Friday, March 27, 2009

How to Generate Permanent Passive Income Streams for Life

Last week, I traveled to beautiful San Diego for business and spent the day in a hotel restaurant that overlooked the harbor. With laptop in tow and cell phone in hand, I worked, without hassle.

As the sun set, I took a stroll and it occurred to me that technology and the crazy pace of our world has caused us to work 24/7. Life’s way too short for that.

But, Passive Income holds the answer.

Passive Income means that you earn money while you enjoy the beach, golf or the mall.

Pursue these 5 Ways to Generate Passive Income:

1. Real Estate Investing

Acquire a building; then you can collect rent. Other than maintenance and managing tenants (and you can outsource these activities if you like), rent is pure passive income.

2. Sales - Good Old Fashion Selling

As a longtime sales professional, I like this flavor of passive income. Depending on the commission plan, you can establish an account, close sales now, and earn commissions for years to come. The key to earning passive income is the “tail.” In other words, once you close an account, how long will the House pay you commissions?

3. Intellectual Property (copyrights and patents)

As a copywriter, I continuously create written materials. Once we publish a work we can earn profits for years. Consider my bestselling booklet ‘157 Ways to Cut Your Grocery Bill.’ We launched the original edition in 2002, which generated an instant increase in sales and still rolls in today. Once you do the work up front, you can earn money for years.

4. Ezines and Electronic Newsletters

My company newsletter, Publishing Gold, includes some kind of promotion in almost every issue. Sometimes we include the promotion in the Editor’s Note, and other times we include a Link at the bottom of an article. We also post our most popular articles on our Website and include the link to the sales page. These efforts generate effortless passive income.

Even if you are not a writer, you can find freelance writers at reasonable rates; in fact that is one of the services our company offers. Writers can create content for you; or they can ghostwrite, which means you become the author. You can search for “Freelance Writers” and “Ghostwriters” online.

You can find articles (content) for reprint by doing a search for “Article Directories,” “Ezine Content,” “Ezine Articles” and “Article Libraries.” Reprint content that will interest your audience. Be sure to get permission to reprint first, and print the author’s byline exactly as required (you’ll usually find the reprint requirements on the Websites).

5. Affiliate Programs on the Internet

Today, you can create your own passive income stream by creating a Website and offering products for sale. You don’t even have to create product; you can license or promote other manufacturers’ or distributors’ products. Become an “Affiliate” and then promote other companies’ products on your Site. When your members, subscribers or associates make a purchase, the company pays you a commission. With ecommerce, it’s easy and there’s no labor involved. All the work is completely automated online through a shopping cart or affiliate program. And that’s a beautiful thing.

Are you pressed for time? Short on funds and long on expenses? Looking to retire early with confidence?

Then Passive Income Holds the Answers for YOU.

How To Create Passive Income Streams

Lately, I have been meeting many business owners who have questions about multiple and passive income streams. These are business owners just like you - coaches, web designers, consultants and other solo professionals. They charge a very nice hourly rate, but when they are not working with clients, they don’t get paid.

How can you change this? How can you change this for your business, and make money continuously, whether or not you are working with clients. Would it improve your lifestyle and increase your profits if you could have consistent streams of income coming in from sales of your e-books and CDs, workshop bookings and commissions? These are called multiple income streams because they are in addition to you regular income stream, and they are called passive because you create many of the products once. Once you create them, you can replicate them and sell them in perpetuity.

Let’s look at different income streams that a business owner like you can generate:

- Digital products. As a professional who works with customers, you already know what your customers are interested in as well as the information they are looking for.

Turn this information into a sellable product by publishing and selling it. Depending on the topic and the information, you can create digital products of various lengths.

- Audio Products can be delivered in two different formats. They can be instantly downloaded from your web site any number of popular audio formats, or you could burn them onto a CD and physically ship the product.

Either way is a great way to go since many people like to listen to information instead of reading it.

- Teleclasses. Teaching classes over the phone is a good way to demonstrate your expertise to many people at once and to offer your coaching or consulting sessions at a lower price point.

Material taught and discussed during tele-classes can be re-used to create tips booklets, special reports and audio products.

- Workshops. Same as tele-classes, workshops can be used to teach to many people at once, instead of doing one on one sessions.

- Affiliate Programs. There are two different ways to use affiliate programs as another income stream:

1. Creating an Affiliate Program for your products, thus, sharing product products with people who refer new customers to you, and helping them create an additional income stream.

2. Recommending Other People’s Products, though their affiliate program, thus creating another income stream for yourself and your business.

As you can see, there are many ways for you to turn your expertise into products, and generate additional income with it. If you are just starting out, pick one or two different product types, and work on them. Than, add a few more, and you will have different income streams created in no time.

