It sounds wonderful — making money online — that’s why you are here isn’t it? You want to learn how to make money from the Internet. I’ve been doing it now since I first discovered the web in 1998. Yes in a way that makes me a late adopter of this technology. The commercial Internet has been available since around 1993. You see I was a console kid while growing up. I played Nintendo and Sega. I didn’t have a computer until late highschool and only in first year university was I granted the gift of online access.
I didn’t set out to make money online, but I did and still do. I did want to run a business, that is for sure, but during university I had no idea what sort of business. Fast forward to 2005 and I make the majority of my income from e-commerce and intend to continue down the Internet business path. I’m always curious about the ways other people make money online so no doubt you are too. So here in no particular order are the methods I have used to make money on the Internet.
EBay and Online Garage Sales
A lot of people have bought and sold on eBay and while the average user does not trade on eBay as a business that doesn’t mean they haven’t made money from it. One of the first ways I made money online was by selling items I no longer wanted on eBay or by setting up a basic web page, often just a text list, of second-hand goods. I posted a link to my list in local forum communities and newsgroups such as my university newsgroup – uq.forsale.
I didn’t make a lot of money doing this and I really didn’t intend to, I wanted to clear some old junk and make some spare change in the process. I sold things like old video games, movies, books, trading cards, cameras, mp3 players, CDs, discmans, gym equipment, sports gear, anything I had lying around the house.
For thousands of people around the world eBay trading is how they make a living. They might choose to buy wholesale or produce the goods themselves or even scout around local antique shops to find products. Generally the most successful eBay entrepreneurs own a niche market and have access to cheap products so they can maintain respectable margins.
When I was younger before the days of the Internet I used to love a newspaper called the tradingpost. It is a local classifieds paper where people sell second-hand goods. I used it mostly to buy and sell video games. I usually sold my old games and consoles to buy the latest gaming device. I was a wheeler and dealer and really enjoyed haggling with buyers trying to get the best price I could for my goods.
EBay is a natural evolution of this trading concept, taking commerce online and automating the haggling process. Nowadays even the tradingpost is online. I don’t trade second-hand goods online very much anymore because I’m out of things to sell, but whenever I find something of value I don’t need I always go online to sell it. It’s in these marketplaces that I got my basic training in online commerce.
Earnings: These amounts were random and of course depended on what I was selling. This was “spare change” income, a few hundred dollars now and then.
Trading Card Trading
After I grew bored of video games the next major hobby I had was the collectible card game Magic: the Gathering. As any good trading card game, Magic had it’s fair share of collectors and because cards were distributed in rarities — commons, uncommon and rares — it was a heavily traded commodity. As a regular player and tournament competitor I had amassed a reasonable collection of cards and I was a vehement trader in real life and online.
Magic cards are bought and sold on eBay every day, there are many trading sites and some huge trading forum communities dedicated to the game. Luckily for me I was the owner of the main Australian Magic community site which had the largest Aussie Magic trading forums so I had access to a large local marketplace. I bought and sold a lot of cards through this site and a few other sites often profiting by selling product I had won at tournaments. Throughout my late teens I did not have a job because I made enough spending cash from card sales. However I could only do this because I was a respectable competitive player and could stock myself with cards by placing well at tournaments. This was only a reliable revenue source as long as I kept playing the game.
Earnings: I made a reasonably stable income from card trading especially after a big win at a tournament. With a box of new cards (usually first or second place won a box) selling for about $100 and certain rare individual cards selling for between $5 – $20 I could bring in around $500 per month provided I kept winning and attending tournaments. Living at home meant this cash was pure spending money and often went straight back into Magic tournaments.
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You can read the other parts of this series here -
- How I Have Made Money Online – Part 2 – Online Stores and Advertising
- How I Have Made Money Online – Part 3 – Online Services and Web Hosting
- How I Make Money Online Part 4 – Blogging
Yaro Starak
Web Entrepreneur
Yes, enlightening articles, all of them, for a newbie. Certainly I add my bit to the catalogue of praise!
