Twenty-one ways to earn extra cash

Keep the cash flowing with ideas like renting out your driveway or selling photos online.

 

 

 

 

Women with cash

Keep the cash flowing with ideas like renting out your driveway or selling photos online. Whether you've been made redundant or just want to make some extra cash, there are lots of easy ways to do it.
To get a grip on your finances, ask yourself if youre spending more than you get in? Can you cancel any direct debits? advises money psychologist Christine Thompson-Wells, author of Making Cash Flow (Planet Press).

Having sorted that, try to create a second stream of income which will help you to keep out of debt.
Here is our pick of the easiest ways to do it...

(1) Home alone
Be a housesitter, definitely not one for snoopers!
DO IT: call 01296 630730 or go to www.homesitters.co.uk .
EARN: Free accommodation, plus a daily food allowance of s7.

(2) Free parking
If you have a garage or driveway you dont use, rent it out.
DO IT: At www.parkatmyhouse.com .
EARN: Anything from s40 a month.

(3) Sign up as an exam invigilator
Most schools hire extra invigilators during exam time. All you need is a beady eye to catch the cheats!
DO IT: Contact local schools.
EARN: About s24 per exam.

(4) Recycle your phone
Its estimated that there are around 80 million old phones in the UK. Recycle it and earn some cash.
DO IT: Go to www.mobile2cash.co.uk  or call 020 8274 4044.
EARN: s1 to s100+.

(5) Cook the books
Prepare meals for people in their homes. Not the one for you if youre a novice Nigella.
DO IT: Visit www.thedinnerservice.co.uk for inspiration.
EARN: s120 for a meeting, shopping and five hours cooking time.

(6) Be an Avon lady
Perfect if you like make-up and chatting to people.
DO IT: Visit www.avon.uk.com .
EARN: 25% on products.

(7) Turn your home into a film set Many films, ads and TV series use normal homes so you dont need to be the owner of a grade I listed building.
DO IT: Visit www.lavishlocations.com .
EARN: s500 a day.

(8) Take to the screen
As Ricky Gervais showed in Extras, working in film and TV can be frustrating but it can also be fun and good money.
DO IT: Visit www.filmextras.co.uk .
EARN: s80 to s100 a day.


(9) Listen to music
Review tracks as a music scout. One for the musos with lots of time on their hands.
DO IT: Log on to www.slicethepie.com .
EARN: Around 5p to 25p per song.

(10) Dog walker
If you feel comfortable around dogs, then taking one for a stroll is a great way to earn money.
DO IT: Visit www.ukdogwalkers.co.uk .
EARN: s9 an hour.

(11) Sell unwanted items on eBay
They say one persons rubbish is another mans treasure, so clear out your wardrobes and put it all on eBay.
DO IT: Register at www.eBay.co.uk .
EARN: Could be s50+ a month.

(12) Rent out a room
Take in a lodger and earn s4,250 a year before tax.
DO IT: Register your room free at uk.easyroommate.com.
EARN: Depending on location up to s500+ a month.

(13) The mystery shopper
Enjoy meals out and get paid to shop, then report back on your experience.
DO IT: Call 01409 255025 or visit www.mystery-shoppers.co.uk
EARN: Around s300 a month of free goodies, plus expenses.
(14) Freelance interviewer (door-todoor interviews)

The National Centre for Social Research is recruiting.
DO IT: Visit www.natcen.ac.uk  or call 01277 690100.
EARN: s185 for an average of 17 successful interviews.
(15) Music to the ears
If you can play music have a go at busking. Check with the council to find out where you are allowed to play.
DO IT: Visit www.buskerworld.com .
EARN: s40 an hour if youre good.
(16) Clear out
your CDs
Sell your unwanted CDs online.
DO IT: Visit www.musicmagpie.co.uk
EARN: 60p to s1 per CD.
(17) Let your home
If you live somewhere with a big event, like the TT Race or Wimbledon, you could let your home.
DO IT: Contact the local tourist board.
EARN: From s150 per week.
(18) Street surveys
Get paid to talk by interviewing people for market research companies.
DO IT: www.rmltd.net/vacancies.htm
EARN: s8.75 per interview
(19) Sell snaps online
If you can take a decent photo, sell your images to agencies.
DO IT: Visit www.picturenation.co.uk .
EARN: s2-s30 from each sale.
(20) Online market researcher
Youre sent products or services to test and fill in a survey with your findings.
DO IT: www.valuedopinions.co.uk  or call 0845 257 3299.
EARN: Up to s2 per survey.
(21) Turn into Supernanny
If you like kids register as a childminder and look after more than one child in your own home.
DO IT: Contact the National
Childminding Association, www.ncma.org.uk or call 0800 169 4486.
EARN: From s2.50 per hour.

