How to Make Money Online in Kenya

Introduction

It’s not once or twice that you get to hear a person asking how to make money online in Kenya. There is a good reason behind doing this profit-paying online business. It comes with a range of benefits that most will consider lucrative. What makes it even better is the fact that you can make money online in Kenya through M-Pesa.

It is said that the average person spends more than 23 hours per week working, and its time that you start to think about how to make money online in Kenya from home. If you’re running out of ideas on what business you should begin or are simply looking for an additional source of income, then online companies are for you. All you have to do is find out how.

Benefits of Online Businesses

Still don’t get why you should make money online in Kenya? There are more than enough reasons for this. The benefits are many like:

i.                   You don’t need to be restricted to a location, and you can work from anywhere across the world.

ii.                 You don’t need to invest any money to start your venture; all required for setting up an online business is a computer and Internet connection.

iii.               No matter how little or how much time you have available, there are numerous options for making money online since you are your boss.

iv.               The growth potential is enormous when doing online business. Since you are your boss, you can set your own pace.

v.                 You get to set your yearly earnings target and work towards achieving it at a time that suits you the best.

vi.               You will have an unlimited source of income, and your earning potential is limitless.

How about we look at 50 ideas you can consider for making money online in Kenya for beginners? We will subdivide them differently into the best online businesses that you can make money through M-Pesa, the ones for beginners, and the ones that don’t require any capital to start.

How to Make Money Online in Kenya Through M-Pesa

As a Kenyan, making money online matters, especially if it pays through M-Pesa. This saves you a lot of trouble that you may have to go through to get your money. Below we take a look at some of the best online businesses that allow you to invest and withdraw through M-Pesa, with no middlemen.

1.     Forex

Forex trading is a business that allows you to make money online in Kenya through investing. It is a business that involves the buying and selling of currencies like the Euro, United States Dollar (EURUSD), and Japanese Yen (Yen), among other major international currencies.

These can be traded on forex trading platforms.

Want to Start Trading? Here is our List of Recommended Forex Brokers

a)     IQ Broker

IQ Broker is among the fastest forex and binary platforms that exist in Kenya. It is consistently among the first platforms to make available new forex trading products and innovations. It also has a user-friendly interface that allows traders to make money online in Kenya through M-Pesa.

b)    FX Pesa

FX Pesa is a great forex broker, given that they are regulated with Capital Markets Authority (CMA), making it among the safest platforms to trade with. It is also a platform with the best customer service, as evidenced by how it took care of its clients when M-Pesa had its outage late last year.

c)     Exness

You probably have heard about this great way that will allow you to make money online in Kenya through M-Pesa. They have friendly rates for traders to trade with and a minimum deposit that is very easy to have. You can start with amounts as low as KES 100 and build your empire from there. Just study the markets before embarking on any forex trading.

2.     Academic Writing

Academic writing has been getting bigger and bigger in Kenya, with youths and university students taking as much advantage of it as they possibly can. From academic papers to term papers, most young people in Kenya make money through writing essays, journals, reports, annotated bibliographies, and dissertations.

What makes academic writing such a great way of making money online in Kenya through M-Pesa is that it doesn’t require much to start or keep going. You get to make as much as over KES 2,000 a day easy. Examples of some outstanding accounts that pay through M-Pesa include:

a)     Upwork

Upwork is an online freelancer market that requires you to make a working portfolio to make money from it. It is also a great way of connecting with academic writing accounts that pay through M-Pesa in Kenya.

You get linked with many clients from all over the world. Starting may not be easy, given that most clients want a reputable individual. However, once your portfolio starts getting clients, there is no stopping it.

b)    Nerdy Turtlez

Nerdy Turtlez is an academic writing account that pays through M-Pesa. They are a great place to start and learn how to make money online for beginners and professionals in the field.

3.     Blogging

You have to admit that blogging is an excellent way of making money online in Kenya. So many people make good money through blogging. You have to make use of what you blog about to make money online in Kenya.

