I a
Everyone knows a little something that other people wish they knew. So, why not get the satisfaction of teaching others what you know and getting some money doing so.
Below I have created a list of the best ways to make money with online teaching to get you thinking.
All of these ways can be done in your spare time – so they make the perfect side hustle!
Table of Contents
Make a website
One of the best ways to make money with online teaching is to make your very own website or blog.
A website is the main hub where you can share written articles, videos and other e-products.
If you have never created a website before, you probably wonder how it is even possible to earn some money with one. Well, I can tell you from first-hand experience that there are so many ways to make money with a website.
Making money with a website can include:
- Paid advertisements (ads)
- Affiliate marketing
- Sponsorships
- Guest blog posts
One of the main ways to make money is by placing ads throughout the site. Companies then pay you money if an ad is viewed and clicked on. The more traffic you have to your site, the more money you can earn from ads. Google’s AdSense program is one of the largest advertising networks out there if you’re thinking of earning some money with ads.
Affiliate marketing is another way you can make money with a website. This is where a company gives you a special link (affiliate link) that can track when a visitor has come through your website. If the visitor then purchases something from the company, you will earn a commission. For example, say you teach people how to make illustrations on a tablet. You can place an affiliate link on your website to promote that tablet and earn money doing so.
Sponsored content is where others pay you to post their written content on your site. Usually, this type of monetisation is available when the website has become an authority in the field. The more visitors the website attracts, the more valuable these types of sponsorships can be.
It is worth stressing that creating a website is not a get rich quick route. It takes a lot of time and dedication to
Earning potential: >$1,000 per month
Starting costs: $0-$100
Become a YouTuber
YouTube is an online video platform where people can watch, upload and share their own videos. YouTube is the second largest search console on the internet that attracts a whopping 5 billion video views per day.
If you’re an online educator, you seriously need to think about creating video content. I believe video content is by far the easiest form to educate people. Think about it from a student’s perspective, would you rather read a book or watch a video to learn something new?
There are a few options availabe when it comes to making money with YouTube:
- Paid ads
- Affiliate marketing
- Sponsorships
The most popular monetization option for YouTube is to display ads on your channel. However, you need to grow your channel to 1,000 subscribers and 40,000 hours of watch time first before you can enable paid ads.
Another option is affiliate marketing. Here, the affiliate links can be placed in the video description. If a viewer then clicks on this link and makes a purchase, you will earn some commission.
Another popular way to make money through YouTube is sponsorships. Sponsorships are where companies pay you to talk about or use their product in your video. As you can imagine, you need a decent amount of subscribers first before you can think about doing this. Marketing platforms such as Famebit are a good place to start if you are thinking of connecting with potential sponsors.
Building a YouTube channel takes time and dedication. The goal is to create quality content and performing the right SEO to get ahead of your competitors. Doing this consistently will build up the number of subscribers and income.
- Related: How To Create A YouTube Channel: A Step-By-Step Guide
- Related: How Much I Earned In A Month With Just 1,000 Subscribers On YouTube
Earning potential: >$1,000 per month
Starting costs: $0-$100
Create an online course
Online courses are bundles of written guides and/or videos that are packaged up and sold to students who want to learn a very particular thing. So why not sell
In 2016 alone online courses made $46 billion! Once more, interest in online courses is set to keep on rising.
I have had success selling courses to students. Albeit there is a lot of initial work to put into the content creation and marketing. However, once the product is made, there is no limit to the number of copies you can sell.
The good news is that it is easier more than ever to start creating your own course and making money from it. I use and recommend Teachable. Teachable is a platform that hosts and takes care of the administrative duties involved, including payment processes and content delivery.
Another way you can earn a little bit more money through online courses is to add affiliate links within the course content. If students have purchased your course, this mean there is a level of trust there. So, if you recommend to use certain products through affiliate links then you are likely to earn some more money.
Online courses are a great way to earn some extra money. They take a bit of time initially to create, but can turn very passive as the time goes on.
- Related: How To Create An Online Course: A Step-By-Step Guide
- Related: 13 Best Online Course Platforms
Earning potential: >$1,000 per month
Starting costs: $0
Create an e-book
Electronic books (e-books) are digital versions of physical books or PDFs that are read on devices such as laptops, mobiles, tablets and Kindles.
Unlike physical books, e-books are not limited in the number of copies that can be sold. So, you don’t need to store boxes of books in a room and ship them out yourself. Simply create the content and upload it to
Publishing platforms can turn a simple Word document into a sweet e-book that is ready to be sold. They can even take care of the hosting and delivery of the e-book. Publishers make their money by taking a cut of any sales.
One of the largest e-book publishers is Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). With KDP, you can earn up to 70% of revenue from book sales made through the Kindle store.
Earning potential: >$100 per month
Time required: 1-2 months
Starting costs: $0
Create your own online class
Online classes are similar to online courses but are generally smaller. They usually contain videos totally around 1 hour in length.
Skillshare is a great place to start if you are thinking about making money from delivering online classes. Their platform has over 4 million students, many of whom pay a subscription to access their premium classes!
At Skillshare teachers are paid based on the amount of minutes the class is watched by premium students.
Skillshare state that, on average, first-time teachers earn around $200 – with top performers earning up to $3,000!