Make Money In Your Underwear With Passive Income

Every online dream begins with the vision of opening your email box and “like magic” the money comes rolling in. It’s true — building a passive income is your key to earning more money without working harder. While it’s unlikely you’ll earn millions overnight, building a passive income is a smart way to supplement your existing income. Here are some ideas for how you can build an automatic income source for your online business.

AFFILIATE PRODUCT PROGRAMS

Affiliate programs allow you to earn income selling other people’s products. There are literally THOUSANDS of affiliate programs that you can sign up for in every category imaginable. Whether you are interested in selling ebooks, toys, magazines, or kitchen utensils, I guarantee there is a shop in that category with an affiliate program.

Here are some criteria to use when selecting an affiliate program. Choose a quality product that you personally believe in. You need to actually try and buy the product yourself. This allows you to personally buy into what’s great about the product so you can write a killer personal testimonial. Additionally, try to find products that offer higher than average commissions. Why work your buns off selling a 5% commission product, when you can sell one that offers 30, 40, or even 50% commissions?

If a deal sounds too good to be true, it probably is. You can investigate a company by Checking them out with the Better Business Bureau in the business’ native state. http://search.bbb.org/search.html

CREATING YOUR OWN INFOPRODUCTS

What is your secret to success? Success sells, and if you have your own personal method to getting there, others will pay to hear it. That’s why ebooks on how to succeed are topping the sales charts. Ask yourself, “What you know that is special, unique, and could help others?” The answer to that will make a successful infoproduct.

=> Do you know how to:

fix something, find something, save something, do something more quickly, do it better,

do it more efficiently, do a greater amount of it, do it with greater quality, do it less expensively, do it more easily, do it more often, be happier doing it, do it automatically, or more effectively, take existing knowledge and apply to a new situation

RESELLER OF SERVICES

As a businessperson, your customers will often ask for recommendations for reputable service companies. This puts you in the perfect position to earn commissions reselling those goods and services. Make a list of all the services your customers use. For example, as a web developer my customers use hosting, merchant accounts, shopping carts, newsletter broadcasting services, and domain name vendors.

PARTNER COMMISSIONS

Do you recommend consultants services to others? Often my customers need assistance with proofreading, multi-browser compatibility testing, copywriting, virtual assistance, and animated graphics. I have sought out partnerships with companies in these key areas. When I refer a client to them, they pay me a referral fee and vice versa. Who do you know that you could create similar deals with?

ADVERTISING SALES

You may be sitting on valuable real estate and not even know it. If your web site gets lots of traffic or you have a popular ezine, you may be able to earn income through advertising sales. Some ideas for how to package your advertising packages can include banner ads, text ads, sponsorships, partnerships, paid classifieds or business directory listings. Another ideas is to create “co-branded” paid or free ebooks with advertising space.

REFERRAL NETWORK

Think about who your audience is, and then ask yourself, what other types of professionals have the SAME target audience. By creating your own referral network, you can charge businesses to become a member and agree to promote them to your audience. This is on the idea of how the 1-800-Dentist concept works. Dentists pay a fee to be part of the dentist network. When someone phones 1-800-Dentist asking for a dentist in their area, they look at their list of dentists and match you up with one bearing the qualifications you are seeking. Then 1-800 Dentist gets a small commission from the dentist for sending them a qualified customer.

For an idea of how this can work in a web application, you could create a preferred network of web developers. Web developing companies pay a small fee to be included in your referral network. Then offer an area on your site where people can search to find a web developer in their area. When a visitor signs up with one of the web developers in your network, you get a commission.

THE PAY PER INCLUSION CLUB

If you are an expert in your field, you can create a community where others can learn your secrets to success. By offering a free level of membership, you can allow visitors to poke around and see that you know your stuff. Then you can offer them a paid membership to your member’s only section. Internet Marketing Challenge is one such community built by Internet Marketers geared toward the aspiring entrepreneurial crowd. CoachVille by Thomas Leonard is another community built for the business/personal coaching audience.

SUMMARY

According to Think and Grow Rich, the wealthy of the world are people who have a brilliant idea that has changed the world. I believe that those who resell those brilliant ideas will become rich. Take advantage of the power of passive income and you too can be working less and earning more!

What’s Better Residual Income Or Passive Income?

Most of us have been taught to go to school and get an education. Ideally you graduate from high school and further your education through college or a trade school. Some go on to achieve their Masters or PHD allowing them to command more money for their time. Ultimately, one must choose what they intend to do for a career, earn a living and be productive in society. Not that you or anyone else needs a “diploma” in order to be successful but some would consider it to be a “marker” of discipline, as to whether one may finish the task or do the job required.

