OK let’s get one thing straight – nobody MAKES money online!  The only people who can make money are the mint, and possible counterfeiters… what we can do however is EARN money online.  We do this by offering VALUE, usually in the form of a product or service which someone is willing to pay for.

You probably know several ways of generating an income online.  Since you’re readying this blog I think I can safely assume that you are interested in starting an online business, or supplementing your existing online income.  In that case you’ve probably already looked at the possibility of running an online store, creating and selling information products, affiliate marketing, possibly even building sites for Adsense?

However, there are many other, less discussed income sources on the Internet, an no I’m not talking about filling our surveys, paid surfing or any of the other dodgy sounding schemes out there.

Got skills, earn cash!

We are all different.  We come from different backgrounds, different professions, and we all have different skill sets.  Not everyone has the skills necessary to successfully create and market a video based membership site, or even an e-book, although we can all learn those skills.  We do however all have skills that can be put to work, building income streams.  Let me explain…

For the past 8 years or so I’ve been developing websites, web applications and games, and also teaching those skills both on and offline.  During that time I’ve built up quite a collection of designs, code snippets, unfinished sites, and parts of designs or applications which for some reason were left on the cutting room floor.  Recently I discovered a way of earning an extra income from these leftovers by selling them online.

This got me thinking – what other skills do I have, or could I acquire, which would allow me to supplement my online profits and so I’ve decided on an experiment.  Over the coming weeks I will try to make a profit from as many different skills as possible, and report back with my results.  I can already guess what the results might be – I’ll do well from some, and less well from others, and there will probably be a few surprises along the way.  What I don’t know however is how hard it will be, what hurdles I might come up against, and ultimately how much money I can make, but it will be an interesting experiment.

What skills can be turned into cash?

You might be surprised just how many opportunities there are for turning skills you probably already have into cold hard cash.  I’ll be discussing many of them in depth over the coming weeks but here are just a handful of examples:

Photography

Got a digital camera, and an eye for a good photo?  Perhaps you’re a keen photographer with a whole library of high quality images, or maybe you have nothing more than a camera phone and an inquisative mind!  You might be surprised to learn that you can sell photos online through stock photography sites.  Of course the amount you’ll earn depends on many factors, but rest assured I’ll be following up with a complete case study shortly!

Music

OK so maybe you’re not going to win any National Geographic awards for your photos, but do you have a musical talent?  With a decent soundcard and a good ear you can write and sell jingles and loops, or create sound libraries and samples which again can be turned into profits… This will be another case study in a few weeks time.

Writing

No flashy cameras or music equipment needed here, just a good old fashioned computer keyboard and the ability to put sentences together.  From blogging to article writing, ebook ghost writing, audio transcriptions and more there are literally hundreds of opportunities to turn writing into profits and since it’s a skill you already have at some level, and can be easily polished with practice, it’s a great place to start.

Programming

This is what first got my attention since I’ve been programming for over 20 years.  If you have any coding skills, from C to J2ME, PHP to Actionscript, there are great opportunities to use that skill to supplement your income.  I’ll be kicking off this series with a case study using my Actionscript experience and seeing how much PASSIVE INCOME I can make from applications I developed in the past and are just sitting on my hard drive!!

This really is just scratching the surface.  Over the coming weeks I’ll be looking at quite a number of income opportunities, so many and so varied that you are bound to find one that suits you.  Some are active income (i.e. do the work and get paid once) while others are passive (i.e. do the work once and get paid over and over) but all are real opportunities where many people are earning substantial incomes.

I’m very excited about this experiment and I hope you are too.  I’ll be kicking off with the start of the first case study at the weekend so be sure to check back and see how I’m already earning money from files that were just sitting on my hard drive!