The 16 Best Advertising and Marketing Strategies to Try in 2020

1. Educate with your content

Content has long been king and 2019 was no different.Citing figures from the Content Marketing Institute’s 2019 trends report, Robin Barendsen, head of digital marketing at office space rental company WehaveAnyspace, noted 77% of B2B marketers use content marketing.“In fact, the majority of B2B content marketers use educational assets to nurture leads and build audience trust, which is absolutely essential for inbound marketing,” he said. “Think about informational blogs, white papers or quizzes.”

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We’re likely preaching to the choir here, but, generally speaking, brands should create content that is relevant, authoritative and, of course, educates its audience.

2. Personalize your marketing messages

Peter Wilfahrt, managing director of digital agency Versandgigant, said marketers should personalize every single message in 2020 by digging into analytics and understanding demographics, affinity categories and in-market segments. More on that in a moment.“Only very few brands execute a personalized messaging strategy,” he said. “And we’re not talking about adding the first name to your email greeting … really dig into your prospect’s mind and discover what they fear, wish and want.”While Brock Murray, COO of digital marketing agency seoplus+, agrees consumers should be made to feel special, he argues automation is the way to go because it allows advertisers to create ads that dynamically change based on whoever is searching. And, Murray said, results show consumers want this type of customization.“With that being said, timeliness also proved to be a critical part of any strategy as users proved they still don't want to be bombarded with content, particularly if it isn't even relevant to them,” Murray added. “Overall, all of your content and markup should be concise and easily understandable to ensure your users receive value with each interaction. Transparency and respect of users’ privacy should also be a critical component of any digital marketing strategy.”Frank Spear, content marketer at WordPress contest plugin RafflePress, said personalization boosted his marketing strategy far beyond his expectations in 2019.“We tried to implement personalized content in virtually every aspect of our strategy,” he said. “Our opt-in ads change based on the content users read before the popup was triggered. The relatable promotion is designed to show consumers that we understand their pain points and want to help. We allow our customers to pick the type of content they want to receive from us when they subscribe to our email marketing campaigns.”Effective personalization is the result of efforts like behavioral segmentation, or separating audience members into groups based on their actions, like first-time purchases, abandoned carts, repeat purchases and page views without conversion, said Sam White, marketing manager at CBD site Soul CBD.“Each behavior group can look very similar to each other demographically and then act in very different ways,” White added. “Behavioral segmentation is what allows us to speak to each group in a way that makes sense with how they interact with the brand.”Vivek Chugh, CEO of checklist app Listables, agreed data-driven segmentation has worked well so far because it allows Listables to tailor its messages and make sure it is getting it in front of the right people, so this segmentation will be a big part of marketing in 2020, too.

3. Let data drive your creative

According to Natalia Wulfe, CMO of digital marketing agency Effective Spend, platforms like Google and Facebook are taking control more control of audience targeting as they simultaneously move away from manual bidding capabilities. Meanwhile, their algorithms have become adept at understanding which ad images and copy will drive the best click-through and conversion rates.“With these shifts, we’ve seen creative emerging as a serious performance driver, carrying equal weight to other key drivers like placement selection and audience targeting,” she said.As a result, Effective Spend overhauled its creative design process to incorporate a data-first approach.“We analyze the performance metrics of existing creative, identify where the gaps are, and then design new creative that directly impacts those poor performing metrics,” she added.

4. Invest in original research

One of the best marketing strategies of 2010 was investing in original research.Tamas Torok, head of online marketing at Javascript development company Coding Sans, said Coding Sans has been publishing its own research on software development trends since 2017, and these reports have generated links from reputable websites and yielded thousands of subscribers.“This strategy worked because we came up with something new,” he said. “New data attracted links and it was beautifully presented, which made people share it on social media.”Coding Sans plans to publish at least three new reports with original research in 2020.Matthew Zajechowski, outreach team lead at digital marketing agency Digital Third Coast, agreed using proprietary data to create long-form content with graphics has been an effective 2019 strategy, resulting in backlinks from thousands of high-authority publications.“Publishers want new story angles to cover on a subject even if they’ve covered it a billion times before,” he added. “Having proprietary data allows us to have that unique angle and presenting it with graphics makes it easy for them to share. We look for writers and publications who cover that subject and present it to them as new research or a study.”