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"What would you do to earn money if all you had was five dollars and two hours?

"What would you do to earn money if all you had was five dollars and two hours?

I remember reading Tina Sellig's (executive director of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program) book- What I wish I knew when I was 20. (I don't know Tina, though I wish I did, and I love her book.)

She gave her students the exact same problem. Here are her words, with my emphasis. If you don't have time to read the whole thing, just skim and read the words in bold.

"What would you do to earn money if all you had was five dollars and two hours? This is the assignment I gave students in one of my classes at Stanford University, as part of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program...

Each of fourteen teams received an envelope with five dollars of “seed funding” and was told they could spend as much time as they wanted planning. However, once they cracked open the envelope, they had two hours to generate as much money as possible. I gave them from Wednesday afternoon until Sunday evening to complete the assignment.

Then, on Sunday evening, each team had to send me one slide describing what they had done, and on Monday afternoon each team had three minutes to present their project to the class. They were encouraged to be entrepreneurial by identifying opportunities, challenging assumptions, leveraging the limited resources they had, and by being creative.

What would you do if you were given this challenge? When I ask this question to most groups, someone usually shouts out, “Go to Las Vegas,” or “Buy a lottery ticket.” This gets a big laugh.. These folks would take a significant risk in return for a small chance at earning a big reward.
The next most common suggestion is to set up a car wash or lemonade stand, using the five dollars to purchase the starting materials. This is a fine option for those interested in earning a few extra dollars of spending money in two hours.

But most of my students eventually found a way to move far beyond the standard responses. They took seriously the challenge to question traditional assumptions—exposing a wealth of possibilities—in order to create as much value as possible.

How did they do this? Here’s a clue: the teams that made the most money didn’t use the five dollars at all. They realized that focusing on the money actually framed the problem way too tightly. They understood that five dollars is essentially nothing and decided to reinterpret the problem more broadly: What can we do to make money if we start with absolutely nothing?
They ramped up their observation skills, tapped into their talents, and unlocked their creativity to identify problems in their midst—problems they experienced or noticed others experiencing—problems they might have seen before but had never thought to solve. These problems were nagging but not necessarily at the forefront of anyone’s mind. By unearthing these problems and then working to solve them, the winning teams brought in over $600, and the average return on the five dollar investment was** 4,000 percent! If you take into account that many of the teams **didn’t use the funds at all, then their financial returns were infinite.

So what did they do? All of the teams were remarkably inventive. One group identified a problem common in a lot of college towns—the frustratingly long lines at popular restaurants on Saturday night. The team decided to help those people who didn’t want to wait in line. They paired off and booked reservations at several restaurants. As the times for their reservations approached, they sold each reservation for up to twenty dollars to customers who were happy to avoid a long wait.
 
As the evening wore on, they made several interesting observations. First, they realized that the female students were better at selling the reservations than the male students, probably because customers were more comfortable being approached by the young women. They adjusted their plan so that the male students ran around town making reservations at different restaurants while the female students sold those places in line. They also learned that the entire operation worked best at restaurants that use vibrating pagers to alert customers when their table is ready. Physically swapping pagers made customers feel as though they were receiving something tangible for their money. They were more comfortable handing over their money and pager in exchange for the new pager. This had an additional bonus—teams could then sell the newly acquired pager as the later reservation time grew nearer.

