How to Make Money With Web Scraping

Last updated: May 15, 2023

The video by Cobalt Intelligence is about how to make money with web scraping, with the speaker sharing his personal experience and tips on selling data versus selling software.

The video is about how to make money with web scraping.

The speaker, Jordan Hansen, shares his personal experience of how he started making money with web scraping and gives tips on how to be successful in this field.

He talks about the stigma associated with web scraping and how it can be done ethically. He also emphasizes the importance of selling data rather than software and how recurring income from data scraping can be valuable.

Hansen shares his journey of starting his own business and how he used web scraping to achieve his goals.

Web scraping can be used to make money.
There are ethical ways to use web scraping to make money.
Selling data is more valuable and easier to maintain than selling software.
Identify a problem that web scraping can solve and focus on a niche.
Blogging can help improve web scraping skills and attract customers.
Selling data and building an API can be profitable.
Web scraping can be a way to start your own business.

How to Make Money With Web Scraping - YouTube

Introduction

The video is about making money with web scraping.
The speaker is Jordan Hansen from Wealth Intelligence.
Web scraping is a fringe software that is sometimes frowned upon.
There are ethical ways to use web scraping to make money.
The stigma around web scraping can create a moat for businesses.

Personal Experience

Jordan's first exposure to web scraping was building software for a friend's business leads.
He sold the software for $600, but it became a headache to maintain.
He eventually changed the software to a recurring data delivery service for his friend.
Selling data is more valuable and easier to maintain than selling software.
Jordan wanted to start his own business and used web scraping to do so.

Tips for Making Money with Web Scraping

Find a niche and pick a blog to focus on.
Identify a problem that web scraping can solve.
Build a scraper for yourself and sell the data.
Recurring data delivery is more valuable than selling software.
Be ethical in your web scraping practices.

How to Make Money With Web Scraping - YouTube

Conclusion

Web scraping can be a valuable tool for making money.
Selling data is more valuable and easier to maintain than selling software.
There are ethical ways to use web scraping to make money.
Web scraping can be a way to start your own business.
Identify a problem that web scraping can solve and focus on a niche.

Starting a Blog and Niche Down

The speaker decided to start a blog about web scraping.
He picked a niche and decided to focus on JavaScript web scraping.
He wrote blog posts every week and challenged himself with new things.
He posted on Reddit and offered to scrape data for free to use as content for his blog.
He got better at web scraping through blogging.

Selling Data and Selling Software

The speaker landed a real estate customer who hired him as a retainer.
He sold his time a little bit but also built processes that made it easy for him to work on.
He made money through sponsored blog posts and occasional contracting jobs.
He stumbled upon the Secretary of State and found data that he could sell.
He started cold calling and emailing people to sell the data.

Building an API

The speaker built an API called Cobalt Intelligence.
People could use the API to get data and pay him to use it.
They were leveraging his web scraping outsourcing instead of building their own scrapers.
The speaker learned a lot as he built these scrapers.
He found it pretty cool and thought it was a great time.

Summary

The speaker started a blog about web scraping and focused on JavaScript web scraping.
He got better at web scraping through blogging and landed a real estate customer who hired him as a retainer.
He made money through sponsored blog posts, occasional contracting jobs, and selling data.
He built an API called Cobalt Intelligence that people could use to get data and pay him to use it.

How to Make Money with Web Scraping

Create content through blog posts and videos to build credibility and get your name out there.
Use web scraping to improve your skills and become better at it.
Sell data instead of software as it is more profitable.
Find valuable and fresh data that can make someone money.
Sell the data as a service on a monthly basis.
Avoid selling custom software scrapers as it doesn't scale well and requires maintenance.

Watch the video on YouTube:
How to Make Money With Web Scraping - YouTube