You’re here because you want to make money on Reddit.
And I don’t blame you.
Reddit has become a lucrative way for businesses, freelancers, and marketers alike to make extra cash.
One post or comment could lead to sales, clients, or even a job offer. Whether you already have a business or you’re starting a side hustle Reddit is going to help you.
In this article, I'm going to break down six ways you can make money on Reddit. I’ll also showcase some examples of how I leveraged Reddit to grow Ticker Nerd, a startup I co-founded in 2020.
What you need to get started
Reddit can be a harsh place. By “harsh” I mean that users aren’t afraid to call you out or hurt your feelings. Strict subreddit rules, karma requirements, and competition amongst other Redditors make winning tricky. So here’s what you need to know before getting started.
Your karma matters: Certain subreddits will have high karma requirements to mitigate scams and spammers. The r/cryptocurrency subreddit for instance won’t let you make a comment unless you have 50 comment karma with a 30-day-old account. If you want to make a submission the requirement is 500 comment karma with a 60-day-old account. Not all subreddits will be this strict, however, it’ll save you loads of time if you do this research before you get started.
Your post history indicates whether you’re legitimate or not: This is critical, especially if you decide to spam 10 subreddits with the exact same post. Not only will the Reddit algorithm pick this up, but other users will also spot it immediately.
Pro tip: The more authentic you are on Reddit, the more success you’ll have.
Here are six ways you can make money on Reddit
There’s a subreddit for absolutely everything.
A subreddit for happy cow gifs has over 378,000 members and counting.
This means there’s loads of opportunity for you to make money. Whether you’re a Freelancer or an OnlyFans creator, you can earn more money leveraging Reddit.
You just need to be looking in the right places. Below you’ll find the right places.
1. Find freelance gigs on Reddit
If you’re a freelancer I highly suggest leveraging Reddit to land gigs. It can be less competitive than marketplaces such as Upwork or Fiverr.
The easiest way to do this is by finding the subreddits relevant to your freelancing skill. Below are three common subreddits for freelancers:
You can join the subreddit and turn on notifications so you can be the first to know when someone is hiring. When a post is made, simply comment how you can help and why you’re the best person for the job.
Pro tip: Make your Reddit profile more trustworthy by uploading a display picture, bio, and website link if you have one. This will help you stand out since most users are pseudonymous.
2. Find odd jobs on Reddit and get paid in Bitcoin
If you’re not a freelancer and you simply want to make extra money, this one is for you. The subreddit r/jobs4bitcoins allows you to post your skills for hire or apply for job postings.
The posts highlighted in orange are users looking to hire someone for a job. The posts in green are users who have skills to offer. You should tap into both.
By making a “for hire” post and also commenting on “hiring” posts you’ll increase your chances of landing a job.
3. Promote your startup
The startup community is huge on Reddit!
If you have a startup, or you’re thinking about starting one, then you should join this community.
The r/startups subreddit hosts just over a million members. The community is a mix of seasoned entrepreneurs to beginners figuring out how to validate an idea.
Each month the community encourages you to share your startup in a pinned post. There’s no upvoting system and the comments are randomly ordered within the post. This means your startup will be given the best chance of gaining traction especially if you’re consistent with posting each month.
4. Sell your product or service on Reddit
This one is a little more advanced.
In order to do this, you’ll actually need to have a product or service to sell. You’ll then need to create a post and indirectly link or plug your brand. Since Reddit has become strict with self-promotion you’ll need to get creative.
Here’s how you could do it:
- Find the most relevant subreddit in your niche.
- Become active by adding value in the comments section for a couple of weeks.
- Make a super valuable post that the community would appreciate.
- Make a very subtle mention of your brand or website. You don’t need to do this in all cases. The community will ask if your post is valuable enough.
Here’s an example of how Harry Dry, the founder of Marketing Examples managed to execute this in the r/entrepreneur subreddit.
Marketing Examples was started over two years ago. In order to grow the email newsletter list, Harry decided to create an intriguing case study on Lil Nas X. Everything from the title to the case study is interesting.
The post went viral, generating over 7,000 upvotes. Here’s the subtle plug to the Marketing Examples website:
The best thing about this tactic is that it can work for absolutely any niche and almost any business model.
There are three core factors to success you should consider:
- Finding the right niche
- Make the most valuable post you possibly can
- Only plugging your brand in a subtle and non-obvious way
5. Promote an OnlyFans
This one’s not for everyone, but it’s definitely the most lucrative.
There are thousands of subreddits dedicated to growing an OnlyFans account.
The r/OnlyFansPromotion subreddit alone has over 700k members. Most of the not safe for work or “NSFW” subreddits are usually a great spot to promote your account.
The most popular NSFW subreddit, r/gonewild, has 3.9m members. Whilst this specific subreddit banned all promotional content it validates the notion of growing an OnlyFans account on Reddit. It’s safe to assume your target audience is definitely here!
