How to make money if I don't have anything of my own to sell?

So I'm here, trying to weigh up my options for putting a plan in place to begin creating passive income. I no longer have my own business, and even if I did, it wasn't a good fit for online marketing. (for anything more than just the services offered)

Hopefully, I'm not incredibly daft for asking this - but it is possible to establish a good business if you don't sell anything of your own? I'm not a webmaster, not a programmer. In fact, at the moment, I'm nothing.

There is so much information, and I don't know where to start. Obviously, many people find making money online as an organic by-product of their career choices. What about the rest of us?

Thanks in advance.

 

You can always do affiliate marketing. Look for details on the the conversion ratios and see if the commissions are to your liking.

If you have no funds for marketing (and if you have no website URL of your own to use as a platform), affiliate marketing will be more difficult, but not impossible. If you can write, create "advertorials" that offer lots of information as well as opportunities to promote your affiliate product/service/site, if they're quality you can get them listed in blogs.

You will need to be diligent if you want to make it work, but you'll also learn quite a bit about how to market from the ground up. This will give you an added advantage over those who get comfortable with their marketing due to having a large budget or an in with the search engines, or those who outsource their marketing.

 

I have about $50 to start with. Not much, but it's all I can swing. Having a site or two (to start out with) is not out of the question. But the big point is... Do people who are into marketing actually do it with conviction about the things they are pushing - or is this just about distributing information?

I'm a pretty good writer. I could easily start blogs and un-impassioned websites. But is that a good approach? Being a master of "fluff"?

I'm not really that good at any one thing in particular to focus on. I work in a specialized engineering field, and it does not appeal to mass marketing.

Thanks for your reply.

 

You're welcome

I can't speak for others, but I promote what I think is worthy of my time and efforts. Many out there promote what makes money without giving much thought to it, and some do make a lot of money doing it that way.

If you're knowledgeable about what you're promoting, you'll be able to leverage that by knowing what others will respond to in terms of adverts. If you give out quality information that's not mere "fluff", you'll stand a much better chance of getting conversions.

Here's an example of an article that's only obliquely related to any of the items/services that we promote: http://www.pegym.com/articles/detraining-effect-understanding-reversing-negative-habits-improve-erection-quality-sexual-confidence-part-1
There's not even a call to action" there, but because the article is timely and informative it creates site "stickiness". That's going to keep viewers hanging around the site more- which should result in more conversions.

 

I'm not sure that I understand... Is the "bath mate" is your product?

When you say, "items/services that we promote", are you saying that this is your site, that you wrote the article, or that you are advertising on the page?

Sorry to be silly. I'm a complete noob, still not sure what I'm getting myself into yet.

Thanks again for your replies.

 

I wrote the article, but my service is the "Male Enhancement Coach" program found on that site. I'm also an administrator for PEGym (not an owner)- which sells a whole array of different products; and I offer customer support on some of their sites within the network too

 

Ok, I got it. Very good way to make extra income...

I have no such option, at the moment. Like I said elsewhere, I'm not really a webmaster. But I could easily throw a basic page together. What you have going is something that would take me time to work up to.

 

If you need something that converts very well without much start up capital, please feel free to contact me. To date, most of our advertising has been done "in house", and we do not have many affiliates.

I'll do what I can to help, and we're definitely looking to expand our reach

 

solid7, from what I see, your english is pretty good and you are funny too (your 2 topics made me laugh already ). You can definitely pull some money from a talent like this. I suggest you start as a freenlance article writer (pretty good websites out there you can register on and start writing - you can try Odesk for an example). When you make some money out of it, you can either continue writing articles or use your money to start Affiliate Marketing, or even make an ebook about article writing (if you enjoy it and if you get pretty positive reviews - it shouldn't be a problem).

 

You can't make money without investing. You always have to invest time and hard work. If you have that, you can survive in this business. I know there are many informations, but I recommend to go easily: step by step. Start with CPA marketing (lot of cool advices on LukePeerfly blog), there is a Peerfly, best CPA network and lot of great opportunities. You mentioned you have $50? Invest in domain and hosting, join Peerfly and start promoting offers.

Work Hard, Dream Big!

 

TheAnimatorGuy - I really appreciate that feedback. Writing, is, in fact, one of my strong points, although it's never been so clearly pointed out to me. That is a huge burst of encouragement. It would be really great to be able to monetize such a resource, as it's free, and costs me nothing but my time. And now that I think of it, I can generate a pretty healthy amount of content in a fairly short amount of time. (probably doesn't hurt that I can type 80+ words a minute)

I will check into this. I always assumed that one had to have some sort of journalism background to be taken seriously in the capacity of a writer. I will gladly write to turn a buck, if it can be done!

 

Not afraid to work hard, or investing what I have to invest. (or re-invest, as the case will one day be)

Thank you for your feedback. I will definitely look into your suggestion.

 

Knowledge. That's the best product. What are you an expert in?? What do you know better than anyone?

 

Well, see, that's my problem, right there...

I don't have any knowledge in a field that has "mass" appeal. I'm a specialist in a engineering related field. Believe me, it doesn't cross over well.

 

There is always a market, if you get a following in your highly targeted niche you could build powerful relationships with your audience, which might become useful in future work related settings.

 

Join with affiliate network and start build your blog using free blogging service. You can also earn from PPC program.
It's slow accelarate to make money but you can try it for surely. You only need to invest your time to learn & act.
There are many options to start online business. Just take a look what the programs you can join in this site: http://www.earningproof.com
You'll find the payment proof from other users for each make money program.

 

Could be... But I don't want to be in that field anymore. Too much work, for too little pay, IMO. There are easier ways to make money, with more job satisfaction. I want to work very hard for awhile and reap windfall profits later. Not work like a slave and just get by. Maybe I find this as supplemental income now, and reinvest it later into bigger and bigger projects.

"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."

 

If you don't have anything to sell... You have to options.

1) Create your own products
2) Join an affiliate program

Now as far as monetizing your affiliate links?

I would recommend:
1) Starting a blog
2) Starting an email list

There are a million ways to do this, but blogging and email marketing go together like peanut butter and jelly.

You can create a piece of content ONCE, and then blog it, and also email it to your list.

We're all small marketers right?

So... We have to work smarter.

 

Yes, I suppose you are right...

Is it possible to turn an affiliate program into a "pseudo-store"? For example, I have something that I'm super interested in. Maybe it's sport jerseys/kits. I don't want to sell them. Handling the actual merchandise is NOT where I want to be. But maybe I offer a blog that talks about the things I like, and then points to a particular section that gathers the "best prices" on particular merchandise into a specific section. Fresh content, especially when you have transfers, drafts, etc, and everyone wants that new player's jersey or kit.

That's just an example. Obviously, I don't want to share my real idea, but it's a good parallel example.

 

I've looked at different wordpress plugins / themes that handle this. Google things like "wordpress store" "wordpress affiliate store" etc. there's plenty out there.

One thing I have done in the past is create Amazon affiliate review sites.

Write detailed blog posts about particular products on Amazon.

That way you can promote goods without touching anything.

It's simpler than setting up a psuedo-store front, and can be fun researching about products.

One thing that worked for me, was making the URL of each post the full product name then "customer review" or "customer complaints".

Lots of people will Google that, "product name customer review" or "product name customer complaint".