You are gonna cringe when you read these 8 cheap things you forgot to add to your stockpile list.
First, what’s the whole deal with a food stockpile? Well, in times of emergency like when a worldwide pandemic hits, while grocery stores will still remain open, if you fall into a situation where you are quarantined at home or you don’t feel safe leaving your house, your stockpile will keep you and your family fed.
You don’t have to go crazy with this. A few weeks of supplies are perfect to help you hunker down and storm through it all.
If you didn’t see these 25 stockpile staples, I highly recommend you check it out.
But, wait.
You forgot some stuff?
Check out these 8 stockpile must haves that probably didn’t make your list, but should!
8 Cheap Stockpile Items You Forgot to Buy
1. Tampons
Ladies! Tampons and sanitary napkins (pads) are needed. Because that time of the month can hit while you are hunkered down in your pad and you want to make sure you have PLENTY of pads or tampons. This is something a lot of people probably forget. Don’t!
2. Handwash/soap/laundry detergent
You are washing your hands a ton. You should also wash your body often and your clothes. Especially when going out into the public and coming in contact with other people, germs, etc.
So make sure you have plenty of laundry detergent, soap, and handwash. This stuff will save ya!
3. Junk Food
What? Yes, junk food. You’d be surprised how boring stockpile food can get. So, make sure to have protein and granola bars, cookies, candies, all the junky stuff you may not normally get to enjoy. When you’re boarded up in your house, you can get restless and good food helps.
Ditch the diet stuff, and go for the junk. It sounds so weird to type this out, hehe. But, I loaded up my pantry with cookies, crackers, granola bars, and flour/sugar for recipes I can bake like sweet breads, etc.
Feeling stressed about visiting the grocery store?
Sign up to Instacart where you can snag SAME DAY grocery delivery from top grocers in your area.
Instacart is a total staple for my family and we use it to get delivery from Costco and HEB, but there are 8 other stores we can buy from too!
Don’t forget your pets! How awful to run out of pet food or cat litter, etc. Make sure you think about these special lil guys in your life and get pet stuff.
5. Drinks
A lot of people focus heavy on foods when they think stockpile list but drinks are super critical. Like, fruit juice, Crystal light and other instant drinks, coffee and tea. Can you imagine running out of coffee?!? Eek. I can’t! Make sure plenty of drinks are on your list.
6. Paper goods
Paper towels and paper plates, tissue, and other paper goods. You just wanna make sure you have enough.
7. Dish soap/Dishwasher fluid
You are washing dishes, maybe more than normal, especially if your kids are home because schools are closed and you and your partner are working from home.
You’ll be eating more at your place and thus, more dishes.
So get dish soap and dishwasher fluid!
8. Trash bags
You are gonna need to throw out waste, like normal. Don’t get caught in a pinch and make sure you got plenty of trash bags, my friend.
BONUS 9. Food Accessories
These are things like pickles, sauces, and the extras you eat alongside your food. Soy sauce, mustard, ketchup, etc. These are cheap enough and can really make or break a meal. Get these!
Final word
Boom! What do you think? If we forgot anything, comment below to let us know! And, if you want a full guide to get your family and pantry stocked well, check out this guide to get you started.
If you are wondering about how to land Instagram sponsorships, you are not alone. Instagram sponsorships are super desirable for influencers, bloggers, and YouTubers because they are lucrative, help you build lasting relationships with brand, snag free stuff, and get paid to Instagram! This article is going to share all about Instagram sponsorships!
You be wondering…
How to get Instagram sponsorship for small accounts?
How to get sponsors on Instagram?
What income is possible?
Is this income sustainable?
And, more questions!
Make sure you bookmark this post to save for later and if you can, give us a follow in Instagram! We’re growing this new social channel for us and we’d love to have your support!
How to Get Instagram Sponsorships?
