20 tried and tested ways to make money

20 tried and tested ways to make money

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New blog – I’m frequently asked by people how I make money each month. So I thought I’d share here 20 different ways to make money in the hope that it can help others to make more money as well!

  1. Mystery shopping.  I’m a great fan of mystery shopping as a way to make an extra income and get some new stuff as well! Basically, you get paid to enter a store, assess the condition of the store and the levels of customer service offered by that store. Usually, you also get given a budget as well to buy a product with so you can test how good the experience is from browsing products to buying one. If you’re new to mystery shopping I highly recommend signing up with Marketforce who will give you a nice easy start to mystery shopping. If you’re interested in joining them then click here.
  2. Test websites. Another great way of earning money (usually about £5 for every 20 minutes) is through user testing new website designs. Basically, you get paid to be filmed using a website and sharing your thoughts on its design. It’s not for everyone as you do have to feel comfortable with giving your opinion even if it’s a negative one and you do need a laptop or a computer with a microphone and webcam in order to participate (although there are some tests on smartphones and tablets as well). If you’re interested in signing up then two companies I’ve worked with are usertesting.com (click here for their website) and whatusersdo (click here to sign up for them).
  3. Prolific. I’ve written before about Prolific which is one of my favourite survey sites. I use them to earn about £20 a month but if I’m at home a lot this can be up to £50 a month. If you’re interested in signing up with Prolific and earning some extra money yourself then click here. Or if you’d like to know a bit more about them first then you can read my briefing on how to get the most money from prolific by clicking here.
  4. Inbox Pounds. Inbox pounds is another website that I’m a great fan of and which I use to earn a minimum of £20 a month from the comfort of my own home! Inbox pounds is a combination of a paid to click website and a survey site. Some of the surveys can be quite low paying but others can pay quite lucratively so it’s worth sticking with. They also offer payments for signing up to other companies as well so it’s possible to make quite a decent income from them. I will be publishing a blog in the future sharing my experiences of using inbox pounds but it the meantime if you want to sign up and earn a free £1 for your trouble then click here.
  5. Branded surveys. Another popular survey site for me that I use to earn about £15 a month (sometimes more if I’m motivated!). You get points for completing surveys (and also for being disqualified from surveys if you don’t meet the eligibility criteria). You also get points for completing daily polls. Once you reach a 1000 points you can cash out through a variety of ways such as into your PayPal account or as Amazon vouchers which you can use to buy nice stuff with! Another advantage of the website is that the more points you earn, the more badges you earn and when you get a gold badge you can earn a lot more points a lot quicker! If you’re interested in signing up then click here.
  6. Cashback websites. Although these websites generally give you cashback on purchases (which can be great if you’re looking to make some online purchases, switch bank accounts take out insurance, etc). But they also offer money for free signups e.g. for getting a quote on insurance, joining a survey site or entering competitions. I make hundreds of pounds a year from cashback sites because I funnel most of my purchases through them. The two main cashback sites I use are TopCashback and Quidco. I find TopCashback offers the best rates so if you want sign up for them click here. However, Quidco can also offer exclusive deals so it’s always worth checking both sites before making a purchase. If you’re interested in signing up for TopCashback then click here. Or for Quidco click here.
  7. Airbnb. I’m a great fan of Airbnb and tend to book the majority of my accommodation through this website. Airbnb is a room letting website where you can list spare rooms (or even your entire house) to rent to holidaymakers or just people looking for a room. It works like any holiday booking site where prospective travelers go online, select the dates they wish to travel and pick from a list of options. It can be particularly profitable when the hotels in your area are full due to a major event. You can set up the type of tenants you’re looking for and make it so that they have to contact you before they can make a booking so that you can vet them properly. If you’re interested in signing up as a host then click here. As an added bonus for money mental viewers I also have a deal in place for new users of Airbnb who are looking to book a trip (rather than host someone themselves). By clicking here you can save £25 on your first booking! Note this is a different link to the one provided above for becoming an accommodation provider.
  8. Slicethepie. Another online opportunity to make money is via Slicethepie. This is a website where you get paid to review music, adverts, new fashion items and sometimes other more specialist items. The better quality your review the more you get paid. I use it very rarely through the course of the month (usually only when the survey sites are quiet) but still get at least $10 a month from it (which is worth about £7.10) so if listening to music and getting paid for it appeals to you then you can sign up for it here.
  9. Swagbucks. A lot of people go crazy over Swagbucks. The concept is that you earn ‘Swagbucks’ i.e. points for taking part in tasks such as watching videos, answering surveys, doing web searches, taking part in competitions and various other fun activities. You can then trade these points for vouchers or money into your PayPal account. I tend to use it very rarely myself as I find there are too many demands on my time to be watching videos etc, but there are people who make tens or even hundreds of pounds a month from it so it may appeal to you on that basis! If you’re interested in signing up you can do so by clicking here.
  10. Qmee. Qmee is an extension that you can add to google chrome which can offer money for searching the web as well as completing online surveys. It pays into PayPal or if you save up £5 you can earn vouchers. I usually find it good for £5 – £10 a month of minimum effort work so it’s worth having! To get you started you can make £0.50 by clicking here. Even better you can withdraw it your PayPal straight away so what’s stopping you?
