Industry Tips

How to Earn a Living Without Leaving Your Home: Investing in Online Games

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from G2G


Anyone that has ever played a multiplayer game will know that the markets are cutthroat. This is most present in games such as WoW and other MMORPGs. But what if rather than just investing in the virtual auction house, you could make a living outside of the game by being a virtual assets reseller?

Sounds too good to be true, right? After all, so many people fail to even get rich in-game, let alone outside of it.

We’ve already made hundreds of virtual asset resellers. If you aren’t sure how to turn your in-game money into cold, hard cash, then get ready!

Is it realistic to start making money by selling currency in video games?

Millions upon millions of people today are playing MMORPGs. Most of these are highly competitive, committed players that are willing to sacrifice in order to get the tiniest edge. Pretty much everyone is willing to pay some money for a chance at getting stronger.

If you’re focusing on game currency, then your first step is to find a product that’s in high demand. This is what you’re going to be looking to sell. For example, you wouldn’t want to go for a 1/1000 chance mount like WoW’s Invincible; rather, you should look for something that sells well, but isn’t too hard to get to either.

Now, most in-game currencies are balanced so that it’s quite difficult to earn them. After all, this is what makes it so that they have any value in the first place. This might look like a hindrance at first; however, it is a blessing in disguise. All you’ll have to do in order to make your video game empire is pay attention to the tips laid out here and play the game the correct way.

Popular strategies & tips

Ensure that you have people that can help you get your hands on a lot of in-game currency at all times. While it’s entertaining to be hunting deals by asking individual players, guilds, or grinders, this is extremely inefficient. Rather, you should find a seller who you can always rely on. So, where can you find this kind seller?

  1. Most games have a healthy population of gold-selling bots. These are bots that are usually found in China or India, and they automatically farm in-game gold. They tend to be willing to sell it for very low prices; however, do note that this can get you banned. The best strategy to use here is to buy gold off an alt (an alternate account), and then trade this back to your main account.
  2. Joining a guild isn’t too bad of an idea either. Guildmates are generally quite helpful to their peers, which is great when it comes to trading gold for money. They will probably offer you their in-game currency for almost nothing. Also, pay attention to anyone quitting the game, as they’ll often give away their entire inventory.

Okay, you’ve got your gold. What now?

Now you invest it. There are two kinds of items you’ll want to invest in:

  • Rare items: These are items that require a lot of grinding to get to – those that you know will only increase in value as time goes on. These are usually end-game boss rewards. Alternatively, get all cool-looking limited-time items. Items that are only available for a limited amount of time are extremely likely to spike up in price. Sometimes, when an item is rare enough, you might be able to do a complete buyout (buying every copy on the market). And then you can set the price yourself.
  • High-end crafting items: Most MMOs feature crafting as a central part of their game mechanics. However, it isn’t always easy to get the materials to level up your crafting skills. These players are also those that usually don’t enjoy grinding much, hence they’ll be willing to pay a small premium to not have to actually fight monsters to get their goods. This is an especially lucrative method during the first days of a new expansion.

Once you’ve got these, you’re set! Just buy low, sell high, and you’ll be rolling in dough in no time!

How about other ways to earn?

Selling stuff isn’t the only way you can make money in games, believe it or not.

As we’ve already mentioned, guilds are quite tribal in nature, meaning a guildmate will much sooner buy something from you than some random guy on the auction house. When you’re trusted enough in your guild, you can start making lots of money by being somewhat of a “bank” for your guildmates. By buying in-game currency when its value is low, and selling it back when a new expansion releases, you’ll make huge profits. You could even offer loans, for either in-game or real-life currency. These are two great ways to make sure you’re getting the most bang for your buck.

Using an online marketplace like G2G.com is a great way to compare prices of virtual goods online. You’ll want to remember that no matter how alluring an offer might be, if it isn’t coming from a trusted site, you’ll want to pass on it.

Ideally, rather than competing with all other resellers in a wide-open market, you’ll want to find your own niche where you can make a monopoly. This will make it much easier to earn, as you won’t have to be looking at every move your competition makes.

What else can I sell?

Even though so far, we’ve focused mostly on MMORPGs, they aren’t the only kind of game where you can make money. If you’re good at a popular game (say, a MOBA like League of Legends), then you can even sell boosting services – this is basically a way of saying you’ll play with a player (or on their account) in order to increase their in-game rank.

In MMORPGs, you can assemble a squad of guildmates, and offer to guide new guilds and parties through difficult raids for a profit. This is also quite lucrative, as you still get the raid rewards as well.

You can also sell max-leveled accounts. You’d be surprised at how many people are too lazy to level to the endgame. By leveling multiple accounts by using a bot (making sure to not connect this account to your main), you can have hundreds of max-level accounts to sell in no time.

Getting paid with Payoneer

So, this is all fine and dandy, but if you can’t withdraw your money, it’s rather pointless, isn’t it?

Luckily, online marketplaces like G2G.com offer you a variety of ways to get paid. G2G’s recent partnership with Payoneer makes it easier for you to withdraw your hard-earned funds online and transfer it to your bank account. Payoneer has proven to be a reliable, solid choice for online entrepreneurs and is one of the most popular global payment platforms out there.

Here’s our quick guide on withdrawing funds from your G2G account into your Payoneer account!

G2G Solution Suite provides a comprehensive online marketplace solution for gamers to buy and sell anything gaming related. We offer a revolutionized online transactions platform that is fully governed and secured by GamerProtect; where both sellers and buyers can enjoy an absolute peace of mind.

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