“Having my own business gives me the flexibility I need as a single mom,” says Shan Thomas, a strategic business advisor and founder of Credible Visibility Agency, an Atlanta-based website design agency for women in business.
“Corporate America just didn’t afford me the flexibility I needed to be available for my kids,” she says. “An online business affords me that. I have clients all over the world and have been able to access and service them online. It’s cost-effective and has opened so many more doors.” Thomas notes there are clients in rural communities who wouldn’t be able to access professionals like her if it weren’t for her having a 100% online company.
The ability to make extra money online from home has created a new category of work: “anywhere workers.” That’s the takeaway from a recent survey of more than 1,400 respondents from 67 different nationalities conducted by Lonely Planet and the freelance marketplace Fiverr. According to the survey results, 54% of workers considered themselves “anywhere workers” in that their ability to make money online and pursue financial independence was not contingent on a particular location.
If you’re curious about how to make money from home, advantages and disadvantages to selling online, and how to generate extra money with a location-independent online setup, here’s some advice and tips from experts who’ve done it.
Advantages to Making Money From Home
Making money from home can be a great way to have the best of both worlds. You generate income while having no commute, and for many the prospect of flexible work creates solutions for childcare or other personal responsibilities that wouldn’t be possible otherwise.
“The work-from-anywhere movement is real,” says Yeves Perez, an entrepreneur and CEO of Workbnb, an online travel agency and Airbnb-like service for traveling workers. More than 40 million Americans will be working remotely in the next five years, according to the 2021 Future Workforce Report from Upwork, a gig economy platform. Some want to develop a side hustle that brings in a few hundred dollars a month, while others leverage an online store, online courses, or other money making ideas to make money online full-time
5 Ideas For Making Money From Home
There are many practical ways to make money from home. Here are five popular side hustle options that have low costs to start and tremendous potential for extra cash every month.
No. 1: Sell a Digital Product
Your knowledge and experience could be packaged into digital information products. Some examples include an eBook, a video course, an audio product, or short informational guides.
“Almost everybody has some skill they can package into a digital product,” says Arne Giske, an online entrepreneur and co-founder of the Insider Investors Club and Groups Funnels. He’s built a digital product business with over 5,000 clients.
“You just have to learn the process of putting together an offer that people are willing to pay for,” he says. Giske notes that you can turn a lot of information into a digital product that sells passively once you build an audience. There are few costs to creating digital information products, which creates an opportunity to bring in money immediately and develop good profit margins.
Pro Tip
Package what you know into a digital information product. You can create an eBook, course, or informational guide once, then sell it online over and over again to generate passive income.
No. 2: Offer Freelance Services
Businesses and individuals are always looking for help, but they don’t necessarily need an employee to get the job done. Often, hiring virtual assistants or a freelancer is a better fit, and freelancing is a great way to make money from home. Some of the most popular freelance ideas include:
Managing someone’s social media accounts on their behalf.
Creating content for a business, whether it be articles, blog posts, or newsletters, to drum up spare cash.
Offering virtual assistant services, in which you are paid by the hour to help someone with administrative tasks from the comfort of your own home.
Related: Freelancing v. Coaching v. Consulting, Explained
No. 3: Become an Online Coach or Consultant
Some people prefer to work with an expert one on one. What you know can be taught to others in the form of coaching or online tutoring, and with access to Zoom and other software tools, you can coach clients from anywhere in the world.
“We don’t offer done for you; we offer done with you,” says Isaac Mashman, an entrepreneur and CEO of Mashman Ventures, a company that helps business leaders with personal branding.
“We consult our clients and work with them to build out their brands,” he says. “We’ve built a team of 12 independent contractors who consult our clients virtually.” Mashman says being able to consult from home has been great for himself and his team.
If you’re not familiar with the process of coaching, there are options for training and certification. You can step up an online coaching side hustle with just the costs of using conference software and promote your offers on social media.
No. 4: Teach English
If you speak English, there are options to find online tutoring jobs and teach others how to speak English. This side hustle can be done anywhere, and the potential to make money is good.
“I replaced my teaching income by teaching English through vipkid,” says Tara Branch, a former teacher and current owner of an online travel agency.
“I was bringing home at least $2,000 a month when I was teaching English full-time. I taught six to seven days a week. There are ESL certifications you can get to teach English as a second language, and there are platforms in the U.S. now, such as Outschool.”
Branch says there are apps such as iTalki, tutor.com, Cambly, and many others that offer the opportunity to teach English. You can become certified and get paid to teach from the comfort of your home. The hours can be flexible, and it’s a side hustle with very few expenses.
No. 5: Become an Affiliate
If you don’t have time to deliver a product or service, promote someone else’s offers instead and rack up commissions. You can sign up to become an affiliate with large companies such as Amazon or other retailers or service providers whose products you use.
Being an affiliate means you get paid every time someone buys with your affiliate link. There is no cost to be an affiliate, and you can be paid (from home) to promote things you’d probably talk about anyway.
Start Making Money From Home Today
Online side hustles and remote work can be great ways to make extra income, and they also act as a safeguard if something happens unexpectedly in your career. Evaluate which strategy to make money from home aligns with your life and goals, do your research, and then start taking action today.
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