Truelancer

2. Blogging

Your shiny new blog can be up and running in no time at all. Follow these steps to get started.

Choose a name for your blog

There are various sources of inspiration that you can draw upon in your quest for the perfect blog name. Books, magazines, friends and family, to name a few.

Many bloggers use their first name and last name, for example, Albert Einstein.

Get a domain name and web hosting

Once you have settled on a blog name, you can register a domain name. Continuing with the above example, an ideal domain name would be alberteinstein.com

You can check the availability of the domain name and get web hosting at A2 Hosting by clicking the Shared Hosting “Get Started” button.

In this example, the search reveals that alberteinstein.com is unavailable and suggests alternatives. You should prefer a .com domain as it is the most widely known and memorable suffix. If your first choice is unavailable, try some different names.

Install WordPress

A content management system (CMS) is software that allows users to publish, modify and manage a website’s content without the need for any coding experience. 

WordPress is one of the most popular CMS platforms, powering over 42% of all websites on the Internet.

A2 Hosting provides a one-click WordPress installation option, meaning that even non-technical users can quickly and easily set up a website.

Write and publish your first post

If you haven’t already, now is the time to choose a topic for your blog. The best topics are those that you are knowledgeable or passionate about.

Promote your blog

Fast forward a few days or weeks. You’ve written engaging, captivating masterpieces that are sure to resonate with your target audience. Now what?

Use social media to let people know about each new post you publish. A social media presence can play a massive role in driving traffic to your blog.

Monetize your blog

Your blog can generate revenue in several ways:

• Advertisements from ad networks such as Google AdSense, Mediavine and Ezoic
• Affiliate links in your blog posts
• You can sell your own physical or digital products
• You can sell your own services
• Sponsored posts

3. Social media

YouTube

You can join the YouTube Partner Program and start earning from YouTube ads, once you:

• Have 1,000 subscribers
• Have 4,000 watch hours
• Have a linked Google AdSense account

You can also make money from sponsors, whereby a brand pays you to mention their product or service in one or more of your videos.

Yet another method is placing affiliate links in the video descriptions.

Instagram

There are several ways to monetize an Instagram account, with even a small army of 1,000 followers:

• Sponsored shout-outs and posts
• Promoting your own products or services
• Affiliate marketing

TikTok

You can monetize your videos on this platform via:

• Live streaming
• The TikTok creator fund
• Brand promotion and endorsement

4. Selling your own products

Etsy

Founded in 2005, Etsy is a big player in the global e-commerce industry. The company is based in New York and operates an online marketplace where independent sellers can sell handmade and vintage products.

Examples of items sold on Etsy include:

• Jewelry
• Sandals
• Pillows
• Baby toys
• Paintings

Etsy significantly lowers the barriers to entry for people looking to get started with e-commerce. Sellers do not need to struggle with the complexities inherent in setting up and operating an online store, such as building an e-commerce website and driving traffic to it.

Setting up an Etsy account is free. However, there are listing, selling and shipping fees.

Here are a few steps you can take to make your Etsy shop more enticing to potential buyers.

Complete your profile. A detailed profile builds trust and credibility, increasing the likelihood that customers will choose your store over those of your competitors.

Provide excellent customer service. This means responding to customers’ queries in a timely fashion. A satisfied buyer often becomes a repeat buyer.

Use high quality photos. The adage “A picture is worth a thousand words” is never more true than when shopping online. Crisp, sharp images make up for the fact that online store items usually cannot be viewed in person.

Promote your store on multiple platforms. Instagram is a great place to showcase your products and build a loyal following. Also, consider setting up a website where you could publish blog posts about your products and include links to your Etsy store. This could lead to additional search traffic from Google.

Other e-commerce platforms

Amazon, eBay and Shopify are three popular alternatives to Etsy.

You could also set up an e-commerce website with WordPress plus the WooCommerce plugin.

5. Selling other people’s products

Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is an advertising model where an affiliate promotes a company’s products or services and earns a commission on each resulting sale or desired user action. Examples of user actions include: a user installs a mobile app or signs up for a free trial of a service.

Many years ago, long before the Internet and Wikipedia, there were encyclopedia salesmen. They went door to door, convincing people to part with a significant amount of money for a set of books. These salesmen received hefty commissions for their efforts.

Affiliate marketing has evolved rapidly since then, and now a single blog or social media post can reach far more potential customers in a day than those salesmen could reach in a year.

Get started by:

• Joining an affiliate network, e.g. Amazon Associates, eBay Partner Network
• Choosing a product to promote
• Sharing your affiliate links in your blog posts and/or on social media

Dropshipping

Dropshipping is an e-commerce business model where an online store sells physical goods to customers but does not store or ship the goods.

When a customer purchases an item from your online store, you forward the order to a third party supplier and pay them for the item. This supplier is then responsible for the logistics: acquisition, storage, packaging and transportation to the final destination.

The beauty of dropshipping is that the parties involved do not need to reside in the same geographical region. A retailer in New Zealand could partner with a supplier in China and sell to a customer in the United States.

Print on demand

Print on demand (POD) is a business model where custom designs are printed onto white label items only when an order is made. This greatly reduces business expenses, as there is no costly inventory to maintain.

For example, text and/or images can be printed onto a plain white t-shirt. Other popular white label items include sweatshirts, baseball caps, mugs, posters and books.

Popular POD companies, such as Printful, integrate with your preferred e-commerce platform or online marketplace. Printful has integrations for Etsy, Shopify, WooCommerce and many others.

They also combine printing and dropshipping, which means that they handle everything after the sale. All you, the store owner, have to do is provide great customer service.

You may be wondering how you get paid, after earning some money online. The most popular payout methods are PayPal and bank transfers. The latter payout method is sometimes only available to residents of some countries. If in doubt, read the help pages or reach out to customer support.