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/diy/ - Do It Yourself

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160097 No.160097 [Reply] [Original]

/diy/ BUSINESS IDEA / SIDE GIG THREAD

ITT: Post ways to make money without having an hourly wage job. Anything goes, just as long as it's legal (gray area okay), minimal time investment, and not totally time-consuming/soul-draining

I'll start (and post more should this catch on. I know a bunch of people who got fed up with the working world and became entrepreneurs out of necessity):

>Guitar electronics repair
Most of the time, the input jack is the cause of the problems. After that, it's mostly a worn out pot (crackling when rotated), or a DIY job gone bad. Information is free online and most musicians are too lazy to fix it themselves. Local shops charge $60 just to look at the problem. You could easily make $40-$120 for a single repair/pickup installation.
Pic related: this is a screenshot from an eBay side business selling random stuff people throw out or post as free on eBay.

>> No.160106

Repair computers - all you need is autism and a few years experience playing around with computers.

>> No.160118

>>160106
You'd end up hating your life after talking to about 10 normal computer users.

>> No.160128

>>160118
Nah it's not that bad. I already fix most of my friends' computers, for free though. You don't have to tell them in detail what's wrong.
There are people who pay 30 euros to have their hdd formatted!! My 14yo brother googled "how to format hard disk", printed a simple guide and did it by himself in half an hour.
I may start doing this for money.

>> No.160198

As gay as it sounds, niche blogs have given me a nice income since i was 16, i set them up and write posts on each one once a day..theyre all first on google so i reviece alot of traffic from them. Adsense for money mostly, end of each month i get a check from google for 200-500 bucks. Which isnt bad since im a jobless college student. If you need help post your skype or some sort of contact info and ill help you get started.
Currently im working on getting an online business running, i found a niche that has lots of sales but i cam get higher quality and a lower price which will destroy my competition

>> No.160217

>>160198

I attempted to blog for money last year when all of 4chan was involved, but failed at setting up AdSense. Left my Skype in e-mail field, add if you wanna discuss things.

>> No.160235

>>160198
hey i used to blog but i quit. good to see that it can pay up. my skype username is in the e-mail field.

>> No.160238

i am a plumber. if i have to cut out copper/cast iron/steel/brass pipe, i usually, clean it at home with some water jets, and then buff it up and sell it to a junkyard.

>> No.160240

>>160106

I did this my first semester at university. Set up a few signs around campus and got my name around via word of mouth. I made a little over $1000 dollars in five months working right out of my dorm two days a week. Easiest job I ever had.

>> No.160245
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160245

Bumping for interest. I can't have a traditional job at the moment...currently caring for two disabled adults and a child at home. The loss of my income when I started doing this has been really difficult for us, and I want to find SOME way to generate some money at home to offset what we lost.

>> No.160248

if you live in a college apartment or dorm buy an electric griddle and learn to make a bunch of stuff like pancakes, eggs, cupcakes, etc

put up some fliers with prices and wait for the calls to never end. i did this in college and made an unbelievable amount of money delivering to drug addicts/ alcoholics late at night

>> No.160262

>>160248
That's actually a pretty good idea, but at least in some areas, you need health certification to be allowed to sell any kind of food.

>> No.160270

>>160240
I tried this ay my Uni. I actually worked at a repair shop before coming to Uni. Never got any bites. Figured too many CS kids were doing the same.

>> No.160303

Local SEO consultant. Outsource your work to ph/india/eastern europe/india.

Alternatively, web design works well here as well.

>> No.160308

It's not fancy, but I had a "4 hour work week" in school simply managing a lawncare business. It's just marketing. I never mowed a lawn. Also it's pretty transparent, without any special knowledge to start.

>> No.160309

>>160308
care to go into more depth?

>> No.160310

>>160309
There's not much to it. Make up marketing flyers, advertise in spring about when the first lawn-mowing is going to happen and hire someone to mow. The end.

Oh, and don't even worry about competition.

>> No.160327

>>160310
Like a boss!
Really though that's a good idea. Especially since you can hire some 16 year old's and send them out with their dad's mower.