You can make money online in Kenya through blogs by writing articles about the latest news and make good money from advertising. If you create quality content, a lot of people visit your blog and make money online in Kenya.

If you are already doing some good income writing for magazines or in newspapers, why not use blogging and its alternative ways of increasing your income and make money online on PayPal.

4.     Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is an excellent way of learning how to make money online. It involves promoting someone else’s product or services. If you have some products and would like to make more money, make a deal with the company. They will pay you for every lead that comes through from your site to their website.

To make it as profitable as possible, you need to drive traffic to your site because the more clicks you get, the more you earn. Given that you are the one with the site, you can make your clients pay you through M-Pesa.

5.     Editing and Proofreading Jobs

Editing and proofreading jobs are so many on the internet, given the amount of content published on the internet daily. Making money online in Kenya can be found on editing and proofreading jobs very quickly.

6.     Online Marketing

You have probably seen how many people have turned to online marketing in Kenya. It has gathered some negative attitudes from Kenyans, but it doesn’t mean that it’s not an excellent way to make money online in Kenya.

The truth is, online marketing can make you make money online in Kenya. You need to be competent and very choosy on the kind of online marketing you are into.

How to Make Money Online for Beginners

If you have stuck with us this far, you probably have started to get some ideas about making money online in Kenya. While you can make money online in Kenya through M-Pesa, it doesn’t mean that that is the best way to go as a beginner.

Some online jobs are preferable for beginners, and we are going to take a look at them.

7.     Video Creation

Online content creators make some excellent cash online mainly because it is relatively easy to make videos, and most of them are not time or patience sensitive.

If you have a phone camera, fire up your YouTube account and start making some cool videos about what you know best. This can be music, food, fashion, or anything that comes to your mind. If you make an exciting video for us to watch, just drop us a share using our Google+ page.

The more we make as an audience, the more likely we get the attention of a sponsor who will pay us by sharing their products through the same channel. This would be a win-win for you and them.

As a beginner, make sure you are honest, make no promises, and make it last at least 3-5 minutes to make your audience feel that you have fully satisfied their needs as they move on to watch the following video.

8.     Survey

Surveys are a fun way of making some online money. Surveys don’t require any specific amount of knowledge, and they can make you good money if done right. You will make more on completion of your questionnaire as compared to signing up for it.

The work is slow, but it pays well for the time spent. Due to this notion, make sure that you take each survey seriously to make as many points as possible so that when you complete tasks, they should be multiplied by high amounts making enough money for your effort. Some credible survey sites in Kenya include Survey Monkey, Swag Bucks, iPoll, and PaidViewPoint.

9.     Write Reviews

There is a lot of money to be made by writing reviews for online businesses. Paid review websites are big business, and if you have something to say that others will value, some companies will pay you to share your opinion.

If you’re interested, do some research on what sort of site pays the best and finds out whether or not you’ll need any special qualifications to write for them. You can then make money online with PayPal.

You can also do it as a freelancing job hunting for clients who have products that need reviewing. They will pay you good money for starting their reviews for some of the products they are selling. It’s easy to find them if you have a freelancing account.

10. Airbnb

Airbnb is one of the fantastic and new ways to make money online in Kenya! Using Airbnb, you can make extra income by renting out your home or vacation property. It’s free to list your place so that anyone around the world can inquire about renting it from you.

Airbnb will charge a small percentage as a commission fee if your unit is rented out successfully. At the same time, the guest pays for all costs related to accommodation such as electricity, water, etc.

If you are looking for alternative ways to make money on the internet in 2018, this has become one of them, considering their popularity nowadays. You can also make some extra money from part-time jobs like dog sitting, cleaning houses, cooking food, etc.

11. Searching and Surfing the Web

As surprising as it may seem, it’s true, you can make money by searching for stuff or simply surfing the web. What you have to do is search for a site that allows you to do this. These sites include Swagbucks, Mobile dollars, Inboxdollars, my Points, and Upvoice, among others.

