How to Make Money on Reddit: Why Most People Fail

Reddit is one of the most powerful traffic sources on the internet — 1.2 billion monthly visitors, 100,000+ active communities, and an audience that actually reads long-form content. For anyone trying to make money online, that sounds like a goldmine.

It’s not. At least, not the way most people approach it.

Reddit’s community has a visceral hatred of self-promotion. Drop an affiliate link in a subreddit, and you’ll be banned within hours. Post a thinly veiled product recommendation, and you’ll be downvoted into oblivion. Create an account that does nothing but promote your business, and Reddit’s spam detection will shadow-ban you before your second post.

The people who actually make money from Reddit understand something fundamental: Reddit doesn’t pay you directly. It pays you indirectly — through traffic, credibility, and audience building that you monetise elsewhere. The platform is the funnel, not the cash register.

I’ve spent 15+ years evaluating income methods. Reddit can generate real revenue — but only through strategies that most “how to make money on Reddit” guides get completely wrong. Here’s what actually works.

First – A Reality Check…

Hey, my name is Mark.

After 15+ years testing income methods, I’ve found that Reddit is one of the best free traffic sources available — if you understand its culture. But building income through Reddit requires patience, authenticity, and a monetisation strategy that lives outside the platform.

The best method I’ve found for building recurring income is local lead generation. I build simple 2-page websites that show up in Google and generate leads for local businesses. Each site pays $500–$1,200 monthly, recurring, with 92–97% margins.

Go here to see the exact system I use to do this.

My business partner James built a system for people targeting $3,000–$5,000 monthly. But first — how Reddit monetisation actually works.

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What Reddit Is

Reddit is a social platform organised into communities called subreddits — each focused on a specific topic. r/personalfinance discusses money. r/entrepreneur covers business building. r/beermoney shares small earning opportunities. There are subreddits for virtually every interest, profession, hobby, and niche imaginable.

Content is posted as text, images, links, or videos. Users upvote or downvote content, which determines visibility. High-vote content rises. Low-vote content disappears.

Karma is your accumulated upvote score. Higher karma signals credibility and unlocks posting privileges in certain subreddits. You earn karma by posting content the community values.

Reddit has over 1.2 billion monthly visitors and 110+ million daily active users. But unlike Instagram or TikTok, Reddit users are deeply skeptical of marketing and aggressively hostile toward perceived self-promotion. This shapes everything about how monetisation works on the platform.

How Monetisation Works on Reddit

Reddit doesn’t have a meaningful creator fund, ad revenue sharing, or direct monetisation for most users. Money comes from using Reddit as a traffic and credibility engine.

Method 1: Traffic Funneling to Your Own Assets

Build credibility in relevant subreddits through genuine participation. Share valuable content that naturally references your website, blog, or email list. Interested users visit your external properties where you monetise through ads, products, services, or affiliate marketing.

Method 2: Freelance Client Acquisition

Subreddits like r/forhire, r/freelance, and r/slavelabour function as job boards. Post your services (writing, design, development, marketing) and find paying clients directly. Rates on r/forhire typically range $15–$50/hour.

Method 3: Product Sales

Subreddits like r/Entrepreneur, r/smallbusiness, and niche communities allow product discussions. Build genuine relationships first, then introduce your products when contextually relevant.

Method 4: Reddit’s Contributor Program

Launched in 2023, this program pays users for creating popular content. Participants earn based on gold awards their posts receive. Most participants report $50–$500/month. Requirements include account good standing, consistent posting history, and program acceptance.

Method 5: Selling Digital Products via Reddit Traffic

Create free value-dense posts that demonstrate expertise. Include a link to your profile, which points to your website or product page. This indirect path respects Reddit’s culture while building sales.

Subreddit Rules: Why Most People Get Banned

Every subreddit has its own rules, enforced by volunteer moderators. Violating these rules results in post removal, temporary bans, or permanent bans.

Universal rules: No spam (Reddit defines this as repeated self-promotional posts). No vote manipulation. No harassment. No posting personal information. Accounts that exist primarily to promote a product or service are considered spam accounts.

Common subreddit-specific rules: Many subreddits prohibit all external links. Others require minimum karma or account age before posting. Some ban affiliate links entirely. Many require specific post formats or flair.

Reddit’s 10:1 guideline: For every post that includes anything self-promotional, you should have at least 10 posts that are purely valuable community contributions with zero self-interest. Many moderators use this as a screening tool when evaluating whether a user is genuine or a marketer.

The consequences of ignoring rules: Moderators ban aggressively. Reddit’s site-wide spam detection catches promotional patterns. Shadow bans — where your posts become invisible to everyone except you — are particularly dangerous because you may not realize you’ve been silenced for weeks.

How to check if you’re shadow-banned: Visit reddit.com/u/[yourusername] in a private/incognito browser window. If it shows “page not found,” you’ve been shadow-banned.

The Traffic Funneling Strategy (What Actually Works)

This is the most sustainable approach to Reddit monetisation.

Step 1: Choose 3–5 subreddits in your niche. Read the rules carefully. Observe the culture for 1–2 weeks before posting anything. Understand what gets upvoted and what gets removed.