>> No.160331

>>160198
My email is in the field, won't have access to skype for a while.

Thanks, man

>> No.160513

>>160310
How do you keep the employees from just pocketing the proceeds or skimming? Lets say you hire them and they go mow 5 lawns at $40 a piece. That's $200, and your share is, say, 20%? What's to stop them from charging more and keeping the excess or saying "I only did 2 lawns", etc etc?

>> No.160522

>>160198

hey i'm very interested as well, skype email in contact box, thanks

>> No.160523

>>160513
You could bill the people for services rendered. Guy mowing gets paid from you. Doesn't collect a penny.

>> No.160527

Ideas:

Selling scrap metal. Find it sitting around on trash day. I haven't done this but a coworker of mine did.
Mowing lawns. Great for high school kids, I made $20/hr doing this in high school.

>> No.160530

>>160198
skype is chanthrowaway. Hit me up.

>> No.160538

>try to set up a google adsene account
>page keeps freezing for no reason
the universe doesn't want me to get rich.

>> No.160604

>>160217
Weren't most of those accounts shut down for click fraud?

>> No.160619

>>160513
My employees never touched the money. I bill the client. They guys just show up and mow.

>> No.160673

>>160198

Sounds interesting, might be able to help me out.

Also anyone have tips for finding a college job? My biggest problem is the 4 hour bus time I need to get from home to school and vice versa.

>> No.160676

>>160198
dont have access to skype right now, left my email at the email part. hit me up dude

>> No.160686

Taco stand downtown by all of the drinking holes. Operate Friday and Saturday night. Cheap start-up costs after you get through of all the legal and health labyrinths

>> No.160693

>>160673
Depends on what kind of college job you're talking about. If it's in a lab/for research, you'll likely be able to get one with flexible hours if you ask around at a bunch of labs that interest you. Jobs like working in the library or at the bookstore are harder to get but you might land one if you just keep sending your resume out to different opportunities and show some perseverance.

>> No.160698

>>160097
I was thinking of doing some instrument repair myself for a quick buck here and there. How do plan on marketing yourself/getting the word out?

>> No.160711

>>160698
Craigslist is good. Find where the practice spaces are at and post fliers. Just do a quick mental survey of a musician's life: where do they hang out, where do they play music, where do they go for equipment. You could leave your card at local music shops that don't have on-site repair. If you can fix amps or do setups, you're golden. Just remember to be upfront about your costs (I trade repair work for weed sometimes) before getting too deep in a project. A good way to do it is to charge a base rate and include labor and parts into the cost (i.e. $40 base rate with two hours labor included, 1/4" jack/pots included in price). If the job takes you longer, call the customer and explain the situation to get more cash for your time. A lot of shops are inundated with work and would be happy to forward you some to keep up.

>> No.160759

>>160198
I know I'm like the 10th person to reply to your post, but if you could hit up my skype, that would be awesome. I've always wanted to know more about this.

Skype: fight_with_tools

>> No.160764

Online poker

you could make a decent living play strictly by the book, mathematical, poker.

If you've got a lot of heart and interest in the game you could make a lot more

2+2 forums are a great way to get more advice.

>> No.160767

>>160759
He never came back :(

>> No.160768

>>160198

Hit me up as well. I just started a blog as a hobby, and I'd like to get some pointers. My skype is atillathehun50 and I'm available 6:30 - 11:30 pm EST on any day of the week. Looking forward to it!

>> No.160769

>>160767
you mean he never returned you a message?

>> No.160789

>>160198
skype in email field

>> No.160935

>>160619
So you had to be there with them. That could be a little frustrating, couldn't it? Just sitting around waiting for them to finish?

I have a Square so I could accept credit card payments, though...that might be a huge benefit.

I badly want to do something to earn extra money, but I am sorta tied to the house. Lost about 2000 a month when I had to quit, and it is really hurting us.

>> No.161317

>>160935
I'm not the guy who ran that business, but you can just send the customer a bill in the mail. Drive by on the day of mowing to make sure an acceptable job was done.

You don't have to supervise all the time.