5. Update your content

And don’t forget the content you’ve already published.In fact, Cyrus Yung, co-founder of SEO company Ascelade, said updating old content is a strategy that has served Ascelade well as Google has a freshness ranking factor and most sites eventually see content decay.“They have old articles that have ranked well previously and have attracted backlinks, but the search traffic for that particular article is on a downward trend,” he said.Mark Webster, co-founder of online marketing education company Authority Hacker, said 2019 was the year Authority Hacker focused on this tactic of refreshing older content instead of just pumping out new, high quality content. “After some testing, we found that making simple updates and tweaks and, most importantly, changing the date of the article to represent the newest revision [made] our rankings instantly [jump] up,” he said. “It's no secret Google prefers fresh content but we had not anticipated this to be such an easy win.”What’s more, it’s cheaper to refresh old content, so Webster this small technique a “huge win.”Jeroen Minks of PPC agency Vazooky Digital, too, called updating existing website content “one of the best and most successful marketing strategies that I [used] last year.”“By going through each article and page individually and [updating] them, I have seen a big increase in organic rankings which have led to more website traffic and new customers,” he said. “Part of the content optimization was to involve other experts in my articles, which led to more external links and a better social media presence.”

6. Try subscribing to HARO

Another popular 2019 strategy was responding to queries from journalists on services like Help A Reporter Out (HARO), as they are constantly looking for experts in a range of fields.In fact, Olga Mykhoparkina, CMO of chat platform Chanty, called answering HARO queries “by far the best marketing activity we’ve done this year”—more so than even guest blogging and fixing broken links.That’s because Chanty gets an average of five to ten links a week by responding to relevant queries.

An example HARO request from Twitter.

“We’ve come up with a methodology to pick the best and most relevant queries, send timely answers to them and, in the vast majority of cases, we’ve gotten backlinks from high authority websites,” she said. That list includes outlets such as American Express, Forbes, CMSWire, and Inc.com.“As a result, we’ve grown our organic traffic and our domain authority has noticeably increased in a matter of just a few months,” she added.Vartika Kashyap, marketing manager at project management software firm Proofhub, agreed, noting HARO has been a great source of authoritative backlinks and has helped boost content ranks.“And do you know what the best part is?” asked Alexandra Zamolo, head of content marketing at communications platform Beekeeper. “It's absolutely free. All it takes is a little bit of your time to craft a few well-written quotes every day that apply to your industry. How cool is that?”

7. Expand your guest blogging opportunities

Another way to expand your reach? Allow more people to create content for your brand through guest blogging. Pamela Bourgault, a digital marketing specialist at digital marketing and social media reporting platform DashThis, said DashThis has scaled its content strategy by allowing clients to contribute to its blog.“This type of strategy is ideal for both of us since they can use this guest post contribution to leverage their expertise and we can use their knowledge to leverage our blog as a resource for relevant information and lead generation,” she added. “In most cases, these articles bring in a lot of organic traffic and promising leads for us. We have some articles that our clients have written that still to this day bring in over 200+ leads per month.”

8. Use more video (again)

Video remained a popular digital marketing tactic in 2019, and it’s a must marketing strategy for this year, too.Stuart Leung, vice president of marketing for vaping brand Breazy, said videos forge stronger bonds with consumers, which, in turn, makes them more likely to purchase a product. Options include tutorials, testimonials and behind-the-scenes footage.Case in point: Chris Savage, CEO of video software company Wistia, said Wistia has paid close attention to the rise of streaming platforms and has seen more and more businesses take a page from the Netflix playbook, creating longer-form original content to build brand affinity. That’s why Wistia created its own late-night-style talk show, Brandwagon.“Throughout the series, I talk with some of the top minds in the marketing world to learn the secrets behind some of their biggest successes,” he said. “Plus, we welcome some unexpected special guests and our team even buys a ’91 wagon to transform into the ultimate Brandwagon along the way.”Wistia used social media to advertise trailers and clips and allows viewers to binge watch the entire show, resulting in a steady increase in brand search volume and an increase in overall time spent with the brand, Savage said.

