I received an email the other day from a College Student wanting to know how they could make extra money online. The email stated they didn’t have a lot of time because of their studies. So after giving it some thought, I came up with a list of 7 quick ways college students could make extra money online.
I dismissed blogging in general because it takes some time to get a blog established and making money (the exception is local websites and blogs, see below). I assumed the emailer needed money fairly quick.
Here are my suggestions to the emailer.
- Project Payday: A few months ago, I experimented with a way to make money quick online with a program called Project Payday. I took a day and researched this project online. Seemed real people were making real money with it. Not getting rich, but making enough extra money quickly to pay some bills or other stuff. The next day I signed up with Project Payday, watched the training video’s and browsed the Forums to get a feel as to how this program worked. In all, this process took me a few hours. The next day I followed the directions and made myself available for some “offers”. The first day, I made $30. The next day I hit it hard for about 6 hours and brought down $70 for my efforts. The following day, I worked 3 to 4 hours total and made $45. I soon found out one drawback to this program. It’s boring! No special skills are needed other than the know-how to operate your computer and use the Internet, but it is tedious work. I’m not cut out to spend hours behind a computer! Most people can make money quickly with this program, but you’ll have to put the time into it. The more time you put into it, the more money you’ll make generally. It’s not rocket science but you will have to keep track of the trials you sign up for. If you’re interested, check out Project Payday by clicking here. It’s free to sign up if you fill out an offer or you can buy directly into the program. Next you’ll need to read the promotional literature they have and watch the training video’s. They even have a guarantee that says if you follow the simple 4 step process in Method 1 and don’t make money in 24 hours, they’ll give you $100! This is the best guarantee I’ve seen online. I doubt anyone will need it though, because I found it easy to make money with Project Payday although it was boring computer work.
- Read Emails – Taking Online Survey’s, etc: In my opinion, this isn’t as easy as Project Payday, but it’s real close. There are companies that receive thousands of emails every day that need to be read. Obviously the CEO or other employees can’t spend every day reading emails, so they outsource this. There are several companies where they outsource this type of work as well as other tedious, time consuming chores such as product testing, online surveys, online mystery shopping and other. Send Earnings is one such company that other companies outsource to. Consumers such as you sign up and are normally paid on a per assignment completed basis. The pay varies by what type of assignment you choose. You choose where you want to make money. Click Here to learn more or to sign up for this opportunity.
- Become a Freelance Writer – Can you Write a sentence? Then you may have what it takes to make money as a Freelance Writer. You don’t have to have a degree in English either. In fact, if you can write in an easy to read manner, you have what it takes to make money writing Web content, short stories and other media. You can sell articles on Forums like DigitalPoint and SitePoint, but don’t expect to make a whole lot. Or you can sign up for a service like Freelance Home Writers. Basically this is a job board for Writers where Companies and Individuals needing Writers post their offers. You can either accept or reject them, it’s up to you. Click here for more information about the Freelance Home Writer program and learn how to make money as a Freelance Writer.
- Make Money On Ebay - There are many ways to make money with eBay. It seems that the 2 most popular ways are either by going to Garage Sales or Estate Sales and buying stuff to resell. You can make some decent money this way. Back in 2001 I did this same thing for several months and I made around 1-1600 per month. But it was long hard work making all those auctions or driving around looking for deals at Garage sales. Another way that is becoming more and more popular is people starting their own online stores with the help of eBay. ProStores is an ebay company that offers several packages for you to start your online store. They do a lot of the work of getting set up for you. If this sounds interesting, give them a test drive. One Month Free Trial! ProStores – an eBay Company
- Become an Online Tutor – I’m not sure what this pays, but I’ve known people in the past who have worked with companies like e-Tutor, SmartThinking and Tutor.Com. Online tutoring is an in-demand service and growing all the time. If you like helping others learn, this could be just the ticket for you. You will have to set aside a certain number of hours per week, anywhere from 2 hours on up on average depending upon which service you go with.
- Give eLessons – Do you know MS Word inside and out? Can you make an Excel spreadsheet scream for mercy? Can you work magic with Quicken? Well, there are thousands of people who just want to know the basics of these programs or are looking for some updating. You can advertise on places such as Craigslist and Kijiji or even the local newspaper. You’d be surprised at the number of people just wanting to learn the basics on operating a computer and who are willing to pay someone to teach them!
- Become an Online Juror – Even Lawyers need to practice! There are places such a eJury and TrialJuries.Com that stage mock trials. The Jurors get paid anywhere from $5 to $60 depending on how complex the case is. There’s no guarantee you’ll get a case, but it has to better than cleaning up after the old folks at the Senior Citizen Center! Many colleges have access to these mock jury trials, but from what I’ve been told, they don’t pay as much as the online jury pools. Also, as with anything in life, if you slack off on the Jury, don’t expect to be called back. The more you pay attention and get involved, the more likely they’ll “keep your name around.”
Some college students show up on the first day in a bright shiny BMW convertible. Those are the ones who do not need help. For most College Students, a few extra dollars a month goes a long ways in making it easier to study for their classes. If you’re in a pinch, there’s no need to run down to the Blood Center to give blood, just turn your computer on and go to work.
24 responses so far ↓
1 Michelle // Jul 18, 2007 at 2:39 pm
College students should also check out oDesk (http://www.odesk.com) if they’re looking at freelancing options. One of the advantages of oDesk is just how easy it is to get paid — you can use the oDesk MasterCard (works like a regular MasterCard) or have the money directly deposited in your bank account. There are tons of job postings and the hourly pay option makes it easy to on your own time. For a college student looking to live on more than Ramen, oDesk is a great way to get some work experience and make some money!