>> No.161322

>>160198
I NEED MOTHERFUCKING HELP

quaquaraquaqua69

>> No.161325

>>160935
You'd be better off sticking to checks if you did do it. Not going to contently lose that 3%.
Charge people 30$/hr minimum one hour. Pay the guys doing the work well 15$/hr. You set up all the appointments. Get enough business to keep one guy working fairly regularly. Expand as needed. Offer snow removal in the winter if your climate applies. Make sure to set it up as a legitimate business. Call the clients to make sure it was satisfactory. Randomly stop by the job sites to make sure the worker is actually doing his job. 15$/hr for sitting at home and making a few calls.

>> No.161327

>>161322
Then why not figure it out yourself? Also if you want help be polite. Make a blog that has a constant stream of searches but isn't flooded. Your video game or tech blog will never get thousands of clicks a day without actually being good. Make your blog about holistic treatments for herpes (Not really). Make a blog post every 2 days. Get a good amount of search keyword density in each article. Learn to do some basic SEO. Slowly collect money from adsense.

I've never done this and I figured out that much. Your brain is a terrible thing to waste son.

>> No.161366

>>160310
>>160310
>>160310
>>160310

Sorry but I have to call total bullshit on this. I have been doing property maintenance for years. To say it is a struggle is an understatement.

4 hour work week? Fixing machines and having them break, dealing with psycho customers, employees that don't show or damage customers shit and watching them so they don't do worse.

I find it hard to believe an anon just printed up some flyers and had money come rolling in.

No way in hell this happened. I believe very little of what I see on the net and less of what I see on 4 Chan.

>> No.161375

I wouldn't say it is easy but one way to make extra money is renting out your pickup.

Many home trades and businesses require a pickup for hauling materials and such anyways. Offer services to move goods about town.

Also I have been making pretty steady income just by doing dump runs. It took me over a year to get the hang of it. I state clearly in my adds cash only. Many checks will bounce or keep you tied up at the bank for extended periods or not clear because they spell your name wrong or some such. I do curbside/garage only. No tvs on second story, no random shit laying in the back yard, nothing nasty that isn't bagged up.

I only make about twenty bucks a load but make sure I can knock them out in less than an hour. I never go outside my area without an extra charge. I never spend time or gas on estimates.

Show, load, dump get paid. If I ain't in and out I don't mess with it.

The extra money per day isn't a whole lot but it does add up over the course of a month. And once in a while you get extra furniture to sell or scrap to recycle.

I don't make enough as of yet to live off it but it does take the edge off the rest of my businesses.

>> No.161467

>>161375
Too bad I don't have a pickup.

>> No.161482

>>161375
Im willing to try this.
How do you advertise? Do you mention that you only pickup within an area code or zip code?

>> No.161514

>>160097
>ITT: Post ways to make money without having an hourly wage job.

Get a salaried job. trollface.jpg

>> No.161527

I have been playing guitar for many years know and i feel like I can teach it for beginners. I am level 7 by royal conservatory standards (only classical and modern classical pieces). I'm still learning but my teacher is telling me i should start teaching young kids. Any tips?

>> No.161532

>>160198
skype is in email field, would like to talk to you

>> No.161681

>>161527
>>161527
Same here, except I'm a pianst, and I've been playing for about 13 years.

I live close to several grade school, right now my plan is:
>Make flyers with pull off phone/email pieces
>Place two-3 in front of or across the street from school
>wait
The only problem is
1) I live with my parents, so I'll have to go to the students house; meaning they have to have a decent keyboard or piano
2)I don't have a car, so I'll have to walk or ride my bike
3)I do to school as well, and I use friday (and sometimes Saturday) for school work.
Basically, I could only teach Monday, Wednesday, Sunday and some Saturdays
...Problem solvers?
Or is that a decent plan of action?

I'm planning to charge $30/hour, so $15 for a half-hour lesson seems pretty decent, right?

