15 Legitimate Ways to Make Money Online in South Africa

1. Start A Blog

If there’s a subject of activity you’re serious about, you can start making money online by writing about that subject or activity.  Start a blog because blogging is one of the easiest and most sustainable income sources. What makes you excited? Is it a particular sport, a game, or some kind of automobile? Is it fashion or fitness? Write a blog.

You can start a blog related to a particular profession or trade. Celebrity and entertainment, and sports bloggers are the most common in South Africa. The opportunities for blogging are endless.

Another way to start a blog is to identify a niche, a segment with a unique need and start producing targeted content or writing for your chosen niche. Blogging requires very good writing ability, and as long as you keep your blog attractive with the right audience in the right niche, success will follow your hard work.

I have written a comprehensive guide on how to start a blog in South Africa for beginners that will sure throw more insight on blogging.

2. YouTube

The video-sharing site YouTube is another platform where young people, in fact, anyone can earn money online. With YouTube, you create a channel and like blogging, you choose a subject that you love and a viable niche. Your channel must attain a certain minimum subscribers or set minimum hours of view over a given period to qualify to monetize your channel and content.

3. Sell Your Own Stuff

Selling stuff is one of the fastest ways to make money online. If you have some items that people love, you should enter the e-commerce space. You could sell on your own e-commerce site or other existing e-commerce sites.

If you choose to sell your products on your own website, you’ll need to come up with a very attractive name and branding. Then you’ll have to get a few technical configuration and requirements set. You’ll have to get a domain name registered and a web-hosting account, and you’ll need a merchant account for accepting payments.

You may also add an express checkout page on your website to allow your customers to make quick purchases. Make sure to collect only important details from them to lessen the hassle of filling up a form.

4. Dropshipping

Dropshipping is a really profitable and quickly growing sector of online business. This involves selling products to customers that you don’t know. The most interesting part of this business is that you don’t own the product. The customer simply places their orders with you and then your chosen supplier ships the products directly to your customers.

To get started, I recommend you read our beginners guide on how to start a successful dropshipping business in South Africa. This beginners guide highlight all there is to know about the dropshipping business.

5. Use Existing Websites

You could use other websites for making money instead of setting up your own. For example, you could post your products on social media sites like Facebook. You may otherwise opt for ebay or another e-commerce site. The existing website option frees you from the technical hustle of keeping the site up and running so you can devote time to producing your stuff.

6. Freelance Writing

Freelance Writing is great way to earn money online if you have writing skills and creative talent. Many online magazines pay for great and creative content, so it’s possible you could get paid to create online content. There are a lot of platforms where you can start your freelance writing. The two most popular are Fiverr and Upwork.

7. Google Adsense

A whole lot of ads you see when you visit any website are Google ads. Adsense is an online advertising program from Google. When your website starts to get steady and decent traffic, you should sign up to Adsense. You don’t need very huge traffic numbers to qualify for Adsense.

Google AdSense is easy to get set up. You’ll need a Google account and signup is free. Once signup is complete, Google will give you a unique code that you will paste onto your website. Adsense does not require maintenance. However, there are program policies to comply with.

8. Sponsored Posts

When your website has a large audience or a large social media following, another way you can make money is by pursuing sponsored posts and ads. Basically, companies, often, are willing to pay bloggers and social media influencers to promote their products and services Similarly, campaigners for a cause are willing to pay bloggers to promote propagate their message and promote their cause.

9. Consulting

Consulting is another way to make money online. Your expert knowledge which you express through your content can earn you a consulting gig. You may find people willing to pay you to offer expert advice for their personal or business enterprises. You could be surprised at the types of expertise people will pay you for.

10. Teach Online

You can also make money online by teaching online. Many platforms recruit teachers to teach certain subjects online. Some of such websites include VIPKids, QKids etc. Some of these platforms pay at least $15 per hour with bonuses for an excellent performance.

11. Become a Virtual Assistant

You can become someone’s or a company’s virtual assistant. There is a wide range of tasks that visual assistants do. You may take care of emails by reading and replying to them, you may receive and make calls on behalf of someone, or you can be a research assistant on some projects. Virtual assistants advertise their services on Fiverr, Upwork, Freelancer.com, and other websites.

12. Sell Online Courses

With more people embracing online courses, you could make money by selling online courses. However, you will need to be an expert in a particular field in order to deliver an excellent course.

A number of platforms allow you to do this without any upfront costs to you. For example, Udemy has courses that get thousands of enrollments over the months, depending on popularity and fee. If you offer good courses and charge moderate fees, you are very likely to accumulate a large fan base, ensuring the success of other subsequent courses you may wish to launch.

13. Transcription

You could also make money online by offering transcription services. Most transcriptionists earn between $100 – $3000 monthly depending on their expertise, equipment and dedication.

14. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a popular method of making money online in South Africa and across the world. You can sell into a variety of markets with this business model, and make money almost anywhere.

You can generate revenue from product sales. In other words, affiliate marketers will refer readers to a lot of products and get a small cut from them. Once a customer/reader buys products, you will earn a commission.

15. Forex Trading

Forex trading is one of the most popular ways of making money online in South Africa. Making money on Forex is simple, you will choose a currency pair, and bet on the direction of one currency vs. the other.

If you are correct, and then sell the contract, you will make profits. While this might sound easy, most people who do this lose money.