15 Great Ways to Make Extra Money on the Side
This is not one of those typical ways to make extra money article. This article contains side hustles that Andrew and I have either personally tried or we have interviewed someone who has. Like others, this list was not thrown together without thought. We wanted to make sure that you, the reader, actually can make more money.
This list contains real ways to make extra money.
Some of these will earn you more money on the side than others. Some also require more effort than others. But these 15 ways to make extra money on the side will earn you actual money because we filtered out the ones that do not.
Let’s find a side hustle that fits you so you can start making extra money right now!
1. Create an Affiliate Marketing Website
This side hustle for extra income is not an easy task but if done right it has the potential for the highest returns compared to other options on this list. An affiliate marketing website is a site that focuses on particular products by reviewing them or just advertising them. The site points the visitor where to buy the product, the visitor buys the product from that website, then that website pays you a commission for sending them a paying customer.
Still confused? That is alright. Andrew wrote an amazing article with 50 affiliate website examples.
Ready to start your own? Check out this guide on how you should start your very own affiliate marketing website.
2. Start a Blog
Starting a blog is very similar to creating an affiliate marketing website. Instead, you pick a subject that you want to write about, such as finance or gluten-free recipes. Then you start writing and marketing your content.
Typically, you will make money from advertisements, sponsored posts, and affiliate income. Here is the full story on how you can start your own blog today!
3. Monthly Dividends
Andrew loves dividend stocks because he can make extra money from these payouts that companies give him each month. This gives him about an extra $10 to reinvest back into more stocks. This starts a snowball effect earning him more money each month only to reinvest more each month.
We have fellow blogging friends that are making hundreds or even thousands of dollars each month just from monthly dividends.
Interested? I highly recommend you check out what dividends are and dividend investing.
4. Become a Children’s Author and Illustrator
This side hustle is so cool! One of my friends is an illustrator for a greeting card company. She had an amazing idea and decided to write and illustrate her very own children’s book!
Overall, this side hustle takes several years to complete but sounds like an adventure for anyone who is passionate about writing or illustrating. Here is how Leah became a children’s book author and illustrator.
Photo courtesy of Leah Gilbert.
5. Use the Ebates App
You are not going to get rich by using Ebates, but you are certainly going to earn some extra cash. So what is Ebates?
Ebates is a platform that has partnered with thousands of stores. When you make a purchase through the Ebates platform from a store like Amazon, Amazon will pay Ebates a 4% commision. Then Ebates passes part of that commision back to you.
Essentially, Ebates is an affiliate marketing platform that passes some of that affiliate money back to you!
How awesome is that!?!?
Here is Andrew’s review on Ebates.
6. Write Articles
Andrew has had a lot of great success writing articles for Seeking Alpa. This website accepts articles from freelance writers about stocks, bonds, assets classes, ETFs, and investment strategies.
They are understandably very strict about the quality of the articles you write from them but once you start to figure out what they are looking for the writing gets easier. To find websites like this for your niche you should do a Google search or see if any fellow bloggers are doing the same thing.
7. Sell Stock Photography
I love photography. I got into it about 10 years ago on a trip throughout the Pacific Rim. Over the years I have taken about 50,000 photographs and some of them have turned out okay.
With so many photos stored up, I wanted to see if I could earn some money from them. I decided to upload about a dozen and hit the jackpot with my St. Louis Arch photograph.
Over the years this photo has made over $1,000 by just sitting on a few sites.
Here is some more information to help you get started with stock photography. Do not forget to check out our tips as well!
8. Exercising
The Achievement App allows you to earn points for exercising. Once you earn enough points they give you cash.
To be honest, this is the least lucrative venture on this list. You will not earn much money at all. The reason I put the Achievement application on the list is that it is truly passive. You do not have to do anything outside of exercising to earn the points. The application does it all so you might as well sign up!
9. Selling T-Shirt and Swag Designs
Teespring is an awesome website that allows you to put your custom designs on t-shirts and other swag. Then you get to sell everything you put that design on! Teespring takes care of all the order process and shipping once items sell then they send you a check.
Andrew has tried Teespring out a couple of times and has really enjoyed it.
10. Become a Movie Extra
Back in 2010, Andrew had the opportunity arise to be a movie extra in an Adrien Brody movie. This experience paid him $80 for one day worth of work!
Even though he sat around for most of the day, he had a blast being on set. Learn how you can become a movie extra.
11. Selling Your Junk
There are so many different ways you can sell your unwanted stuff now. The most popular is by selling things on Craigslist and eBay.
I was able to help pay our car off quicker by selling about $500 worth of things my wife and I did not need anymore. These items included our second TV, an old camera, and some old computers.
What would you sell on Craigslist or Ebay?
12. Start a Drone Photography Business
A little while ago, one of my old high school teachers was given the opportunity to fly a Phantom 4 drone. He decided at that moment he wanted to earn money on the side by shooting aerial imagery.
Soon after he started up his own business called WHaerial and is now shooting aerial videos from companies around the Cedar Valley area in Iowa. If you are in the area, I would check out his work!
Photo courtesy of WHaerial.
13. Rent Your Stuff
Here in Denver, there is a small startup that created a service that allows you to rent out gadgets, cars, tools, and so on to others in your community.
Fluid App is super easy to use and provides a $1 million insurance in case anything goes wrong. Andrew tried the Fluid App out for us. He had some issues with people canceling on him but once he found a reliable person to rent from, he had a great time.
14. Become a Photographer
A good friend of Andrew and mine started her own photography business several years back. It is amazing what she has turned this little business into.
What is even more amazing is she agreed to share with us how she started off in the photography business. With a lot of hard work and perseverance, she has turned this into her career and guess what. So could you!
Photo courtesy of Britney Brown Photography.
15. Domain Flipping
Domain flipping is a fun side hustle. Here you find domains that are for sale then flip those domains for a profit. Some domains have flipped for millions of dollars!
Do not expect to get that from the domain you buy but you could get hundreds or even thousands of dollars! This side hustle will take time for research, patience for the right buyer, and about $20 every year to maintain the domain.
If you have a good idea, I would check it out!
What’s Next?
Do not hesitate, it is time for you to go out and make extra money. Most of the options above are very easy to get started on so you could be making some extra money by this afternoon!
What is your favorite way to make extra money on the side?
Is there nothing on this list that is appealing? That is alright! We have TONS of other ideas located in our Ways We Make Extra Money page. This page has other side hustle ideas we have tried that I did not mention today as well as other ideas Andrew and I have not tried out yet.
I happened to stop by Goodwill the other day and saw Polo Ralph Lauren used sweaters in good condition for virtually pennies on the dollar. I assume the price of the sweaters was $4.00 each. I could’ve easily bought them and flipped it on eBaY or elsewhere for @ least $30 each. The side hustle is here to stay and certainly a good thing to know because employers nowadays don’t know how to act when it comes to maintaining good character in the workplace and treating their employees right.
Wallet –
I would love to be a movie extra! I do quite a few of these above, and think that if I went full-time – the blog income would crush upwards, I just know it. Nice list.
-Lanny
Nice and useful article. May I suggets +1 idea:
If you believe in bitcoin with a small investment you can start a masternode in cryptocurrency world.
If you are not geek then with the help of gincoin
Also there are shared masternode services if you want to put in even smaller amount. Don’t forget to invest only that much you can afford.
Do your research.
-Viktor
Well i started my online career by reading some guides on https://www.webemployed.com and then i got hooked up with a company that hired me as a online teacher. I am currently earning $1200 to $1400 per month by teaching English online. Before you start as an online tutor, it’s best to get familiar with online chatting software like Skype.