How To Monetize Your Skills With These 3 Proven Online Business Models
Combine them to turn your expertise into multiple streams of income.
Whether it’s dog training, digital marketing, cooking, fitness, or relationship advice—you can monetize practically any skill or interest online.
That’s the beauty of today’s creator economy.
Since 2018, I’ve been building digital education businesses, and most of my revenue has come from three proven online business models:
The Content Business Model: Get paid to share content around your expertise (e.g. Substack, YouTube, Medium).
The Service Business Model: Offer your skills through 1-on-1 coaching, consulting, or freelancing.
The Digital Product Business Model: Package your knowledge into scalable assets like e-books, courses, templates, etc.
These aren’t mutually exclusive. You can combine them to turn your expertise into multiple income streams.
But it’s important to understand the pros and cons of each model, so you can choose what fits you best (or mix and match wisely).
The Content Business Model
Creating content can be a surprisingly lucrative way to monetize your skills, especially on platforms like Substack, Medium, and YouTube.
For example, I earned over $100,000 from the Medium Partner Program by writing about productivity, self-improvement, and online business.
Today, my focus is Substack. With 420+ paid subscribers to our Write • Build • Scale newsletter, it’s a solid five-figure income stream on its own.
The key is to choose a content platform that plays to your natural strengths instead of the one that’s ‘hot’ right now.
I love writing. So Substack makes perfect sense for me.
But I’m terrible at short-form video—and I don’t enjoy it—so I don’t waste time on Instagram or TikTok.
Choose a content type you enjoy and are good at, and growing an audience becomes way easier.
The Benefits:
Monetizing content is great for beginners as you don’t need to build a digital product, website, marketing funnel, etc.
You’re not only making money, but you’re also building an online audience of future buyers (so it’s a win-win)
Content can go viral and reach thousands or even millions of people (some of my Medium articles generated hundreds of thousands of views online)
The Downsides:
Algorithms change all the time and could decrease your reach/income overnight
Social media platforms go in and out of popularity, so you can’t rely too heavily on one platform for income
You’re never fully in control (bans and shadowbans can be a real problem on some platforms)
My Approach:
In my businesses, the main role of content creation is to generate traffic and grow our email lists.
Any income from content is a bonus, as the real money is made by offering products and services to our email lists.
(I like to say that social media is for growth, email is for monetization.)
But if you’re just starting out as a creator or online entrepreneur, creating content is one of the most straightforward ways to monetize your expertise.
Just keep in mind that most creators shouldn’t rely on content as their main income source, as you’re not directly in control of your income (but always at the mercy of the big social media companies).
The Service Business Model
Offering your expertise through 1-on-1 coaching, consulting, or freelancing is one of the most direct ways to get paid online.
In 2025 alone, we’ve generated tens of thousands of dollars through our high-ticket coaching programs (like our Mini-Course Accelerator coaching program and Substack System coaching program).
And the best part is, you can set up (and start selling) your first coaching program in less than 24 hours. You don’t need any fancy tech to get started.
But you do need:
A clear offer people want to pay for (learn more about that here)
A method to attract potential clients (also learn more about that here)
A tool to capture payments (like Stripe or PayPal)
Just realize that when you offer services, your time and income are closely tied together.
And since time is limited, your income will also be limited, which is why most coaches or freelancers get stuck at a certain income ceiling.
The Benefits:
You can charge a premium price for 1-on-1 services compared to digital products (you only need a handful of clients per month to make a full-time income)
You get your clients the best results as it’s a done-for-you or done-with-you solution (while content and digital products are do-it-yourself solutions)
You can gather valuable feedback and testimonials from your clients and use that to build a profitable digital product
The Downsides:
Doing 1-on-1 client work is not scalable, so your income will always be directly tied to your time and effort (taking time off = no income)
Doing 1-on-1 client work is time-intensive, so if you fill your calendar with client work, you don’t have enough time to focus on scaling your business
My Approach:
We offer 1-on-1 coaching as a premium upsell to customers who have joined any of our communities of online programs.
This way, we don’t rely on 1-on-1 work as our main income source, but we can still serve our customers more in-depth if they want it.
The Digital Product Business Model
In the last few years, digital products (mostly mini-courses and online programs) have been my most profitable revenue source.
Especially if you’re a coach or online creator, I recommend you turn your knowledge and skills into a digital product.
It’s life-changing to have a digital asset that can generate income on autopilot (even if you’re sleeping, taking a few days off, etc.).
When you’re creating your first digital product, don’t just do it because you think it’s a cool idea, but make sure it’s something your audience truly wants and needs.
Uncover their pain points, problems, and desired results, and create a digital product around that.
Always take an audience-first approach instead of a creator-first approach. It will make everything ten times easier (and more profitable).
The Benefits:
Digital products are scalable, so you can sell to thousands of people without requiring any extra time or effort
Digital products have incredible profit margins (usually around 90%)
Digital products can be sold on autopilot and turn into a stream of passive income (disconnecting your time and income)
Digital products are usually more affordable than 1-on-1 services, so you can serve and impact more people
Digital products free up your time, allowing you to invest more hours into growing your business rather than staying stuck with client work
The Downsides:
Compared to 1-on-1 services, you’ll need to make more sales to earn a full-time income (and more sales means you’ll need a larger audience)
Creating a digital product requires time, effort, and specialized knowledge (figuring out the software, recording videos, making a sales page, etc.)
My Approach:
Digital products form the core of my online businesses.
There’s incredible power in having digital assets that separate your time from your income and produce revenue on autopilot.
Yes, it requires time, effort, and specialized knowledge to create a digital product.
But once you’ve done the hard work, digital products will do most of the hard work for you.
The 3 Business Models Summarized
Content helps you grow an audience.
Services help you earn quickly.
Digital products help you scale.
When you combine all three, that’s when things can really start to take off.
If you want more help turning your expertise into a thriving online business, subscribe to Write • Build • Scale publication:
Great compilation, thanks for the nice content!
I love how these all work together or standalone Jari.