Residual income is known as money that is received on a regular basis from efforts already sown. Could be thought of as money that is “left over” from an initial purchase or ongoing installment. Its nickname or also known as (AKA) “mailbox money” and can be obtained by anyone, graduate or non graduate.

Usually to keep receiving residual income, one must still be “active” within the company or organization. Should they leave or break “policy”, you can expect to stop receiving any further residual money. Replacing the mailbox money with a final termination letter and ceasing any more paychecks as the residual return comes to an end.

Passive income is similar to residual income but with one major difference. With passive income you can now be an “inactive” party. Qualifying you to “retire” from your venture an yet still keep on receiving your expected paycheck. Not to be confused with a pension but giving you the freedom to maintain your preexisting standard of living, while NOT having to work for it (the paycheck) any longer.

You hear a great deal of individuals giving testimony to having a residual income, which is what most people strive to obtain and rightly so. This is to be expected when working within a home based business environment or any other self-earned income opportunity. However, if you can build your residual earnings into an ongoing passive income, you will be better off once you choose to STOP acting (or working) to get the paycheck.

Whether it be residual income or passive income, once you get a taste of either one you will most likely want to continue in this manor and grow it to unlimited heights. Allowing you to experience a lifestyle unlike others they may need to report to workplace at a certain time each day, week after week and year after year.

If you are currently representing a company or thinking of joining a company that offers residual income as a form of payment. You should check into their company policies and learn how your earned paycheck may be treated, should you choose to move on to another business opportunity. Losing a residual income after spending your time and energy creating it, could be devastating if you are not aware of its tenure ahead of time.

Create Passive Income with Ebooks and Special Reports

Information products are a hot commodity in the online marketplace, transforming traditional entrepreneurs into infopreneurs. Ebooks and special reports are two of the most basic forms of info products. They are relatively easy to create and distribute and best of all, these products can generate passive income—money you make while you sleep.

An ebook is an electronic book that can be downloaded to a reader’s computer or hand-held device. Special reports are similar, but typically shorter in length. Some savvy internet marketers sell special reports ranging in size from two to twenty pages. Ebooks tend to be more comprehensive, with page counts from twenty to three hundred.

If you’ve been thinking about cashing in on this trend, then follow these simple steps to get started.

Establish Your Expertise

Everyone is an expert at something. Whether you are great at writing financial reports, organizing a home or training hamsters, you have something to offer the public. Sure there may be other people out there with similar qualifications, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t room in the market for another expert. If you have a unique approach, you can compete with the best of them.

Building your expert status takes some effort. If you have special degrees in your field, a popular website, have published articles, been quoted by the media or given presentations on your topic, you are on the right track. If you don’t yet have these qualifications on your resume, start working on adding as many of these credibility-builders as possible.

Find Your Audience

You could write the most fascinating ebook on the planet, but your parents and friends will not be enough of an audience to make it worth your while. To be successful at selling ebooks and special reports, you must be able to reach a broad group of buyers. The best place to start is with a content-rich website.

For example, if you want to become an expert on dog training, your website should appeal to dog enthusiasts. To attract an audience, offer resources and articles that appeal to the dog-loving community. You can write your own articles or ask others to contribute content to your site. You can also locate articles available for reprint from sites like ezinearticles.com and ideamarketers.com. The key is to offer as much valuable information as possible. When your site visitors find value, they will be more interested in investing in the products you have for sale.

Communicating With Customers

One of the most effective ways to reach potential buyers is with an ezine. By sending a monthly or even weekly electronic newsletter, you accomplish several things at once: you get your name in front of your website visitors, you establish your credibility as someone who provides valuable information, and you can get your products in front of readers repeatedly. Studies show that the average consumer must be exposed to a product six to eight times before making a decision to buy. Your ezine can become a powerful tool for your information product business.

To capture subscribers to your ezine, provide a subscription link on every page of your website. You may want to offer a bonus, such as a complimentary special report or ebook, to entice visitors to sign up.

Create Your Products

Once your website is drawing traffic and your ezine is going out on a regular basis, you’re ready to create your first information product. First you must decide what topic to cover in your ebook or special report. Consider what information your site visitors want to know. Do you receive the same questions over and over? Answering those could be the basis of your first product. You could also survey your customer base to find out what interests them.

