February is over and the year is flying! It seems like only yesterday that it was Christmas, but here we are 1/6th of the way through 2019!
Let’s check out how it went.
What is the purpose of this report?
Most of you now know the drill here, so you can skip this section, but if you’re new then read on whilst we explain what’s going on here.
If you haven’t read our ‘About Us’ page then you probably should. It explains this whole crazy idea, but in essence, we’re just three fairly regular guys from England trying to make money on the side of our regular day jobs.
Income goes into the collective fund where it is earned over and above our usual monthly incomes. So that’s nothing from salaries or our existing personal investments. We’re looking for stuff over and above that. The sort of side-hustles that anyone can pull off if they’ve got the time and energy (and in some cases desperation).
The purpose of publishing these reports is so that you can see how well (or badly) the fund is doing. And we think that’s important for two big reasons:
- The whole purpose of this blog is for us to try money-making methods so that you can see what works and what doesn’t. The best way to prove what’s working and what isn’t is obviously to share our earnings (or lack of them) from these various sources.
- Secondly, we’ve done something that we think is a blogging first. We’re giving all of our readers a 10% stake in the fund – more details on that in this post. And naturally, we think you’ll want to receive regular reports on how that’s going for you.
Simple enough? Let’s crack on and talk about how this month went.
What were our goals for the month?
At the end of January we were in possession of a decent-sized fund, having reaped the rewards of matched betting over Christmas and New year.
So February was about trying to work out what to do with our rapidly accumulating fund, and what else we could invest in.
We got together one evening at the start of February to thrash our our next move.
I’ll let you read the full article here, if you haven’t already. In short, though, we’re going to be pursuing the opening of a new online business.
Getting our new business of the ground is going to be something that is going to take a push for the next couple of months. We’re all starting to realise that these things don’t just happen over night.
The challenge is to keep the income trickling in from our existing sources whilst still giving our new venture the energy it needs. We’ll be spinning plates for a couple of months to come.
Results
| Project | Income | Expenses | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Be My Eye | £19.60 | £19.60 | |
| eBay | -£9.40 | -£9.40 | |
| Matched Betting | £342.19 | -£150.00 | £192.19 |
| Surveys | £109.00 | £109.00 | |
| Kantar / TNS (stamps) | £12.08 | £12.08 | |
| User Testing | £15.00 | £15.00 | |
| £497.87 | -£159.40 | £338.47 |
Matched Betting
We’ve been matched betting for 3 full months now, and we’re totally sold on the idea of it. In those 3 months, the three of us have made a combined income of £1,538.42 (excluding expenses). As you’ll no doubt spot, that’s the vast majority of the fund total.
Earnings this month were a little down on our first two months, mostly because we didn’t do so many new customer offers. But the result is still by far and away our biggest earner for the month.
One of the tools we use, which helps SO MUCH with matched betting is OddsMonkey* and the various tools that membership gives you access to. Having paid £17.99 per month for the last 3 months, we decided that we were ready to take the plunge and pay for annual membership. All of us envisage we’ll be continuing to dabble in it over that period.
Annual membership is £150 for the 12 months, which works out at £12.50 per month. In other words, paying for a year upfront saves you £65.88 per year. Seems like a no-brainer to us.
While we acknowledge that’s still a lot of money to be paying, after 3 months of using the OddsMonkey* service, we think it represents value for money. When you compare how much extra it allows you to make – and specifically the time it saves you – it’s worth it. We’ll do an article this month setting out the case in a bit more detail, for those who are still unsure.
If you want to learn more about it, you can check out our how to get started on matched betting article and for those who do want to make some side money, our 12 essential matched betting tips.
BeMyEye
Currently, the most popular article on the whole site is our review of the BeMyEye App.January was a very quiet month for mystery shopping missions on this platform, but the green shoots of springtime have started to sprout in February and once again we’re picking up work through it.
One of the things that has truly astounded us is that 4 people have joined up using our link. When someone does that, it’s a win-win situation for us both. We get £1 and so do they, when they complete their first mission.
We’re pumped that we’ve been able to help 4 people discover this way of making money and help them get a little extra cash bonus too. By the way, if you’re one of those people who signed up using our link then it’s a sincere thanks from us! Come and say hi in the site comments some time!
Kantar / TNS – stamps
Another month, another set of stamps have been earned! The total stamp stash as at end of Feb 19 is now £88.56. Check this link for an explanation of how we’re earning these stamps.
The big news here, though is that stamp costs are about to go up in March. As the BBC News site explains:
From 25 March, the price of a second-class stamp will rise by 3p to 61p – breaching Ofcom’s current price cap of 60p which is in place until 1 April.
BBC News
The price of a first-class stamp will also increase by 3p to 70p.
A 3p rise on first class stamps represents a 4.48% rise! Bad news if you’re buying stamps, but actually great news for people like ourselves that have a stash of stamps already.
It’s such a big rise that it makes you wonder if it’s worth buying some more stamps before 25th March to get yourself an instant 4.48% return. However, given that it has hardly been that easy to offload our existing £88.56 of stamps, it’s difficult to get enthusiastic about the prospect of dipping in to the market to get many more.
Surveys/Focus Force
Another reasonable month using online surveys and Focus Force meant that we added about £75 to the fund, most of it earned from the comfort of an armchair in the front room.
The jury is still out on online surveys; they can be a little frustrating and repetitive, but if you have the discipline, it is a great way to add to your fund for zero outlay. The Money Mountain will continue down the online survey path for the foreseeable future…or until Ben gets banned from every platform in town (yup…Ben is now barred from not one, but TWO online survey platforms as they didn’t think he was taking it seriously enough…which was probably right).
User Testing
Not much to report on this one, but Chris picked up two User Testing jobs in the month. He still thinks this is an underrated little way of making money, as it quietly keeps the cash trickling in. £15 for the month might not be setting any pulses racing, but we’ll take it all the same.
Overall total
Amount at the start of the month: £1,492.19
Income: £497.87
Expenses: -£159.40
Total value of the Fund at end of January: £1,830.66
It has now been 8 months since we stared this project and the time has absolutely flown by! We’ve done quite a lot in that period, but the single most significant thing we have done seems to be to discover matched betting, which has taken our fund value up to a new level.
Matched betting has proved to be the engine that’s currently driving this whole project. We’ll keep making the most of it for now, but we need to develop other sustainable sources of income.
What next?
We told you about our Summit Meeting a few weeks ago and that we are going to start selling something; this plan is still on track. We’ve been gathering more information on the market we’re going to enter in to and hope to be meeting up with a potential supplier in the next few weeks. We’ll be telling you more once we have more to tell!
It’s also fair to say that we’re stuck in a bit of a matched betting rut. It is too easy to make money this way and as a consequence we’ve not been as adventurous as we were at the beginning of the project. We’re all keen to get out there and start trying some different ideas for side hustles asap.
That said, we’re far from making the most of matched betting! When we see some of the profits others in this sphere are racking in, we’re merely playing at matched betting!
The Cheltenham Festival is also coming up in March, and we’re hoping there will be some bookmaker offers floating around for that.
Let us know your thoughts
As always, if you’ve got any comments, questions or ideas on how we can make money on this site then get in touch.
Are we going about this the wrong way? Are we missing easy opportunities? Have you got any money making suggestions you think we should try? Let us know in the comments below.