raju 1. Start/Run Your Own Business
We’re living at a fantastic time in history if your goal is
to start your own business and create passive or “low
effort” income streams from it selling products or services.
With the many benefits of the Internet, the power of direct
marketing (online and offline), and the large number of top-
notch contractors and third party companies you can offload
the day-to-day “grunt work” to, today’s entrepreneurial
environment a dream come true if you know how to set things
up to take maximum advantage of the many tools and resources
available.
In addition, it has never been easier to set up a strong
flow of income doing something you love or you’re really
passionate about – no matter what it is or how “obscure” it
may be. Again, the Internet and direct marketing create
unprecedented levels of opportunity.
Finally, there are numerous tax advantages to having your
own business which enable you to put much more money in your
own pocket — if you know how to set things up and take
maximum advantage of the many tools and systems available.
If you want to live your ultimate lifestyle, your own
business will be at the core of it. It’s my #1 choice for
creating the ultimate lifestyle.
2. Royalties
If you have a specific area of expertise and you know how to
turn it into a book, audio, video or multi-media course, you
can get other people to manufacture it, sell it, manage all
the details, and send you a royalty check for a percentage
of the sales. This is a great stream of passive income and
one I’m currently pursuing aggressively.
You can also generate passive royalty income from inventions
or other marketable ideas of various kinds.
You make less money “per piece” when you go this route, but
the fact that you don’t have daily responsibility for
managing the production, sales, accounting and other details
has a lot of value, and if you set it up right, the products
that generate royalties for you also cause people to come
back into your orbit to buy and do other things that end up
benefiting you in many other ways in the long run.
Do you feel this is a good idea but you don’t think you have
the expertise that could translate into a royalty stream?
That *might* be true, but I can almost guarantee that you
have expertise you don’t know you have, you could easily
create it by following a passion and/or create a potential
royalty stream from knowledge you have or could get if you
got some the right kind help.
3. Licensing Fees
This income stream is similar to the royalty stream, but has
many notable differences. Licensing involves charging a fee
to allow others to sell products you create (books, tapes,
videos, etc.), or to use your likeness, logo or other very
visible aspect of your work, business or “brand.”
Licensing can also take the form of allowing others to
present a seminar, workshop or talk you’ve designed that
provides many benefits to the audiences receiving them. I
have two friends, Charles and Will, who’ve licensed the
rights to one, two and three day seminars with their
material, and they receive HUGE checks every month.
Will actually has 5000 people licensed to present his one
day seminar, and tens of thousands of people are getting the
benefit of his work, and he’s getting big checks without
lifting a finger.
There are other forms of licensing, however, that don’t
require expertise on your part, just visibility and a
“brand.”
One example includes Disney who licenses their logo, the
likenesses of Disney characters, etc. Another example
includes Harry Potter merchandise. Another example includes
the use of the Coke or Pepsi logo.
While it’s true that these examples center around huge
companies, there are a variety of licensing opportunities
for “little guys” like you and me if you get creative and
set it up right.
