8 Ways to Make Money on Instagram in 2022
Instagram may be an old social media platform, but it’s still going strong as one of the most popular apps in the world. With over 1 billion monthly active users and an entire ecosystem built around monetizing your content and helping you develop an audience, Instagram can be one of the best ways to supplement your income. Here are eight of the best ways to make money on Instagram in 2022 and beyond, as well as some tips on how to make them work for you.
1) Grow your audience on Instagram
Although you can make money from posting your brand’s advertisements, it’s much easier if you start with a large follower base. Therefore, your goal should be attracting as many followers as possible so that companies will pay you to advertise their products. To do so, regularly post pictures and videos of your brand and use hashtags in your captions.
2) Go freelance
If you can market yourself and write, there’s nothing stopping you from earning money on-demand. More than 200 million Americans freelance—that’s a third of our workforce—and 17% of those workers are already making more than $75,000 per year by working as online freelancers. These numbers are only set to grow as technology makes it easier for companies (and individuals) to work remotely. If you can write a good email, you can freelance.
3) Take sponsored posts
Companies want online traffic, so they’re willing to pay Instagram influencers—that is, social media personalities with large followings—to feature their products. You can accept sponsored posts that relate to your niche, or find a company whose brand matches your personal interests. To receive payment for posting photos of yourself using a product, use a dedicated hashtag for each sponsor (for example, #sponsoredbymacmakeup) and clearly mark every post as paid content.
4) Sell Products with Affiliate Links
This is an easy way to make money from your existing social media following. If you have a substantial amount of followers, consider partnering with relevant brands or businesses and make extra money by promoting their products or services through affiliate links. To get started, set up an account with Shopify and then look for relevant affiliate programs (or create your own). In time, as you grow your following base, there will be plenty of brands interested in doing business with you!
5) Sell Products Through Shopify
Shopify is a great resource for making an online store, and it doesn’t cost you anything unless you choose to use one of their more advanced features. For a beginner, I would recommend starting out with Shopify before moving onto something else. The reason why Shopify is so helpful is because they have hundreds of articles which can teach you how to create a website or product landing page from scratch.
6) Monetize through online courses
If you have a specialty—something you’re great at and your audience wants to learn more about—consider putting together a course and selling it online. This will allow you to reach a larger audience of potential students and demonstrate your teaching skills. To set up an online course, first write out what you’d teach as if you were teaching it in front of a classroom.
7) Monetize through affiliate marketing
Affiliate marketing is a type of performance-based marketing where you get paid based on your sales and referrals, not just impressions. Affiliate marketing is a good way to generate passive income because it means less work for you—just send people to a product or service you’re promoting, and affiliate companies do all of the selling. You can promote products or services from other providers such as Amazon, eBay and Rakuten.
8) Be an influencer
You’ve probably heard of influencers—people who make money by promoting brands and products on social media. If you have a sizeable following on your primary channel, like YouTube or Instagram, consider working with select brands that are looking for ways to market their product to your audience. You can approach them with unique ideas that aren’t available anywhere else and make extra money through commissions.