First, you might be wondering, who the heck am I to give out Instagram advice. Especially since I have a super tiny following. Well, I’ve been in the influencer space for about 5 years, operating and selling dozens of blogs, that I have monetized in many ways, including with blog sponsorships.
I have monetized small blogs with Instagram sponsorships and helped others score blog sponsorship deals.
And before I was in the influencer space, I was running an ecommerce store. As a store owner, I worked intimately with tons and tons of influencers. I collaborated with bloggers and influencers, hosted and participated in events, giveaways, roundups, blog hops and more! Influencers were one of the chief reasons my store reached $30,000/month in sales!
The truth is, getting Instagram sponsorships is a lot easier than you might think.
Here’s how it works.
How Do You Get Sponsored on Instagram?
An Instagram sponsorship is where you, the influencer, partners with a brand to collaborate on Instagram.
The collaboration is a feature where you, the influencer features the brand on your Instagram feed, showcasing their product and/or service to your followers. And, the brand pays you to do this.
Brands recognize this and they’re willing to pay for exposure to an influencers audience.
So, that’s where Instagram sponsorships come into play.
Furthermore, microinfluencers are becoming more and more popular. They have better engagement and a closer connection with their audience that large million-follower influencer accounts. Microinfluencers can snag brand deals up to $10,000 per post (or more)!
It’s really incredible.
How Many Followers Do You Need For Sponsors?
You can get sponsored with as little as 500 followers. 500 loyal followers might not seem like a lot, but it’s 500 people. Think about how many people that is. For me, it’s just slightly larger than my high school graduating class. And, those followers are loyal.
So, 500 minimum up to an unlimited number of followers for Instagram sponsorships to work, though I’ve seen bloggers with less than 500 followers get brand deals too!
How Do You Get Sponsored?
You need to connect with a brand.
You can do this by contacting them.
Waiting for them to contact you.
Or, partnering with sponsored networks.
So, these are the most effective ways to get brand deals, without having to spy on your blog competitors (though this works too).
Contacting them is the most proactive approach. Make a list of brands you wanna work with. Find their email address, shoot them an email and wait to hear back.
Next, you can wait on brands to contact you. Many influencers do this and it’s more hands off than the first approach, though a less steady stream of potential income.
Lastly, there are sponsored networks. These are free to join and connect you with brands who want sponsorships.
All these routes work. You can be successful with them all. And, be on your way to getting paid with Instagram sponsorships.
How Do You Get Paid to Promote Brands?
Brands pay in multiple ways, from:
Direct deposit
PayPal
Venmo
Gift cards
Free products
Store credit
You want to try to get cash for brand deals. So, direct deposit, PayPal and Venmo are the most desirable ways to make money with Instagram sponsorships or brand deals. If you’re smaller, you may get offers for free product or store credit. This is fine too, but with my guidance, I can show you how to get paid cash every single time.
Check out Brand Blogger Sponsorships, my PAY WHAT YOU WANT training course where I show you how to get those brand deals from Instagram and other places to monetize your influence.
Sign up and gain a great foundation on:
How sponsorships work
Tools/resources required to be successful
How to land your first sponsorship in 30 days or less
Sponsorships and how they work for microinfluencers and nanoinfluencers
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To make the most money blogging I highly recommend that you monetize your blog with affiliate marketing. And if you want to earn the most blogging with affiliate marketing, you have got to take Michelle‘s making sense of affiliate marketing training.
After I took this course, within 2 to 3 weeks I made 10 times my regular monthly affiliate income going from around $80 per month to over $800 the next month.
You’ll find tons of great information, support, access to other students who have taken the training and she does a really excellent job of updating the content and material in the course. Highly recommended.
Click this link to take a look at the training and if you buy using my affiliate link, contact me and I’ll send you $50 off one of my courses, your pick!
From designing your blog graphics to customizing your email header or creating pins for Pinterest, you’ll find everything that you need and design software from Canva.
Canva is one of the best resources for blogging and it’s totally free.