Step 2: Become a genuine contributor. Answer questions thoroughly. Share original insights. Provide real value without any expectation of return. Do this for 2–4 weeks minimum before any self-promotional content. Your comment history is public — moderators check it.

Step 3: Share original, high-value content. Write detailed text posts that genuinely help the community. Long-form text posts with actionable advice consistently outperform link posts on Reddit. If your content is valuable, users will naturally check your profile.

Step 4: Use your profile strategically. Reddit profiles allow pinned posts and bio links. Direct your bio to your website, email signup, or primary monetisation asset. Users who value your posts will check your profile organically.

Step 5: Create a content loop. Publish content on your website. Share a condensed, value-rich version on Reddit (not just a link to your blog). Interested readers visit your website for the full version. On your website, you monetise through ads, email capture, product sales, or affiliate recommendations.

The key: the Reddit content must stand on its own as valuable. If your post only makes sense as a teaser for your website, it will fail and may get you banned.

Affiliate Marketing on Reddit: The Careful Approach

Affiliate marketing through Reddit is possible but requires extreme care.

Direct affiliate links are banned in most subreddits. Posting “Check out this product [affiliate link]” gets you banned instantly in the majority of communities.

The soft funnel approach works. Create genuinely helpful content that mentions products you recommend. Link to your own review page (on your website) that contains the affiliate links. Reddit users visit your site, read your review, and some click through to purchase.

Disclosure is both ethical and practical. When recommending products, acknowledge your relationship. Transparency builds trust — Reddit users respect honesty about financial interests.

Subreddits where affiliate-adjacent content works: r/Deals, r/BuyItForLife (product recommendations), r/HomeImprovement (tool/product reviews), and niche hobby subreddits where product recommendations are natural to the conversation.

Karma Building Strategy

Karma is Reddit’s credibility currency. Without sufficient karma, you can’t post in many subreddits, and your content gets less visibility.

Comment before posting. New accounts should focus on helpful comments for 1–2 weeks before creating posts. Insightful comments in active threads accumulate karma quickly.

Target active subreddits. Comments in subreddits with millions of members get more visibility (and votes) than comments in niche communities with 10,000 members.

Sort by “new” and comment early. Being among the first comments on a post that later reaches the front page generates significant karma.

Share genuine expertise. In-depth, knowledgeable answers to specific questions consistently earn high upvotes. Reddit rewards demonstrated expertise.

Avoid karma farming. Reposting popular content, comment-harvesting bots, and vote manipulation violate Reddit’s terms and risk account termination.

Income Math Example

Reddit traffic funnel to a niche website (after 6+ months of consistent participation): Subreddit participation: 5 hrs/week Monthly Reddit traffic to website: 3,000–8,000 visitors Website monetisation: affiliate links + email list Affiliate conversion rate: 2–4% Average affiliate commission: $15–$40/sale Monthly affiliate revenue: $900–$4,800 (at scale)

More realistic beginner scenario (months 1–6): Monthly Reddit traffic to website: 200–1,000 visitors Affiliate revenue: $30–$200/month Email list growth: 50–200 subscribers/month

Freelance client acquisition via Reddit: Posts per week on r/forhire: 2–3 Client inquiries per month: 3–8 Conversion rate: 30–50% Average project value: $200–$1,000 Monthly freelance revenue: $200–$2,000

Reddit traffic compounds. A popular post can drive thousands of visitors in a single day. Consistent participation builds ongoing traffic. But the timeline to meaningful revenue is 3–12 months.

Reddit Monetisation Subreddits Worth Knowing

Subreddit	Members	Purpose	Earning Potential
r/beermoney	1.5M+	Micro-earning opportunities	$50–$300/month
r/forhire	900K+	Freelance job board	$200–$5,000+/month
r/Entrepreneur	2M+	Business discussion	Indirect (traffic/leads)
r/passive_income	500K+	Passive income strategies	Educational (indirect)
r/WorkOnline	600K+	Online work opportunities	$200–$2,000/month
r/flipping	400K+	Buy/sell for profit	$500–$5,000+/month
r/slavelabour	300K+	Micro-tasks and small jobs	$50–$500/month
r/freelanceWriters	200K+	Writing gigs	$200–$3,000+/month

Pros and Cons

What works: Massive free traffic potential (1.2B monthly visitors). Highly targeted audiences in niche subreddits. Long-form content performs well. High-quality discussion builds real credibility. Anonymous posting allows genuine sharing. Content can go viral with zero ad spend. Established subreddit communities trust insiders.

What doesn’t: Aggressive anti-promotion culture. High ban risk for any perceived self-promotion. Slow build — months of contribution before monetisation. No meaningful direct payment for most users. Community-dependent (moderators control everything). Algorithm changes affect visibility. Account reputation is fragile.

Reality Check: The Indirect Monetisation Problem

Reddit’s biggest strength — its anti-marketing culture — is also its biggest monetisation limitation. You can’t sell directly. You can’t promote aggressively. You can only build value, hope people click through to your external properties, and monetise there.