9. Livestream

Morgan Lathaen, marketing specialist at printing company Thumbprint, noted livestreaming was on the rise in 2019 and will continue to dominate in 2020 because it is free, takes a short amount of time to produce, reaches a broader target audience, and offers authentic user engagement.“With that, live content has the ability to generate greater impressions than posts published in newsfeeds,” she added.

10. Try explainer videos

Another option for video content is explainers. That’s what Raj Vardhman, editor-in-chief of remote work resource GoRemotely.net, said his site opted to do in 2019 to make complex concepts easier to understand.“The Google algorithm continues to favor websites with video content, which makes these incredibly important both for marketing and SEO,” he added.Larissa Murillo, Marketing Manager at SEO and website marketing tool Marketgoo, said Marketgoo took this one step further by creating a course for online learning platform Udemy that was more educational than promotional.“The idea behind this tactic was to build brand awareness of our SEO tool and use the course to teach basic SEO and how to use our tool to help with that effort,” she said.While conceding the attribution for signups was tricky because students were typing in URLs rather than clicking on links, Murillo said another advantage was the videos were reusable in other capacities, like blog posts.

11. Host or join podcasts

Digital marketing consultant Ryan Scollon called podcasts “a real breakthrough in 2019” with a surge of shows in digital marketing in particular.Marketers can appear as guests on established podcasts or start their own, both of which Scollon said offer huge benefits with few downsides.“Podcasts are a great way at building a solid audience that returns every week without having to have your face in front of the camera,” he said. “It's also a great way for repurposing content that you may already have on your blog.”Stacy Caprio, founder of Accelerated Growth Marketing, said appearing on podcasts has been one of her most effective marketing strategies of 2019 because it has driven site traffic and brand awareness.“The trick is to go on … podcasts that have devoted audiences in your own niche, so the audience interest overlaps with your own,” she said. “This works well when the podcaster has a large audience that trust them implicitly and will take their interviewing of you as an endorsement that they want to check out on their own.”

12. Prioritize local SEO

According to Dan Rice, marketing manager at recruiting firm Talent Locker, the most effective strategy in 2019 was optimizing and prioritizing Google My Business, the free tool that allows businesses to manage their online presence across Google, including search and maps.“We have used this as part of a wide-ranging digital marketing campaign designed to raise awareness of the brand and brand name,” he said. “Through steadily producing posts, updates and actually helping drive people to our Google My Business listing, we have been getting strong results … it doesn’t just appear to be helping local SEO, it is also highly significant in driving searches on brand names, too.”Digital marketing consultant Leslie Whittaker agreed, noting while most businesses have claimed a Google My Business listing, only a small percentage have optimized it. Plus, Google continually adds new features and many businesses aren’t even aware they exist, which means they are missing out on opportunities to drive leads.“For business with a brick and mortar location, Google My Business is an essential marketing tool,” she said. “It's the first place people turn when looking for a business, especially local businesses and it’s an easy way to increase leads in a short time.”For example, by focusing on the Google listing, Whittaker said one client, a spa in Midtown Manhattan, saw a 398% increase in the number of times the listing appeared in Google searches, an 84% increase in phone calls and a 153% increase in traffic to the website. Another, a dermatologist with a new practice in Long Island and a new listing, has appeared 8900 times in search results and has received 280 site visits from said listing, along with 300 phone calls.Erin Sparks, CEO of digital marketing firm Site Strategics, said the new real estate from Google, along with lead funnel functionality, shows it wants customers to interact with its properties first, which is why Google is giving businesses the tools to connect with said customers.“From the Get a Quote functionality to Custom Service Menus to the relatively new Google Guaranteed Local Service Ads, it is clear that Google wants you to interact with the customer as quickly as possible with its tools,” he added.

13. Set up automated email marketing campaigns

Maciej Baranowski, manager of customer engagement at career advice website ResumeLab, said ResumeLab started automating its email marketing campaigns in 2019, which was a “resounding success.”That’s because the company can send almost four times as many newsletters, which more than compensated for the initial drop in conversion rates.“Ideally, we want both, but math tells us that the tradeoff was more than worth it and we’ve been surging ever since,” he said.Automated email also allows for better customization with A/B testing, infographics, sequences, time zones and CTA buttons, as well as data-backed optimization.