Earning potential: >$100 per month
Starting costs: $0
Host a webinar
A webinar is an online lesson or lecture that is delivered through conference software to various students at the same time. Webinars are usually delivered live but some can be pre-recorded.
There are two popular strategies teachers use to make money through webinars:
- Charging for access
- Promoting your products (e.g. online courses)
The easiest way to profit from a webinar is to simply charge students to access it. However, this can be difficult to implement if there isn’t a bit following or trust.
More commonly, teachers often run free webinars that attract a high amount of traffic. After providing students with some helpful content, a plug is then added that funnels them into considering a premium product. This premium product could be an online course that you have made or an e-book.
So, think of webinars as a means of promoting your other premium content rather than a sole ticket to riches.
Earning potential: >$100 per month
Starting costs: $0
Become a freelancer
Freelancers are individuals who are available to hire for their service.
If you have skills in a certain area, it may be possible to become a freelancer specialising in online education. Here, companies will pay you to create online educational content for them such as blog posts, how-to videos and e-books.
Fiverr is an excellent marketplace to make yourself available as a freelancer. By creating a ‘gig’ (service), you can advertise your expertise to millions of potential customers.
When you sell through Fiverr, they take a 20% cut of all sales. So, if you sell a gig worth $20, you get to keep $16.
Freelancing is by no means passive, but, you can earn you a decent amount of money in the short-term.
Earning potential: >$1,000 per month
Time required: A lot; basically like a full-time job
Starting costs: $0-100
Sell your educational material
As an online educator, chances are you have a lot of resources and materials that you use to teach others. Examples of such materials include cheat sheets or tests. Well, why not sell these resources to fellow teachers to earn some money?
TeachersPayTeachers is an online marketplace where you can sell your original resources for some spare cash. Think of it like eBay, but aimed at teachers and the products are mainly digital downloads.
By selling your material on TeachersPayTeachers, you can earn 55% or 80% of all sales depending upon the type of seller account you have.
Selling your educational matieral can earn you an extra bit of income over time. It will not be your sole source of income as an online educator, but it’s easy to add to your monetization portfolio.
Earning potential: >$50 per month
Time required: A few hours to set-up
Starting costs: $0
Become an online English tutor
Teaching English online is quite a big thing, which is hard to believe if you are a native speaker.
There is a particular demand for online tutors to teach English to Chinese children.
VIPKid is one of the largest platforms that connects tutors with parents in China who want a private tutor to teach English to their child (4-12 years old) one-to-one.
With VIPKid you can earn up to $22 per hour. Obviously, the more classes you teach, the more you can earn.
Teaching English online is a very flexible way to earn a bit of extra income. Like freelancing, the more hours you put in the more returns you will make.
Earning potential: >$1,000 per month
Time required: A few hours per week
Starting costs: $0-100
Become an online tutor
If teaching English isn’t your thing, there are also other platforms that you can join to be an online tutor to teach different topics such as maths or science.
Preply is a great place to start when considering online tutoring. At Preply you will be given your own personal page to advertise your expertise and connect with students. You can also set your own hourly rate.
Preply state that their most popular tutors earn up to $550 per week on their platform. They take a cut of between 18-33% from all paid lessons.
As with any t
Earning potential: >$1,000 per month
Time required: A few hours per week
Starting costs: $0-100
Create a podcast
Podcasts are prerecorded audio episodes that people can download and listen to in their own time.
So an idea to think about is to create a podcast series where you educate others on a particular topic.
Over recent years the popularity of podcasts has increased exponentially. It is believed that 32% of Americans listen to podcasts at least once a month.
Creating a podcast can be relatively inexpensive; you only really need a microphone and some audio editing software. This means start-up costs can
There are a few ways you can monetize a podcast:
- Sponsorships
- Charge for access
- Affiliate marketing
- Crowdfunding
The most popular way to make money with podcasts is to get sponsorships. This is when a company pays to place a short advert or plug, usually at the beginning, of the podcast.
Another option is to simply charge people to get access to the podcast. Alternatively, you could provide an initial section of the episode for free, such as the first 2 minutes, with a charge to access the rest.
If you have a website where you post podcast episodes on, there is also the option to include extra information. Here you could add in a transcript or overview of what the episode is about and include any relevant links. If you talk about using a particular product, then there is the option to add affiliate links.
Crowdfunding is where a group of people will collectively raise a sum of money for a particular project. If there is a large amount of interest in your podcast, then crowdfunding may be an option to earn some extra income. If you are thinking about crowdfunding a podcast then check out Patreon.
When it comes to online teaching, podcasting might seem unorthodox. But, with the rise in their popularity, there is the potential to earn a decent amount of money.
Earning potential: >$1,000 per month
Time required: A few hours per week
Starting costs: $0-100
Conclusion
As you can see from the list, there are so many ways that you can make money teaching online.
My advice is to adopt as many income streams as possible. They each may only make you a modest amount of money per month, but collectively they can make you an impressive passive income.
Have you got a method you use to make money that’s not on this list? Let me know in the comments below.
That’s an incredible list of ideas! You have listed and explained every possible way to make money with online teaching. This blog will be very helpful for those who are looking for ideas to make money with online teaching. Thank you.