I’ve spent a lot of time and effort looking for the best passive income streams using various strategies. After trying and failing at various schemes and methods I’ve had one or two successes too. Some of the ideas in this list are better than others. Some of them I have tried personally and other I have yet to attempt.
Best Passive Income Streams – My Journey
I started looking to the internet as a means to earn an income about 15 years ago. Using ebay I sold a few items from my house. Not exactly a passive income but little did I know it would lead to something else. My ebay journey took my charity shop interest and turned it into a small profit. I looked for items to buy and sold them on ebay. Some sold for a profit and some didn’t sell at all!
I tried various methods of buying and selling on ebay – see my article how to buy and sell for profit on ebay. After a while I decided something was flawed with all the ‘systems’ I had tried. I had to do something every time I wanted to make a profit.
Ebay – Best Passive Income Streams
I had bought a few e-books off ebay and at the time they could be downloaded instantly. I just paid and clicked to download the e-book. Since then e-bay have changed their rules, but this little idea started me thinking. I bought the ebook, paid and clicked to access it. The seller didn’t have to lift a finger at the point of the transaction. All they did was continue to list the item (the ebook), again and again. They didn’t have to keep finding new items to sell. They just re-listed their item over and over again.
Ebay is great for selling items like this or turning your shop into a global business. But it’s not passive unless you can get it all working on autopilot. There are a few little methods to get ebay working for you which require only a small imput:
- Drop shipping on ebay. Drop shipping companies do the handling and selling for you. You simply create a listing pointed to the item for sale. When the sales comes through you refer the item to the drop shippers. Have a search for drop shipping companies on Google.
- Buy it now listings on ebay. Buy it now listings are probably the best way to sell on ebay. You create one listing and sell multiple products through it. Although ebay is fairly competitive, if you have something unique to offer this is a great low maintenance strategy. You can also buy in bulk from companies like alibaba.com. The more you buy the cheaper each item becomes and the higher your profit margin when you sell through a buy it now listing. However, there is a tone of competition on ebay and it can be tricky competing with the established players.
Best Passive Income Streams – Google Adsense
Google Adsense deserves a mention next because that is where I directed my attention for a few years. I tried several online courses which taught blogging, keyword research and use of Google Adsense. The idea with Adsense is to create a popular blog and place adverts on it which you can get from Google’s Adsense program.
You simply place a piece of code on your blog and it populates the space with a targeted advert – targeted to your blog topic. When someone browses your blog and they click on an advert, you earn a small commission. The goal is to build a blog big enough and useful enough to get a few thousands click a day. Each click is only worth a few pence but with enough website traffic you have a nice income and it’s mostly a passive one. You still need to put in a lot of work before you can earn from it. But it beats working for a living right!
You can also use Adsense with YouTube – now also owned by Google. By creating regular videos and building a following, you can earn money from visits to your YouTube channel and videos. Although this isn’t passive initially and takes some time to build up, once you have several hundred or thousands videos think of that passive clicking earning you money every day.
Best Passive Income Streams – Affiliate Marketing
After a long trial of going after the Adsense money train I decided affiliate marketing was a better option. I had dabbled with selling digital products on my blogs and noticed a few affiliate sales was worth a month of Adsense clicks. So I decided this was the better option. You can of course use both these methods on your blog. The only problem is that for every penny you earn when someone clicks on your Adsense adverts, you lose that person from your website. Also you need a lot of traffic to make income with Adsense. Anyway, I digress.
Affiliate marketing is basically selling someone else’s product on your website. You can point a banner or a link to almost any product on the internet now and earn a commission from its sale. Affiliate marketing allows you to make a passive income from the work you have done previously. Much the same way Adsense works, but instead of getting them to click an advert, you send visitors to products. If your visitor buys the product, you earn a commission.
Is Affiliate Marketing Passive?
Well not in the first place. It’s not like having a million in the bank and earning interest. However, it can become passive once you have put in the work in the first place.
- An article can continue to earn an affiliate money long after it is written, this is one way it is passive.
- You can sell memberships with affiliate commissions attached to those memberships – selling a ‘one off’ product gets you a commission, selling monthly memberships gets you monthly commissions for the same initial work.
- Up-selling – Up-selling products through the same product line can earn you a passive income. You still need to make the initial sale but a built in sales team can earn you thousands if you join a program which offers this benefit.
- Email List – An email list makes an internet business very passive because it allows you to automate most of your communications with your potential customers.
Best Passive Income Streams
Obviously the best passive income streams are those which work. Even for writers, actors, authors and other kind of artists, they only get their passive income from royalties for work they have done previously. Passive income from earnings comes when you invest money to make money. Property development and buy-to-let properties give you a passive income but you need to own property first to rent it out! You need money in the first place to invest and speculate with your money.
Best Passive Income Streams – An Internet Business
There is opportunity for anyone to make an income online and then scale it upwards using tools and systems which can be automated. The opportunity to earn multiple passive income streams by working online is probably one of the most accessible opportunities which anyone can take advantage of today. Learn more and access a free video series which will explain how you can start your own profitable internet business from scratch.