However, where can we get information on the mechanics of, just for instance, selling adspace? Did you invoice your clients? How did they remit? that sort of thing. Can you point us to anybody offering concrete advice?
woow thats an amazing follow up frnd..i really like your blog now..well i also made a blog which is growing very rapidly as i am working hard to update it with best posts, n hoping for your best wishes, my blog is “www.earnmoneyfast.co.cc”
thanks again for this wonderful blog
Wow! its really a good stuff i hope that i can also have all this things and ideas of yours apply in my online business strategies. Again thanks and really impressive one.
Revero
Making money with blog
I think I read through these articles back when I first found your site, maybe it was the links over from Problogger about the blog profits blueprint. But since I’m trying to run up some comments here I thought I would say thanks, even though it’s a bit late.
Seriously, the Blueprint PDF and Mp3 (yes I even listened to it several times) gave me a sense of direction that I could make a little side money from writing about what I love.
Nice Article, but actually here what is more interesting are
sorry Yaro !
the comments
I wonder why people post them here instead of making a very interesting posts in their own blogs with them.
But anyway, I guess that your posts encourage people to speak, which is great.!
I really enjoyed reading this and will be coming back to read the related articles. I sell a lot on eBay (mostly one of a kind collectibles) and enjoy seeing what other people find and sell. I actually have come across several packs of Magic the Gathering cards, but sold them at very low prices because I knew squat about them and the research was taking too long for me since I don’t actually play. Stop by for a visit!
Good motivation mate!
The internet is coming of age and its commercial viability is getting more and more lucrative. Anyone that is discounting it as a fad should be royally shot in the butt.
Ah eBay…I still use them after all this time and actually am growing faster than ever recently.
I’ll always use eBay as one of my revenue streams. It’s simple and reliably sits there providing extra money month after month!
On occasion I have sold Lego’s on eBay and usually make double I bought them for. It is nice to have some income from time to time. I enjoy using eBay as it is the most consistent sales I have had online, because I’m selling products people actually want. Thanks for the article Yaro.
i make money from a system like this in Turkey. EBay is the most biggest site, so everybody makes money with the garage.
Ebay, Ebay, Ebay. Only every made a couple of $$’s selling junk – but one man’s junk is another man’s treasure.
I used to love ebay, but they have become almost ridiculous with their pricing structures and new rules. I still use it, but definitely to a lesser extent.
You’d think economies of scale would have made eBook cheaper and better, not more expensive. It seems like the bigger a company gets, the more it becomes totally about profits and nothing else, not even friendly and simple service without tons of rules? A lesson for us all if we ever get big ourselves…
oops, I meant eBay not eBook!
I remember the original Nintendo and Sega Yaro! I think I still own my Sega Genesis! I probably sold my Nintendo on eBay to make some money which is why I can relate to this post.
A couple years ago I tried to start a business on eBay but I didn’t see it going anywhere. I was mainly just selling stuff from around the house. And the question in the back of my mind was what happens when I run out of stuff to sell? So I let my eBay business retire.
Great post Yaro!
I used to love the NES back in the day
Super Mario Bros 
I am new to your blog, and am doing the trips down memory lane today. It is rally cool to see that such an old blog post still counts among your favorites. The oldies but goodies are almost like the wisdom of the ancestors, in a way. Some truths are timeless.
ONe thing that I sense, Yaro, all the while I am one who is whining all the time about how hard and tough it is to blog and getting your blog up and doing the stuff it needs to . . . It sounds as if you have really worked very very very hard for what you have acomplised – the hard fact that you have been so many places (I’m not talking about your journeys to cities and countries) – I’m talking about you who as it seem through your writings also must have had your ups and downs.
Thanks for inspiring me indirectly and being so down-to-earthly honest.
What a great article!, i been on the ebay business for a LONG time and still I have learned a lot from articles such as this. This defy the saying that you can’t teach new tricks to an old dog ^^.
For whatever reason only half of the post has been displayed, could it be my browser or the site?
Hello Home Profit System,
Thanks for the comment. We have checked the post our end and the article is complete and the site is working fine.
Possibly your browser?
Kind regards,
Stephanie (E-J editor).
I’m really loving this series of posts Yaro…making money online is truly the american dream!! at least to me…it gives you so many things, the most important being FREEDOM. I’ve never done the ebay thing, or the trading cards, but they sound like reasonable ways to make money online…I myself choose blogging, it’s what I’m most comfortable with! Thanks for another wicked post Yaro!