Being a creative isn’t always easy. Sure, you enjoy the work, but the pay part? That can be challenging. Working for an employer as a creative, whether in publishing, graphic design, media, content development, or other role, may be a thrilling experience but still, your wings are clipped because at the end of the day there’s a pay cap.
So you wind up feeling frustrated that you’re not really achieving your full potential when you know you deserve and could earn more.
See, here’s the thing: There are many professionals who work for one or multiple employers throughout their entire careers. And that’s perfectly OK if that is your ambition and you’re comfortable and happy as you are.
But of late, more creators and creatives are joining the freelance industry and turning their skills into profit, with freelancers comprising at least 72 million working Americans according to a recent report by MBO Partners. Even if you opted to make your creative skills your side hustle and not your full-time pursuit, this opens up more doors for your career in ways that you could never imagine or achieve if you were working 100% in-house or at an agency alone, for the duration of your professional life.
How To Make Money Online In 2024
Thanks to the multiplicity of online platforms and the gig economy, there’s no shortage of options for sharing your creative skills and knowledge with the world. Here are three simple ways to make money online with these side hustles below:
1. Make Money With Skool
Skool is an online community platform that makes it possible for you to earn a passive income while hosting events, courses, challenges, and other online community-based projects, while earning an income. You can join a community on Skool, relevant to your interests, to get a flavour for how this works.
Some communities are free while others are paid, and they cover a wide variety of niches and areas including business, career development, travel, tech, and beauty and fashion, making this highly desirable if you are a creative, coach, or passionate expert in one of these fields.
2. Make Money With Dribble
Dribble is another excellent way to make some serious cash as a creative. Dribble is essentially a site for freelance designers of all kinds (product UX/UI designers, web designer, animators, branding professionals and graphic designers included) to make money through delivering these creative projects.
3. Make Money With Etsy
Finally, another way to unleash your creative skills without limits is to try your hand at Etsy. The Etsy marketplace is specifically designed to encourage creatives like you to release your skills to the world and get paid for it. You can put your innovative energy and flair to work by creating handmade products and unique items that will sell well on Etsy based on search trends, and you can also sell digital downloads that teach others your expertise or assist them with their work, such as planners, for example. Printable art is another digital product that sells well on Etsy.
How quickly these ideas work is down to you and a number of factors, such as time and money invested, the quality of your market research, and consumer demand at the time. But once it catches on, it will be easier for you to think about scaling and diversifying your income sources through other platforms.
If you’re wondering how to make money online, this is your answer. In short, it comes down to using the creative skills and knowledge you already have, something that you are probably already being paid for in your job and are passionate about, and taking this wealth of expertise to the world.