Another team took an even simpler approach. They set up a stand in front of the student union where they offered to measure bicycle tire pressure for free. If the tires needed filling, they added air for one dollar. At first they thought they were taking advantage of their fellow students, who could easily go to a nearby gas station to have their tires filled. But after their first few customers, the students realized that the bicyclists were incredibly grateful. Even though the cyclists could get their tires filled for free nearby, and the task was easy for the students to perform, they soon realized that they were providing a convenient and valuable service. In fact, halfway through the two hour period, the team stopped asking for a specific payment and requested donations instead. Their income soared. They made much more when their customers were reciprocating for a free service than when asked to pay a fixed price.

For this team, as well as for the team making restaurant reservations, experimenting along the way paid off. *The iterative process, where small changes are made in response to customer feedback, allowed them to optimize their strategy on the fly. *

Each of these projects brought in a few hundred dollars, and their fellow classmates were duly impressed. However, the team that generated the greatest profit looked at the resources at their disposal through completely different lenses, and made $650. These students determined that the most valuable asset they had was neither the five dollars nor the two hours. Instead, their insight was that their most precious resource was their three-minute presentation time on Monday. They decided to sell it to a company that wanted to recruit the students in the class. The team created a three-minute “commercial” for that company and showed it to the students during the time they would have presented what they had done the prior week. This was brilliant. They recognized that they had a fabulously valuable asset—that others didn’t even notice—just waiting to be mined."

Please comment bellow

SEO Growth Hack: Piggy-Back For Fast Rankings

The Myth

You’ve probably been led to believe that it takes months to get a first-page Google ranking, but this simply isn’t true. In this post, I’m going to share a simple SEO tactic to get first-page rankings in as little as 1 week.
When most people think about SEO, they typically only think about getting their own website to rank in Google. But when you publish content on high-authority websites, you can get ranked in Google much faster.

What is a high-authority website?

A really big website that gets a lot of traffic. Like YouTube, Facebook, and Scribd.

Here’s why leveraging high-authority websites works:

It takes a lot of time and effort to build up your website’s reputation (attracting links, etc). But when you publish content on a high-authority website, you piggy-back on that site’s reputation.

Follow These 2 Simple Steps

Step 1. Identify your target keywords

You’ll have the best luck if you target 3-5 word “long-tail” keyword phrases, so you face less competition for the top spots in Google. Use Google’s keyword tool to identify these phrases. You can also use this “piggy-back” strategy to dominate the first page for your personal name or company name keywords.

Step 2. Publish content on high-authority sites

It’s really easy. All you have to do is include your keyword early in the title of your content, and you’ll often start ranking in Google in a matter of days. Here’s a list of high-authority websites where you can publish content:
Video websites

• YouTube (most important)
• dailymotion
• veoh.com
• metacafe.com

Press release websites

• PRWeb.com ($89 and up)
• WebWire.com (only $24.99)

Social networking sites

• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Google+

Doc sites 

• Scribd
• DocStoc

In addition, you can publish guest posts on high-authority blogs, get interviewed on internet radio shows (e.g. blogtalkradio.com), and the list goes on and on…

Example #1: Google Adwords Checklist

We wanted to get ranked for the long-tail keyword Google AdWords Checklist. So, we created a post on our blog, and we also created a YouTube video. As you can see below, the YouTube video ranks #1 in Google, and our blog post ranks #2:
The video started ranking on the first page of Google in a matter of days.

Example #2: Main Street ROI Brand Reputation

We’re also using this “piggy-back” technique to establish our brand reputation. When you Google our company name, What's Hot, our content fills up the entire first page of Google’s results.

I recommend you create branded pages on authority websites ASAP, so dominate the first page of results when prospects, customers, partners, and journalists are checking you out in Google.

I’m assuming you provide top-quality products and services and you have a solid reputation. But as you grow you’ll probably have some disgruntled (or outright crazy) customers. And you’ll probably get some complaints and bad reviews online at some point or another. It’s almost inevitable. And that’s why it’s never too early to start establishing and protecting your brand reputation.

This “piggyback” tactic is the sort of thing that reputation management companies charges hundreds and thousands of dollars for, but you can easily do it yourself for free.

Days not Months

The bottom line: Stop buying into the belief that you have to wait months to get ranked in Google. Go publish content on high-authority websites and you can crack the first page in a matter of days.