  11. Zeek. This is a website for buying and selling gift vouchers at a discount rate. Quite often I earn gift vouchers through the work I do (through surveys, focus groups or competitions). Sometimes I can get hundreds a months in gift cards which can sometimes have a short expiry date on. So if there’s nothing I need to spend the money on then Zeek is a fantastic tool for reselling those vouchers to make some cold hard cash out of them! Vouchers are sold at less than the face value on them but if you’re not going to use it anyway then it’s literally money for nothing! It’s also a great site for buying gift cards at a discount rate as well (especially Amazon vouchers). If I’m planning on making a big online purchase then it’s often worth me checking Zeek to see if I can get some vouchers at a cheap rate for that retailer so that I can save even more money! If you fancy earning £5 for making your first purchase via Zeek then click here to sign up and start saving today!
  12. Clickworker. is a website that houses lots of different tasks that you get paid for completing. Clickworker offers many tasks to make money such as completing short surveys, searching the Internet and giving feedback for what you find, recording audio or even shopping for shampoo! Pay is into Paypal so make sure you have a Paypal account setup before joining. Earnings can vary wildly with this site going from the equivalent of £10 up to £50 a month so it’s worth checking the site regularly to see what jobs are available. If you’re interested you can sign up here.
  13. Lose weight. I don’t mean here earning money by eating less and spending less money on food as a result! Instead, I’m talking about using a website called Dietbet. Dietbet is an online website where you bet on yourself to lose a certain percentage of your weight (either 4% over 4 weeks or 10% over 6 months), You verify your weight loss by sending in photos of yourself and your current weight and then what you end up at and can then win a share of a prize pot. However, you do have to put your own money into the prize pot so it is at risk if you don’t lose weight. When I did it I ended up losing weight and made about £7 profit in the process (as well as the money saved by eating smaller portions as that was my route to weight loss). If you’re interested in signing up to it then you can click here.
  14. TakeNote. I’ve mentioned TakeNote before in my blog about earning money online (which you can read here). Basically Take Note pay users to type up transcripts of meetings such as focus groups, interviews, conferences etc. Depending on your typing ability it is possible to earn up to £12 an hour. You must have a good ability with speaking and typing English, be able to type more than 65 words per minute accurately and have a computer with Microsoft Word installed. If you’re interested in applying then click here.
  15. Focus groups. Market researchers are always looking for people of all kinds of demographics to take part in market research opportunities. They also pay a very good hourly rate, although there are rules about how many you can take part in over a 6 month period. I’ve seen rates of pay vary between £25 and £50 an hour with free product tests or food offered. There are too many companies looking to recruit for me mention here so it’s probably worth spending a bit of time looking on google to find out what opportunities are out there. However, one company I have worked with in the past is ‘take part in research’. You can sign up with them by clicking here.
  16. Curious Cat. This is an app for your smartphone and is one of my favourite ways to make money from my phone. I like it so much in fact that I even wrote a blog with my experiences of using the app which also contains links to download the app. If you want to learn more about it then click here to read all about it!
  17. People Per Hour. This is a website where you can ‘freelance’ by offering your skills whether they be things like writing a blog post, setting up a facebook fan page, creating logos, commenting on blog posts or recording audio books. There’s a couple of ways to earn money on it. The first is by setting up an account and offering services for a set hourly rate. The second is by checking the jobs board and submitting proposals for jobs that are on offer. Those proposals are basically selling yourself and your skills to the client. If you’re interested in learning more about it then you can find out more details by clicking here.
  18. Selling unwanted items. In my house, I have cupboards full of items I never use. I’m sure you do as well! A while back we’d have put these items in the back of the car and taken them down to a car boot sale to make some money. Whatever we’d be left with after paying the site fees and the cost of fuel for getting there we’d count as our ‘profit’. Often we’d be selling things with no idea of there real value. Thankfully now though we have access to things like eBay, Facebook marketplace, and Sphlock. With a few carefully taken pictures you can publish items on these websites for sale and see what the interest it without having to leave home! You can also set a realistic price as well based on seeing what other items are selling for so no more undervaluing items. So the next time you clear out one of your cupboards take a quick look on eBay to see what some of the contents of your cupboard are selling for. You might be sitting on a decent amount of money!
  19. Etsy. I’ve mentioned Etsy before in my blog post about making money online with a tiny budget (you can read it here). When I wrote that blog I was coming from the perspective of selling printable designs on the site to make money. But did you know you can also sell some of your handmade crafts if you have that kind of talent on here as well? Handmade jewellery and knitted items are particularly popular. If you’re interested in learning more then click here for the Etsy website.
  20. Medical testing. Perhaps not one for the faint-hearted but if you’re fit and healthy you can earn over £3000 for testing cold and flu medication and treatments. So if you fancy having enough money to buy a car in your back pocket or just want to find out more about this then you can sign up by clicking here. Hopefully, you won’t end up like the Elephant Man!

So there you have it. 20 proven ways to make money, some more obvious than the others. Using a combination of the above it’s possible to make hundreds every month in your spare time. So if you’re looking to save for a holiday, buy a new car or even save for a deposit on a new house then why not give some of the above a try and let me know how you get on in the comments section below.

Finally don’t forget to follow @moneymentaluk on twitter and instagram to keep up to date with the latest money mental news.

Andrew

N.B. This post contains affiliate links.

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