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

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=948549

by rick_2047 • 17 years ago

5 15 17 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

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.

So do you know of any?Because this will be hell of a way to earn some pocket money.

dabent• 17 years ago

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.

rick_20472• 17 years ago

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).

ThinkWriteMute3• 17 years ago

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

ThinkWriteMute3• 17 years ago

Oh, and pick up some SEO books. The biz is really all about long tail keywords, ranking, and the number of sites you have up.

rick_20472• 17 years ago

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. :)

ThinkWriteMute3• 17 years ago

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

byrneseyeview• 17 years ago

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.

anaid• 17 years ago

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!

rabidsnail• 17 years ago

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

ja27• 17 years ago

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.

nzmsv• 17 years ago

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.

indrax• 17 years ago

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.

datasink• 17 years ago

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.

etherael• 17 years ago

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.

gregking• 17 years ago

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.

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

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