I have been using the software for over two years now and absolutely love it. If you have no design skills at all you can totally make smashing graphics using Canvas easy-to-use software. They have an app too and I use it to design on the go on my cell phone and iPad.
Looking for the best ways to save on utilities? There are many easy ways to save money on your utility bill. And, you’re in luck! We’re going to shine light on 7 amazing ways to help you save big on your utility bill. These ideas are easy to execute, you can start today, and see a lower utility bill starting next month.
Keep reading to learn how to save on your utilities and bookmark this article to read for later!
How to Save Money on Utilities
You can save money on utilities.
And, these simple changes will help you put money back in your wallet. Try these tactics and put them into habit so they can become routine for you and your family.
How would you feel if you could take your $200 electricity bill and bring it down to $80 or lower!
I did this! And I will show you exactly how.
You just need a little effort, consistency, and you can do it. Here we go!
7 Ways to Save on Utilities
Save money on your utilities. This is how you do it!
1. Unplug Appliances Not Used
Have you heard of this one? Sounds easy. Maybe too easy to be true but it totally is.
When not in use, unplug those appliances! Because when they’re plugged in, you’re still using power, believe it or not. It’s called vampire energy.
Examples of vampire energy:
Your toaster sitting on your kitchen counter plugged in
Your TV plugged in when you’re away for the day at work
Your can opener or bread maker plugged in or your computer and printer hogging energy when you’re not using them
This is one you can try starting today and it will make a sizable impact!
How to Do it?
Go room by room.
Next, unplug.
That’s literally it.
Here are some examples appliances and devices you might have plugged in:
Coffee brewers
Toasters
Icecream machines
Bread makers
Video game consoles
DVD players
Slow cookers
Priners
Fax machines
There’s more than this too!
Make an effort on this one and you will see your utility bill shrink.
2. Invest in Smart Power Strips
A smart power strip is what you need. It lets you connect all your electronics to a single strip of outlets. When you want to turn it all off, flip the switch and all devices that are plugged into the strip instantly turn off.
Super easy.
This one from Amazon is a favorite. It can sit on your desk or counter! This is sitting on my computer desk right now!
3. Switch to a Programmable Thermostat
When you’re at work during the day, your home can be warmer. In the evening when you are home, your house can be cooler. And this can be programmed super easily with a programmable thermostat.
It’s a stylish programmable thermostat that can be run using your smartphone!
Big money saver. Try this one.
4. Time Your Water Usage
Limit showers.
Don’t run the water while brushing your teeth.
These are just a few things you can do to limit water usage and save money on your water bill.
And, if you EVER have a broken toilet. Make sure to get it fixed ASAP.
In my old place, I had a broken toilet and let it go way too longer before it got fixed. Little did I know that while the toilet was broken, it was running water, 24/7.
My water bill was 7X the normal price the next month.
Waste of money.
Don’t let this be you. Tend to this if it ever happens in your home.
5. Keep Your Home Cool and Well-Decorated with Curtains or Blinds
Curtains. Blinds. Get them. Use them.
Not only are they stylish and can totally transform your space but, they also help keep your energy costs down.
Regulate the temperature in your home better with window coverings. Try this, it works!
6. Energy-Efficient Light bulbs
Try LED bulbs or green-friendly light bulbs. These use less energy and last longer. That means less time throughout the year worrying about replacing bulbs.
7. Call Your Utility Company
Don’t be shy. Reach out to your utility provider to see if they can save you money.
This can include promotions on rates, free money-saving equipment, and more.
You want to make $1000 a month. You’re not alone. A lot of people are looking for ways to make more money. Did you know that most of the American public lives paycheck to paycheck? Really, most Americans struggle financially.
You want to make more money. You want to make $1000 a month, but not sure how to get there.
You’re in luck! I’ve been reviewing and researching side hustles for nearly a decade. It all starts back when I was at my corporate job. I was making good money. And, I wasn’t living paycheck to paycheck but I wanted more.
