There are two types of ways you can earn money online – the fast and fake way or the real way – the choice is yours.
Are the kind of person who wants everything handed to them right now without putting any work in, the same kind of people who never get anywhere, or are you the kind of person who is willing to learn new skills, work hard and reap the rewards in the long-term?
Why are there so many scams online?
I'll tell you:
Because scammers thrive on manipulating our emotions with empty promises of get rich quick schemes and automatic cash generating sustems.
I really wish these actually existed, I mean who wouldn't love to earn millions just be signing up to a system and clicking a mouse?
The only problem is… it's just not reality.
If you want to earn real money on the internet, it will take hard work, diligence and it will take TIME (some might even say it's the slow way – but it is the real way.)
How To Earn Money On The Internet Fast!
There are hundreds of ‘gurus' who will promise you riches and give you lots of hype.
Ever seen massive statements like these?
“Make $1,000’s overnight with this cash spitting software!”
“If you don't make $30,000 in the next 3 days I'll give it to you myself!”
Blah, blah, blah…
All you need to do is buy into their program and by the time you wake up the next morning cash is running to deposit itself into your bank account.
They make these super-bold promises, make crazy outrageous claims about how much money you can make, but it's just gimmicks and tricks – there's never actually any substance to it. Just hollow promises they will leave you igh and dry and disappointed every time.
Just think about it for a sec, if they have access to unlimited piles of money through their own Google-busting techniques, why do they need to sell anything to us?
There are some really easy ways to spot work from home scams like these if you know what to look for. Here's are just some of the tell-tale signs someone's trying to enrol you into a scam:
1. Promises of fast and easy money
Have you ever watched a YouTube video of someone driving around in a Ferrari boasting about making millions online while they're sailing in the Mediterranean on a yacht clutching huge stacks of money in each hand.
Have you ever wonderd how they make their money? By selling you their fake make money program that's how!
Have you noticed they'll go on and on about how much money they're making, but they'll never get round to telling you exactly how they do it and what their business model looks like… instead they'll just tell you need to buy their one-of-a-kind system except that to buy this system before your time runs out.
We've all seen ads like this one:
Cami White scams are a typical example of this and once peopel realise what they've fallen for and try to get their money back, she just shuts up shop and moves over to a new website with a new name. But it's the same scam every time.
2. Pyramid Schemes And MLMs
There are everywhere too. You've got multi-level-marketing schemes like Younique and Amway that can insist all they want about how they're not a pyramid scheme but the truth is you need to sign other people up under you to ‘make it'.
They dress it up, try and tell people they're something they're not and tell people they can become business owners signing up other business owners.
And once you're inside the ‘hype-bubble' of these types of programs, it's hard to take a step back and see that you don't own a business, you're not a business owner, you're just a block in the pyramid and the only things you own are the overpriced products you paid for.
By very definition, a pyramid scheme has a few winners and a lot of losers and for this reason are illegal in most countries.
3. The money making system is selling the money making system to others
Wouldn't you like to earn millions each and every month on autopilot?
Great!
Let's get you started! All you need to do is buy a $299 for a over-priced starter pack and harass your friends and family until you can find others who will do the same, then they find others who will do the same and so the pyramid chain continues…
Then just watch the money piling up. Click here to get started!
I'm joking – please don't do it!
Yes, you can ‘earn‘ money fast when you sell people on suck people in with big, bold but hollow claims and use that to get them to buy your expensive training program, but your success will be short-lived as you run out of people that you can rip off.
Be very careful. There's a very fine line between an illegal pyramid scheme and a multi-level-maketing scheme with a few over-priced products thrown in.
4. Blatent Spam
Do you love spam as much as I do? No, I'm not talking about the canned meat product made mainly from ham
I'm talking about email spam, comment spam, Facebook spam, tweet spamming to name a few…
There's a reason spam and scam seem to go well together – spam is an illegal, unscrupulous way to make money at someone else's expense.
Hype and deceit are the tools these con artists use to trick you out of your money. Trust me, this is not the real way to earn money on the internet.
OK, enough of what definitely doesn't work. If you've already fallen victim to any of these schemes it's okay, dust yourself off and learn from it.
The good news that can come out of all of this is that are REAL ways to build a legitimate online business and earn an honest and long-term online income.
How To Earn Real Money On The Internet (I.E. A REAL Business)
After falling for yet another scam I almost gave up looking for a real way to make money online. If you can relate, please don't lose hope.
Right now I'll walk you through the real process of earning money using the power of the internet. It's not ‘get rich quick' but it is faster than building an offline business.
Compared to a traditional style business, building an income online takes less time at just a fraction of the cost. For an online entrepreneur the start up costs are less than a hundred dollars.
Yes, you read that correctly.
You don’t need to max out your credit card and waste $1,000’s on worthless training, useless tools, dodgy backlinks, cookie-cutter landing pages etc to create, grow and build a very successful and profitable internet business.
If you're ready let's get straight to it. Here are 5 of the best, most effective and real ways to earn money on the internet.