>> No.161855

>>161681
>>161527
I've taught guitar back in the day at a guitar shop and at my own house. Here's what you need to know:

- Most kids will not practice or ever become competent. That's understandable, as most parents push their kids into shit without asking them if that's what they want. As a teacher, you need to make the lessons FUN. That's the key to getting repeat students. Jam out, teach them easy songs, give them a reason to come out of your lesson room and tell their parents they had FUN.
- First lesson is half-price. Discounts for hours ($20/.5 hr., $30 full hour).
- Students will quit.
- Find out what type of student you have and cater to that. Most of the time, you'll be teaching intros to pop punk songs or whatever is popular.
- Have a couple of lesson books on hand and have them purchase it from you so you can keep track of what you're teaching them week from week.
- If you do it from your house, be as professional and clean as possible. Make it look as painfully clear as possible that you are not a pedo. You can have the parents sit in with you if the kids are really young. Parents are paranoid about this shit.

The real money is in setting up a business where you have teachers pay for the space or split the cash. Then you only have to set it up right, with substitute teachers, a telephone, a computer with a spreadsheet for scheduling, etc. It runs itself at that point.

>> No.161867

>>160198
Ok so I made a blog this morning. It's about history and stuff if anyone wants to see

http://www.1veritas-et-aequitas1.blogspot.com/

now the problem is getting people to go to it. I have content on it so far. I'm obviously gonna be posting more. But I need to get more traffic on it.

Any tips? I also got in contact with another /b/ro and he's doing the same thing.

The only questions I have are
-how to get more followers
-when to get adsense
-how much does adsense pay off

>> No.161902

>>161532
HURR

Am I on youtube or what?

>> No.161923
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161923

I'm a shipping manager for a wholesale plastics/ building material store. One of the small time delivery businesses we use has a pretty simple setup. Here's how it works:

The owner sits on his ass all day waiting for customers to call him (he has around 50 local businesses he delivers for). When I call and tell what and where I need merch to go, he dispatches one of his 3 drivers (who own their own pickup) to come get it. He charges $20 for a normal delivery and pays the driver $8. It doesn't sound like a lot but it all adds up.

The overhead is minimal as you can imagine.

Another idea I'm rolling around is a fulfillment service. It's pretty much just shipping for drop shippers or retail/wholesale stores without space for inventory. I figure with the courier connections I've made over the years I'd have a good start.

>> No.161933

>>161855
>>161855
Thanks for the info!! That's really helpful. I had to play classical stuff (not "NO FUN ALLOWED", but very little fun), so I'll keep that in mind. I figure I'll just be teaching scales, chords and pop songs to most kids.

I can't do it at my house (even though I have a piano) because my mother is a crazy, and my younger brother is at home all day long (he's homeschooled).

Anything else?
>>161867
also bumping this.
I started a blog with music/album reviews (obscure, yet mainstream stuff: non american OR old things [think Randy Newman or solo Freddie Mercury])

>> No.161968

>>161933

what's your blog addy?

>> No.162171

>>161968
>>161933
both of you tell me what your blog addys are so I can add you lol

i need a few connections

>> No.162327

bump
this is a great thread that needs to continue

>> No.162485

bump
Struggling student here with no time for a job (srs.. the course is mental). Need to find something to help me survive uni

I've looked into dropshipping, but after lots of reading into it, it seems most people who offer dropshipping services are middlemen or scams and the only way to compete with online markets is to buy wholesale (which as a student, I can't afford)

>> No.162615 [DELETED] 

>>162485

there are reputable dropshippers out there, you just have to seek them out and do your homework.

before you look for dropshippers tho, you need to identify a niche to market to. for instance, a couple years ago I felt like the little steampunk scene was going to become something bigger in the future, so I bought steampunkboots [dot] com and sat on it for a while. I eventually found a reputable dropshipper, set up a shopify and got it going. It's doing pretty well now, most of my traffic is from cheap facebook ads. don't even fuck with google adwords, shit is way too expensive.

check it out and let me know what you bros think
steampunkboots[.]com

>> No.163593

>>161867
>>161867
>>161867

first rule: never post the direct link on 4chan, get a twitter account, post a tweet with your blog URL, and link your twitt.
second, find some people from old 4chan-blog-group, i can giveyou some names to look for : DWei, Derp, Baur, Zyu, Mark. now go on their blogs, and follow them and their followers, and comment on all their shit. they will comment back. i just started doing this again last month. my £60 is coming next month hopefully.

