Intro

If you really want to make money online you need to stop wasting your time on pointless micro jobs like online surveys, clicking links, watching videos, downloading apps, because no matter how hard you work on this stuff, at best you can only make a few dollars, and that’s if you’re lucky, since most people don’t actually make any money from them. It’s almost impossible to build a business that can scale to the point where you start making thousands of dollars every month with micro jobs and other online moneymaking gimmicks you’re going to find out there.

The reason most people fall for them is because when you try to start making money online, the first thing you’re most likely going to do is go on YouTube or Google and search for how to make money online, and then you start seeing a bunch of videos claiming you can make money by clicking links, reading news, watching videos, downloading apps, and all that kind of stuff. But look around, you won’t find any successful online entrepreneur who built their business that way.

Fact

As a matter of fact, the person creating content to show you how to do these things is probably not using them, so first you need to get smart and stop chasing side hustles that waste your time. What you need to do is follow the basic principle of success in any field or industry: if you want to be successful, find out what successful people are doing and follow their steps. If you want to be successful in the online business space, find out what successful people are doing to make money online and follow their steps, don’t just watch random videos on YouTube and expect to get real results. Here’s the most important thing you need to know: making money online comes down to learning a skill and then creating value with that skill.

For instance, people like me make money every month from YouTube because, one, I know how to make videos, and then I create videos that people watch on YouTube. So the skill is video creation, and the value I create is the videos I upload that people come to watch, and

because I do that consistently, I get paid by YouTube. So if you can do these two things, learn a skill and then use that skill to create value for people, you’re in a strong position to make money online. And you can see from the example I’ve just given you that some skills have the potential to reward you in many ways. With video creation, for instance, you could become a creator, a freelancer, a course creator where you make paid online courses to teach people how to make videos, and you can even combine all these different methods to make money for yourself.

Personal Story

Over the years I’ve made money doing business online, and from my experience here are seven practical skills that can help you build a profitable and scalable online business. These are high-value, in-demand skills that helped me and others make money online and can work for you regardless of your current status, qualifications, age, or location, if you stay focused and consistent. Learn and master at least one of these skills and you can start to see real change over time. The number one skill on my list is video content creation. In the world we live in right now, knowing how to make videos is something that will pay you well.

Video Content Creation

It also has the potential to pay you in many ways. You’ve seen content creators who make videos on platforms like YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok make money, and the best part is this is something anybody can do. Making videos online changed my life, and when I started, the only thing I had was my phone, so if you have a phone in your hand right now, that means you have enough to get started. There are different types of videos, different styles of videos, and different tools you can use to make them. You probably don’t need to know all of them, you just need to get to the point where you can confidently make videos that people can watch and make sense of.

Once you get to that point, you can either become a content creator publishing videos on platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram, or you can become a freelance video editor where people pay you to make videos for them. Either one is rewarding, and as you get better with this skill, more opportunities to make money will start coming your way. So learning how to make videos online is one skill I recommend to anybody who wants to build a profitable online business, and don’t tell yourself you can’t do it because this is something anybody can do, even if you think you’re camera shy or maybe video isn’t for you. The more you do it, the more comfortable you become, and with time it just becomes part of you.

Web Development

The second skill is web development. Knowing how to create different types of websites will pay you well because people and businesses need websites for all sorts of reasons, and web developers get paid well to build these for them. There are two main paths you can follow here: you could learn how to code, which I’d recommend, or if you don’t want to go the coding route, there are no-code tools you can use to create websites, the most popular being WordPress. If you learn WordPress, you can create almost any type of website, and most small businesses prefer their websites built with it.

Whichever path you take, once you master this skill there are opportunities out there that pay well, whether you want to freelance or take a conventional job as a web developer, whichever you prefer. You can also combine it with video content creation to do amazing things for yourself. For instance, I create website tutorials on my YouTube channel and get paid for that, that’s me combining web development and video content creation to create an extra stream of income for myself. So skill stacking, or acquiring multiple skills, is something that gives you a real advantage in this space. The third skill on my list is sales.

Sales

This is like a superpower, because if you know how to sell online and get people to buy from you without meeting them in person, you’ll rarely be short of options in this life, because at that point making money can be as simple as finding something people need and selling it online. So if you want to reach the point where you’re consistently making money online, learn how to sell. This skill opens a lot of money-making opportunities: you can sell your skill as a service, create your own product and sell it, or get other people’s products and sell them as an affiliate. There’s a lot you can do with it.

And if you feel like you’re talented and putting in a lot of effort yet still not making money online, it’s probably because you haven’t mastered this skill of selling, you don’t yet know how to get people to buy into your ideas and your potential, and learning this skill will open a lot of doors for you.

Paid Advertising

The fourth skill on my list is paid advertising. Here’s the thing: attention is one of the most valuable commodities on the internet, because even though there are a lot of people online, it’s hard to get their attention. There are two ways to get people’s attention online: organic methods or paid methods. Most people use organic methods, like consistently creating content, but you can also get attention by running paid ads, and this can give you a real advantage over people trying to grow organically.

So if you know how to run paid ads to get more eyes on what you have to offer, you become a valuable asset that can quickly grow any online business, valuable to your own business or to other businesses, and they’ll be happy to pay you for that. The two main ad networks worth focusing on are Facebook Ads and Google Ads. If you master running effective ads on those platforms, you can start to see real results online. And if you combine this skill with the previous one, knowing how to run ads and knowing how to sell, that’s a strong combination.

Audience Development

Skill number five is audience development, meaning being able to grow an audience online. The platform doesn’t really matter, it could be growing your YouTube channel, Instagram followers, TikTok followers, Twitter followers, or building an email list. If you can build an audience online, the internet tends to reward that in a lot of ways, as long as you have eyes on your content, regardless of the platform, you’re in a good position to make money.

For instance, you could sell your own products or affiliate products, or become an influencer where brands pay you to talk about their products in your community, and platforms like YouTube will pay you once you hit their eligibility thresholds. At best you can combine all these different methods to make money for yourself. So if you can build an audience online, you have one of the strongest business models on the internet, and regardless of what you do or where you are, you’re in a solid position to make money.

Generative AI

Skill number six is the productive use of generative AI. Recently we’ve seen a lot of powerful AI tools, the most popular being ChatGPT, and you need to learn how to use these tools to save yourself time, because time is one of the most valuable assets you have when you’re trying to build or run a business. These AI tools can help you get more done in less time, and the best part is you don’t need any technical knowledge to use them.

Search for Information

The number seven skill on my list is knowing how to search for information on the internet. This one sounds simple, but a lot of people don’t know how to use platforms like Google, YouTube, and ChatGPT to search for information and solve specific problems. All the skills I’ve mentioned in this article you can actually learn by yourself for free, without necessarily paying for courses, coaching, or mentorship, if you know how to search for what you’re looking for. If you’re building a business, you’ll come across a lot of problems, but the good thing is somebody else has likely encountered the same problem before and documented how they solved it, and that solution is out there.

So if you know how to use Google and YouTube to search for the information you need, you’ll be able to solve problems as they come up. You’ve probably been in a situation where somebody asked you a question and you found yourself thinking, this is something they could easily find out with a simple Google search. This is one skill that most people don’t have, and learning it alone will save you a lot of headache. If you know someone starting their online business journey, feel free to share this with them too.