1. Earn Money Building Niche Affiliate Websites
When people ask me how to start earning money on the internet, my answer is always: with a niche website. A niche is a specific audience or a group of people interested in something. This could be anything, from “how to find the best camera lens”, to “dog sports gear”, to “making money online”.
There are literally millions of niches where you can carve out a very successful (and profitable) business for yourself online. The niche you choose to go into can be almost anything you have a special interest in.
This is one of the core internet business models Wealthy Affiliate teach (it's where I started out) and it is a business that can take shape rather quickly (in a few months' time).
The process in a nutshell looks like this:
(1) Choose a niche
(2) Start a Blog
(3) Building out content on your website (that leads to rankings/traffic)
(4) Monetise your site (the make $$ part)
Recommended: Wealthy Affiliate
2. Earn Money Through Affiliate Marketing
I love affiliate marketing because it means you can promote potentially millions of different products or services without having to pay out for stock or deal with shipping.
The truth is, most of all purchases made online are done through affiliate links. When you sign up to an affiliate program, you are given a unique link that you can use to direct people to their page and you make a commission on any sales you refer. Depending on the affiliate program you choose within your niche, commissions can range anywhere between 4% and 75%.
Big brand names like Nike, Samsung, Canon Amazon, LEGO and hundreds more big companies have affiliate programs you can that are free to join and promote.
Earning money on the internet with the affiliate marketing business model works really well with building niche websites.
If your website is your online store, then the products you can possibly promote are endless. There's no limit on how many affiliate programs you can join and the earning potential for your new internet business is limitless.
Recommended: Wealthy Affiliate
3. Earn Money Selling Digital Products
If you prefer to make your own products, there are several platforms out there that allow you create and promote your own digital products. You can write and sell ebooks at places like ClickBank and become a self-publisher at Amazon through their Kindle network.
Many people have become successful online entrepreneurs and earned lots of money by selling their own digital products through the internet.
Promoting anything digital can be a very lucrative option simply because after the small initial outlay for product creation and design, once you have it, you can sell the same eBook, online guide or training course a million times over with no additional storage or shipping costs.
The payment and delivery of digital products can be beautifully automated, leaving you to collect the profit for years to come.
Recommended: Wealthy Affiliate, Clickbank.com
4. Earn Money Selling Through eBay
Most people use eBay to get rid of unwanted clutter and earn some fast cash in the process.
But what if you could take this a step further? I mean, go pro with it? You could source new or used items at super low-prices at auctions or online wholesalers and sell them on eBay for a handsome profit.
This work from home opportunity may require a little investment, so check out what’s in your garden shed, get it listed and use the money you earned to invest in stock. Use your newly cleared shed as your eBay storage space.
Your seller rating is obviously crucial so keep an eye on your inbox and answer buyer’s questions. It’s also a good idea to set reasonable minimum bids to make sure you get a decent return.
Recommended: eBay.com
5. Earn Money Freelancing
Earning money on the internet by offering your services as a freelance writer, graphic designer, website programmer, SEO expert, video editor, (actually almost anything you can think of) can be a great start up option.
You can earn money from 1,000’s of tasks/jobs (aka gigs). Bloggers, online businesses owners, video marketers all need help form time to time with various online tasks. And then sign up to sites like iWriter to outsource their work.
The only problem with this internet business model is that your earnings are potentially limited by the number of hours you put in; you put the work in and get paid once.
This is a good way to earn money online, but you are in essence a hired “worker” or “contractor”, rather than being a business owner. A big difference, but there's no question you can earn a full-time income from internet freelancing.
Recommended: Fiverr.com, iWriter.com
So there you go! We've just walked through four fast and unethical ways as well as five real and honest ways to earn money on the internet.
Protect yourself from work at home scams, be careful course or scheme. There are a lot of people making money online by promising other people how to make money online! Sad but true, and this is why it took me so long to finally be able to be successful online – I just kept bumping into scammers like these time and time again.
If a product claims that it will make you money overnight with a simple click of a mouse – question it.
The truth there are so many real and honest ways to earn money online. If you want to create a proper business, there is a proper path to doing so and I will be more than happy to help you out if you're ever ready to build a legitimate, fun and long-term internet business.
What has worked for you?
For me, learning how to earn real money through the internet has been one of the most fulfilling and life-changing this I have ever done.
Got any questions? Drop me a comment and I'll get back to you ASAP. Are you earning money online already? If so, what has worked for you? Leave a comment and let me know if I’ve missed anything obvious. I'd love to hear from you!
Simon Crowe is on a mission to help as many people as possible kiss their bosses goodbye.
Take the free Wealthy Affiliate test drive to discover how to smash your online income goals and make your dream business a reality.
What a great article!
I still don’t get how people in 2017 are still falling for those foolish scams!
Everyone should long know that there is no ‘Get Rich Quick’ and money making is a result of hard work, creation, time and effort.
As you say, making money through Affiliate Marketing is one of the incredible ways you can use the internet to make money online, and as far as I know, Wealthy Affiliate is the best way where to get started with Affiliate Marketing.
