As a student I don’t have time to work a full-time job and so I am currently working three days a week, and spending four days in lectures and studying. Due to this I have been scouring the internet for ways to make money online, in order to have a small amount of extra income to supplement my travels. I am not claiming any of these methods to be a get rich quick scheme, you have to put in the hours to get rewarded, but over the last few years I have tried and used a lot of websites, so I am aware of the scams, and the genuine ones to use.
You can make money online by spending a few minutes filling in online surveys. This is not a very quick way to earn money, but it does come through. I use the survey website YouGov. It’s very easy to sign up, you just enter in your name and address, and then fill out your profile. Your profile asks you questions about your income and relationship status, so that the surveys they send you are tailored towards you as a person. I get about two-three surveys a week, which will pay between 50p-£1 each time. Once you reach £50 then you can request a cheque, and this arrives within a few days. I have been filling in surveys for 6 months, and reached £50 a few weeks ago. As I said before, I don’t claim this will make you a lot of money quickly, but every little helps, and that £50 will give me a few extra days of travelling, which is no bad thing!
This is by far my favourite way to make money online. I regularly can make £50-70 a month just by writing online reviews. You can write about absolutely anything, from a packet of crisps, to a lawnmower, to your backpack, to travel reviews about recent places visited! It works on a point system, so obviously an electronic item will earn you more money than a packet of crisps, but the points soon add up, and spending 30 minutes to an hour a day can easily earn you £50 in a month.
My favourite review site is DooYoo. It is very easy to use, and easy to understand the point system. For example, if you write about an electronic item, and your review is over 150 words then they will pay 60p into your account. For every time someone reads your review (normally 20-40 people read a review) you are paid 2p. For one review you essentially could therefore earn £1. It’s fairly easy to knock out a 150 word review in no time at all, and as long as you include a fair amount of detail it’s very easy to accumulate your money quickly.
The other review site I use is Ciao. This earns you slightly less money than DooYoo as you don’t get paid for writing reviews, but you get paid every time someone reads the review. As long as you write a few good quality ones each month, then Ciao will give you a reward at the end of the month. I normally earn £8 – £10 on top of my earnings from people reading my reviews. To be honest I write my review for DooYoo and focus on that and just copy and paste my review over to Ciao, to earn a bit of extra money.
This is covered in more detail in my post: How to start selling everything you own. It’s very simple to list items you own and no longer need or use on eBay. I’ve found it to work extremely well and have made close to £500 so far! The fees can be slightly excessive and frustrating but you can list anything and everything you could possibly imagine, and someone else will snatch it up from you! I never imagined there would be much demand for my old shoes, my 6 year old ipod, my Status Quo (hahaha!) scarf, but there was!
What is everyone looking for when they go online (apart from porn!) ? Information!! It is possible for you to be paid for writing informative articles about almost any topic. I’ve used the website Helium to write a few online articles. It is easy to use are you are paid for the quality of your writing of the article, as well as how many people read your articles. You should write an article which is roughly between 500 – 1500 words, which doesn’t actually take too long to write if you are actually interested in the subject you are writing about. You simply find a title which interests you, start writing, and then hope that people love your article and read it heaps of times!
It isn’t just article based websites that want your writing either, website owners and others that don’t have the time to write for themselves,need to people to write their web content for them. Check out Elance and you’ll find lots of jobs that require you to ghostwrite for another person. In my experience you are typically paid between £2-£8 per article, and the amount you get paid is dependent on the amount you write, and how eloquent you are with your writing. Once you find an assignment you like, you are generally given more details about the article, such as the title, and what should be included, as well as being given a word count and then you can get writing!
There are many other ways of making money online which I have yet to delve into. There are lots of people that have become very successful at monetising their travel blogs through advertising, and this is something that I have yet to look into, but if you read around the area then there definitely are a lot of possibilities out there. Whilst they won’t pay for your whole round-the-world trip, they may help contribute an extra week or two to it, which is no bad thing at all!
Have any more suggestions or recommendations on ways to make money online? Leave a comment below and let me know!
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Lauren is a twenty-something physics graduate, who decided upon graduation to leave behind everyone and everything she knows and travel solo around the world indefinitely. This blog is a record of her travels, photos, experiences and adventures!
Great post with some great ideas here. I also do the yougov surveys and got £50 a few months back but yeah it takes a while but if you just do 1/2 a day it doesn’t seem like much for some free money!