Pro tip: Use Howitzer to send personalized outreach to users who comment in subreddits in your niche. More on this later.
6. Promote your YouTube videos
According to Hootsuite, views outside of YouTube can still inform your success with the algorithm.
This means a viral Reddit post can help increase the reach of your Youtube videos. Especially if it’s valuable enough for Reddit users to watch the whole video. It’s also a great way to growth hack your subscriber count!
Here’s an example of a software engineering video that went viral in the r/python subreddit.
Two ways I’ve personally made money with Reddit
SuppliersData
Suppliers Data was a basic website I purchased from Indie Maker. It wasn’t making money at the time and I didn’t really have a plan to scale it.
So I decided to leverage Reddit for growth.
I applied the three core factors to ensure success (also mentioned above):
- Find the right niche
- Make the most valuable post you can
- Only plug your brand in a subtle and non-obvious way
I decided to create a high-value post in the eCommerce subreddit
You can see it below.
I shared three key resources that aren’t common knowledge. One of them happened to be a site I owned. I didn’t even include a link to my site but the really keen users would research SuppliersData and eventually find my site.
Had I included any links the post wouldn’t have been as successful.
Giving the Reddit community value is the most critical factor to success.
Ticker Nerd
In 2020, I co-founded an investing newsletter called Ticker Nerd with my close pal Sam. It grew quickly and was soon acquired by Finder. Most of its success was attributed to leveraging Reddit for validation and initial growth.
Here’s an example of a successful Reddit post that drove sales.
We decided to share a premium stock report for free within the r/stocks community.
Reddit users were critical of the report, however, many others were very thankful. This was reflected by all of the awards we were gifted. Along with the sales we made.
How to uncover hidden opportunities on Reddit
Reddit boasts some crazy statistics. According to its website, Reddit has:
- Over 50 million daily active users
- Over 100,000 active communities
- Over 13b posts and comments
The opportunities are endless.
But you might be wondering how you can possibly trawl this much information to find the opportunities.
The solution is simple. Leverage tools that do the hard work for you. Here are two tools you can use right away.
1. Howitzer: This is my favorite Reddit tool by far. It’s the first Reddit tool I’ve found that not only allows you to conduct research but also set up automated outreach campaigns. The use cases are endless. You can message users about job postings, promote your startup, find clients and very easily promote OnlyFans accounts using this tool.
2. Anvaka Github Tool: This tool renders a spider map of related subreddits. For instance, if you plug in r/investing, you’ll notice how the users of r/investing are also active in r/personalfinance.
3. SubReddit Stats: If you want to get a quick understanding of what’s happening in a subreddit this is the tool to use. It breaks down everything from the growth of the subreddit to the most frequently used terms.
Can you make passive income from Reddit?
I don’t believe anything is truly passive. You may be able to detach your time from when you make the income but the continual investment of time is required.
In saying this, if you manage the following then you could make passive income from a Reddit post.
- The post is highly valuable to the community and not easily replicated
- Users are frequently searching for the main theme/term of the post
- It gets >1,000 upvotes (this changes based on subreddit size)
If you hit these three items it's likely your post will be shared in other blog posts or communities. This won't guarantee passive income but it will increase your chances.
How to avoid getting banned from a subreddit
Read the subreddit rules and wiki: Moderators are flooded with requests and spammers violating the rules. Their tolerance for accidents is low so it’s best to just avoid slipping up at all costs.
Keep your post history clean: Redditors like to lurk. Expect them to click on your profile and look through your post history.
Be genuine: Don’t try to trick people Redditors have a low tolerance for stuff like this and will have no issue calling you out.
How to avoid Reddit scams
The most important thing to remember here is this: If it’s too good to be true it probably is.
Reddit is mostly anonymous.
This means you can’t trust any random user without thoroughly vetting them first. Even once vetted a user should only be trusted with very minor things.
Everything from a person's history to their offer should be considered.
Here are three signs of a scammer:
- Their profile clearly seems fake. They have low karma and their post history is suspicious
- They’re very pushy about you taking action
- They want you to pay in a very specific way or give them very specific details
For more information on how to spot a scammer, I suggest reading this.
Closing remarks
Reddit is a place that rewards those who give value. To be successful and make money on Reddit you need to give as much value as you can.
Here are the six ways you can make money on Reddit:
- Find freelance gigs on Reddit
- Find odd jobs on Reddit and get paid in Bitcoin
- Promote your startup
- Sell your product or service on Reddit
- Promote an OnlyFans
- Promote your YouTube videos
If I decided to launch a side-hustle or earn money on Reddit again, I would definitely leverage as many tools as possible. Especially Howitzer and SubRedditStats. They make your efforts easier and more scalable.