But as you mentioned, there is a lot of ways to make money online, freelancing, etc.
Thanks for helping people to get it clear!
Chanan
I think people generally are becoming more savvy to work from home scams, it’s just that scammers know how to press our emotional buttons so sometimes, even despite our gut telling us it’s dodgy, we push that aside because we really want it to be true…
There are lots of real ways to make money online, affiliate marketing being my favourite. I appreciate your feedback Chanan, thank you!
thanks for sharing this most insightfulinformation, It is so amazing off the many ways that persons can make money online. The internet have made made it possible because of the amount of people that you can reach in a short space of time. The information that you have will help so many to decide which way is best for them. Thanks again.
Hey thanks! Which way do you make money online Norman?
One thing that I would like to comment on is, when you are looking to make money online make sure that you are really paying attention to what is being said when the company is trying to sell you on their “program.”
Recently I found something that, to me, sounded pretty easy to do. I signed up for it and found that I wasn’t getting what I thought. I must have misheard something along the way. They had a 30-day money back offer, which I did and got my money back.
Just remember to really read between the lines and really keep your ears open.
Thanks Allan, this is very good advice. Always check out their refund policy in case the program doesn’t meet your expectations and check out and research other people’s experiences by reading online reviews.
I love the post’s main image 🙂 I’ve been like a couple of years searching methods about how to make money online. And there are truly millions of greed traps everywhere. Sometimes is even difficult to not click to one of those shiny advertisements.
But that’s part of the game… you have to be strong to go and persist the hard/real/slower way.
Thanks for the tips Simon!
It reminds me of those horror films… everyone’s in the car all having a great time and then someone says… “Oh look a shortcut!” – you roll your eyes because just know it isn’t going to end well!
I totally agree Adrian, however tempting those so-called shortcuts may be… don’t do it.
I like how Kyle at Wealthy Affiliate describes it, he says when you’re looking to earn money on the internet do you want o build a shack or a skyscraper? A shack can be up in a day but doesnt last long and has no foundation, a skyscraper on the other hand is a solid internet business model that will generate income for you for years to come.
Simon,
Loving this post! I agree that a lot of us when we came to learn about the concept of making money online are bombarded with “scams” and claims about how you can earn money fast.
But that’s not true at all, online is not different than offline. If you want to earn a sustainable income, you’ve gotta start building your business.
Thanks for sharing!
Cheers,
Anh
Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks Anh
Nice work here, Simon!
This post is awesome! I would agree that those are some very legitimate ways to make money online, however I was wondering if you had thought about adding domaineering to the list? I suppose it is a niche website, but it’s more about online real estate than selling products.
Hi Taylor, I have talked about ‘domain flipping’ before, is this the same thing? Domaineering is not something I’ve personally done before but I know that many people can make a healthy profit from it.
Do you think buying and selling domains can be turned into a full time and scalable way to earn money on the internet?
I can relate to what you’ve been through because I did so myself three times before I found Wealthy Affiliate. I was led to believe more than once that all I needed was a thousand dollars to start making $10,000 a month. Thankfully I didn’t fall for that… Primarily because I didn’t have the money. Lol
I agree that building niche websites is the key to making money online especially for such a low startup cost.
Yeah I’m sorry I wasn’t the only one to go through this experience. I’m sure we’re not the only ones…
This was actually The Make Money Online Blog came about – as well as showing people that blogging could be more than a hobby, I wanted to show that there is legitimate ways to build an online income that doesn’t involve scams of MLMs.
And you’re right – actually getting started with Wealthy Affiliate is a fraction of the cost compared to the crazy hyped-up nonsense out there – and it actually works!
I’m only where I am today because of the training courses I took on Wealthy Affiliate – two years on I’m still a very active member, paying it back and helping others do the same as I have – that’s got to say something right?
Hi Simon! I am majorly impressed with the information you provide and how you’ve organized it. I am definitely one of those people who have searched the internet for work from home or anywhere moneymaking opportunities. Your site comes across as honest yet authoritative, fun (the sofa) and informative. It’s easy to navigate and read. I think it will be a valuable resource for me and I look forward to more of your material.
Thanks for that, I appreciate it. I believe you should have fun in whatever you’re doing, I spend a lot of time putting these articles together so I’m glad to hear it helps : ) See you around the blog!
Great website valuable stuff here. The old get rich quick scheme has burned a lot of people. Sadly i was one many times. You go over the ins and outs on how those scammers work out there on the internet. It’s very helpful information. I see you helping a lot of of novice people on the internet who don’t know about these things. Great job keep up the good work.
Hey thanks – yeah I too was burned my the scammers but not anymore. If the Make Money Online Blog can help anyone avoid the scams and find true success online then I’ll be happy.
This is a very thorough analysis. I think you hit the nail on the head and helped to dispel a lot of the myths out there about making money online and exposed them for what they are.
You offer a real way to earn money on the internet – like freelancing, selling digital products, and selling things on ebay in addition to affiliate marketing. Thank you! I couldn’t agree more!
Glad they helped Mike 🙂