mendes
Junior Member
- May 29, 2013
- 132
- 52
For many of you reading this, $500 may be low, but I have set that goal for a few reasons.
(you can skip to "what is the plan" if you don't care for context)
I am currently in-between jobs after I quit my last one. I have funds for another 2 months living well (3 if I go saving mode and maybe 4 if I go frugal - aka cheap bastard mode). I am currently looking for a good job, so I'm not taking some opportunities that are showing up that would pay me well, but would also be too stressful or too far away (I hate commute). I am allowing myself that patience mostly because I do have that money saved.
But looking for the right job is, like I said, a very patient endeavor, which means I'm not doing much with my time and I'm not happy with the boredom. Being on vacation mode got old very quickly. I've been thinking about getting a simple underemployment job. One in which I would not be paid what I'm worth as a professional, but that would also not stress me out, require much effort and would be at walking distance from my place. The city where I live is not so small that people would know I worked at such a job. I could just not add that to my resume and no questions would be asked once I got that good job I'm looking for.
Right when I was thinking about that, I remembered BHW. I've been here for a while, since 2013. I really like finance and entrepreneurship as topics, so reading about making money online was like a hobby. I may have tried one or two things in the past that did not work out (I don't even remember what it was) and I had a small success reselling social media likes, views and etc., but I have never had any actual commitment to a method or anything lasting.
If I went the underemployment route, I would probably make between $250 and $500 / month (I'm converting from my currency to USD). So I decided I would give IM a chance putting real effort into it. Right now I have absolutely nothing generating income online for me. I am not a complete beginner because I am familiar with most of the terms and strategies, but a beginner that has taken any action knows more than I do about actually executing those strategies. I will focus on things that bring me recurrent or passive income, but the ultimate goal for this journey is to make 500 USD by June 30th. If I fail to do it and am still unemployed by then, I will most likely take any simple job I can to make myself busy. If I succeed, I may consider starting a new journey with different goals.
What is the plan?
I'm not sure. I don't have a detailed plan with milestones in between because I have no past experience doing this. I have brainstormed some things I think about doing (in no particular order). I will appreciate any advice or thread suggestions for any of the topics below.
Some additional notes before the actual brainstorming:
Mturk: Yeah, I know Mturk is not great, but I want to be able to add some money to the count each day, even if it's only $1. It's just a small bit of motivation while other things may take at least a few days to generate revenue.
Fiverr: I have some basic design skills that I could try to sell on Fiverr. I know it is really hard to get sales without reviews, but I want to try putting up a few services and seeing what happens. Remember that I'm bored. Spending an afternoon making logos is not a big investment. I would be playing Stardew Valley if I was not doing that. This is also something that would bring more immediate revenue (if I can sell anything at all).
Working as a VA: This is one that I am very unsure about. I have great professional experience with administrative processes. I know this sounds vague, but I have worked with continuous improvement, efficiency and automation for 2 years so applying lean, six sigma and all that fancy stuff to making processes better is natural for me. The reason I am unsure is that I have the impression that it is really hard to get a job as a VA nowadays and that the pay would be too freaking low compared to the time dedicated to it (I could be wrong).
Blogging: Is blogging still a thing in 2019? Thinking about how I consume information, I either read books or watch youtube videos. I definitely have one or two topics I could knowledgeably write about, but I think this would require a lot of SEO effort and would most likely not bring results the first month. Maybe for the second Journey?
Writing: This kind of derives from the previous one. If blogging requires too much effort and takes too long to bring returns, maybe I could write for other people / websites? Here I have the same concerns as in the VA part. It seems to me it is super competitive to get a writing gig. And then again, I do believe my English is pretty good, but I'm not native.
Kindle Ebooks: Yet another idea that involves writing. I know there is quite some good content in here about this.
Instagram: Growing some accounts on specific niches and monetizing them somehow. Not sure what else to say here. Also seems like a lot of effort and like it would take a while to generate revenue. On the other hand, it is something I would probably appreciate doing.
YouTube: I absolutely love youtube. It is by far the website I spend most of my free / procrastinating time online. Time and time again I think about producing something for youtube, but I really do not feel comfortable exposing myself there. There are some things I could do. CPA + YT, but I have never done CPA before. Affiliates + YT without showing my face, but I would probably have to invest in a good mic at least, or finally, actually creating content to grow a channel. That seems like a huge effort, learning a lot of skills I don't have and a long time before any returns. But I would also probably enjoy it.
Facebook Ads: Everybody says it is so easy making money with FBA it kinda makes me want to try. I have never committed to investing the money on ads to test the results. I honestly don't think it will be different on this journey. Maybe if I reach $100 soon, I would be willing to try $20 on FBA? Maybe $20 is too little? I don't know. Don't judge me, this is brainstorming. Judging is not allowed during brainstorming.
Website Cold Selling: I saw this idea here in an old thread and I think it's pretty good. Finding local businesses that do not have a website or even better: have a shitty one, design a website for them and contact them trying to sell it with the argument that "it's ready, it can go live tomorrow if you purchase it today". I have started this in the past, but the complexity of setting up a free beautiful WordPress theme set me off.
BHW Marketplace: I have an idea about a service to offer here, but it would take some time to develop it fully. If I have the motivation needed, I will probably work on it in parallel with the other things.
Tell me what you think! I want to hear suggestions, comments, previous experiences, links to great BHW threads, anything you want to share. I have started a journey before and I abandoned it. I will try not to let this happen to this one. On my next update I will let you know what have I started on and what is the current status.
Thanks for reading!
