How to Add to Your Rideshare Income with Advertising

Author photoBy Hamed

As a rideshare driver, you want to make the most out of your time on the road. There are plenty of rideshare driver hacks you can use to earn more, but one of the most lucrative of these is to be paid for advertising.

Advertising acts as an additional passive income that takes little effort but gives your wallet a nice boost! Here are 5 ways you can harness the power of advertising to increase your rideshare income.

1. In-car Advertising 

In-car advertising acts as a fun activity for the ride or can be a helpful additional service for your passengers. Not only that, but having these little extras can also increase your tips and driver rating. All this while boosting your rideshare earnings at the same time. It’s a win-win!

In-car advertising takes many forms, from tablets to paper flyers, but the most popular are the back seat interactive video screens. The screens are attached to the headrest of the front seats and riders can choose to engage with them or not. Their unobtrusive design means there’s no risk of advertising negatively impacting your service. If there’s no harm done, then why not? 

There are multiple advertising companies out there offering a variety of in-car options for rideshare drivers. It’s just a matter of finding one you want to work with. One good option is Play Octopus, a gamified form of advertising on a tablet. Riders play the games for free with ads popping up at different stages of the game. The riders have fun, ads are seen, and you, as the rideshare driver, get points for every ride and for every game played. Hit your point target and you get cash. Simple!

2. Car Rooftop Advertising

Rooftop video screens and billboards are also a great rideshare advertising option. They are supplied and fitted by the advertising company so there are no costs incurred by drivers. 

San Francisco based startup, Firefly is one of the best paying rideshare billboard advertising companies out there just now. They will fit an LED billboard to the roof of your car and give you around $300 per month for the pleasure. 

3. Food and Necessities  

Back in the not-so-good-old-days, rideshare drivers would pay out of their own pockets to stock their backseat with tasty treats in a bid to get a 5-star rating or tips. Now, there’s no need to spend your own money and, what’s even better, you can now get paid to provide the exact same snacks. 

Cargo is an in-car vending machine of sorts, providing rideshare passengers with a variety of yummy and useful goodies while they make it from A to B and it doesn’t cost you a penny. 

You just head to the Cargo website, fill out an online application form and wait. Cargo will send you out your very own fully-stocked Cargo Box. You install the Cargo Box in your car and invite passengers to order products, while you get paid for each order. Sweet, right?

4. Car Wraps

You can also go the whole-car route with Wrapify. They will pay you to have your car completely wrapped in an advertisement. They will pay for the wrapping and then pay you a monthly fee, which can be anything between $250 and $450. The best thing about car wraps is that you don’t have to do anything at all, apart from getting the wrap! Once that’s on, you go about your rideshare business as normal and receive an extra payment while you’re at it.

5. Phone Apps

With technology constantly advancing, there are always novel ways to advertise, and Steereo is just one of them. Steereo is a new app, specifically made for the rideshare industry. They reach your passengers through the power of music! Drivers are paid to share new music during an active rideshare journey via the Steereo app, with each song minute earning you between $0.01-0.09. Music to our ears!

But, is advertising allowed?

In a word, Yes. As a rideshare driver, you are an independent contractor. Beyond the age of your vehicle and how many doors it has, Uber or Lyft have little say over your vehicle or how you choose to customize it. 

That said, car wrapping may cause you issues if you take your vehicle for inspection at one of the Uber hubs, BUT that’s just another reason why doing your inspection with Rideshare Mechanic is such a good idea!