When you have to deal with an ever-rising cost of living, there are some traditional options you can check out. You can hustle harder at work and log extra hours, negotiate a raise, or take on a second (or third) job. Naturally, your mileage may vary, but you don’t have to restrict yourself to those choices. Earning more money with passive income streams can offer a great solution, which lets you input some effort upfront to gain additional revenue over time. Even better, you can now try your hand at some methods that are exclusively online—and require far less initial capital than, for instance, buying real estate or shares of stock. Here are some for you to explore.
Open an online store
The convenience of online shopping, combined with rapid improvements in shipping and logistics, has dramatically shifted consumer habits over the years. Consumers now just look up the product they want online and order it in a few clicks. Start by researching trends and finding your suppliers. You don’t need to compete with Amazon; simply do what any small business startup does—find a niche you can serve and secure it. The rest doesn’t even require a lot of technical skills. For instance, a WooCommerce cloud hosting provider can also be your site builder and let you design and organize the storefront.
Create and distribute digital content
You’re likely to get really good at something you do at your day job or previous work experience. Why not make that expertise do double duty by creating a course or guidebook and making it available for purchase through your website? If you’re inclined to do some creative writing on the side, it can even be easier to create and distribute an ebook through Amazon self-publishing. Online platforms make it easy to translate your existing skills and knowledge into added income without any prior experience in publishing or marketing.
Monetize a blog
Many people use social media posts to express themselves and build a following. They could do so on a website, but social media tends to be more convenient. However, why not write and post images on your website while also bringing in additional income? Simply by transposing your writing onto a personal blog and learning some basic blogging skills, you can open up the possibility of earning through ad placement. Through a starter method such as Google AdSense, you can host CPC or CPM ads to generate income and eventually earn more by building up your blog’s reputation and hosting private ads or affiliate links.
Sell or license stock resources
These days, our phones are always within arm’s reach. When you consider that modern smartphones are not only amazing productivity tools but also capable cameras and audio recorders, it’s perfectly feasible to start capturing images and sounds wherever you go. You can sell or license these resources through online sites dedicated to stock photography or audio distribution. Even completely mundane resources, such as the sound of a passing train or images of Scrabble tiles forming words, can find unexpected demand and yield good returns for such little effort invested.
The reach and power of online selling and distribution channels offer you some excellent opportunities to make money on the side. With a minimal initial outlay and sweat equity, these options can bring in some much-needed passive revenue to help you get by.
