Built a shopping browser extension — now stuck on how to actually make money

Browser extensions are easy for users to install but notoriously hard to monetize. For shopping extensions, the most common revenue approach is affiliate marketing — earning a percentage when a user buys something through your link — but giants like Honey and Rakuten already dominate that space, making it tough for newcomers to get meaningful traffic. Charging a subscription fee runs into the 'why pay for something that used to be free?' problem, and inserting ads into a shopping tool tends to erode user trust quickly. The underlying challenge is that the value the extension delivers has to be unmistakably clear before users will pay for it in any form. Niching down to a specific product category or audience — rather than competing head-on with established players — is often the more realistic path for indie builders.