

Ask HN:Is it actually possible to earn money online? - rick_2047

I was going through my spam directory just as a curiosity, just to check what does these thousand odd messages contained. Apart from usual Viagra and length enhancement drugs, there were some emails offering "paid to click" websites. These websites apparently pay you to click on ads,often as minimum as $0.001. But a question begs to be asked, is it actually possible to make money online? If you type "earn online" in google you can get many of these sites which pay you to click or sign up from referal links. But we all know these sites never pay you a penny. Apart from Amazon mechanical turk, I have never come across a big company which gives money for doing simple tasks.<p>So do you know of any?Because this will be hell of a way to earn some pocket money.
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ja27
Many of those are "arbitrage" schemes. For example, buying a Google ad for
"steering wheel desk" and with an Amazon affiliate link. If the Google ad is
cheap enough and Amazon converts and pays enough, you can make money. The
difficulty is that there are tons of people doing this for every search term
they can think of.

I always recommend that instead of buying some scam package, people look at
the free 30 Day Challenge ( <http://www.thirtydaychallenge.com> ) program,
where Ed Dale and team show beginners how to start niche marketing online.

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ThinkWriteMute
The question is raised, not begged.

But yes, my dad (Whom is 58) makes money online by putting up websites with
Ebay/Clickbank/Adsense links. Makes about 125/month.

It takes time and money and about 4-6 months worth of patience /after/ you've
learned how to do it correctly.

For start, google: Ban sites, and google: warrior forum

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rick_2047
The question begs to be asked on HN because such questions never come up on
this site and being asked on this site is actually a privilege. :)

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ThinkWriteMute
Who am I kidding, it's being used incorrectly enough these days that it might
as well be correct.

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nzmsv
Just do a quick calculation, and see how much you'll actually make. Then
realize that your local McDonalds pays more.

Also, ask yourself this: how do you know you'll get paid? You are helping
someone run a scam. Which means they aren't exactly a model of integrity. So,
if they just don't pay you, who are you going to compain to? Google? "Hi, tech
support. I was working for this guy trying to scam your customers, and now he
won't pay".

Next thing you know, you'll be responding to one of those "work from home
opportunities" re-mailing packages. The cops busting your door down follows
shortly after :)

Seriously, use your time to learn new skills. It is worth way more than you
think.

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dabent
It is possible to earn money online. Create an "earn money online" product and
spam it. Better yet, offer an affiliate reward for it and let others spam it.
The "earn online" packages you're seeing are likely cousins or siblings of the
rebill scams that (used to be) in Facebook apps and at the end of checkout
processes now.

That's the sad truth about "make money online" programs like that. Think about
it, even if it was legit: by signing up for any kind of service that offers
money for menial tasks, you're putting yourself into a kind of digital piece
work factory -- about the lowest possible position in the labor pool.

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rick_2047
Hey the second point you mention probably describes the Amazon mechanical turk
well. But still I would work on it because its just easy to earn some money on
it.(Well I havent actually got anything from it now, but just as an experiment
I have done 5 tasks of different rewards to see what I can get from it).

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datasink
Learn affiliate marketing. Seriously. With everything else, you're working
very hard for pocket change. Affiliate programs like Amazon's pay you for
completed sales, so the payouts are typically large. There are several
companies through which you can find CPA campaigns to run, and quite a bit of
material for learning how to run, scale, and make respectable amounts of money
from these campaigns.

Check out: clickbooth.com, cj.com, pepperjam.com, neverblue.com. There are a
bunch.

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anaid
Definitely possible, although it is work, like anything else. Depends on what
your likes and dislikes are- if you are going to do it, you probably need to
enjoy and believe in what you are representing/selling- whether it is a
product or information. Then, it requires some research and testing. Then,
lots of patience and smart work. One word of advice: pick a smaller niche
rather than one that has a lot of competition. It is easier to promote and
market. Good luck!

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rabidsnail
Yes, on Mechanical Turk (<http://mturk.com>).

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indrax
<http://www.problogger.net/>

Even if you fail at this, you'll have more experience, learned more, networked
more, and have something to show for it. And it's legitimate.

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byrneseyeview
If there's a way to make money online simply, it's probably being done by high
school students and people in the Third World -- i.e., anyone whose time is
nearly worthless.

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etherael
This is more a question along the lines of the above but with a specific
example. Tferris' 4Hww, for those that haven't yet read it, the basic process
is this;

Build an end to end business in which you control the distribution channels
for a product that has high demand as evidenced by various keyword search
tools, then outsource all the parts of that business so you're just pulling
the strings of everyone else and they're making money for you.

Aim for price point per product of 50-200$ and 8-10 markup on initial costs to
cover both your outsourced operating expenses as well as a significant profit
for yourself, then minimise your personal cost of living and maximise your
quality of life by employing various other strategies.

It sounds in principle, plausible, however.. markup of 8 - 10 times per item?
Those margins seem extremely high, I understand that they're being maintained
by virtue of you controlling the entire distribution chain + having picked a
niche which has significant demand and not high competition, but still?

I figure someone here has at least tried it? Enlightenment appreciated.

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gregking
I made $2300 over the course of two months a few years back using Comission
Junction through PPC arbitrage. I found the entire industry to be really
spammy and full of scams (not so much CJ but ShareASale, AzoogleAds,
Clickbank, etc)

1\. Sign-up for CJ/Azoogle/etc 2\. Digitalpoint.com for YAHOO/MSN/GOOGLE
credit vouchers $200 in ads for $20. 3\. PPC account (Google not reccomend for
newbiews) 4\. www.sherpastore.com/ to accquire matieral to read internet
marketing case studies, understand landing pages, call to actions, etc. 5\.
html/css/design skills to create your own landing pages, crazyegg.com to
understand user clicks.

Ultimatley its more work for less money than you would make at even a retail
job.. but if you are serious I am sure you can come up with innovative ways to
drive user to your links and maybe even sign-up for trials or products. I made
the bulk of my earnings from Rhapsody sign-ups using obscure music genres on
MSN. While the money seems okay -- you're likely to lose quite a bit while
discovering a niche -- that is if this even works anymore -- I know google was
starting their own affiliate network and i see information for arbitrage being
advertised by gurus on CNBC at 3AM.