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“With each subsequent week, we’re getting smarter about what the ideal newsletter looks like,” Baranowski said. “In the end, the juice was more than worth the squeeze. The transition pains have yielded a much smoother, smarter and efficient approach that we look forward to fine-tuning further.”

14. Prepare for voice technology

Continuing a trend from prior years, voice search was once again on marketers’ minds in 2019.That includes chatbots, which Paige Arnof-Fenn, CEO of marketing consulting firm Mavens & Moguls, noted cut costs and convert visitors into leads by answering FAQs, as well as optimizing for voice queries and long-tail keywords. Again.Arnof-Fenn said the latter will be key to maximize marketing and advertising opportunities via voice assistants like Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant. “I predict that the brands that perfect the branded skill with more customer-friendly [and] less invasive ads are going to win big,” she added.

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Faizan Ali, who does PR for WordPress resource site WPBeginner, said adding semantics and optimizing content for voice searches yielded a lot of featured snippets for WPBeginner, which helped increase traffic by 37% in 2019.What’s more, Alexander Kehoe, operations director of web design firm Caveni Digital Solutions, said Caveni is using natural language processing to assess the quality of its own human contributors and create more value for customers.

15. Test out augmented reality

Extending the personalization trend, Polly Kay, senior marketing manager at window treatment retailer English Blinds, said interactive content that allows customers to preview products paid off well in 2019.For English Blinds, that means rolling out a tool for prospects to upload pictures of their home interiors to create window treatment designs to see how they’d look.“This idea initially came from my seeing hair design websites in which women were able to upload a picture of their face and see how it would look with different hair styles overlaid to it,” she said. “This proved to be hugely successful for us during testing, for many reasons. The most obvious of these is that it enables people to see how one of our products will look in their home before paying the money and taking a chance, which of course helps to incentivize sales in and of itself.”After a four-month trial of this Virtual Interiors tool, the brand decided to look closely at enabling additional interactivity in 2020.

16. Use smart bidding

According to Wulfe, Google and Facebook have also significantly expanded their AI-based ad targeting and bidding capabilities over the last year and her agency has adopted them across “at least 90% of our search and social ad campaigns.”That’s because smart bidding options like Google’s Target CPA are able to learn quickly from past data to optimize ad spend toward top-converting search queries, ad creative, audiences and demographic segments. To ensure the algorithms have as much data as possible, Effective Spend tracked all the important activities users do on clients’ sites and connected clients CRM data directly to each digital channel to tell the algorithm which conversions were junk and which ones became qualified leads and sales. “The more engagement and lead value information you feed the algorithm, the more insights it can crunch to optimize your ad spend toward the leads that are most likely to turn into paying customers,” she said. “We saw this firsthand and are further committing to it in 2020.”

The best marketing strategies to try in 2020

To review, here are 16 expert-approved digital marketing strategies to try out this year:

1. Educate with your content
2. Personalize your marketing messages
3. Let data drive your creative
4. Invest in original research
5. Update your content
6. Try subscribing to HARO
7. Expand your guest blogging opportunities
8. Use more video
9. Livestream
10. Try explainer videos
11. Host or join podcasts
12. Prioritize local SEO
13. Set up automated email marketing campaigns
14. Prepare for voice technology
15. Test out augmented reality
16. Use Smart Bidding

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I’ve been a financial advisor and entrepreneur for many years, and I have had some big successes along the way. On days where I receive a big payday or one of my ideas works well, it’s hard not to be completely overwhelmed with pride.Still, none of my earlier successes compare to the first day I made $100 on the internet within a 24-hour period. Something about getting a $100 check from Google just blew me away — even though I was earning well over six figures in my career.It was a game-changing moment for me since this realization helped me begin this amazing online journey that I am so grateful for.

21 Ways to Make $100 or More Online in a Single Day

While it’s been a long time since I had my first $100 online payday, I have learned about a ton of different strategies to earn money online since then. And I want to share them all with you, one by one. But first, let me give you a little context about me and my story.