>> No.163757

This isn't really lifehax, but renting out every fucking room you can for spare cash is quite a way to keep the cash flow up. Food for thought.

>> No.163765
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163765

>>163593

/jp/ once did this before to make ends meet. Others prevented it from happening, its worth your while doing so now.

>> No.163774

>>160248

I remember something similar to this. A friend of mine use to tell me about some buddies who use to supply dorm parties beer and alcohol late at night when they're out. They'd charge a fee along with the beer and made a good amount from doing so every Friday-Saturday night. All they needed to do was pass out flyers to college dorms, a space for some fridges and freezers for beer and that was it.

>> No.163777

I did the whole adsense blog thing for 2 weeks. Google decided that the same people visiting my blog and commenting everyday was fishy. They banned my account when I had 34 dollars :(

I tried to upload porn clips from asian webcams on file sharing sites. At first I was getting like 12 bucks a day, sometimes 15-18. I was so happy until it started dropping. Now the company has taken everyone's earnings and ran away. I had 68 dollars and payout is not until 100 :(

>> No.163789

this thread must never die

>> No.163797

bump

>> No.164035

bump

>> No.164043

rent out a house around a campus as a designated party house

A 4 friends of mine did this the four years they were in uni, each made around 15k a year doing nothing but school and throwing parties

FUCKIN HATE MYSELF FOR NOT INVESTING, I went the traditional route and got a job cuz i was skeptical

>> No.164118

OP here, wow, didn't expect for this thread to last...

Anyway, as promised, here are a couple more DIY hustles:

>eBay selling
If you're new to eBay, I'd suggest that you sell a bunch of things around the house before diving in headfirst. Once you get an idea of how things on the site run, you'll be ready to start selling in bulk.

Go to Goodwills, thrift stores, garage sales, one-step-before-landfill wholesale, rich neighborhood trash days, etc., and buy/take away consumer electronics (like routers, name brand AC power adapters, computer parts) and flip it on eBay. You should never have to pay more than $5 for anything or else your profit margins will be too low. You should experiment with new products or search on "Completed Listings" with your smartphone (if ya have it) to see what sells.

Sooner than later, you'll see that there are certain parts of the gig that are tedious (like listing and shipping). So, you hire people to do it for you. Boom, you've just employed someone. Pay them $1 per listing and you can be making amounts like in the 1st picture.

Then, you can use this eBay cash to diversify (always do this if you DIY your income). Buy a shirt press and get silkscreen transfers made to make t-shirts. Get a tube tester and use it to test tubes that you find in vintage stuff (big money if you have a supply).

Now, you'll have a lot of excess crap that doesn't sell or is broken. Take those circuit boards and random electronics and put them in a box and bring them down to the...

>> No.164121

>>164118

>Scrap Yard
A lot of scrap yards specialize in e-waste or industrial waste. I prefer electronics scrapping, as there is gold and other precious metals on the PCBs. Get a couple of tubs together and bring it down to the local reputable scrap yard (search online). Cell phones, old circuit boards from computers (if they don't sell on eBay), routers, video cards, USB connectors... search online for ideas. Search for "gold fingers" on eBay for an idea of how much those PCI card connectors can go for.

>> No.164130

>Stock photography
Check out this website: istockphoto.com

Get yourself a nice camera and start taking pictures. Now, you don't want to go all hipster and take pictures of sidewalk cracks and flowers. No, you want to have a target market. Pictures of consumer appliances without logos (shop that stuff out), office situations, bookshelves, whatever. High quality pics are what you're looking for. People buy this shit to use on their websites or brochures or whatever. They can't use images without getting into copyright issues, so they pay a small amount. You get a certain percentage, iStock gets a percentage, everyone wins.