I wanted to grow my savings, eventually buy a house one day, and not have a worry about finances. So, I started my hunt for side hustles and ways to make extra money.
Here are 10 ways to make $1000 a month that you can start this week. Enjoy.
1. Ecommerce
This is one of the things that I did when I was working my 9 to 5. My ecommerce brand became so successful, it actually helped me leave my day job and run the business full time.
I reached $30K per month in it’s peak, with 50,000+ monthly page views.
Also, made a lot of friends in the ecommerce community. I learned a lot. I made a lot. Life was good. I was finally living my life as an entrepreneur.
How did I do it?
I started by picking a niche. Your niche is your category. What will you sell?
Fashion
Home goods
Food
Baby stuff
Toys
Shoes
The list goes on and on and on. Pick something. Then, find suppliers.
Figure out how you will get your supply. Will you make it? Will you need to find a manufacturer or wholesaler?
I did wholesale and I used places online to fuel to my store, like:
Then, you launch your store. Go with Shopify. This is who I went through. They are A+ and have everything you need to run a successful store:
Gorgeous, professional paid and free themes for your store
Access to experts to help you with customer service, marketing, fulfillment, etc.
An app store with free and paid apps for everything under the sun, like marketing, customer service, email marketing, etc.
Right now Shopify has a 14-day free trial. If ecommerce is something you want to try. Give it a test drive and see how you like it. You will NOT be disappointed, trust me.
2. Blogging
Start a blog, like this one, Millennial Nextdoor.
Write about your passion. Make money online. Connect with an audience. It’s really awesome.
On my Tik Tok, I just featured this college blogger who makes $30K+ per month as a blogger.
She just graduated college and she’s already making six figures. She started her blog while in college and it blossomed beautifully. Follow me on Tik Tok to see more business tips and business/blogger spotlights!
You can start a free blog, like on Medium. But, if you want to make the most money with blogging and establish a professional name for yourself as a blogger, you’ll need web hosting.
I recommend Siteground for web hosting services. They offer affordable hosting, at $3 to $6 per month. And, their service is incredible. I’ve talked to their chat team a few times and they are on point! Siteground is who I use for my blog, by the way.
This blog, Millennial Nextdoor, is actually like my 20th-something website, I think.
I do website flipping on the side. So, I have tons of experience creating sites.
My first blog grew to $1,400/month in under a year and I sold it for a cool $12,000!
I will teach you all my tips and tricks for growing a blog. Make sure to bookmark Millennial Nextdoor so you can keep up with all my updates and new blog posts!
I’ve made tens of thousands of dollars freelance writing. I’ve probably made six figures by now. I started taking freelance writing jobs more frequently starting last year. I made nearly $30K from it in 2019 and it was on the side!
If you love writing, get paid for it!
You can charge $.02 to $.05 per word as a beginner.
This means, if you have 3 clients writing 10,000 words/month each, you can earn this much:
10,000 words * $.05/word = $500 times 3 clients = $1,500!
And, you might shiver at 10,000 words, but it really isn’t that much content.
Here are some tips to crank out quality writing work quickly:
Try dictation: this is where you speak aloud and have your computer type what you’re saying. It’s a free feature on Google Docs!
Make an outline for your writing-this helps you write so much faster
Use Google-look at those “People Also Ask” questions and use those in your writing. It’s great for SEO. See screenshot below.
They are super cheap with plans starting at just $9/month.
Or, get on Amazon!
Sell on KDP and be on Amazon’s platform with your book available for sale to the public.
6. Sell Courses
Courses are another great alternative to making $1000 a month! You can price your course at $200 and only need 5 sales per month to meet your $1,000 goal!
Credit is something that you definitely need in life.
It affords most people the ability to buy house and buy a car as well as finance other large expenses and sometimes even unexpected costs that can arise.
