Diversify To Survive The Recession

Creative Commons Licensed - courtesy LauraFries.com

Money.  Love it or hate it, it’s value has increased in our personal lives as of late.  With all the lovely news coming out about the economy, the record number of layoffs hitting every industry, and all those bankruptcies… well it’s pretty obvious that we need to get smart about the money we do have, as well as secure some new ways to make some more.  To save it of course.. not to spend it on that shiny new XBOX.  Shiny, sexy XBOX… lookin good XBOX.. aw yea..

Oh right.. saving money.  Ok, so I’ve been doing some of the footwork for you as far as some potential ways to bring in some extra money with the skills you have now.   If you’re a loser with no skills then I don’t know what to tell you besides that people will always need someone to make their Whoppers for them.  I kid!  (no pickles on that #2 ok?)

Affiliate Marketing

I recently did an interview with Rae Hoffman (Sugarrae) about this very topic and you should check it out when you get a chance.  Originally I did this interview because I am very interested in this topic and wanted to get someone on the ground level with it who could provide the right frame of mind on approaching it.  Quite honestly, this is going to be my first pick out of what I talk about in this post.  It’s the one path that us web people can take and still remain in our natural environments in terms of development and marketing.  Obviously, that’s a good thing if you got some strong skills that help drive traffic to a site.

Go check out the interview because I think I asked some of the things that most of us are afraid to ask for fear of sounding like a noob.  There were a number of concerns I had that kept me on a fence about taking the plunge.  From the sound of it, it’s not a plunge, more of a stroll into some different waters.

Professional Blogging

Some people have the gift, some people don’t.  Guess what.. I sure as hell don’t but maybe one day I will.  But, maybe you do already!  But how to figure that out without sounding like a pompous ass?  Well ask yourself these questions first; 

• Are you a passionate about writing?
• Are you extremely knowledgeable about a certain topic?
• Do you spend time learning as much as you can about the trends and changes for the topic?
• Do you have professional contacts in the industry related to that topic?
• Got a blog that gets traffic?

Those 5 things right there can serve as a launchpad.  But the one you need to really sharpen is number 4 on that list;  who you know can take you farther than just skill alone.  Hate to say it, but we all know that’s how it works in all industries.  Get yourself on twitter and start communicating with others to grow your community of contacts, you’re gonna need it.  There are a number of places that won’t pay you, but it is exposure.  It gets the ball rolling and yes it takes some time to get noticed.  The key here is to be consistent (thus why I can’t do this lol) and effective about getting eyes on your work.  Market yourself tastefully (aka be able to talk about more than your work and how awesome you are), be accessible, be positive and do your homework on what your writing about.  You’ll get authority on your topic and offers will come your way if you stay on the ball.

Online Surveys

Yea I know, this sounds spammy but hell, if it pays it pays.  And it’s only 10 to 20 minutes of your time tops.  A few that I have investigated and that have turned out to be worth trying are SurveyScout or Paid Surveys Etc.  There are a ton of others out there, but any of us who have been on the net for awhile know from either first hand experience or word of mouth that there are some shady bastards out there that will screw you if given the chance.  But hey, if you got a suggestion for some other decent sites, post it in the comments, I would love to find some more to check out.

Oh, and a word of advice on the paid survey stuff.. setup a junk email account first and use that when signing up for anything

Domain Reselling

Personally this is something that I don’t do, or want to do, but there is money to be made here.  Why don’t I do this?  Well I’m sort of a purist with my approach to the internet and the properties I create on it;  I just use what I need for the project and don’t want to put anyone in a position of having to make an unplanned larger investment to get themselves started out here.   But that’s just me.

Since I don’t do this, my suggestion would be research places that do good deals on bulk registrations and automatically makes the parked pages associated with the domains.  This isn’t always quick money, and yes it does involve some money up front, but if anything you could treat it as a potential long term investment.

Drop Ship Merchandising

This is the oddball of the group, but it does work if you use your online marketing skills.  Get yourself a cafepress or Printfection account and create a line of products that you could promote to the right audience.  Since we’re all a bunch of web geeks, well there is a ton of possibilities as far as marketing angles go (industry, OS vs OS, slang, inside jokes, sci-fi, conventions, etc).  Just like any other SEO work you do, it’s all about getting eyes on what you have without being a total jerk on how you got that traffic in the first place.  Reputation is vital on this one, so be reasonable about your pricing and be honest about the shipping costs or delays.

If you’ve ever marketed in an ecommerce environment, you have a great leg up on how to push product intelligently.  Some secrets on that is cross selling from within product pages, cross selling from any site you have where it seems like a logical fit to advertise it, and to always be accessible to the public.  Hit the social media sites and have some fun with it.

eBay

Your junk for cash.   The only pain in the ass about eBay is the fees, dealing with the post office and the lack of trust buyers have in a new seller.  Perks about doing eBay;  the USPS will deliver shipping materials to your house for free (boxes only) and if you got a digital scale and a printer, you can print out shipping labels for your stuff which in turn you can have the post office pick up your outbound packages for you.  Once you get a little bit of cash in, head down to thrift stores and get more merchandise.  Like what?  Well that all depends on what you’re interested in selling really.

Conclusion

The financial bigwigs keep saying that it’s going to be  a rough year for everybody, so having the eggs in one basket is a bad move.  If you got suggestions on how we can all stay afloat with some side cash ideas, help your fellow geeks out and tell us about it.  And remember, either you’re serving me Whoppers or you’re playing Rock Band on XBOX with me.  The choice is yours

Sphinn This Twitter This Stumble This Trackback