Around ten years ago, I started a blog called Good Financial Cents. While my website makes tons of passive income now, I initially built my blog as a marketing tool for my financial planning practice.

At the time, I didn’t know anything about online marketing, social media, or SEO. In fact, I was oblivious about the fact you could make money online. Fortunately, I met some mentors along the way that showed me I could use my online presence to earn real money.This was such a huge mindset shift for me since, until then, the only way I knew how to earn money was by going out and getting more clients. I didn’t know it at the time, but I would eventually replace my full-time job with blogging income alone.Now that you know my backstory, it’s time to dig in to some of the ways you can start earning passive or active income with the internet. If you’re interested in earning money online and in your spare time, check out these 21 ways you can earn $100 or more per day:

1

: Google Adsense

When I started my blog, I faced a lot of restrictions as a financial advisor. As a result, one of the only ways I could monetize at the time was by using Google Adsense. With this income-earning strategy, you simply sign up and Google gives you a code to copy and paste onto your website. From there, Google does the rest and you get paid any time someone clicks on your ads and/or makes a purchase.When I finally added Google Adsense to my website, I was able to earn my first $100 payout within around three months. This is pretty cool, but a lot of people have asked me how I earned so much with Adsense at first.You have to keep in mind that, as a financial advisor, most of the ads on my website are for financial products that pay out rather well. If your blog is in a different niche like food or fashion, it may take you longer for your ads to pay off with your first $100 check.

2

: Text Links

The second way I made $100 at first was via text links. If you’re wondering what text links are, check out any article on the web and you’ll see highlighted words you can click out to take you to another web page.While I didn’t realize it for quite a while, there are a ton of companies who are willing to pay $100, $200, and even $1,000 or more for you to link from your website to theirs. But I was pretty stoked when a few companies would pay me $100 or more just for inserting a link into one of my blog posts.Unfortunately, I eventually learned that selling text links is against Google’s terms and conditions. If you are doing this on a consistent basis, your website is going to tank over the long-term.For that reason, selling text links isn’t a good long-term monetization strategy. You can do it every once in a while without any negative impact, but you’ll live to regret it if you get greedy and overdo it.

3

: Sponsored Posts

With a sponsored post, a company pays you to talk about their product or service on their website. While I initially made $100 to $200 for each sponsored post I did on Good Financial Cents, I kept jacking up my rates over time.

How much can you earn? Blogger Alexis Schroeder of FITnancials says she frequently earns $3,000 per month with sponsored posts. However, some blogs with more traffic can easily earn $20,000 per sponsored post or more.

If you plan to do sponsored posts, I definitely recommend only working with companies you believe in and feel good promoting. If you promote anything and everything without making sure it aligns with your values, you probably won’t gain a lot of trust from your readers. Over time, this could hurt your efforts to grow your website more than the income from sponsored posts helps.

4

: Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is one of the most lucrative ways to make money online. When I was able to add affiliate links to my website, I watched my income surge in a big way in a matter of weeks!In the financial planning niche, affiliates include companies like online brokerages, online banks, and financial tools. These kinds of companies pay very good money if you’re willing to promote them.While the type of affiliates you work with will vary depending on the niche you’re in, keep in mind that some companies will pay you up to $100 per conversion. It’s not too hard to start earning real money with that kind of return on your time.

If you don't believe me, check out Making Sense of Cents. Michelle Schroeder-Gardner is the entrepreneur behind this blog, and she is also the founder of a course called Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing. Through her website and course sales, Michelle consistently earns over $100,000 per month. No, that is not a typo.

5

: Display Ads

Display ads are very similar to Google Adsense except that the reader doesn’t have to click on the ad for you to make money. Think of display ads as billboards that are on your website instead of on the side of the highway.With display ads, you get paid based on the number of times your ads are viewed no matter what. For that reason, these ads will work better for you as the traffic to your website grows over time.

6

: Freelance Writing

Freelance writing is another way to earn online income if you don’t mind earning some of your money with active work. Another benefit of freelance writing is that you can gain exposure by writing for larger websites.One of the first websites I wrote for paid me $150 per article. This wasn’t a lot of money, but I used the opportunity to improve my writing skills and get my name out there. I don’t write as much for other people anymore, but I do know plenty of freelance writers who are earning $250, $500, and even $1,000 or more per article.

