How to Make Money Through Online Investing

Are you sick of your dead-end 9-to-5 job? Sick of a boss who only praises you once a year during your annual performance review? Sick of fighting traffic just to get to work? Or maybe you keep getting a 5% raise every year that you know isn’t even keeping up with inflation.

Screw that! It’s time for a change. Time to do something with those feelings of frustration and helplessness. You’ve got big dreams—but lately it doesn’t seem like they are a reality.

It’s time to give yourself a raise! But how? How can you make more money and break free from the corporate Matrix?

We’re going to show you a great way to do this. Through online investing.

Online Investing 101

Can you make money investing online? You better believe it. Everyday people are making extra money online through investing. But while this might sound intimidating or complicated, we’re going to strip down this subject into plain English. So you can see how it works and start cashing in.

The rise of the Internet has revolutionized a bunch of different aspects of our lives, including how we invest our money. Online investing has become increasingly popular, giving people the chance to take a bite out of financial markets and earn significant returns. A lot of our students, after finding success in self-publishing, have chosen to grow their money by using online investing.

Whether you’re a seasoned investor or entrepreneur, or just starting out, online investing can be a fantastic way to make extra money. It all starts with having the right knowledge and strategies. We’ll explore some key steps involved in online investing.

The GameStop Saga

Before digging into the ins and outs of investing, let’s look at a perfect example of the power of online investing from 2021.

Everyday people who use their own money to invest in stocks are called “retail investors.” A big spotlight hit this group of people in 2021 with the GameStop investing saga.

If you’re not familiar with what happened, we’ll give you a quick summary. Basically, a big group of retail investors decided to bet big on GameStop. This move ended up causing market chaos because of institutional investors having “shorted” the stock, meaning they bet against it. When the stock started to go up, and fast (to the moon!), the investors who bet that it would go down started losing massive amounts of money.

An army of retail investors who were part of a Reddit channel called WallStreetBets, led by a Youtuber named Roaring Kitty, doubled down on the stock, along with a few others, and caused massive market disruption.

We won’t say any more about this interesting chapter in online investing, but one of the big lessons is that online investing can be a powerful and effective way to make money—if you’re educated about what to buy and when to sell.

Educate Yourself

Knowledge is power. And knowledge is also money. Or can lead to money. The more you know, the more you grow (your bank account). Ok, enough of the cliches. Sorry.

But seriously. Before diving into the wild world of online investing, you have to educate yourself. Get familiar with terms like stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs (Exchange-Traded Funds) and other investment vehicles. Don’t be intimidated by all the fancy terms. You got this! And the good news is that you don’t have to go to college or get a Master’s Degree in economics to learn the basics of online investing. There are a ton of books out there that break these concepts down into easy-to-understand language.

You should also get familiar with the risks involved, along with the potential rewards. We’re not trying to scare you away from dipping your toes into online investing, we’re just saying that everything comes with risks. Be aware and educate yourself as much as you can about the downsides.

Take advantage of the vast resources available online, including educational websites, books and investment forums.

What Are Your Financial Goals?

The next step to online investing is to think about your unique financial goals. What are you trying to achieve in investing? Are you looking for long-term growth, to generate a passive income stream or just a place to park your money? How close are you to retiring? How quickly do you want to retire early or achieve financial freedom?

Setting clear financial goals for your situation will help you create a better investment plan and help guide your decision-making process.

Picking an Online Brokerage

Next, you’ll need to pick which online brokerage platform you want to use and open an account. In 2023, you have a ton of options.

Here are some popular platforms commonly used by online investors:

E-Trade

E-Trade is an online brokerage platform that offers a variety of investment products, including stocks, bonds, options and mutual funds. It provides a user-friendly interface, research tools and educational resources you’ll need as an investor.

TD Ameritrade

TD Ameritrade is another well-known online brokerage platform. It offers a wide range of investment options and a solid mobile app.

Robinhood

We’re not talking about the Disney movie here. Robinhood is an app that gives investors an easy way to get into the game. Robinhood gained a lot of popularity in recent years because of its commission-free trading model. It also got in a lot of hot water after the GameStop debacle where they cut off certain features during the controversy. But that’s not to say you shouldn’t use it.

Webull

Webull is an emerging online brokerage platform known for its commission-free trading and user-friendly interface. Webull gives you real-time market data, technical analysis tools and a good community forum for investors to share knowledge and tips.

Interactive Brokers

Interactive Brokers is a popular platform for active and professional traders. It offers a wide range of investment options, including stocks, options, futures, forex, and more. The platform provides advanced trading tools, direct market access, and competitive pricing.

These are just a few examples of popular online investment platforms in 2023. Other platforms include places like Fidelity Investments, Charles Schwab and Vanguard.

Whatever you do, make sure to pick a reputable one since it will provide you with the tools, resources and support you need. Look for a brokerage that offers a user-friendly interface, competitive commission fees, a wide range of investment options, educational materials and reliable customer service. Read reviews and maybe even ask friends or family who have more experience doing this than you do.

Diversify Your Portfolio

Another part of successful online investing is a principle called diversification.

Diversifying your portfolio means spreading your investments across different asset classes, industries and regions. This way you reduce the risk of being heavily exposed to a single investment dropping and you increase the potential for consistent returns. A well-diversified portfolio might include a mix of stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs and other instruments.

This basically just means don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Otherwise, the basket could get knocked over, all your eggs spill and crack and you lose everything.

In the investing world, it would be like if you used all your investing money to buy Apple stock. While this might not be a bad long-term investment, it’s still risky because if Apple’s stock starts going down, your entire portfolio will suffer. Better to spread your risk across multiple stocks and investment opportunities.

Research, Research, Research!

Before making any investment, do a lot of research on the companies or funds you’re thinking about investing in. Look into their financial health, performance history, management team, competitive position and growth trends. There are lots of financial websites, news outlets and company reports you can lean on to get this info.

Maybe start by picking an industry you’re interested in and looking into some of the companies that are related to it. You’re also going to learn a lot by simply practicing.

But be careful not to practice with amounts of money that have a ton of zeros behind it. Start small and build up your skills and knowledge. Before you know it, you’ll be investing like a champ!

Practice Risk Management

The cool thing about online investing is that you can put in certain checks and balances to make sure you don’t lose too much money. Here’s how it works. To protect your investment, you can put in place certain automatic risk management strategies.

You can set a stop-loss order for every investment you make to automatically sell if the price drops below a certain level. This helps limit your potential losses. Another rule of thumb is to not invest more than you can afford to lose and keep an emergency fund for when things don’t go the way you’re expecting.

Everyone’s goals and risk tolerance are different when it comes to online investing. Just don’t let yourself get carried away in the moment and invest everything you have in your checking account, leaving nothing left over for rent and groceries.

Make sure you also stay on top of your investment portfolio, keep track of everything and monitor what’s working and what’s not working. This is where online communities can be really great. They can keep you accountable and help you learn the ropes even faster.

Online Investing Can Be Fun—and Lucrative!

We’ve only scratched the surface of how you can start to get into online investing to make extra money. There’s so much more to learn. Buy a few books or check them out at the library and start reading up on how the stock markets work. Follow famous and successful investors to see where they place their bets.

Start to tap into the online communities that are learning how to invest online through best practices.

You just might find you get hooked on it and can retire early and start pursuing your dreams!