(you can skip to "what is the plan" if you don't care for context)
I am currently in-between jobs after I quit my last one. I have funds for another 2 months living well (3 if I go saving mode and maybe 4 if I go frugal - aka cheap bastard mode). I am currently looking for a good job, so I'm not taking some opportunities that are showing up that would pay me well, but would also be too stressful or too far away (I hate commute). I am allowing myself that patience mostly because I do have that money saved.
But looking for the right job is, like I said, a very patient endeavor, which means I'm not doing much with my time and I'm not happy with the boredom. Being on vacation mode got old very quickly. I've been thinking about getting a simple underemployment job. One in which I would not be paid what I'm worth as a professional, but that would also not stress me out, require much effort and would be at walking distance from my place. The city where I live is not so small that people would know I worked at such a job. I could just not add that to my resume and no questions would be asked once I got that good job I'm looking for.
Right when I was thinking about that, I remembered BHW. I've been here for a while, since 2013. I really like finance and entrepreneurship as topics, so reading about making money online was like a hobby. I may have tried one or two things in the past that did not work out (I don't even remember what it was) and I had a small success reselling social media likes, views and etc., but I have never had any actual commitment to a method or anything lasting.
If I went the underemployment route, I would probably make between $250 and $500 / month (I'm converting from my currency to USD). So I decided I would give IM a chance putting real effort into it. Right now I have absolutely nothing generating income online for me. I am not a complete beginner because I am familiar with most of the terms and strategies, but a beginner that has taken any action knows more than I do about actually executing those strategies. I will focus on things that bring me recurrent or passive income, but the ultimate goal for this journey is to make 500 USD by June 30th. If I fail to do it and am still unemployed by then, I will most likely take any simple job I can to make myself busy. If I succeed, I may consider starting a new journey with different goals.
What is the plan?
I'm not sure. I don't have a detailed plan with milestones in between because I have no past experience doing this. I have brainstormed some things I think about doing (in no particular order). I will appreciate any advice or thread suggestions for any of the topics below.
Some additional notes before the actual brainstorming:
- I will not attempt everything at once. I know it is common sense here on BHW that it makes much more sense focusing on one project and making it work instead of doing a little bit of everything.
- I am not sure what is going to be my approach to investing or reinvesting on methods. It kinda depends on how the journey goes. As I said, I'm not focusing on building a passive empire right now. I just want to see if I can do it. If I can reach my goal by the deadline.
Mturk: Yeah, I know Mturk is not great, but I want to be able to add some money to the count each day, even if it's only $1. It's just a small bit of motivation while other things may take at least a few days to generate revenue.
Fiverr: I have some basic design skills that I could try to sell on Fiverr. I know it is really hard to get sales without reviews, but I want to try putting up a few services and seeing what happens. Remember that I'm bored. Spending an afternoon making logos is not a big investment. I would be playing Stardew Valley if I was not doing that. This is also something that would bring more immediate revenue (if I can sell anything at all).
Working as a VA: This is one that I am very unsure about. I have great professional experience with administrative processes. I know this sounds vague, but I have worked with continuous improvement, efficiency and automation for 2 years so applying lean, six sigma and all that fancy stuff to making processes better is natural for me. The reason I am unsure is that I have the impression that it is really hard to get a job as a VA nowadays and that the pay would be too freaking low compared to the time dedicated to it (I could be wrong).
Blogging: Is blogging still a thing in 2019? Thinking about how I consume information, I either read books or watch youtube videos. I definitely have one or two topics I could knowledgeably write about, but I think this would require a lot of SEO effort and would most likely not bring results the first month. Maybe for the second Journey?
Writing: This kind of derives from the previous one. If blogging requires too much effort and takes too long to bring returns, maybe I could write for other people / websites? Here I have the same concerns as in the VA part. It seems to me it is super competitive to get a writing gig. And then again, I do believe my English is pretty good, but I'm not native.
Kindle Ebooks: Yet another idea that involves writing. I know there is quite some good content in here about this.
Instagram: Growing some accounts on specific niches and monetizing them somehow. Not sure what else to say here. Also seems like a lot of effort and like it would take a while to generate revenue. On the other hand, it is something I would probably appreciate doing.
YouTube: I absolutely love youtube. It is by far the website I spend most of my free / procrastinating time online. Time and time again I think about producing something for youtube, but I really do not feel comfortable exposing myself there. There are some things I could do. CPA + YT, but I have never done CPA before. Affiliates + YT without showing my face, but I would probably have to invest in a good mic at least, or finally, actually creating content to grow a channel. That seems like a huge effort, learning a lot of skills I don't have and a long time before any returns. But I would also probably enjoy it.
Facebook Ads: Everybody says it is so easy making money with FBA it kinda makes me want to try. I have never committed to investing the money on ads to test the results. I honestly don't think it will be different on this journey. Maybe if I reach $100 soon, I would be willing to try $20 on FBA? Maybe $20 is too little? I don't know. Don't judge me, this is brainstorming. Judging is not allowed during brainstorming.
Website Cold Selling: I saw this idea here in an old thread and I think it's pretty good. Finding local businesses that do not have a website or even better: have a shitty one, design a website for them and contact them trying to sell it with the argument that "it's ready, it can go live tomorrow if you purchase it today". I have started this in the past, but the complexity of setting up a free beautiful WordPress theme set me off.
BHW Marketplace: I have an idea about a service to offer here, but it would take some time to develop it fully. If I have the motivation needed, I will probably work on it in parallel with the other things.
Tell me what you think! I want to hear suggestions, comments, previous experiences, links to great BHW threads, anything you want to share. I have started a journey before and I abandoned it. I will try not to let this happen to this one. On my next update I will let you know what have I started on and what is the current status.
Thanks for reading!