Some freelance writers I know are even earning six figures or more writing from home each year. This includes blogger Holly Johnson, who earns over $200,000 per year writing articles for other websites. Johnson also offers a course you can check out if you want to become a freelance writer but need some help getting started.

7

: Getting New Clients for Your Business

When I started my blog, I envisioned my website as a marketing tool to get new clients for my financial practice planning. This strategy worked great since my online presence helped me build authority and reach people I may not have reached otherwise.If you have a service-based business of any kind, I would absolutely suggest starting a blog or building an online presence you can use to get new clients. This can help you build your client base just like I did, and it’s a lot more fun than cold-calling or holding boring seminars.

8

: Coaching

If you have expertise in a specific field, you can also use the internet to build up a coaching business. This is something that happened on accident for me. As I built my blog and my brand, a ton of people started reaching out to me to learn how I did it and how they could apply the same ideas to their own business. While I initially gave out advice for free because I enjoyed it, I eventually started charging a consulting fee.

How much you earn depends on the type of niche you wind up in. According to recent statistics, executive coaches make around $325 per hour while business coaches make more like $235 per hour. Life coaches, on the other hand, are able to charge approximately $160 per hour.

If you’re an expert in your field and people are constantly asking to “pick your brain,” you should start charging people . Your time is valuable and so is your advice!

9

: Selling Leads

Once I was a few years into Good Financial Cents, I started a second website called Life Insurance by Jeff. While we initially started this website to build up our own leads, we got to the point where we had so many leads we couldn’t handle them ourselves.Eventually, I found out that a handful of insurance companies were willing to pay for leads generated through my website. These companies would pay between $35 to $100 per lead, which is insane. This was a big eye-opener for me since I had no idea this was possible.Also note that it’s not just life insurance companies willing to pay for leads. There are a ton of different avenues and lead generation strategies out there, so make sure to consider all the possibilities.

10

: Digital Products

There are all kinds of digital products out there, but there is always room for more. I even have a few of my own!

If you sign up for my free Make 1K Challenge where I show you how to start a blog and make your first $1,000, for example, I have a $7 upgrade that includes some PDFs and behind the scenes video. While $7 doesn’t sound like a lot of money, this one product still helps me earn an additional $1,500 to $2,000 per month passively!

Another example of digital products is the wide world of printables. Lots of online entrepreneurs create digital products their customers can print at home, and they often make bank doing it. While many bloggers have their own printable budget templates, meal plans, or checklists, you can also find examples on Etsy.com.

11

: Online Courses

I’ve talked about my digital products before, but keep in mind that you can make nearly digital product on your own. It could be a PDF, a video series, or a course — whatever you think fits with your business model. Just keep in mind that you have to deliver the goods and make sure your product is high quality. If you sell crap just to make a buck, you’re going to lose street cred pretty quick.

In a post I wrote on how much YouTubers really make, I shared how some YouTube stars have courses of their own. For example, famous real estate YouTuber Graham Stephan earns a ton of cash selling real estate courses through his Real Estate Agent Academy. How does he earn so much? His courses start at $497 each. That's just one example, but there are plenty of others.

12

: Investment Gains

Like anybody out there, you can set up an online brokerage account and buy ETFs or stocks. I’ve been able to make at least $100 per day off my investments for a long time, and this income is some of my favorite since it’s entirely passive.Keep in mind that it’s crucial to have traditional investments in addition to an online business that can help you rack up passive income. Just open an account with Scottrade, TD Ameritrade, or another online brokerage and you’re good to go.

There are so many ways to invest online these days that there is literally no excuse not to. I am tired of the excuses, so start investing your money to grow long-term wealth today.

#

13

: Peer-to-Peer Lending

I’ve been making money with peer-to-peer lending for a long time. With websites like Lending Club, borrowers and investors can connect for mutually beneficial financial transactions. On the investing side, you can invest in crowdsourced loans for individuals who need to borrow money all over the United States. Returns tend to be high on these loans, and you can use these platforms to build more passive income for yourself while also helping someone out.

