On this page you’ll find all the best ways to make money in your spare time whilst at university based on our own experience. We’ll keep adding new ways to this page so go ahead and bookmark it. And please do share your own ideas in the comments !
01. Online surveys :
An increasingly popular way for students to make money is to fill out online surveys in their spare time. Research companies are always recruiting new members to answer surveys and test new products . For a few minutes of form filling, you can make a couple of quid which is paid as cash or rewards. You can bag up to £3 ($5) for some surveys !
A few good ones to try are: Tonula , Vivatic , My surveys , YouGov , The Opinion Panel , iPoll , Hiving , PanelBase , New Vista ...
Also sign up for Swagbucks.com which rewards you for surveys as well as simply surfing the web, watching videos and playing games .
02. Paid for searching the web :
Interested in earning cash for doing what you already do online? This has to be one of the easiest methods of making money online without really any effort or change in your behavior .
This innovative idea by Qmee.com rewards you for searching in Google, Bing or Yahoo. You just install a simple add-on to your browser and when you conduct a search there may be a few sponsored results alongside your normal search.
Each Qmee result has a cash reward attached – if you are interested in it simply click on it and collect your reward.
The best thing is there is no minimum to cashout – our first one was just 72p wired to our Paypal account. You also have the option to donate it to charity.
Sign up now for free and start earning from your own searches ! Click here to start
03. Social Investment Networks :
The historically hard-to-break world of investing in stock markets and currencies has been cracked wide open. Today there is no need to be a fat cat or fund the yachts of Wolf of Wall Street style stock brokers. You can do it all yourself with the help of free online market trading platforms.
Having spent many hours researching this new opportunity, I’ve been experimenting with eToro.com which has over 4 million users worldwide. It was recently featured in the BBC 2 documentary “Traders: Millions by the Minute” and the Financial Times.
One of the best things on eToro is the CopyTrader feature. This lets you literally see, follow and copy the investments of other top performing traders.
04. Sell clothes on eBay
Everyone’s best friend when it comes to getting rid of junk is Ebay . Online auctions are a sure-fire way to turn that sleeveless jacket (which came in and out of fashion in a week) into hard cash.
Some eBay sellers look at trends and try to predict what will be big ahead of the market. If you are good and don’t mind taking a risk then you can buy early in bulk and sell on when the craze hits.
05. Start your own website
If you’ve ever seen the film The Social Network then you’ve most likely had your brain spinning as to what website you can start-up to make you billions.
And of course there are lots of stories out there about successful students who have started a site while at university, or even bought a domain name and later sold it for 1000s.
In fact, Save the Student is one such example of a website started at university by Owen Burek in his first year, which has since grown into a full-time and successful enterprise.
06. Review music for money
If you love music, make it your business by reviewing unsigned bands and artists online for cash with Slicethepie .
It can take a while to build up your reputation but some users of the site have said that they earn £40 a month. This may not sound like much, but if it’s something you enjoy then it shouldn’t be hard work and is another thing for your CV . Money you earn will be in $US but anyone can sign up and review.
If you don’t mind sharing your notes with other students it’s a great way to generate a little extra cash. There are sites out there that you can upload your notes to, along with your price, and then when another student downloads them you get paid .
Sites like Notesale are free for you to list your notes but tend to take a cut of your profit in order to handle the marketing etc so that you don’t have to go out there and promote your notes yourself.
You will most likely have to upload PDFs but it’s worth it for the return and you can submit handwritten notes but you’re likely to make more money if they’re typed up .
08. Sell your photos
If you think you’ve got a good shot and a little creativity, try uploading your photographs for free to stock websites. A good starting point is Fotolia or istockphoto .
Make more money selling photo subjects that people are demanding, and there’s a great resource to find this out here . It might be a good idea to test them out in print first yourself .
09. Affiliate marketing
If you’ve got a good presence on social media or perhaps you even have a blog or website, you can start bringing in money immediately by promoting all sorts of companies, products, services and offers online.
Sign up to an affiliate network such as Affiliate Window , check their offers blog or browse the merchant listings to find something you think your friends would be interested in, grab your affiliate link and share it. If someone buys (can be within up to 90 days) using your link you’ll make a nice commission.
To take it a step further, set up a website or a topical Facebook page and invite all your friends to join it and post your affiliate offers on there.
10. Sell second-hand course books
One great way to make money is to buy other students’ text books at the end of the year, and then sell them just after freshers’ week – when the new intake of students know that they need them!
You can either advertise on campus or list them online very easily on Amazon.co.uk Books Trade-In (just bear in mind they take a commission on books sold).
