As a freelancer, one cannot have enough sources of income. With more and more clients taking 60 or even 90 days to pay an invoice, additional checks each month can bridge the gaps in income and ease the tough times.

You’ve probably seen the articles that tell you to “Sell your stock footage” or “Sell your ideas” online.  However, in this article I’d like to talk specifics.  How, where, and from whom you’ll be earning these residual checks each month.

Selling Your Animations and Videos

One of the great things about the Internet is that it allows anyone anywhere to easily connect with anyone else.  To the person with ideas and products to sell, this means the easy exposure and distribution. What used to be a handful of large conglomerate stock agencies has exploded into a smaller number of companies for you to pick from and work with to sell your ideas.

One I find interesting is videohive.net. This site sells a very high volume of materials (video, Flash, and audio) from its registered users.  Although the sister sites have been around longer (Flashden and Audiojungle) there is also a great deal of video and animation content available for sale there.  The high volume of sales do yield a decent amount of sales for even the small-time animation content producer.  You earn a cut of 35% on sales of materials distributed exclusively through Flashden payable via Paypal each month.

What to create:  Create high definition animations (720p or 1080i) that are colorful, seamlessly looping, and work well as backgrounds for videos or websites.  Consider a variation of styles: clean, retro, grungey, etc.  Create “sets” of backgrounds that have several color variations.  Each of these will sell for about $5 – $10 each.

Realistic expectations: Post 10 high quality animation backgrounds staggered every couple weeks to once a month. This should yield about $100 a month, or more.

Selling Your After Effects projects

This is a rapidly expanding area, and is the area that I am concentrating on most these days.  Why? Cutting right to the chase: you can easily make $1000 a month if you post just a few projects (about 5 – 6) that people want to purchase.

You may have heard of RevoStock, which sells the above mentioned stock clips as well, but also sells After Effects projects from its producers.  They have been quite successful and are moving a lot of projects. The word has gotten out, and there are a lot of producers flocking to Revostock to make a quick buck.  Don’t make it a get-rich scheme.  Be patient, and spend some time looking at what people are buying and what you can contribute. DO NOT rip off tutorials and submit them as your own.

What to create: Create clean, usable, well designed projects.  Pay attention to detail.  Make them easy to modify by precomping elements that need to modified by users, and labeling them clearly.  Take a look at the the top sellers and see what is popular, what people want, and want people will pay money for.

Sell Training Products

This by far has the most potential, and yet is the most work.  A good teacher that can explain things is golden, and people will certainly pay for it.

Granted, reputation is certainly earned.  So, it might take some time invested on your part in the form of free tutorials, developing a presence on the Internet as a moderator or frequent helper on the various design forums, and writing your own articles and blog posts to get your name out there.

Also, don’t expect to be able to teach perfectly the first time you try it.  Recording tutorials is a lot harder than it looks. Stay out of tangents, do not over-explain, but do not under-explain. It takes time.  This is why you really must spend a lot of time recording free content, to fine-tune your skills as well as earn a following.

A great intermediate step that will get you some cash right up front is to author a tutorial for AE Tuts.  The existing community of authors is a great mix of experts.

What to create: Keep on top of the tutorial community. Know what is out there so you are not duplicating efforts.  Choose topics you know very well and that you can explain well.  Produce tutorials that are goal oriented, that have an aesthetically pleasing result, so that your viewers want to get all the way through.

Realistic expectations: Depending on your training, how long, how well, etc. expect to make anywhere from $100 to $2000 per month.  To keep your momentum going, try to release a new product for sale every 4 months, and hold the interest of your audience by releasing free tutorials in between.

Sell! Sell! Sell!

So, if you take the steps to create an awesome downloadable tutorial that everyone will want, how does one handle e-commerce options? Enter the commerce partner e-junkie.

E-junkie provides all of the tools you will ever need to provide shopping cart links, receiving payment, and most importantly: getting paid.  I’ve used them in the past and will continue to do so for some new things that are coming down the pipe.  I highly recommend them!

Overall, you can look at these as investments in your time just like you can invest money. A very small amount of time can blossom over a year into an easy thousand dollars a month.  More time will equal more money.   Unlike the stock market, however, these won’t deplete and leave you high and dry!