Which peer-to-peer lending platforms should you sign up for? David Galland of Gallan Research dove deep into every option a few years ago. Ultimately, he said that the best peer-to-peer platforms for investors were Lending Club, Prosper, Upstart, and Funding Circle.

14

: Crowdfunded Real Estate Investing

There are a lot of real estate investing websites out there, but the one I still use to this day is Fundrise.com. With Fundrise, you add money to your account and professional investors will invest your money on your behalf and pay you dividends. If you want to invest in real estate without the hands-on hassles of being a landlord, this is a great way to get started with as little as $500.

15

: Sponsored Social Shares

Like sponsored posts on a blog, sponsored social shares take place a company pays you to post about them on social media. This could be on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or any other social media platform.I don’t do much of this, but my wife gets paid some fat cash to post pictures and talk about things like furniture, rugs, and kid’s clothes. It’s almost funny to me how much money you can earn, and it is surprising the kinds of things people will pay for!

16

: Selling Stuff Online

Another way my wife makes money all the time is by selling stuff online. She normally sells our stuff online via different Facebook groups. For example, we just sold this wooden hutch someone gave her for free as part of a social media sponsorship.If you have items to sell and don’t mind spending some time creating free ads on Facebook or a website like craigslist.org, selling stuff is a great way to use the internet to earn more money.

17

: Sell a Physical Product

Back in the day, my wife and one her business partners had a subscription box product called Happy Mommy Box. They had 1,000 customers that were paying $35 per month for these cute boxes full of products happy mommies love.Eventually, she got overwhelmed by it all and she and her partner decided to shut the business down. However, this just goes to show what kind of opportunity is out there.

For example, several popular YouTubers have their own stores they use to sell physical products. Jeffree Star sells makeup, for example, and Jake Paul sells all kinds of fan gear through his online store. You can also head to to Etsy.com and find all kinds of entrepreneurs selling homemade soaps, unique home decor, T-shirts, and pretty much anything else you can think of.

The bottom line: Physical products can also help you earn real money, so make sure to explore the different products you could sell. This could mean drop shipping products you market as an affiliate, but it could also mean coming up with your own product to sell.

18

: YouTube Ads

Even though I used YouTube back in 2011, I didn’t even turn on ads until 2017. When I did finally turn ads on, I started making $5,000 per $6,000 per month!YouTube ads are easy because all you have to do is turn on ads every time you publish a video. Obviously, you’ll earn more money with this strategy as you build your viewership.

19

: Buying and Selling Websites

People buy and sell websites all the time for a variety of reasons. And, if you know what to look for, it’s easy to buy websites that can help you earn some passive income over time.

Personally, I have bought several sites over the years including FinanceforTeachers.com. I haven’t done anything with the site since I bought it a year ago, but it still helps me earn $100 to $150 per month with no effort at all.

If you want to check out websites and URLs that are currently for sale, head to Flippa.com.

20

: Brand Sponsorships

This strategy runs alongside sponsored posts, but it’s much more involved. Many brands want more than a sponsored post when they work with you. In fact, they are often willing to pay for some sort of sponsorship package that includes written content, videos, social shares, and more.I’ve done a few of these over the years, and they can be very lucrative but also a huge pain! But, if you’re willing to jump through some hoops and you have a sizeable following, you can absolutely consider brand sponsorships as yet another way to earn money online.

21

: Book or eBook

Finally, you can also consider writing a book. I wrote a book called Soldier of Finance several years ago, but I am still selling copies to this day. The growth of my YouTube channel has been a big part of that, which I am eternally grateful for.

The cool thing about a book or an eBook is that, once it’s out there, you can just keep selling it over and over. Plus, you can write a book about any topic you want! If you’re interested in any topic, hobby, or idea, chances are other people are as well.

The Bottom Line

While these are some of the ways you can make money online, this list isn’t all-inclusive. We didn’t talk about Facebook ads, retail arbitrage, membership groups, or a ton of other strategies!If you need to earn more money on the side, remember to think about all the different ways you can earn money with the internet. Even if most of these strategies don’t sound like much fun to you, chances are good that one of these ideas is perfect for your lifestyle and goals. Start earning money online and I guarantee you won’t regret it.

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