Online side hustles provide a great opportunity for Nigerians to earn extra income working from home.
The internet offers many options to leverage skills, knowledge and spare time to generate an income stream through independent freelancing, content creation, eCommerce and more.
With youth unemployment high in Nigeria, combined with rapidly rising costs of living, a side hustle in Nigeria can be a lifeline for many citizens.
It empowers tech-savvy individuals to become financially independent even without a regular 9-5 job.
Some of the most popular and accessible online side hustles in Nigeria include:
- Freelancing – Offering skills and services to clients abroad through online freelancing platforms
- Blogging – Creating content and monetizing it through ads, affiliates and products
- Affiliate Marketing – Earning commissions promoting third party products and services
- Online Surveys – Getting paid for sharing opinions on brands, products and services
- Selling Products Online – Creating an online store and dropshipping products
This introductory section provided a brief overview of the online side hustle landscape in Nigeria. The sections below explore each of these options in more detail.
Freelancing
Freelancing has opened up tremendous opportunities for Nigerians to find remote clients and projects across the globe. By offering skills and services online, savvy freelancers are able to generate incomes exceeding local salary rates.
Some of the most popular online freelancing platforms include:
- Fiverr – This global marketplace offers gigs starting at $5. Categories like graphics design, digital marketing, writing, video production and music are popular among Nigerian sellers.
- Upwork – With clients ranging from startups to large corporations, Upwork is great for finding high paying freelance jobs in areas like web development, accounting, customer service etc.
- Freelancer.com – Similar to Upwork, this site lists projects across over 800 categories including software development, finance, engineering, science and more.
Benefits of Online Freelancing
- Work from anywhere with an internet connection
- Set your own rates and working hours
- Broad range of specializations and skills in demand
- Opportunities to work with international clients
- Potential to earn significantly higher income than traditional employment
With expertise in growing niche areas like graphic design, digital marketing, writing, programming and more, Nigerian freelancers are able to successfully compete on the global stage.
Blogging
Blogging represents an excellent opportunity to establish online expertise and visibility around topics of interest. By consistently creating high quality content and monetizing it, bloggers are able build a stable income even without major upfront investment.
Some popular blogging platforms to easily start with include:
- WordPress – The world’s most widely used blogging and content management platform. Extremely versatile and easy to use even for non-techies.
- Blogger – A simpler blogging option by Google with reduced features but also less learning curve.
- Wix – Wix empowers users to create professional looking blogs through an intuitive drag and drop interface and built-in SEO.
Monetizing a Blog
Once a blog establishes decent traffic through search engine optimization and social media engagement, bloggers can leverage this visibility in several ways to generate revenue:
- Display Advertising – Joining ad networks like Google AdSense to show ads on site
- Affiliate Marketing – Earning commissions by promoting relevant products
- Sponsored Posts – Paid promotions of brands wanting coverage on established sites
- Digital Products – Selling own ebooks, courses, templates, graphics etc
As blogs build authority on search engines and social media over time, this enhances opportunities to monetize the platform in diversified ways.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing represents an easy way to earn commissions from sales made when referencing a company’s products and services. Reputable affiliate programs provide unique codes to track referrals made by participants.
When conversions result, pre-agreed percentages are earned without needing to handle payment, customer service or order fulfillment.
Some leading affiliate programs open to Nigerians include:
- Amazon Associates – The ecommerce giant offers referral commissions up to 10% on millions of products
- ClickBank – Digital marketplace focused on info products paying high recurring commissions
- Jumia Affiliates – Leading African online retailer providing consumer goods offers up to 7%
- Konga Affiliate – Rival platform to Jumia also offering attractive referral payouts
- SendFox – Email marketing platform paying $50 per sign up + 20% recurring
Getting Started with Affiliate Marketing
The keys to success with affiliate promotions are:
- Having an audience to promote to (social media, email list, blog/site traffic etc)
- Choosing relevant products that meet audience needs
- Driving lots of targeted traffic to consistently convert sales
When done right, affiliate marketing can become a significant passive income channel over time.
Online Surveys
Online surveys represent a simple online side hustle in Nigeria that almost anyone get started with immediately. By sharing opinions, providing feedback and taking part in research, participants receive cash rewards that add up over time.