What these sites do is that they are paid by other sites that want to make sure that they can appear among the first on search engines by making sure their content is seen. So be assured that this is legit work that works well for making money online in Kenya for beginners

12. Academic Writing on Facebook

Facebook is a social networking site with users from different parts of the world, and you can make money by simply writing academic papers for them. There are groups on Facebook where people post their requests to make sure that they write their academic papers by experts, and there are also groups with large numbers of members who request your services as a member.

Once you have found one such group, you need to introduce yourself, where you tell your clients how professional you are when it comes to academic writing.

After getting an order and doing it to perfection, you will make them come back looking for more of your services in the future. Make sure that whenever someone asks for help, make sure to give them what they want while making some cash at the same time online.

13. YouTube

YouTube is a great place to start as an influencer. It’s an even great place for getting to make money online in Kenya. You can make money online by posting videos on YouTube and engaging with your audience in the comments section. Many YouTubers like Logan Paul are known for making millions of dollars monthly through this method.

What happens is that after posting your video, which should be entertaining and engaging, for every number of watches you get, you are paid. Right now, the pay stands at $0.10 to $0.30 per view. Imagine having hundreds of thousands or even millions of views!!!

14. Podcasts

Podcasts are much needed by the industries nowadays. They are very popular with radio jocks who get to make money through their podcasts, and you can be one of them.

Get yourself a microphone, or borrow from your neighbors, and start recording. People are always looking for good content in the news/entertainment industry, whether sports or current affairs.

You can make money selling adverts, product placement, getting companies to give you products they want reviews about in exchange for advertisement slots in your show. You can also host calls where people will call you and ask questions to help them out in life/businesses.

15. Selling Accounts

This is an excellent way of making some extra bucks. You can have an account or several social media accounts that have a significant following. You can choose to sell them. A lot of people buy such accounts in Kenya, and they do bring in good money.

Similarly, you can choose to sell an academic writing account that you have created and make it your business. Either it’s a money-making account or a social media account, there is no shortage of demand for them.

16. Become an Influencer

One of the popular ways of making money online in Kenya is by becoming an influencer. We have seen the rise of bloggers and influencers such as Edgar Obare and the sorts. We know that they make good money from following their followers.

Having a significant following on social media sites is critical for making money online in Kenya as an influencer. Influencer marketing is a practice of partnering with specific influencers in the social media space.

The goal of that partnership is to make your brand or product more popular by coming up with campaigns that make exclusive use of these influential people’s fame and make them ambassadors for your brand.

17. eCommerce

eCommerce refers to a method of conducting transactions digitally. It involves a website that offers goods or services to the public using various payment options such as credit cards, e-wallets, bank transfers, among others.

This is a business that will allow you to make money with Paypal, given that not everyone can conduct eCommerce. They, therefore, approach you to do their transactions for them for a special commission. As a result, your ability to make money online in Kenya through this method becomes limitless.

18. Email Marketing

This is a field that is still taking off, but it’s a great way of making money online in Kenya. What you get to do during email marketing is sending several commercial emails to different people.

This is done hoping that one of those who have received the email is interested in the product you are advertising through the email.

If they make a purchase, then the money is sent to you as commission. This is one of the best ways of making money online, and the good thing about it is that it’s easy to make a real profit in this field. Beginners can earn between $50 to $80 within just a couple of weeks when working.

19. Google Ad Sense

Google Ad-sense is a great tool that will allow you to make money with google. What it does is that they post relevant ads on your blog, and when a visitor clicks on the ad, you make money.

You need to have a Google account and a website where these ads can be posted, and you are good to go. You get to earn in terms of commission, so you know the more traffic you get to your site, the more you will make.

20. Lead Sales

Lead sales are one of the best and fastest ways to make money online. It is by far one of the most profitable legal money-making systems out there in Kenya, even when compared with other money-making methods involved in trading.

If you can master lead sales, you will make a lot of cash from home. Leads do fall into this category because they are specific contact details. Leads work by gathering the contact details from anyone and then selling these contacts to those who need them.