Once you know what your subject matter will be, then get to work on writing your first ebook or special report. It would be wise to have your content edited by either a friend or a professional so you can ensure you are delivering the best output possible. Don’t forget to include your website and contact information along with a copyright statement similar to the following:

Copyright © 2006 by Annie Author

Once your work is complete, you will want to convert it to a user-friendly format. Adobe PDF Creator software allows you to convert your document to PDF format which can be viewed on personal computers, Macintosh computers, and numerous handheld devices. You can also choose security settings to protect the contents of the document. If you don’t already own this software, you can visit www.adobe.com to convert up to five documents at no charge.

Automate the Sales Process

Once your finished product is ready to go, you will need to automate the sales process. You could add a link to your website and attempt to process payments and deliver your info products manually, but this will only leave you and your customers frustrated. One of the benefits of info products is the instant gratification. When a customer makes a purchase, he wants to access the product immediately instead of waiting for you to check your email and deliver the goods.

There are a variety of online merchant systems available and one such solution is offered by www.payloadz.com. This service manages the sales and delivery of electronic products. You can upload your file to Payloadz and create shopping cart buttons that can be placed on your website. When a customer makes a purchase, Payloadz will handle collecting the payment (which is processed via Paypal), and will send the buyer a link to download the product from their server. All you have to do is sit back and wait for the cash to hit your bank!

Market, Market, Market

Once your product is created and the sales and delivery process automated, your focus should be on marketing. Few businesses can be successful without marketing, and information products are no exception. Here are some ways to market online without breaking the bank:

*Publish articles in related industry publications and websites.

*Publish articles through content sites such as ezinearticles.com.

*Write a book. Being an author is an instant boost to your credibility and a book can open the doors to a variety of opportunities such as media appearances and speaking engagements.

*Form strategic alliances with website owners in your industry. Trade links to each other’s sites, swap ads in your ezines, or partner on a project or event.

*Be everywhere. Participate in teleconferences, internet radio interviews, blogs, and industry-related forums and chat rooms.

As your business grows, continue to evaluate what your customers want to know and develop products to meet those needs. Remember that it’s much easier to fill a need than to create one. And if you can do just two or three things each day to market your business, it shouldn’t be long before your website traffic and product sales exceed your wildest dreams.

Enjoy Multiple Streams of Passive Income Every Day from Joint Ventures

Instead of pushing your business card at people, pitching your product or service with a little “Elevator Speech” and hoping to make a sale, why not enjoy Multiple Streams of Passive Income Every Day from Joint Ventures? In fact, you don’t even need a business to do that!

All it take is a different mindset. Forget about what YOU want - (nobody cares, anyway!) and start looking for ways to get other people what THEY want. Then, get paid to deliver. And here’s the good news… sorry, GREAT news - you let someone else do all the work, carry all the risk and cost and pay YOU for the privilege! That’s right - Joint Ventures offer you the opportunity to earn a significant, even unlimited amount of money by brokering deals and connecting people. See, you do that anyway, don’t you? Problem is, you’re not getting paid for it, are you? Oh no, you’re Mr. or Mrs. Nice Guy. Mr Social Worker, right? You think people will reciprocate but they don’t. They take the business and often don’t even take the time to thank you. But you keep on giving and not getting.

Time to change. Time to get PAID.

Want to know more about how you can become an astute Joint Venture Broker, work from anywhere in the world with a telephone and an internet connection (or even without the internet!) part time or full time? And learn it in ONE DAY? “That’s too good to be true”, you claim? Check out these testimonials then click on the link at the bottom of this article to see how to change your life!

This is a small sample of what Delegates of the Joint Venture Bootcamp in Vancouver on May 28th said: (Originals available)

“If I use and apply the information from this Bootcamp, I conservatively expect to make $40,000 per month”
- Ron Brauer, President, One Stop Renovation, Surrey, BC.

“If I use and apply the information from this Bootcamp, I conservatively expect to make $100,000 more per year. What an exciting introduction to Joint Ventures!”
- Faye R. Davis, PhD. Defense Logistics Agency Chair, Professor of Logistics: National Defense University, Industrial College of the Armed Forces, Fort McNair, DC

“If I use and apply the information from this Bootcamp, I conservatively expect to make $10,000 per month more”
- Paul Travis, Principal, Vivify LLC, Seattle WA

“If I use and apply the information from this Bootcamp, I conservatively expect to make $250,000 in the first year. This is one of the best seminars! Fabulous JV connections!”
- Peggy Brauer, Owner, Energy 4 Ever, Surrey, BC

“If I use and apply the information from this Bootcamp, I conservatively expect to make $10,000 per month to start with! Great day – thank you. I’ll join the JV Forum.”
- John Hewson, President, Peak One Consulting, Whistler, BC

“If I use and apply the information from this Bootcamp, I conservatively expect to make $2,000 - $5,000 per month more. Excellent, informative course, the most promising I’ve ever heard. Thanks, Robin”
Michael Nault, Executive Director, Play Mate Promotions, Vancouver BC

