9 Ways to Make Money Online (with Examples)

Looking for how to make money online? Remote work opportunities are on the rise! Here are 9 ways to earn some extra money from the comfort of home.

Approximate read-time: 7.5 minutes

Wondering how to make money online? Great news: if you have some spare time, you could earn some extra cash!

Whether you want to work full-time or part-time, working from home is becoming a great option for a growing number of people. So if you're stuck indoors, or you want to ditch the commute, remote work could be for you.

There is a wide range of remote work options. Seriously, there are so many opportunities it might shock you. From freelance data entry to selling products and services - all you need is an internet connection and a little determination.

So just how do you make money from home? The Internet is full of small businesses making a killing! Armed with search engines & social media, they are slowing change the business landscape.

At Formidable Forms, our entire team is remotely distributed. We've worked this way for 11+ years! In this article, we are drawing upon our experience to help spread the word about working from home.

So without further ado, here is our list of 9 best ways to make money online. Enjoy!

1. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a way of making money online that has been around for a really long time. In fact, it's over 20 years old! The first affiliate marketing programs began appearing online around 1994.

Amazon is one of the biggest and most successful affiliate program runners. They've been running their Amazon Associates program since 1996! Since then, loads of new affiliate marketing options have sprung up.

If you've never heard about affiliate marketing, it's a revenue-sharing model where content creators and marketers can push web traffic to websites where people make digital purchases.

Of course, if people buy a product, then the affiliate marketer will get a small percentage. Each sale by itself won't amount to much. But if you can build a website that gets lots of qualified traffic, your earnings could really add up!

There are 2 places to look for affiliate marketing opportunities. First, you can look into companies that run their own affiliate programs (like Amazon). Second, you can join an affiliate network or platform.

An affiliate network is a place where marketers can find companies that are running affiliate programs. Usually, they are smaller companies that are piggybacking on the resources of a large network.

But there are some networks out there that are hosting very large affiliate programs, for example, Rakuten Marketing hosts the Walmart affiliate program.

Take a look at this list of the best affiliate networks to check out:

• ShareASale
• CJ Affiliate
• Awin
• Rakuten Marketing
• Avangate Affiliate Network
• ClickBank
• FlexOffers
• Peerfly

And by the way, our humble WordPress form builder plugin also has an affiliate marketing program on ShareASale that you might want to check out!

Want to build your own affiliate program? We'll help you choose a WordPress affiliate plugin, and show you how to set up a pay per lead affiliate program.

2. Blogging

In case you missed it, blogging has evolved into a huge industry. In fact, there are 5.8 million new blog posts created each day!

The Huffington Post started as a blog and has now grown into a content machine netting $14 million per month. It's highly possible to make money from blogging.

There are tons of things to blog about. Anything from technology to personal finance could generate quite an audience.

So how can bloggers make money with their content? These days, it's not just about Google Adsense:

• Advertising networks
• Private advertising
• Affiliate marketing
• Sell online courses
• Become a consultant
• Sponsored posts
• Memberships

And that's not even a complete list! Suffice to say, if you can create great content and infuse your unique personality into the mix, you could be a successful blogger. If you don't have a blog yet, take a look at the best blogging platforms we recommend.

3. Podcasting

Podcasting has seen a massive surge over the past decade. It started out as a few renegade comedians posting unpolished audio files to their feeds. Now there are over 900,000 podcasts available!

And if you can break through and amass a following, it turns out you can make a lot of money. For example, it's estimated that Joe Rogan makes around $800,000 per podcast episode! Most of that money is from advertising.

We can't all be the host of the Joe Rogan Experience, but there are still plenty of popular podcasting niches to participate in. If you can build an audience, advertisers will take notice.

Not sure if you've got what it takes to be a podcaster? These are the most popular podcast categories:

• Comedy
• Travel
• Food
• Tech
• News
• Politics
• Business
• The Arts

And of course, don't forget that you'll need all the gear necessary to start a podcast! Luckily, having a home studio is becoming more and more affordable.

4. Dropshipping

What is one of the biggest challenges of starting an eCommerce business? Inventory.

To be profitable, the amount you'd need to sell and the inventory you'd need to carry is huge. So why not remove one of those problems from the equation? That's exactly what you can do with dropshipping.

Dropshipping is an eCommerce business model that allows you to operate a retail business without owning stock or keeping inventory. Pretty cool idea huh?

And if you don't believe it's possible to make money with dropshipping, why not check out these 10 online stores that are making a killing!

To start a dropshipping business, all you need is a niche and products that fit into that niche. There are plenty of companies you can source products from too:

• Spocket
• Oberlo
• Guruducts
• Hypersku

5. Sell online courses

If you are an expert of any kind, you might be able to make money from selling an online course. The hardest part will be creating the course content, but once that's done, you could have a constant way to make money online.

To build courses online, you'll need an idea and content. But after that, putting the whole thing together will take some work. But given the fact that remote learning is on the rise, that will be time well spent.

