At one point or another, you probably thought about the many different ways you could potentially make money from home. Before the internet, your options were quite limited. You had the choice of stuffing envelopes, being a telemarketer or holding Tupperware parties on the weekend. They all sound very fun and entertaining, but if you can’t figure out a way to start making money from home in 2017, you just simply aren’t trying hard enough.

Thanks to the power of the internet, anyone can make money online — and I mean anyone. Even people in third-world countries with limited internet access have mastered the process. It also doesn’t even have to do with intelligence or being a coder or site designer, it’s more about dedication to yourself and making it work, more than anything else.

Just take a look at Jeremy’s iconic Adsense check that still gets massive views and attention today. Don’t focus on the check and its six-figure amount. Instead, focus on the story and dedication it took to get there, then build the Shoemoney brand and blog into what it is today. Once you see what possible, it’s then time for you to take action.

To help with this process and get you inspired like never ever before, I’m going to highlight five working methods for you to start earning from home today.

Start a Dropshipping Business

Starting a business is a serious decision, and it’s also one that often comes with a lot of responsibility, experience, and upfront costs. However, as I mentioned earlier, the internet has completely changed everything about the way business is done in the world today.

One such method for generating income from your own home is dropshipping. The concept is just like any other business model where you are selling online, except you don’t need to actually hold any products or ship out orders. Oberlo, has developed a tool that makes finding products and importing them into your ecommerce store easy breezy. It has excellent guides on dropshipping and an easy to use chrome extension. You’re literally few clicks away from importing and automatically fulfilling orders.

• Lower starting capital – anyone can start their own e-commerce business using dropshipping without having to break the bank or getting to know more about VA home loan calculator in order to get an expensive loan. It’s a case of supply and demand – you only purchase the products you will definitely sell. As you manage your own profit margins you can play the market and use branding and persuasive copy to drive up the retail value of your products.
• It’s low risk – Every new business venture comes with its own risks, but dropshipping is less risky because you’re not locked into expensive stock or retail premises. If things don’t work out the way you thought they would, you are not stuck with loads of products you have to offload.
• Wide selection of products – you can sell so much more through the drop shipping model because you don’t have to stock anything and you can change tact fast.
• You can do it from your own home – you don’t have to worry about running a warehouse or stocking your products so you can manage your business from your bedroom. You have more independence and flexibility.

If you ever wanted to start a legitimate business from home but didn’t know what direction to take or didn’t have the necessary startup funds to get started, dropshipping and selling online is definitely a great option to consider.

Affiliate Marketing is Alive and Well

Over the past 20 years, one of the biggest developments in the world of online marketing has been ‘affiliate marketing‘. The concept here is simple. Site owners and online marketers receive a commission for any leads or sales they generate and refer to another company. A perfect example of this would be Amazon, as they have an affiliate program of their own — which was also a huge contributor in making them the powerhouse they are today.

To get started with affiliate marketing, all you need is a website or traffic source. There are plenty of marketing and monetization methods to choose from, so you are going to want to invest some time in familiarizing yourself with the process. Such methods include pay per click marketing, media buying, social media, content creation, email marketing and much more. Once you have an idea of how you’d like to promote an offer, you can then join an affiliate network like Shareasale to start connecting with different brands and finding products or offers to run.

That’s affiliate marketing in it’s most simple form, but when you start to dive into its complexities and full potential, you will see how billions of dollars are generated with it annually. If this is a route that you would like to take, I would definitely recommend learning as much as you can about affiliate marketing before getting started, then when you are ready, start with a very small daily budget until you start seeing a profit and understand how to build out successful ad campaigns.

Start a Website or Blog

One of the easiest, fastest and most affordable ways to make money online, is through the use of a website or blog. While it might be extremely fast and cheap, it’s also a bit of time-consuming process — this is when considering you might not have a full business model in place or any funds for advertising.

The good news is, starting a website or blog is now easier than ever thanks to the power of WordPress. This free software makes it possible for anyone to go live with a site of their own, with basically no technical skills required. If you know how to send an email or write a Word document… you can have a site of your own.

When it comes to actually making money with your blog, you have a few options to choose from.

• Write about products and services you can promote through affiliate marketing
• Run Google Adsense on your site and make money from ads served by Google
• Create tutorials or guides for people to follow, then earn off their actions
• Build out a site that shows off your expertise or skills and profit from it

The most important thing to remember when starting a website or blog is that there are already over a billion active sites on the internet today… and they are all generating content. It’s not enough to simply create a site and put it out there, you need to actually provide value and then find a way to get it in front of the right audience. In many cases, bloggers will start with a site of their own (without the intention of making money), then it will lead to new opportunities, a loyal following and even some financial gain in the process.

Freelance Writing in Your Spare Time

On the internet, content is king — and everyone always needs more of it. With such a demand for new content from websites, brands, and blogs around the world, there are also freelance writer marketplaces that fulfill thousands of dollars worth of writing jobs daily. Whether it’s through an advanced and professional job site like Upwork, or a dedicated writing marketplace like TextBroker, there is a lot of money to be made in the world of freelance writing.

So, how can you get started with the process? Simple, all you need to do is join any of these writing marketplaces, create an account and then start getting to work. As you complete new writing jobs, your profile and rating will continue to come together as clients leave feedback on your writing styles. The better your content and writing skills, the more you will earn on a per-word basis.

You likely won’t get rich of freelance writing, but you can definitely earn more than a $1,000 per month in your spare time, and you can slowly get better and better at it. If you are really great at writing and can type fast, you should invest some time in creating a site for your services and bring clients in-house so you can earn even more money.

Sell Your Old Junk on Amazon and eBay

The easiest and most obvious way to start making money from home is to simply start getting rid of all the junk around the house that you no longer need. I already covered how you can make money with Amazon as an affiliate or even if you wanted to start a dropshipping business. However, did you know Amazon will also allow you to sell individual products through their site as well? It’s true — and there are plenty of other sites that make this extremely easy as well, such as eBay or mobile apps like Let Go.

One of the biggest problems people have when trying to figure out their financial situations and how to make money is simply eliminating any excess costs they have. This same mentality applies for all of the junk you probably have laying around your house that you don’t even use or remember. Even if you only get 10% return on everything you sell, you are cleaning up the clutter while adding some extra money in the process. Not to mention, once you start selling a few items online, you might just get addicted and really start making some good money on the side!

Plenty of Ideas for Making Money from Home in 2017

Having been in the industry for over 20 years now and always being an entrepreneur at heart, I’ve seen and tried many different ways to make money online… nearly all of which can be done from the comfort of your own home. At the end of the day, if you have the work ethic and dedication to make it work — you are going to find success.

Each of the methods above is completely legitimate and I highly recommend you try at least one of them if you are still yet to ever make any money online. Make 2017 the year you can say you made your first dollar online.