I know someone who makes about $10k a month off of this stuff. You've seen his photo online (random nerd with a computer). He gets royalty checks for sitting on his ass and occasionally doing a photoshoot here and there. Most of his successful photos are of himself, but a model release form is small potatoes when you think of how much you can be generating from this. Be warned: anyone can do what they want with the photo once they have the rights. He actually found his head shopped between some boobs in a local alternative weekly (he's hardcore christian lol).

The time consuming part is uploading it to the website and having your stuff approved. Outsource it! Get some local kid to do it as an internship or pay some Indian $100 a month to do it for you (he'll probably set up a script anyway).

>> No.164137

>>164043

wait, how does this work?

woulnt the landlord be up your ass at all times? what of the mess? and what of unwanted/uninvited people?

>> No.164153

>>164137

I assume that they bought the house when they did this. Short term rentals can be very lucrative if done correctly, though the usual types would be vacation homes and "extended-stay" style renting of rooms.

It makes sense, you could definitely outfit a house, especially one with an open floor plan, to be as conducive to being a party house as possible. Just make everything durable and expect to have to patch holes in drywall fairly often. And keep it to code, but you would want things like bathrooms in there anyway so it likely wouldn't be an issue.

>> No.164158

>>164137
>>164153

To add, my understanding was that they had a house which was not lived in by anyone and rented it out on weekends for a set fee. If done right you would only need it rented out for one weekend a month to pay the mortgage and everything after that would be gravy. You would likely be responsible for cleaning up after the party is over but I can't imagine it would be that difficult to do in a house that is designed for parties; ie you have all the furniture be plastic and just take those outside and hose them off while you shop-vac the inside and then clean from there.

As for sound all you would have to do is buy a house that has an empty lot next to it or something. Wouldn't be too hard.

If they were living in the same house they were renting out as a party house I don't know how that would work out; perhaps they charged per head at the door every gathering or something. It seems like it would be a huge distraction but apparently they made it work.

>> No.164188

the only other problem i could see would be the cops, wouldnt they be watching the house all the time?

>> No.164231

>>160198
Link or it's all lies.

>> No.164234

>>160764
This here. I'm learning poker to turn a profit at the micros (bought Hold'em Manager 2 and deposited $40).

>> No.164253

bump

>> No.164264

>>160198
noneed4email@yahoo.com
i NEED to know how to do this

>> No.164832

Be a consultant, find something that you know inside out and backwards. Market your ability, people will pay for it. Start out with posts on craigslist, flyers look cheesy so maybe drop a bit of cash on an ad in your local newspaper or your local what's what publication.

>> No.164856

Make a robot for internet roulette that alternates black and white and doubles down to negate losses.

>> No.165173
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165173

>> No.166044

bump

>> No.166135

>>160198
I have a blog (link in email field), I post regularly and get reasonable traffic, but very few ad clicks. wat do?

>> No.166137

>>166135
AdBlock. Suck it. Google is moving into new fields of R&D because they KNOW the ad bubble will burst in five years.

>> No.166157

>>166137
Good. Now we just need to clean up tv.

>> No.166159

Ha, joined this thread at the right time it looks like. I have niche websites and 1 main website (blogs are small shitty time) and make around $7-10k/month.

My first website was how to get a 6 pack, and it sat at number 1 in google for like a year with only $200 worth of backlinks. Then Google cracked down on paying for keywords and i went from $3/click to like $0.30/click lol.

Dunno where it sits in the ranks now, but I get emails everyday saying people are subscribing to the email list lmao. Stupid people.

Now my main business is selling weightloss/maybe illegal weight loss drug online here in the uk. (using $ cause most people here are from US)

If you're just getting into this and think it's easy, it's not. Google changes it's rankings all the time, and I think it re-do's the rankings every couple of hours now. which means blog/info sites need new posts every day to keep google thinking you love your site. that means if you have 10 sites, you have to post something with relevant keywords every single day. even hiring a content writer can be $$$.

Which gets me to my point, use blogs/niche websites to fund a main project with some longevity. the internet is changing everyday, and the FTC n shit is cracking down hard on scams / selling fake shit / fake info etc.

Any questions I'll be here for another hour.