As long as someone is willing to buy your contacts, you will have a way to make money online in Kenya without doing anything else extra.

How to Make Money Online Without Paying Anything

21. Tutoring

Online tutoring is becoming a real thing, and if it’s anything to believe, it’s not going anywhere. Thanks to the pandemic, people are turning to online tutors for their children’s academic needs.

If you have experience as an educator, then you know how challenging teaching can be. If you have the patience and skill set required, then tutoring will help you make money online in Kenya.

You get to find sites such as Tutor.com and make money online in Kenya. You will make a difference in people’s lives, and you’ll make great money as well. But if you’re interested, make sure you are teaching something you love because you can get burnt out quickly if it is not your true passion.

22. Webinars

Webinars can help you generate good money from hosting these webinars and allowing people to pay before joining them. You will need to promote your webinar on social media because this is where the real action starts.

Start posting about how beneficial these webinars are and ask people who want to make vast amounts of money online without paying anything, sit back and watch their bank balance grow because they have enrolled with your program.

23. Consultations

You could start making money through consultations by making sure you make your consultation worth it and making people pay for it because if they can do it without you, then they have no reason to come to you, and therefore, the results will be poor.

You should use the internet to make these profitable consultations cause through social media, and you can reach a wide range of people and make money from talks.

24. Language Translation

The need for language translation in Kenya and all over the internet is high. As such, making money around this area by making use of the internet proves to be profitable. Some sites allow people to make money online by translating from one language to another.

You do the translation and get paid for it. This is considered language consultation. You only need to take some fluency tests when signing up for these accounts to make sure that your translation skills are at par with their expectations.

25. Social Media Managing

Social media management in Kenya is an online money-making idea that is worth giving a try. If you are familiar with social media, how you can get an account to gain followers fast and how they work, then that’s all you need to start making some cash right away.

With your skills, you can easily make a living through social media management. There are a lot of opportunities for people who know how to do social media marketing. You can find clients anywhere and get them within no time if you have good knowledge about how social media operate.

26. Audiobook Narration

Audiobook narrators make money recording books into audio format. If you know how to speak well, this can be one of the ways to make money online in Kenya that you should try out. You can make up to $10 for a single-hour narration.

A book usually takes around 4 to 6 hours, and if you get only a couple of requests a month, you can earn more than Kshs 50,000 per month, depending on the number of hours allocated for recordings. It may not sound significant, but things will start rolling once you have recorded your first few audiobooks.

27. Content Writing

Content creation works through the generation of content through unique writings. Content creation has been a source of income for many worldwide, and Kenya is not left out of this.

If you are a blogger, make sure that your blog ranks high on Google to make money through Google AdSense or other advertising platforms such as Media.net.

28. Try Etsy

This is a legit way of making some great cash from selling stuff online. It is an online marketplace where you make things and sell them via photos. You make something unique, take a good picture of it and post it on the site. If someone likes your item, they will order it from you directly and make payment using PayPal.

29. Play Games for Money (And Make Some Real Cash)

Playing games and winning tournaments has become very popular in the recent past. You make cash by winning various tournaments online through competitions like the FIFA Ultimate Team Championship Series (FUT Champions) and Madden 18 Championships.

These tournaments have been made available for many qualifiers to chance to make it to the big time, where you make money from sponsorships and prizes.

Make Money Online Without Paying Anything

30. Photoshopping

It’s crazy how many people would pay you some good money just for you to Photoshop and edit their photos. You make some cash by using your Photoshop skills to make money photoshopping photos and retouching people’s makeups.

You make it more interesting by making the edits according to what they want, adding cool effects, or just removing unwanted things from their photos.

31. Graphic Design Jobs

This is a creative industry where you make money online by doing numerous tasks that make your client happy. This involves designing logos, banners, business cards, and even websites using graphic design software such as Adobe Photoshop.

Join free membership sites like Fiverr to make the most out of this site and make more money on this platform because there are endless jobs here for people like you who can deliver quality with no time delay.