You could host an online course on your WordPress website, complete with registration forms and eCommerce features. If you do it this way, you'll make the most money.

Don't believe us? Way back in 2016, the top 10 instructors on Udemy made more than $17 million dollars! That sounds like a great passive income stream.

For people who want a more streamlined approach to creating and selling their courses online, you could use one of the many LMS (learning management system) platforms available to use today:

• LifterLMS
• LearnDash
• Kajabi
• Ruzuku
• Thinkific
• Teachable.com
• Learnworlds

6. Video content creation

Want to make money online? Become a YouTuber. While that might sound a little pie in the sky, there are thousands of people making a full-time income just by creating video content.

It's not all pretty-faced video blogs and makeup tutorials either. Take Household Hacker, a YouTube channel with 5 million subscribers. They create tech videos and science experiments that the average person can try at home - at their own risk!

Given the evergreen nature of their video content, it's very likely that a channel like Household Hacker is earning well over $20k per month!

What could you make videos about? It helps to be an expert, but there is no shortage of interesting topics to cover:

• Tech videos
• Gaming videos
• Product reviews
• Tutorials & How-to's
• Travel videos
• Fashion videos
• Fitness videos

7. Video conferencing (your services)

If you've ever worked as a tutor or consultant, you've probably wondered if everything could be done online. Guess what? It absolutely can!

With modern internet tech, it's becoming easier and easier to stream your services online. All you need is a remote video conferencing tool like Zoom and you are off to the races!

One company that has been doing this for a while is BetterHelp. Users can signup to receive remote therapy sessions from the comfort of home. They've hosted over 65 million therapy sessions!

What other kinds of trainers can take their services online? It's a bigger list than you might think! Here are some professionals that can make money from home without much effort:

1. Fitness Trainers
2. Churches
3. Therapists
4. Educators
5. Artists/Performers
6. Broadcasters
7. Coaches
8. Consultants
9. Retailers
10. Medical Doctors

If you are interfacing with people or groups of people directly, chances are you can find ways to monetize your services online.

👉 Read more: How to Sell Your Services Online with WordPress

8. Side gig & freelance jobs

Do you have a marketable skill? How about a bunch of marketable skills? Chances are there are a lot of freelancing opportunities you can use to make some extra cash.

The freelance community is massive. Not too long ago, freelancers would turn to sites like Craigslist to look for the dream client among the weirdos. Now, there are several platforms dedicated to making things easier for service providers and buyers.

That doesn't mean all the shady characters are gone, but it's much safer these days. Platforms like Upwork have methods in place that guarantee you will get paid if you successfully complete a project.

If you can manage to dominate a platform by doing great work, you could be busy for a long time to come. There are plenty of opportunities out there, from writing jobs to virtual assistant gigs.

One website, Fiverr, started out as a place where you could buy services like logo design for cheap (often as low as $5). Now, graphic designers are earning thousands of dollars based on their portfolio of work. Though having an awesome WordPress portfolio makes a big difference in bringing in the right clients.

Besides Fiverr, there are tons of platforms to look through. Here is a list of the best ones at the moment:

• Codeable
• TaskRabbit
• LocalSolo
• Toptal
• Upwork
• Guru
• Freelancer.com
• Airtasker

🌟 Freelancing bonus tip

The most successful freelancers don't work alone. They play to their strengths & get help when needed.

For example, if you're an ideas person, dreaming up web applications might be easy, but coding them more difficult. This is exactly where the right partners can help. Our form builder plugin, has built-in features that make it easy to build websites your customers will love - with no coding required.

By working with the right partners and tools, you can free up your time to work on the stuff you do best. This comes into play for us as well! Sometimes our customers need to build very complicated custom web applications. Rather than take on everything ourselves, we partnered with Codeable to help with projects they are more suited for.

As a freelancer, it can be tempting to live that lone-wolf lifestyle. But it really pays to get help when you need it.

9. Remote jobs

Remote working is more than a trend. Over the past 10 years, it's grown by 91%. At Formidable Forms, we're all remote, all the time. And the reason is simple: it works.

Businesses love remote work because it saves them money. Employees love it because it grants them flexibility in their lives. It's an option that is becoming increasingly normalized.

So if you've been forced to stay home, why not look into remote work options? The good news is that it's easier than ever. There are several platforms that curate the best remote work opportunities for you!

All you need to do is signup for the websites below and they will email you new remote jobs every day. Unless you prefer the commute, check out these platforms:

• WeWorkRemotely
• Flexjobs
• Working Nomads
• Jobspresso
• Remote.co

Bottom Line

The bottom line is this: there has never been a better time to make money online. With all the remote work options available, you could be earning cash online sooner than you think.

If you're looking for more tips about building websites and growing your online business, stay tuned to the Formidable blog. Until then, good luck with your new online business!

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If you are starting an online business, you'll need to make sure you have the right tools. One of the most important tools? A form builder plugin. Formidable Forms is the easiest and most powerful builder on the market. Get started with our free plugin or our full-featured premium plans today!