Tweet

Multiple Streams of Income – 5 Reasons Why You Absolutely Need it

Written by: Michele Pariza Wacek

Article Overview: In a nutshell, multiple streams of income means your business has more then one way to make money. For instance, you sell products and you sell services. Those are multiple streams of incomes. Why do you need them? Below are five reasons.

Multiple Streams of Income – 5 Reasons Why You Absolutely Need it

I've become enamored with the word "multiple," especially when it pertains to business. I especially like the idea of harnessing the power of the multiple to grow your business multiple times over.

There are a lot of things that can be multiple in a business, but in this article I’m focusing on multiple streams of income. In a nutshell, multiple streams of income means your business has more then one way to make money. For instance, you sell products and you sell services. Those are multiple streams of incomes. Why do you need them? Below are five reasons:

1. Make money while you sleep. This is a big one for those of us who sell our time (also known as providing services). The biggest drawback to selling time is when you aren't working, you aren't making money. So when you're on vacation, relaxing over the weekend or (gasp) sleeping, no money is coming into the business. But let's say you create a product or two to sell in addition to your services. Now you've just created a passive income stream (passive meaning it doesn't require yours or anyone else's time). So if you are taking a nap or out walking the dogs, money can still be coming into your business. (What a concept!)

2. Leverage your time. This is especially true with income streams that are passive. Basically you're making money without it taking any of your time. Therefore, you can spend your time doing something else and still enjoy money coming in from a passive income stream. This is a good way to use your time wisely. (Rather than work for an hour, get paid for an hour, you can be paid several times in several different ways during that same hour.)

3. Fill your pipeline. If all you sell is high-priced services, it can be difficult getting clients to hire you. After all, clients need to trust you and trust they're getting a good deal for their money. If you offer products or lower-priced services, you're giving those customers a chance to "try you out" before plunking down several thousand dollars for a major project or consulting work. Because your clients' initial investment is lower, you have a chance to lower their resistance to hiring you.

4. Catch a variety of clients. No matter what you offer, a part of your target market is not going to be interested in hiring you. Why? Because they'd rather do it themselves. Or maybe they don't have the money to hire you. Or maybe they do the same thing you do and would rather learn from you to better their own skills. By offering a product or a class or a group option, you're widening your net. Not only are you able to help more people, but you'll also be making more money doing it.

5. Diversify. The more income streams you have, the less devastating it will be to lose one. Not to be negative, but things happen. Industries change. Economies change. People want different things. If all you offer is services, and those services suddenly become obsolete, what happens to your business? Or, a more likely scenario, what if you lose your biggest client? Or a couple big clients at the same time? Sure, eventually you'll find other clients to make up the difference, but what happens in the meantime? What if it takes a month or two or six? Your bills certainly won't wait that long. But if you have other income streams, a dip in your services (or a dip in product income) is no longer so scary because you'll still have money coming in.

Creativity Exercise -- Find time to create multiple income streams

Probably the hardest part of creating multiple income streams is a lack of time, especially when your primary business is service based. So, now that you know how important it is, how are you going to find the time to start doing it?

Here are a few ideas to get you thinking:

* Hire a virtual assistant (VA) or bookkeeper to take care of some tasks you have no business doing anyway.
* Create systems in your business so you can complete business tasks faster and more efficiently.
* Raise your prices so you can take on fewer clients and make more money.
* Dedicate a Saturday or Sunday to working on your business. (Be careful with this one as you could very quickly end up burning yourself out.)

Get a pen and paper and do some brainstorming to see how you can find more time to start creating more income streams.

Related Articles
  Home Business Expert: Multiple Streams of Income
  You Must Have Multiple Income Streams in Your Home Based Business
  MULTIPLE STREAMS OF INCOME IS NOT DUMB
  Creating Multiple Streams of Affiliate Marketing Income
  Build Multiple Streams Of Residual Income Online

Article Tags:



Related Forum Posts
Revenue Streams for Websites - Too funny, I was just reading a book: Multiple Streams of Internet Income: How Ordinary People make extraordinary money on line, by Robert G. Allen. 2001 That's a misnomer, though - they're not ordinary people, they're people with established careers who can take their expertise and exploit it on the web. Ways to generate income? 1) Sell your own material on the site. Ebooks, etc. 2) Join various affiliate programs that match what your website is about. 3) Google adsense - All my money comes from this... it's started out slow but as readership of my sites grown, the income has grown. Nothing to write home about yet... 4) Google adwords - the advertisers whose ads show up on Google Adsense. Unless you're selling big ticket items on your site you don't want to use it, your keywords can cost from 20 cents upwards.
Re: What are your success criteria? - [quote="DwayneGarrett":1igrdgib]Out of curiousity, what has to be present for you to know that your business is a success? The top three things for me are: 1. Maintaining a 6 figure income year in and year out. 2. Creating and promoting my own products. 3. Income not solely dependent upon my personal effort. How about yours?[/quote:1igrdgib] I would have to say mine were: 1. Monthly Residual Income that exceeds all expenses by 110% 2. Free time to create and promote my own products (relies on #1) 3. 5% of all revenues generated by my team going to feed starving kids Now that is "feel good work".
Re: Bad SEO techniques? - [quote="jacksonp":1y3g8bot]that is quite true.We all should avoid these kind of techniques.I am here sharing few more points which we should take in mind..As an experienced person of SEO I want to share here some facts which should be avoided by us.I hope that these will help some of the newcomers a lot.. Choosing a title that has no relation to the content on the page Using extremely lengthy titles that are unhelpful to users Using a single title tag across all of your site’s pages or a large group of pages Stuffing unneeded keywords in your title tags Writing description meta tag that has no relation to the content on the page Multiple domains Multiple identical sites Cross Linking[/quote:1y3g8bot] re: Cross Linking, how do you define that? I thought linking to other pages on your website (that are related) was a good thing...maybe that's not what you meant.
Re: 10 Reasons Who Startups Fail & Book Recommendations - Great post,but please edit the headline. I presume it is "10 Reasons Why Startups Fail & Book Recommendation
Re: Are you proud to be an entrepreneur? - Absolutely!!!


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

2011 Global Brand Trends Letter

Unharnessing Creativity in Business

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.