By Aja McClanahan
After working as a database consultant from home for over 13 years, this past year has been my most successful year yet. However, I was completely exhausted. I think this is a natural evolution in the life of an entrepreneur, especially if you start as a service provider. You will eventually come into your own and want to turn your knowledge and experience into passive income. If you are at that point, here are some ideas on what to consider to start your passive income journey.
Our family paid off all our debts in 2013. Part of that journey included building my consulting business to fund that effort. In an effort to “mass mentor” people who ask me how we did it, my blog was born. On this site, I give many free tips and tools on business and personal finance, but I also collect income from providing premium information in the form of eBooks and eCourses. Additionally, I promote and sell other products that align with my goals, objectives and philosophy. I collect commission on these products. As with any business endeavor, this source of passive income may take time to grow, but it’s a great option to start with.
write a book
It may take more investment if you decide to pay for professional editing, layout and graphic design. However, a web presence whether it is a blog or a social media platform can be a nice compliment. Barriers to entry are quite low, so this option is also quite feasible.
Create an eCourse
People receive information differently. For some, ebooks work, for others video is a better delivery method. eCourses typically use video to relay information. Don’t think anyone has anything to teach? Think again. Go to Udemy.com and check out all the topics people offer—from better sleep to couponing and home schooling—there are tons of topics you can teach. What do your friends and family ask you about the most? Create a class on it. I’ve done a few classes on Udemy myself and it’s been a great source of income so far. I use Screencast-O-Matic with PowerPoint to do the course (Google Slides is free if you don’t have PowerPoint). Udemy is a good place to start if you don’t have a large following, as they do a lot of promotion for their instructors.
Train and Outsource Protégés
If you provide services but are not yet ready to transition from this income stream, this is a good starting point in the world of passive income. I use this method as a consultant. After I established myself, I started hiring and training people to do what I did. As a general rule, you always want to train your replacements (if you want to scale your operation and revenue.) At times, I’ve had about five people work for me which takes my regular hourly rate of $150/hour to four times that number! You have to have the capital and cash flow to manage it properly, but it can be done.
Divert cash into income generating investments
The beauty of generating passive income is that you can use it to generate more Passive income. For me, that is the ultimate goal. Once we paid off all of our debt, we were able to use the money we were using to pay down debt and buy my business and dividend-paying securities. We are currently looking at some real-estate properties for rental income. The takeaway here is that money can make you work harder. The only caveat is that you must have a fair amount of money for your profit and related income.
Which of these methods do you think you can start with?
Aja McClanahan is a mommyneur who writes regularly about eliminating debt, increasing income, and building wealth. www.principlesofincrease.com
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