Spend the next 58 days planning. Then start.
If you want to build a stream of passive income, right now is the time to start.
If you’re starting from scratch, it’s going to take at least 6 months to create a new stream of passive income, but it’s 100% possible.
If you’re serious, take one of these ideas and spend the next six weeks planning your approach.
- Read articles about the topic.
- Choose a product or niche.
- Talk to people who have found success.
Important side note: Passive income does not mean you get paid to do nothing. It simply means the stream of money can keep flowing into your account while you’re not actively working.
Example: you spend 50 hours creating a digital product and it sells for the next 50 weeks. That’s much better than spending 50 hours at work and getting paid for 50 hours of work.
If you don’t find a way to make money while you sleep, you will work until you die.
- Warren Buffett
Passive income is the only way to scale your income exponentially.
Also, there’s no need to drop $5k on a course, unless you want to. There’s plenty of legit info available for free on social media — mainly Twitter, Google, and YouTube.
Here are six opportunities for your next stream of passive income:
1. Info Products
More people are creating info products like e-books, print-on-demand books, video courses, and more.
These take a while to create, and then keep making you money while you sleep. And if you don’t want to continue marketing your products, you can set up a simple affiliate marketing program and get people to do the marketing for you.
Your books don’t need to be 300-page in-depth guides. It can be as simple as 50 pages of actionable guide that people find useful and interesting.
You can also make a simple video recording of yourself sharing knowledge on a topic that others don’t know about. The best way to find a good product is to pick a topic that helps people save time, learn a skill, or make money.
Simple info products like these can sell for around $15–25. If you think the quality of the product is really good, and you get some initial sales, you can sell it for a lot more money.
2. Youtube Channel
If you’re a camera person you can start creating videos and posting them on your YouTube channel. YouTube is one of the most popular ways to make money on the internet.
Just like info products you can create a video once and have it making money for years without much effort.
You need to know that YouTube is a long-term game. You won’t start making money right away. It usually takes years to build a big audience and start seeing any significant revenue.
To start, you need hours of watch time before applying for ads, which is how most YouTubers make money. Once your channel builds momentum, it’s definitely worth it. Simple videos can easily make hundreds of dollars each on autopilot.
You can start earning from day 1 on YouTube with affiliate marketing, but you’ll still need to develop a following before you see significant pay days.
3. Podcast
If you’re not comfortable with recording yourself but love talking and sharing your ideas, then podcasting is the way to go.
You can record yourself talking about a topic or interview different people in your niche, or interview people knowledgeable on a variety of subjects. This is a plus because it means you don’t need to know everything, or do all of the talking. You can relax a bit and ask some simple questions. People will gladly spend an hour or two to get on your podcast and share their knowledge with the world.
You can even partner with a friend to discuss interesting topics. People love listening to interesting conversations.
You can monetize your podcast in almost the same way as YouTube: ads, paid promotions, affiliate promotions, etc. And you’ll build a solid connection with your listeners since you’re talking right into their ear. It’s a huge trust builder. I feel like I know the podcast hosts I listen to, even though we’ve never met.
Most podcasts fail because people give up. Few podcasts get past episode #3, and even fewer make it past #25. The most successful podcasts are simply the most consistent.
More good news: you don’t need fancy equipment. You can go somewhere quiet and record the podcast right on your phone. Or record a Zoom call and publish it to YouTube and your podcast. Then you can edit it yourself, or hire someone on Fiverr to edit and add intro/outro music.
4. Micro SaaS Products
If you’re a SaaS (software as a service) enthusiast but don’t have the means to build a startup, you should explore micro SaaS products.
Micro SaaS products are mostly additional add-ons, extensions, or accessories to existing products or advancements that improve a missing element.
Basically, you build a small SaaS product that solves a very niche problem and earn recurring revenue.
The main goals of a micro SaaS are:
- Solving a small but a real problem
- Working on products you love
- Still making a lot of money
- Freedom from working for someone else
- Staying small (typically 1–5 people)
Canva is an example of a SaaS. They have hundreds of employees and are worth billions. A micro SaaS could be a Canva font identifier. You upload a photo and the software finds the closest font match in Canva.
5. Affiliate Marketing
This is one of the easiest ways to make money on the internet.
In affiliate marketing, you sell someone else’s product using your unique link and earn a commission for each sale.
The good thing about affiliate marketing is that you don’t need to be an expert in a subject and you don’t need to create a product of your own. You just need to know how to sell products to people.
Gumroad has really opened up the affiliate marketing space on social media.
More and more creators are creating info products and are looking for people to promote them in exchange for an affiliate commission.
You just need to have a good audience to promote the products to. So, building an audience is a prerequisite.
The good news is that you can build an audience wherever you want. Whether it’s on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook Groups, TikTok, YouTube, or your own blog.
It’s best to stick with one specific topic, and one that you enjoy. You’re going to need to create a lot of content related to the products you’re promoting, so I suggest finding something you genuinely enjoy.
Like YouTube, affiliate marketing takes a while to get off the ground, but the potential here is unlimited.
6. Blogging
If you’re not comfortable with videos or talking to people, writing articles is the next best option. Many people think blogs are outdated and nobody reads articles anymore. That’s not true at all!
Google is still the #1 source of traffic for websites, and millions of people, including yourself, are reading blogs right now.
People still love reading long-form content and they’re here to stay for a long time. But, how does one make passive income by writing blog posts?
One of the reasons I’m still blogging on Medium is because it’s semi-passive. Instead of getting a single payment for a blog I write, I can get paid for weeks and months after hitting publish.
Here are a few different options:
1. Medium partner program: Medium pays its writers who write articles and put them behind a paywall. When Medium makes money from its paid users (who get to read premium articles) it shares the earnings with writers.
2. Sponsorship: Many blogging platforms like Hashnode have sponsorship programs where readers can sponsor their favorite writers.
3. Affiliate sales: blogging is one of the best ways to earn affiliate income. Write a review of a product or service, or a Top 10 article and get paid when someone buys it.
4. Ads: If you have a blog you shouldn’t ignore ads. People are used to seeing ads everywhere, so as long as you don’t go overboard, ads won’t hurt your user experience.
Writing is a great skill to have. Writing helps to fill your knowledge gaps on a subject and get more clarity on your thoughts.
Now it’s time to get started. The only regret I have about exploring streams of passive income is not starting sooner!
Here's a couple of good ones to take a look at: Heart and Body Naturals , The Club Shop