Even if you have no plans to make a large purchase in the near future it’s still a great idea to make sure your credit is in check. There are so many little things that can impact your credit and often times you may be unaware Of these things impacting your credit score.
A high credit score of forts you a low interest-rate and a low payment where as a low credit score can mean the exact opposite and sometimes not even qualifying for that purchase you’re looking to make.
So with a choice of paying more or paying less, of course you want to pay less in to do that you want to make sure that you have the best credit score possible.
So take a look at Credit firm, which is a company that can help you review and improve your credit. It’s really great to have experts on your side and to take away the overwhelm and stress of trying to manage your credit on your own.
If you’re in a pickle and looking to make a few hundred dollars extra this month, look at online panels. I’ve done multiple panels, earning $100+ for each one. They are free to join and pay anywhere from $40 to $400+.
The most I’ve earned has been $400 on a single panel. It’s like taking a survey but you’ll be doing it interview-style, talking to the researcher on the phone, via email or online.
Did you know that you can save money on your online shopping? It’s like getting paid to shop. All you do is install the free cashback browser extension from Rakuten and you’ll get a popup when you land on a partner retail website. Click “Activate” to activate your cashback and after checkout, it will be applied to your Rakuten account. I earned around $28 very quickly after joining.
It’s not part-time income kind of money but it is extra money that you can get absolutely free, for doing what you’re doing anyway, online shopping.
Acorns helps you invest your spare change on autopilot. They round up your purchases and invest the difference for you. It’s fully automated investing, right at your fingertips. Take control, grow your money and more. This is one of my favorite investment companies.
Looking for an online bank? Today, there are so many available, it’s tough to pick one.
I joined Chime within the last 6 months and I absolutely love them!
They send me daily balance notifications, alert me when a charge is declined, they have savings accounts and much more. I love their overdraft protection feature and it’s easier than ever to transfer money to friends and family. Their apps is one of the most streamlined, easy-to-use online banking apps I’ve encountered.
I found them through a discussion in a Facebook group I was spying on. It was a business group and the discussion was about how the girls in the group used Chime for their business banking for their sole proprietorship and it’s helped them separate business and personal expenses.
It’s a great use for that and also perfect for your personal banking.
ProfileMate helps you learn from the competition. For influencers, small businesses, agencies, marketers, and more, you’ll be able to do in depth analysis of your Instagram competition. Easy to use.
Keysearch is the last tool you’ll use for keyword research. Quickly and easily locate keywords for your copywriting and publishing projects.
You read that right, over 100K subscribers on YouTube in less than 6 months!
Your burning questions:
How did I do it?
Did I use tools?
Did I buy followers?
What’s my niche?
What’s my channel?
Let’s dive so I can share all the details. I hope this inspires you to grow your own YouTube channel or start one. I really think video is the next big thing. I feel like people are slowly moving away from blogs and turning toward podcasting and video content.
If you don’t have a YouTube channel, it’s a free way for you to grow your business, make money, and gain an audience.
Here’s how I did it!
My Background with YouTube
I’m no YouTube guru. You may know me from flipping websites or teaching people how to grow Pinterest or master dropshipping. I’ve done a ton of different business projects over the past 10 years. I have gotten really good at a lot of things, but I haven’t mastered it all.
And, YouTube was one of those things I did NOT master.
Until now.
I was always captivated by YouTube and now, watch it more than TV.
It’s so incredible all the stuff you can learn for free on YouTube. Not to mention, it’s super satisfying (for me at least) to watch people clean their house, bake sweets in their kitchen, take you with them on a shopping haul, and more.
I started this channel a few years ago and it’s had slow and steady growth.
It seems so easy just to pop up videos on YouTube but the truth is, it takes a lot of work.
One video can take up to 8 hours or longer to edit and publish to YouTube.
So that’s 8 hours of YOUR TIME put into YouTube video publishing and guess what, you probably won’t be getting paid for it anytime soon.
It takes commitment and consistency to make it with YouTube.
