It pays to cast your financial net online, where possibilities abound.
Monetizing your expertise -- whether in social networking or
transcribing -- is one way to make money while sitting at your
computer at home. But others also are popping up, such as taking
online surveys or even predicting election results. The good part: You
don't have to pay a dime. And with some sites, you can start to make
money online immediately. Most of these gigs are small, steady streams
of cash. But they can add up to steady earnings over time. To avoid
scams, forget unknown or untested sites with big promises. "Find out
if the site is legitimate," says Nick Mokey, associate editor of
DigitalTrends.com. "How long has it been around? And what are they
asking you to do?" Also, keep a clock running so you can maximize your
income without wasting your time. Follow these rules, and you'll find
the Internet awash in moneymaking opportunities. Pitch products online
Pitching other people's products is one of the Internet's best-paying
gigs. One method is being an affiliate at a mega-site such as
Amazon.com, where commissions are up to 25 percent. Anytime anyone
buys a product you're pitching, you get a cut. And you can choose from
more than a million products, including gift cards or computers. At
ClickBank, commissions are even higher -- up to 75 percent -- and
there are more than 50,000 products to choose from. Signing up is
free. On the downside, some ClickBank products can be of poor quality,
says Bethany Mooradian, owner of QueenoftheRandomJob.com. So some
products are easier to pitch than others. One solution is to buy the
product ahead of time to assess its quality, she says. Dish out
answers If you're an information junkie, this gig is for you. There
are several to choose from to make money online. At kgbanswers.com and
JustAnswer.com, you become an expert after taking a brief test. At
these websites, a customer asks a question and receives an answer from
an "expert." At kgbanswers, answers come via your smartphone. At
JustAnswers, answers come via email or text message. Both offer
subscription and per- question alternatives. Brainiacs are also
welcome at ChaCha, which pays you small amounts of money for
completing guide tasks. Advice runs the gamut from solving puzzles to
answering questions on set subjects. Payouts can be small but steady.
Building a following on ChaCha is the hardest part, though, Mooradian
says. The reason: You're listed along with 62,000 other experts. Also,
ChaCha rates are pretty slim, ranging from 1 cent to 20 cents per
task. Though savvy experts can make money online, don't give up your
day job. Perform a microgig You can offer your services online at task
marketplaces such as fiverr.com or Zaarly.com. At fiverr, workers
fulfill tasks starting at $5 per job. Zaarly.com offers a similar
service. It has launched its first storefront in San Francisco but has
workers performing tasks all around the U.S. Or, even better, head to
Amazon Mechanical Turk, or MTurk.com, says Mokey. More than 200,000
tasks are listed there to make money online, with varying pay and work
requirements. Once a task is completed, payments are deposited in your
Amazon Payments account. "In the worldwide marketplace of today, your
skills can be used for anything, including mapping," Mokey says.
However, you're also competing against people in developing nations
who are willing to work for pennies, he says. To maximize earnings,
evaluate tasks carefully. Can you make accurate predictions? Are you
good at forecasting election results or the price of gold? Then
predictive sites are for you. Introduced by the Chicago Board Options
Exchange in 2008, binary options are financial contracts that let you
earn money by predicting the rise or fall of financial assets. You can
buy them at binary option brokers. The website Intrade is another
twist in prediction-making. You can predict hundreds of events -- such
as presidential election results or Academy Award winners -- by buying
shares if you think the event will happen or selling shares if you
think it won't happen. If your prediction is accurate, you make money.
If it isn't, you lose money. "Some power users buy thousands of shares
at a time," says Carl Wolfenden, exchange operations manager at
Dublin-based Intrade.com. "Others put $50 down and hold their shares.
It's a lot of fun." You should be warned that you can lose your entire
investment, Wolfenden says. On the winning side, your money-making
potential is unlimited. Take an online survey Put your money where
your mouth is by giving advertisers your opinions. To find a job, head
to websites such as MindFieldOnline.com, GlobalTestMarket.com or
ZoomPanel.com, Mooradian says. They offer points and rewards for
taking wide- ranging opinion surveys. Another site, eJury.com, will
pay you for being part of online mock juries, Mooradian says. EJurors
are paid $5 to $10 per verdict. The attorney prepares the case
submission, which consists of facts from the perspective of each
party. EJury converts the attorney's case submission into an HTML
format and posts it to a secure location on the website where only
eJurors can access the case. EJurors review the facts of the case and
answer questions, each clicking a "submit verdict" button upon
completion. But don't expect big paydays. "Surveys are good for making
pocket change," Mooradian says. "Payouts are only pennies to a few
dollars per survey."