- Michelle, oDesk
2 Don // Jul 18, 2007 at 3:50 pm
Thanks for sharing that site with us Michelle. I just took a quick look at it and it does seem like a viable option for someone needing a quick paying part time job they can do online.
3 Jayanand Ukey // Jul 21, 2007 at 1:15 pm
Your article makes a lot of sense to me. I’ve been freelancing for a while now. I think I think move on to other aspect of money making.
Thanks for the wordly advice
4 Rose // Aug 12, 2007 at 3:37 am
Definitely a very good blog post. My blog is about working from home and I’m going to link to your post because its a good list not just for college kids but for just about anyone that would like to work from home and are tired of all of those “work at home” scams.
5 Chris Gagne // Aug 29, 2007 at 10:51 pm
Don, I hope you’ll check out StudentOfFortune.com. It is a student-to-student question-based tutoring service. One student posts a question with a bounty, other students answer the question and earn the bounty.
A couple of friends and I from college started the site about a year ago. Since then, we’ve been featured in the Washington Post, The Chronicle, USC’s Daily Trojan, and Slashdot. Our top earner has earned over $2,100 answering questions in his spare time, selling many of the same solutions over and over again. We also offer a 5% lifetime referral bonus – refer a user to our site and we’ll credit your account whenever they spend money with us. There’s no withdrawal minimum, and we pay upon request.
Thanks again!
6 Mel // Oct 25, 2007 at 1:18 am
checkout http://www.theclassconnection.com These guys are paying $100 for course notes
7 Justin // Oct 31, 2007 at 11:49 pm
A great new site for college students that want to work is called Barefoot Student. The site is set up somewhat like craigslist but has a focal point on students that have a service to offer. For instance you would like to offer a “moving service” to your community while going to school. Simply go to Barefoot Student and create a free footprint with you name, university, major, service, and rates. Once your footprint is up, households can browse for your service. This site is really taking off fast. Take a look at http://barefootstudent.com
8 Sly from Slyvisions.com // Nov 3, 2007 at 2:57 pm
Hmmm. That’s actually a nice list there that I have never encountered before. Thanks for the tips!
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10 alex // Jan 10, 2008 at 3:24 pm
I hope this isn’t a stupid question, but can someone answer what exactly freelancing is?
11 Don // Jan 21, 2008 at 8:01 am
Freelancing is where you go at it alone. You don’t work for a company, but rather you market your services out to companies or other individuals.
It’s along the same lines as being self employed.
Don
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13 War Gold // Jan 24, 2008 at 12:40 pm
#7. Become an Online Juror
That’s great, never heard of this before. Shall get my girlfriend on to this right away!
Proofreading is another excellent way to make money online without needing much time or specific expertise.
14 Tiffany // Jan 25, 2008 at 10:29 am
Good article! Very useful…When I was in the college, my friens competed to be the laboratory assistance. These position was drilled because these offers many opportunity to get money. They can help the lecture do researches, and of course there was some amount they can get as “salary”. Not much but enough. That’s how me and my friend get more money during the college.
15 Seth // Apr 28, 2008 at 11:08 am
I was going to comment on StudentofFortune.com, but I see I’ve been beaten to the punch. It’s a really innovative service for both contributors and for students seeking help with study, I recommend them heartily.
Another option is the ‘new wave’ of survey/offer sites cropping up on the net recently, such as TreasureTrooper or CashCrate. A far cry from the borderline-scam survey sites of old, there’s no promise of overnight riches, just realistic payment for surveys and offers completed, with payouts by check in increments of $10.
Where they really shine is in their multi-tier referral programs, where a user can get a percentage of the earnings of anyone they get to sign up, and also anyone that person signs up. If a student can get everyone in their dorm to sign up, it can mean an easy 50 bucks (and 10 or 20 for those they referred, so everyone wins).
16 One Year Millionaire // May 8, 2008 at 4:59 pm
Great post. I know a lot of people who were buying and selling on ebay for profits… When I was in college was about the time I started in internet marketing and I first made money online by doing graphic design tasks for others.
17 Joyce // Aug 29, 2008 at 6:54 pm
This is a great place that is just getting started and you can Join for Free. Share it with you friends. Log in and Out 30 times a month and you will qualify for your share of the bonus money that comes from the advertisers. It should increase every month.
18 Danny // Oct 6, 2008 at 10:19 am
These sound like good suggestions yet e jury and project pay day are only open to the U.S, does anyone know of any sites open to Australia?
19 AJ // Oct 7, 2008 at 11:48 am
I’m a fulltime college student and I’ve recently join this site. It’s similar to myspace and facebook but you’re actually paid to refer others to the site and the compensation plan is really good.
20 warhammer // Oct 14, 2008 at 12:47 am
actually, making a blog really isn’t that difficult nor does it even take that long. You can always buy an already established blog for less than $100 off many trade sites and start by selling reviews or buzzes for anywhere between $10 to 25 a post and collect on maybe google adsense or link rentals. You can start earning in usually as little as 3 days after maybe some basic simple seo work and etc.
21 Hari // Dec 7, 2008 at 7:02 am
Thanks for your 7 tips friend
22 Amanda // Dec 16, 2008 at 5:34 am
So I’m confused. In this day in age when professors are getting more and more into the digital age (even the oldest ones), isn’t having someone else write your paper for you sort of “illegal” at any school? Isn’t it like plagarism since it’s not actually the person’s own work but the work of another student?
23 Gbemmie // Dec 29, 2008 at 12:05 pm
I want to appreciate you.
may God Almighty bless you for the above information, they will work in such a country as mine where we are still developing
24 Indongo // Dec 30, 2008 at 10:20 am
Thank You
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