At the end of the day, there's no easy money to be made anywhere - online or offline. You still need to put serious work into it all - and maintain that. There are great success stories out there - but more often than not, these people have sweated buckets and put more effort into their online work in one day than many people put into a a salraied post in a week. Success is 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration, as they say.
Generally, as a rule of thumb, you get out what you put in.
2c.
