Given that there are many unemployed or underemployed librarians. Here is a list of 50 ways I came up with that librarians can make money without a job and yes I have actually done a large number of these.

1. Start an online business. There are lots of different forms and many of these other ideas will work well online.

2. Start blogging and find ways to make your blog pay. These can be anything from adsense, to ads, to affiliate programs.

3. Affiliate marketing. You will also need a blog to make this work well.

4. Start your own information research business. Mary Ellen Bates is one expert who does this.

5. Start your own direct sales or network marketing business.

6. Start offering library consulting to small businesses or even to large corporations.

7. If you have specialized technology skills you can make money teaching classes or coaching others to learn these.

8. Create free and paid videos and find ways to monetize these using affiliate products, your own products or other services.

9. Create your own membership site that people pay monthly or yearly to access based on knowledge and services that are library related and that people need, want and will pay for.

10. Create a membership site based on one of your hobbies or passions.

11. Learn how to use social media for business and then teach other businesses how to use it too.

12. Open your own online used book store. Find cheap books at library book sales, on eBay and other places to sell in your store.

13. Open your own eBay store with unique and popular products.

14. If you are crafty you can make your own stuff and sell it on Etsy.

15. Create some clever librarian related merchandise and sell it on Café Press.

16. Learn to master Squidoo and make lots of useful lenses about topics people are interested in and monetize with them affiliate programs and earn money from the ads on the lenses.

17. Develop a list of hot topics about which you have knowledge and offer paid teleseminars on them.

18. Do the same thing as in number 17 but with webinars instead.

19. Learn to do web design and offer your services.

20. Learn how to set up Joomla and offer installation services to clients.

21. Learn how to use wordpress and make money installing and setting it up for clients.

22. Learn how to use wikis and you can make money setting them up for clients.

23. Offer to set up facebook fan pages, and other social networking pages for small businesses. Many of them have no clue how to do this and would be more than glad to pay you to do it for them.

24. Offer free ecourses will valuable content and then upsell the people on a paid series or product.

25. Offer a library errand service. Go get materials at libraries for people and return them for them.

26. Offer research services to small businesses or other interested parties where you do their research for them and give them typed up reports of what you have found for them.

27. Create lots of content based sites and then monetize them adsense and contextual ads.

28. Create and sell clever themed t-shirts.

29. Start your own video show and monetize it with sponsors.

30. Start a podcast and monetize it with ads and sponsors.

31. Offer archival services to smaller organizations on a temporary basis.

32. Offer indexing services.

33. Offer find your textbook cheaper services for students and go find cheaper textbooks and sell them to students for a commission.

34. Offer to write paid book reviews. Many authors will gladly pay a small fee for this and if you do enough of them you can make a significant income.

35. Offer to prepare bibliographies for students and authors.

36. Start a book review blog and monetize it with ads and affiliate links.

37. Start a book summaries review service. You could offer them via newsletters, or paid online content.

38. Create a series of ebooks on how to find information and do research and sell them.

39. Develop a list of topics about which you can speak and do presentations and then start offering yourself as a paid speaker to groups and organizations.

40. Write a book about your life or any hot topic and then make more money selling your book than you would if you had a library job. (Well maybe if you are lucky.)

41. Find businesses that do a lot of trade shows and ask if they will pay you to help out. I’ve seen ads looking for people to do this as an independent contractor.

42. Offer authors your ability to edit their work.

43. Find people who need large amounts of typing done and see if they will pay you to do it.

44. Find students who need tutoring in areas in which you are comfortable.

45. Start a self-publishing service and market your service to authors.

46. If you have specialized programming skills you can teach classes on these or people will hire you to write programs for them.

47. Offer to do family history and genealogy for people. Many people are interested in this but do not have the time and you can use your library and research skills to do it effectively.

48. If you are comfortable with a foreign language, you can either- teach lessons, tutor, do translations or prepare English summaries of books and materials written in foreign languages for people.

49. Master how to use many of the common library databases and then you can find people who would be willing to pay you to learn how to use them.

50. In short, find a need and see how you can fill it.

Do a few of these well and you may find yourself not only earning a livable income but paying off credit and student loans at the same time.

Do you have social networking skills that you have used in your job as a librarian? Or are you trained as a librarian but you are unemployed or underemployed because you can’t find a job? This is unfortunately a common situation for many people, including me. I only have a part time job and therefore, one of the reasons for writing this blog, to earn an extra income.

There are many ways you can use your social networking skills combined with your library expertise to earn an extra income online from home or in an alternative career. Here are some ideas for you:

1. Join a network marketing company and promote it online.
2. Work as a library consultant for an organization or corporation.
3. Start a popular library blog and make money with the adsense and other ads on it.
4. Sell info products online.
5. Work for a book publisher.

Find more ideas on how to profit from your library skills at
Library Jobs.

Learn more about what I am doing to make money using my library skills at Librarians Make Money Online.