There are also freelancing platforms like freelancer.com that help one make money online if they have acquired the right skills in graphic design. This is a skill that can be attained through self-learning or taking professional courses at an institute near you.

32. Web Design

Web designing is a lucrative make-money-online business that is not limited to using affiliate marketing and blog commenting. With the right skills, one can make money online by designing websites for clients willing to pay top dollar in exchange for quality work done within the time frame.

If you have no idea how a website looks like or how it operates, I would advise reading the bestselling books on web design online through Amazon so that you get at least some basic idea of how it all works.

33. Web Development

While you can make good money from web designing, web development is also a great place to enjoy your web creation skills. There are always those who need a little help with SEO, content creation, and so much more.

This involves coming up with a website or mobile application and developing it from the ground up to make sure that it is well designed, fast and functional across all platforms.

34. Transcription

How excellent are your typing skills? You can start learning ho to make money online in Kenya by transcribing audio recordings if you have great typing skills. You could make over $3,000 a month as a freelance transcriptionist on sites like TranscribeAnywhere.com or even make upwards of $4,500 per course at VerbalPlanet.

35. Website Maintenance

Still, on websites, you can make money by helping make websites function better. You can make over $800 a month as an experienced Web Developer on Elance or even make money just by cleaning up spam or fixing minor coding problems on sites like Fiverr.

36. Join Focus Groups

Focus group members make their schedules with focus groups most of the time, and you can make $10-30 for 1-hour meetings held at your home or other places. This is great if you don’t want to make big money but would prefer flexible hours and working part-time on the side. More information about how much does it pays to join focus groups.

37. Become an App Creator

You can make money as an app creator. It’s not a standard option but is worth noting. You make the best apps through programming language skills or by hiring developers to make them for you.

You can source for clients who need the services of an app creator in freelancing sites. One of the best sites is Upwork. You make your app available there to be hired for multiple projects.

This will make you make good money throughout the year since app development requires less hustling than other options in this list and pays more. The cost of making an app varies depending on how complex it is.

It’s costly to make an advanced app that solves many issues and makes life easier for many people. Then some only make simple apps like calculators, games, etc. These don’t need a lot of experience or skill from developers, making them cheaper to produce.

38. Data Entry Jobs

To make money online in Kenya through data entry requires typing data into spreadsheets or forms and making a small charge perform. This is the kind of job that goes on forever because companies always need someone to enter their information into their databases.

It’s real work, but if you learn to do it accurately, fast, and make sure all the forms are filled correctly, you can make enough to make some significant extra cash from home.

39. Sell Your Photos Online

You make money online by taking photos with your phone or camera and selling them on sites like Shutterstock or iStockPhoto. These are professional stock image websites that pay $10 for every photo you sell.

Once you make an account, these sites will let you upload unlimited photos for free (which they can use), after which you earn 60% of the sales price of each print sold. People buy images from these sites to include in their blogs, presentations, and websites, among other things.

Other Ways to Make Money Online

40. PTC Sites

Paid to Click are sites that pay people to click on links that need to get more traffic. You make money depending on the number of ads you view.

If you want, you can make an install alone for your website and make a payout if people click it to get more traffic. You make very little, but you are guaranteed payment each month from the site that pays for your click ads.

Paid Click sites are not new, and some have become scams where they don’t payout, or they ask for a fee before making payment. However, legit sites like ClixSense and SwagBucks pay up without any problem at all.

41. Create an Online Course

The best way to make making money online in Kenya on something you are good at is by starting an online course. Many websites will help you make an online course by connecting you with other learners and helping you make your content.

If you don’t know how to make it, you could look for people on the net who create these courses for you to teach. You can then sell your classes on websites such as Udemy and Skillshare. All these sites have their market to identify what kind of class (course) people want in Kenya. Now create the system if it doesn’t exist yet!

42. Subscription Boxes

Subscription boxes are subscription packages that are shipped to your door each month. You can make many things with them such as food, beauty products, toys, clothes, and more.