Some leading paid online survey panels accepting Nigerians include:
- YouGov – Well known international survey panel covering wide range of topics
- Ipsos i-Say – Rewards include vouchers, airtime and shelling opportunities
- Toluna – Broad selection of surveys with popular voucher/giftcard rewards
- Swagbucks – Points based rewards system redeemable for giftcards or cash
- SurveyTime – Surveys take just 5-10 mins paying out via PayPal fast
Typical rewards per survey range from $0.50 – $5.00+ depending on length and focus.
Maximizing Online Survey Income
Strategies to increase earnings from paid online surveys:
- Maintaining updated member profiles
- Achieving high quality feedback score
- Checking survey availability often
- Participating across multiple panels
While online surveys will not make participants rich overnight, they offer a simple hassle-free way to generate side income that adds up over time.
Selling Products Online
The rise of ecommerce in Nigeria provides opportunities for regular individuals to now compete with established brands by selling products online. Without needing significant upfront investment or inventory, leverage can be made of the infrastructure provided by local online retailers.
Popular online selling platforms in Nigeria include:
- Jumia – Known as the “Amazon of Africa”, Jumia provides sellers with instant access to pan-African audience
- Konga – Leading local player also helping sellers quickly setup own online storefront
- Social media – Platforms like Instagram and Facebook offer integrated shops to sell to followers
Dropshipping Business Model
A popular low risk model to get started selling online is dropshipping. This involves acting as a middleman merchandising products that suppliers directly ship to customers on purchase. This approach requires minimal capital outlay while allowing sellers to focus on aspects like marketing and customer acquisition.
With the continued rise of internet connectivity and adoption of cashless payments in Nigeria, local ecommerce outlets offer an avenue for regular individuals to carve out a share for themselves in the expanding online shopping pie.
Apps Testing
Apps testing represents an easy way to leverage spare time and a smartphone to earn some extra pocket money.
As developers release new apps and updates, they need user feedback to identify bugs and improve overall experience. By downloading these apps and exploring the interface, testers can report back issues for cash payments.
Popular apps testing platforms include:
- Testlio – Well known for testing iOS and Android apps
- uTest – Leading marketplace connecting testers with developers
- TryMyUI – Quick tests paying out via PayPal once done
Payments range from a few dollars for minor app tests to over $10-20 for more complex hour-long testing tasks. With flexibility to participate anytime, this offers a simple hassle free online side hustles in Nigeria.
Microjobs
For those looking to put spare time between tasks to productive use, a variety of platforms connect individuals with requesters needing small digital tasks or services done. Known as microjobs, these minor assignments include:
- Data entry
- Research
- Collecting information
- Transcribing audio files
- Categorizing images
Top microjob sites accepting Nigerians include:
- Amazon Mechanical Turk
- ClickWorker
- Microworkers
- RapidWorkers
While each microjob only pays a few cents or dollars, this can add up over the course of a month providing a nice income boost.
Online Tutoring
The demand for online education and tutoring continues to accelerate globally.
This presents lucrative opportunities for knowledgeable Nigerians to offer their expertise teaching students abroad niche skills online.
Subjects like programming, graphic design, languages, academics, music and more are all in-demand. Popular tutoring platforms include:
- Tutor.com
- TutaPoint
- Preply
- TutorEye
Leveraging video chat platforms like Skype or Zoom, online tutors are able to get paid attractive hourly rates exceeding income potential locally.
Transcription
Offering transcription services represents another viable online side hustle in Nigeria. This involves listening to audio or video files and converting speech accurately into text documents.
With fast typing skills and attention to detail, this remote work opportunity is open to Nigerians across transcription services platforms such as:
- Rev
- Scribie
- Speechpad
- GoTranscript
Earnings per audio/video hour transcribed averages $10-15 providing full-time transcriptionists potential monthly earnings of over $1,000.
While most of these online side hustles in Nigeria will not make you an overnight fortune, they empower industrious individuals to supplement existing income streams and bridge expenses through legitimate remote work.
Key Takeaways
- Online side hustles provide Nigerians with flexible ways to earn extra income leveraging the internet
- Popular options include freelancing, blogging, affiliate marketing, paid surveys and ecommerce
- Reputable platforms make it easy to find remote work opportunities matching individual skills
- Consistent effort needs to be invested over time to build profitable income channels
- Beyond just earning extra cash, these hustles enable financial independence and harness talent