This makes Reddit a powerful traffic source for people who already have monetisation infrastructure (websites, email lists, products). For people without those assets, Reddit provides traffic to nowhere.

Understanding why most people fail at making money online includes the mistake of building audience on platforms you don’t own. Reddit traffic is borrowed — you don’t control the algorithm, the moderators, or the rules.

For the best online business to start, Reddit works best as a traffic channel for owned digital assets — not as a standalone income strategy. Realistic online income expectations from Reddit alone: $50–$500/month for most active users, $1,000–$5,000/month for those with established funnels and significant subreddit credibility.

Who Reddit Is NOT For

If you want direct income from a platform, Reddit doesn’t offer it meaningfully.

If you can’t invest 2–4 weeks of unpaid contribution before seeing any return, the slow-build nature will frustrate you.

If you’re uncomfortable with harsh feedback, Reddit users are brutally direct — and sometimes just brutal.

If you don’t have a website or external monetisation system, Reddit traffic has nowhere profitable to go.

If you can’t resist the urge to self-promote, Reddit’s culture will reject you before you gain any traction.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you make money directly on Reddit? Minimally. The Contributor Program pays some users for popular content, and freelance subreddits connect you with clients. But most Reddit income is indirect — traffic driven to external properties.

How much karma do you need to start earning? Varies by subreddit. Some require 100+ comment karma. Others require 1,000+. Building karma through genuine participation takes 2–4 weeks of consistent commenting.

Will Reddit ban me for promoting my business? If you do it aggressively or obviously, yes. If you build genuine community credibility and share your business contextually and transparently, the risk is manageable — but never zero.

What subreddits are best for making money? r/beermoney (micro-earnings), r/forhire (freelance work), r/Entrepreneur (business traffic), r/passive_income (strategy discussion), and niche subreddits aligned with your expertise.

How long until Reddit generates meaningful income? 3–6 months for freelance subreddit income. 6–12 months for traffic-funnel affiliate or product income. This is not a quick-money strategy.

Is Reddit better than other social platforms for income? For free organic traffic to websites, yes — Reddit’s traffic quality is high and audiences are engaged. For direct monetisation, platforms with creator funds (YouTube, TikTok) pay more directly.

Can I use Reddit to promote my YouTube channel or blog? Yes — but only if you’re a genuine community member first. Share individual pieces of content that provide standalone value. Never spam your channel link.

What’s the difference between Reddit and forums? Reddit’s voting system surfaces the best content automatically. Traditional forums rely on chronological posting. Reddit’s system rewards quality more aggressively, which makes it both harder to game and more rewarding for genuine contributors.

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Reddit generates income indirectly through traffic and credibility — not direct payments. Local lead generation builds assets paying $500–$1,200/site monthly, recurring, with 92–97% margins and no dependence on platform algorithms.

Click here to see how it works.

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The Bottom Line

Reddit is the internet’s most underused free traffic source — and its most dangerous one for self-promoters. The users are smart, the moderators are aggressive, and the culture rewards authentic value over marketing polish. Master that culture, build genuine credibility, and use Reddit as a traffic engine for your owned assets. Just don’t mistake the funnel for the revenue. Reddit delivers the audience. Your job is building something worth visiting.

Building Your Reddit Profile for Monetisation

Your Reddit profile is your storefront. Users who find your comments and posts valuable will check it — and what they find determines whether they become website visitors, customers, or followers.

Pin your best post. Reddit allows you to pin one post to the top of your profile. Make it your highest-quality content — a comprehensive guide, a detailed case study, or your most helpful resource. This post should include a natural link to your website or email signup.

Write a clear bio. Your bio appears on your profile and should communicate what you do in one or two sentences. “I write about personal finance strategies for freelancers. Full guides at [your website].” Keep it simple and informative — not salesy.

Maintain a consistent post history. Moderators and users review your post history before engaging with promotional content. An account that’s 90% helpful comments and 10% links to your own content looks legitimate. An account that’s 50% self-promotion looks like spam, regardless of content quality.

Use the same username across platforms. Consistency between your Reddit username, website, and other social media makes you discoverable and builds cross-platform credibility.

What Happens When You Get Banned (and How to Recover)

Bans are part of Reddit monetisation. Even careful, rules-following users occasionally trigger moderator action. Here’s what to do.

Subreddit bans (individual community): Contact the moderators via modmail, acknowledge the violation (if there was one), and politely request reinstatement. Some moderators reinstate after seeing genuine contrition and a posting history that shows good faith participation.

Site-wide bans: Appealing through Reddit’s ban appeal system is the only option. If your account is permanently suspended, you may need to start fresh with a new account — which means rebuilding karma from zero.

Shadow bans: These are the most insidious because you may not know you’ve been banned. Check regularly by viewing your profile in an incognito browser. If your posts appear normally but receive zero engagement for days, you may be shadow-banned.

Prevention is better than recovery. Follow the 10:1 ratio religiously. Read and respect every subreddit’s specific rules before posting. When in doubt about whether a post is too promotional, don’t post it. Building back a reputation after a ban takes significantly longer than building it the first time.