Definately gonna check out the Dooyoo site though. Cheers!
Garreth recently posted..Making Rough Travel Plans – 18 Weeks Out!
Thanks Gareth!
Yeah, DooYoo is a really great site to use, and I’ve had a lot of success with it. There’s not much effort involved and the money builds up quickly!
Sweet! RT @nefootsteps: *NEW POST!* Extra ways to make money online to fund long-term travel: http://bit.ly/gLMOkq #travel #rtwsoon
Thanks for this list!
Shawn Brandow recently posted..How to choose your next holiday destination
No problem, Shawn! Hope you found it useful!
Some creative ways to earn money here… writing reviews? Have to check that out for sure since we tend to have plenty of things to say about stuff we use
Thanks for sharing
Jill – Jack and Jill Travel The World recently posted..Why Traveling Is Just Like Rock Climbing
You should definitely have a look at writing reviews then! There’s a great community surrounding it, and I’ve been surprised at how much money you can make with minimal effort! You can write a review about just about anything!
RT @NEFootsteps: *NEW POST!* Extra ways to make money online to fund long-term travel: http://bit.ly/gLMOkq #travel #rtwsoon
Hi Lauren. I do freelancing writing and SEO work to fund my travels. Often working for three months and then taking a month off to travel. At the beginning, if you do not have a profile with references from other people then it will be hard to get the good paying jobs.
Also 2 dollars for an article is not good money considering that to research a topic, write about it and then ensure that grammar and spelling are correct would take roughly an hour. The people paying 2 dollars want cheap work but they want 100% quality.
I say, take the 2 dollar work to get your foot on the ladder and some references and then start moving onto the better paying jobs.
Also insist on Escrow, there are a lot of people out there who try to scam freelance writers.
Natalie recently posted..20 Beautiful Pictures of Cappadocia
Some great advice there Natalie! I’d like to get into freelance writing a bit more, but it does take some time to build up a portfolio, so that you can reach those higher paying jobs!
The idea of working for three months and travelling for one sounds fantastic!
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Budget Your Trip, Shawn Brandow. Shawn Brandow said: Sweet! RT @nefootsteps: *NEW POST!* Extra ways to make money online to fund long-term travel: http://bit.ly/gLMOkq #travel #rtwsoon [...]
*NEW!* Extra ways to make money online to fund long-term travel: http://bit.ly/gLMOkq #travel #rtwsoon
Nice RT @NEFootsteps: *NEW POST!* Extra ways to make money online to fund long-term travel: http://bit.ly/gLMOkq #travel #rtwsoon
Nice tips, both from you and from the comments!
Thanks Sofia! Hope you had a good birthday!
[...] post she just wrote about extra ways to earn money online got me thinking that so many of us just aim for the big advertising dollar in the sky. Lauren [...]
Some great ideas here…I had never heard about the surveys or feviews sites, but definitely have to check them out!
Stephanie -Finding The Freeway recently posted..Saving Money- Recycling Household Items
Hey Stephanie! You really should check them out! It certainly won’t make you lots of money – but it can make you a fair bit, and every little helps!
Excellent tips! I’d love to see some more of these posts in the future. It’s always great to see what readers post in the comments as well.
Thanks Ryan!
I’m always looking for new ways to make a little extra money, so will definitely be writing a part two soon!
I worked for a texting service before I left on my long term trip. Whenever I was bored at school in the lab I would get on and answer questions for 3 cents a pop (5 seconds per). Got nearly $600 out of it before I got bored and quit.
Jeremy recently posted..A Mouthful of Scorpion and Other Weird Treats in Beijing
Extra Ways to Earn Money Online to Fund Long-Term Travel. #travel #rtwsoon http://bit.ly/h6gEPH
gr8 advice =) RT @NEFootsteps Extra Ways to Earn Money Online to Fund Long-Term Travel. #travel #rtwsoon http://bit.ly/h6gEPH
Some great ideas in here. Thanks for sharing. I used Ehow for a while and still get a bit of money every month. It’s awesome when you can earn a few dollars for a little bit of time and writing.
Mike recently posted..Getting Back to Nature in Malaysia
Love your site, so glad I found it today
We have a lot in common RT @NEFootsteps: Extra Ways to Fund Long-Term Travel http://j.mp/e4eCh7
Great post will share with friends keep up the good work.