5 Perfect 'Spare-Time' Online Businesses

With all the doom and gloom news about the economy, there's never been a better time to make an extra paycheck online with a minimal amount of time and effort.

If you have an internet connection, you can get started on the road to having the internet pay for your mortgage, car payment, kids' college tuition, or even that special vacation you've wanted. Now, don't worry that you have to be a tech whiz to start a business online--I'm a complete techno-dunce.

A perfect part-time business would have to be very easy to start, require little time and money and no technical expertise, be easy to maintain with just a few hours a week and have a proven track record with a high probability of success.

There's actually one other important criteria--it has to be perfect for you! Experience has taught me that it's different strokes for different folks, and there is no "one size fits all" perfect business. You're much more likely to be successful if you do something you find fun and interesting.

With that in mind, here are five of the best ways to make extra cash moonlighting on the internet:

1. Information marketing:We're in the information age, and the internet provides you with the ideal medium to exchange know-how for money. Do you know the best fishing holes? How to play guitar? The secrets to a successful marriage? A recipe for moist and delicious brownies? A trick for saving gas?

Think about your career, your hobbies and your interests. Virtually anything you know can be turned into extra cash. And don't worry if you think you're not an expert--as long as you know more than the average person on the topic, that information is valuable.

However, if you don't believe you know anything that others would pay for (highly unlikely), you can take someone else's know-how and make money that way! It could be as easy as interviewing a veterinarian to help you create a dog-training product.

Ninety-two percent of people go online looking for information, and you could be one of the many people cashing in on selling it.

2. eBay:One of the largest online marketplaces makes it a piece of cake to get your own business going. You can open an account and start making money within hours on eBay!

While I dislike that whole "sell your garbage on eBay" thing, there is some validity to it as many people get their start on eBay by selling items from their garage or attic that pre-eBay would have been thrown out. This approach is fine, but where is the business once you run out of those items? If you want to create an eBay business that doesn't require tons of time and effort, you need to leverage products that can be sold over and over again.

This is one of the reasons I'm not a fan of the "eBay seller for hire" kinds of opportunities, where you sell things on eBay for other people. You get access to stuff people want to sell, but because each item is unique you have to work to list each and every one. There's no leverage there!