People e-mail me all the time with the question of how to make money online. Although the question itself sounds simple enough, the reality is that without some direction from you in terms of what your current skill set is you might as well be asking me how to get a job. When you want a job you usually pick a field that you have already worked in or have education in. Making money on the Internet is not a whole lot different.
Chances are you know how to do something that other people need to be educated in. Maybe it’s as simple as you being a plumber. You could easily make videos about how to fix common household problems related to plumbing and sell them for a small fee online. Maybe even give some away as a way to build reciprocity with your audience. If you don’t have a formal education or training, perhaps there is something that you have learned recently that you could leverage into a product.
Something as simple as setting up a proper profile on twitter, YouTube, Google maps etc. might be second nature to you. But a small business owner may not have the first idea about setting these things up. That’s the business that almost anyone could do in their hometown.
It has never been cheaper to start a new business than today. You can have a free website running in less than 30 minutes. There is no excuse for not trying something new every day until you find what works for you. Your online business is no different than the off-line business world. You need to try new things constantly to see what works. Once you find something that works all you need to do is work on scaling it as large as you can.
If you are still asking the basic question, “how do I make money online?” Consider that you might really be asking “what do I want to do when I grow up? If you still don’t know the answer you should probably consider looking at additional education for yourself.