“If I use and apply the information from this Bootcamp, I conservatively expect to make $5,000 - $10,000 per month more. This Bootcamp is the most valuable and greatest learning experience. Being a JV Broker is the final key for my life. Thank you so much, Robin; I’m creating my future.”
Keith Tong, President, K&H Business Solutions Inc. Richmond, BC

“Your JV Broker Bootcamp completely blew away all my expectations! Using just three of the strategies you suggested, I conservatively expect to make at least $9,973 on a single joint venture deal within the next month. The experience of being able to mastermind million dollar ideas with the other participants alone is worth twice the price of admission. Your support and mentorship are second to none. Thanks for transforming my entire paradigm of what is possible in business!”
Colin Skow, President - JV Synergy, LLC. Seattle, Washington

Passive Residual Income vs Leverage Income

There are basically two different types of passive residual income. There is a third that is not really passive income that is also great strategy for earning more money while having to do less work. It is a great way to keep your cash flow up and not having to lose your mind due to work stresses. Residual income is money you earn revenue that occurs over time and some of the types of passive residual income include:

• An insurance agent who gets repeated commission every year when a customer renews his policy

• A network marketing or direct sales rep will earn income from her direct customers when they reorder a specific product every month

• An instructor who produces a video as such and sells it where they teach

• A marketing consultant who creates a workbook and sells it as an e-book

• A photographer/author who makes his photos available through a stock photography clearinghouse and gets paid a royalty whenever someone buys something they’ve done

• A restaurant or retail owner who hires a manager

As you can see, there are many different ways that you can generate passive residual income across a wide variety of businesses. You can get repeat income from the same customers, or the sales of a product to new customers. The best part is that you that may never have to repeat the initial work involved in getting stated and still earn money. Most of time the repeat work that you have to do can be done by an assistant or secretary. You can also take advantage of personal development affiliate programs like SkyQuestCom or Success University

You should know that passive residual income is not just repeat money earned. Recurring income may still require your involvement in order to get the income such as if you are a coach or consultant on a monthly retainer, or a caterer who delivers. While this can take some time out of your time it is necessary. Leveraged income basically takes the work of other people to create income for you. Some examples of leveraged income include:

• An e-book author who sells the e-book through affiliates who promote the product for them

• A network marketer who builds a down line and receives commissions on the sales made by those that are in it

• A general contractor who makes a profit margin on the work that sub-contractors do

• Franchising your business to other entrepreneurs which is where the real money is at

You should note that leveraged income may or may not also be residual income.

Providing a Service? But That’s Not Passive Income!

Because I love to see people get the most out of their online businesses and personal lives too, I always encourage business owners to create as much passive income as possible. That way, you’ll have time for the more important things in your life. Still, when we are in need of money, the Internet is a GREAT place to start building an income by providing a service to others. If you decide to provide a service as a means of making money from home, always make sure you are making the most of your time and are working to create the easiest to manage service business as you possibly can.

Here are some tips for you if you would like to work a little less providing a service online:

1. Do Your Math - If you want to make $400 per week, calculate exactly how many service hours you would have to provide to reach that. If you charge $10 per hour, realize that you will have to work with clients for 40 hours per week. And that 40 hours doesn’t include administrative tasks for your own business, marketing and other things that just have to be done that you don’t get paid for. If it’s reasonable to increase your rate to $20 per hour, you would only have to work with clients for 20 hours per week.

==> Super Tip: Realize that it is likely much easier to find 20 hours of work per week at $20 per hour than it is to find 40 hours at $10 per hour. At $10 per hour, you have to work twice as hard to find work and then when you find that work you’ll have to work double the time.

2. Outsource - Just because you are a Virtual Assistant or another service-providing entrepreneur doesn’t mean you have to do all the work yourself. Find other people to subcontract your client work too or get help with some of your own administrative business tasks. This will help you reduce the possibility of overloading yourself with work. Again, do your math and see if you take on a few extra hours if you might hire a student or somebody else at a lower rate to give you a hand.

3. Make a Plan for Passive Income - As a service-provider, if you don’t work, you don’t get paid. Try to set aside a few hours per week to build up your passive income. You can create information products that teach people how to perform your specialized services (ex. a VA can teach others about bookkeeping, managing spreadsheets, etc if there is a market for it). Or you can venture out into creating your own websites that generate and affiliate income. The possibilities are endless. As long as you set aside a little time each week (or hire someone to help you), this will eventually start to grow.

Having an online business provides us with so much freedom we could never find elsewhere…if we do it right.