I see creators dedicate years to growing their platform and only seeing success 4-5 years into it!
While others can hit it big in just a few months.
Every channel is different and it takes a blend of all the right ingredients to create a flourishing, growing channel.
How to Grow a YouTube Channel Fast
First, it takes commitment and consistency as shared above.
You will probably NOT be an overnight success but you’ve got to stick with it. I have seen so many channels really commit to creating videos and go from zero to $12,000/month in just a year!
Others going from zero subscribers to 50,000 in 3 months!
And, more!
You want to start by creating a schedule for yourself. Creating your content calendar is a big deal. Make a calendar for how often you will publish videos and stick to it. If you can stick your schedule up on your channel too (like in your channel art), that definitely can help your growth as well.
What goes into a blossoming channel?
SEO
Keywords
Great thumbnails
All of the above, and more.
First, SEO or search engine optimization helps your video get found in YouTube and Google.
You want to seed your video title and description with SEO keywords that match what people are typing into search when they’re searching for video content.
You can use tools like Tube Buddy to help you with SEO and keywords. They offer a free trial and if you like it, you can continue using the tool on a paid plan.
Next, great thumbnails help attract video watchers to click on your video.
You can create thumbnails for free or you can pay for them.
Free, you will use tools like Canva or PicMonkey and design the thumbnails yourself. You can also use Adobe Photoshop or Adobe Indesign, etc.
Paid, you will hire someone to create thumbnails for you. You can hire on Fiverr, Upwork, on social media, Craigslist and other places.
What do I do?
I do thumbnails myself. My thumbnails are not striking. They are super simple and I create them in about 2 minutes. I use a template and just swap out images for new videos. Easy.
My EXACT Strategy for Growing My Channel
First, I recognized that people are attracted to larger channels. If a video is available on a 50 subscriber account and a 5,000 subscriber account, you are more likely to click on the 5,000 subscriber account video.
It’s called social proof.
People see social media accounts with large followings, which validate their content, so that piques their interest and they want to join or view stuff from that creator.
So, after a dozen videos on a new channel, I bought 1,000 followers.
Eekk..yes I did it.
People always talk about frowning on buying followers.
It’s not for making money or getting traffic. It’s for social proof.
And that growth on the channel helped to improve views almost instantly.
It was $50 and the best investment I made.
Today, I make $300 to $400 per sponsored video, just a few months later!
And, I’ve had offers to buy as high as $3,500!
Next, I executed my content calendar, creating 3-4 videos per week.
Then, I rinsed and repeated.
Between then and now, I was able to make multiple videos go viral, with one reaching 17 Million views.
Final Word
You might be asking about what the channel is or my niche and unfortunately I cannot reveal it in this blog post. Whenever you reveal, people tend to copy you and become your competitors. I’m trying to minimize that as much as possible so while I can’t share the above, I hope this article has been helpful to you.
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To make the most money blogging I highly recommend that you monetize your blog with affiliate marketing. And if you want to earn the most blogging with affiliate marketing, you have got to take Michelle‘s making sense of affiliate marketing training.
After I took this course, within 2 to 3 weeks I made 10 times my regular monthly affiliate income going from around $80 per month to over $800 the next month.
You’ll find tons of great information, support, access to other students who have taken the training and she does a really excellent job of updating the content and material in the course. Highly recommended.
Click this link to take a look at the training and if you buy using my affiliate link, contact me and I’ll send you $50 off one of my courses, your pick!
From designing your blog graphics to customizing your email header or creating pins for Pinterest, you’ll find everything that you need and design software from Canva.
Canva is one of the best resources for blogging and it’s totally free.
I have been using the software for over two years now and absolutely love it. If you have no design skills at all you can totally make smashing graphics using Canvas easy-to-use software. They have an app too and I use it to design on the go on my cell phone and iPad.
You are gonna cringe when you read these 8 cheap things you forgot to add to your stockpile list.
