Ask HN: How did you make your first internet dollar?

[ricoche]

Reading such stories just pumps me up, please share.

[iEchoic]

1999, created a Magic: the Gathering fansite on Geocities. Pretty sure I made a solid $13 or so with display ads, and would one day go on to make many dozens of dollars with my next Age of Empires II strategy fan site.

Good times.

[jjice]

I made tee shirts on RedBubble when I was 14 or 15. Really low quality designs from a non-artist for niche communities. One really caught on. Another two or so got a bit of traction. The other 30 never sold. Ended up making probably around $1,000 total in the end which is great for a kid who can't legally get a traditional job yet.

The market is super saturated now, and there are a lot of people with actual talent now too, which is a big win for the market as a whole so I'm glad!

[karlkong]

A friend of mine introduced me to affiliate marketing and SEO in 2012. After learning the ropes I challenged him on who could make the first dollar with a brand new site. I made a site about Bluetooth speakers, made my first affiliate sale a month later and won the challenge :-D

My affiliate career wasn't very long lasting though. Right now I am trying to make my internet dollars with SaaS instead.

[ricoche]

Funny you say this because we are having a challenge with a friend to make an affiliate site, and see who wins

[satvikpendem]

Funny, I'm from SaaS and going into affiliate.

[antihoney]

I used to make planner templates and similar things of that sort for myself in high school. It wasn't anything special but I enjoyed making them.

I had this guy contact me on Reddit about whether I could customize a daily planner for his kids and gave me a general idea of what he wanted. I delivered the design and he loved it, and commissioned three more.

I charged him $2 USD per planner (didn't know how to price it + it took me an hour tops, but he insisted on paying more which was nice). Ended up earning $15/planner.

[ushercakes]

Most of my internet dollars in the past have come from ads and affilates on various blogs I run.

My first real "somebody paying me for my product" dollar, came in January of this year. I launched IndexGuru - solves a super common issue I had been dealing with on my blogs. Posted it to show HN, and had two separate people sign up and pay me money :)

Pretty great a-ha moment. Business is doing well, but nothing to write home about, I unfortunately do not have yacht money yet.

[cpach]

Been using Internet since 1996, never made any money directly from it. But it sure has been helpful when pursuing a career in tech.

[gwnywg]

Nothing to be proud of, but I once won $50 through betting on ice hockey. I had no clue what I was doing, I just picked a team and put bet for draw every time that team was playing, doubling previous bet. Once I won I took the money and never came back :)

[codegeek]

Bought a side project doing 2k MRR (4 months old). So technically it was already making money.

[thiago_fm]

Adsense, had a couple of websites in the 2000s that helped me fund my studies and eventually buy my first used macbook

[BjoernKW]

Back in 1997, with my first business, which was about hosting and - occasionally designing - websites for companies.

[mr_o47]

I made my first dollar on internet by putting ads on my blog

And also someone ended up sending me money since they found my content really helpful

[ricoche]

Awesome, what year was that?

[VoodooJuJu]

Selling shoes on ebay, new ones I'd bought online that didn't fit.

[ipaddr]

Spun a wheel and won 1 dollar. The internet was great in 2000.