If you make a box for moms in the city, you make perfect money as there is no shortage of moms wanting to spend on their kids. The packages also do not require much hustling since they will be ordered automatically after being subscribed to without any effort from your end.

The only hustle here is in making sure all the content inside is top-notch or picky. Customers may cancel their subscriptions if they aren’t happy with what comes up monthly. Companies looking for these types of boxes include ones making gifts and event planners, among many more.

43. Website Flipping

Website flipping is a rapidly increasing form of online marketing in the last couple of years. You invest in a website, usually at auction via various online platforms such as Flippa, and make money through traffic if you own on this site. Usually, these websites serve ads to make money or charge membership fees for specific content.

44. Arbitrage Business

It is just like how Nigerians make their living online by buying stuff cheaply and selling them at higher prices in international markets, making arbitrage profits.

You, too, can do your own online arbitrage business by buying products locally in Kenya and reselling them at much higher prices on Amazon, eBay, etc… This will make you make money online in Kenya without having to pay anything.

45. Print on Demand

Printing on-demand online jobs refer to creating printable like shirts and other printable materials after receiving their demand. These printable materials make printing more cost-efficient. They are also important because they make it easier for various people to design their clothing and use them at a meagre price.

Before taking this job, one will need to ensure that he has all the necessary equipment and tools like a computer, printing machine, and design software. Pay per project varies depending on its type, some can make you from as low as $1 up to $50/project or even more.

46. Peer to Peer

Peer to Peer businesses (P2P) is carried out by pooling money from different lenders and lending them to borrowers. The borrowers make repayments through the lender’s account.

P2P may be used to make money online in Kenya by connecting with entrepreneurs who need capital for starting or expanding their businesses. You can earn income from this activity by charging a fee of between 10 and 15% of the sum loaned.

If you are looking out for small loans, you will contact many investors to get more significant amounts than other lenders. The best way will be to join P2P lending platforms like Lending Club, where investors pool their capital into a single fund lent out to borrowers.

47. Become a Virtual Assistant

A virtual assistant performs administrative tasks and secretarial work for clients. Applicants must be comfortable with using computer software, email, and other digital resources like Skype to communicate between their offices and the home-based virtual assistants working for them.

Virtual assistants make enough money to live from home while enjoying flexible hours of employment and doing work that does not require special skills or training.

Call Centers in Kenya are looking out hard for suitable candidates to make calls on their clients based overseas. They provide digital devices, take care of phone bills and pay you commission per call completed successfully without much stress or pressure.

48. Writing Books

Writing books, whether it is for you or someone else, will always be profitable. The best thing is that once you make a book, it is out there for the world to see and read.

Another great thing is that books are long-lasting they do not disappear like online products. They can be mentioned over and over again by different people, thereby making them even more popular.

If well written, how much do you make from writing a book? It all depends on what niche you make your book in, but if you spend a moderate amount of time writing books in high-demand places, I can guarantee an extra income every month.

49. Become a Beta Tester

It’s a great and entertaining way to make some extra money online. You do not require any experience or skill, create an account and be active to make a decent amount of money on the side through beta testing.

You can find these beta testing skills online and make money through sites like Freelancer.com and Upwork. In this skill, you make a decent amount of cash by downloading apps to test them before their official release date or during the period known as beta testing.

50. Start Your Website

You make money online by getting your website which you make money off as you build it up. This will be done by creating content and promoting your website across the web through social media and other marketing channels. You can make even more money using affiliate marketing, and CPA offers.

Which One Stands Out from the Rest?

We all have our own preferences when it comes to what we are good at and what we suck at. Probably the best of them would be the one that makes the most money in the shortest time possible.

However, this article can’t really choose for you which way to make money online in Kenya is the best for you. This is just a list, and you can further take time and research these online making ideas through PayPal or Google. Whether you are a beginner in the field or not pick the best option for you and stick with it. It might be the best decision you ever made.