Passive Income: Possible or Not?

9 replies
Before I start, let me make the point that I don't think that one attitude necessarily precludes the other. That said, when you look at your own IM activity, would you say that you are looking to make a quick return or would you say that your activity is more focussed on longer term reward? I think it is important to get this straight in your own mind.

When you launch a WSO, for example, hopefully you will make money if your product is good and – very important – if your sales copy is good. That is an example of a short-term focus. Nothing wrong with it, of course, but it is essentially short term unless you also build in a back-end i.e. you use the WSO to get people into your marketing funnel, your membership site or whatever.

Personally, I would rather spend one whole day doing something that will generate 28 cents per day recurring income, than doing something that returns a $100 one-off payment for that one day.

Why did I choose that figure of 28 cents? Because after 1 year of doing something that yields a 28 cent per day return, you would also make $100. But if that thing continues to generate 28 just cents per day for you consistently, the recurring income strategy will offer a much greater return in the long run.

Is it impossible to do something in one day that would generate you just 28 cents per day recurring income, consistently? The answer is of course, no. But you do need to think long term and you need to have a strong work ethic if this kind of approach is to pay off for you.

If you identified a task that you could complete in 1 day that delivered 28 cents recurring income and you simply repeated that task every day for 1 year, you would have built a business that would be earning you 365 x 28 = $102.20 per day passively, recurring. And if you did this for 5 years consistently, your business would be earning 5 x $102.20 = $511 per day passively.

* So this approach hard work? Yes!
* Is it for everyone? No!
* Is it easy to understand? Yes!
* Can you do it? Yes!
* Will you do it? You have to answer that one yourself?

Does that make you think?
#income #passive
  • Profile picture of the author Christian Chan
    Originally Posted by Will Edwards View Post

    Before I start, let me make the point that I don't think that one attitude necessarily precludes the other. That said, when you look at your own IM activity, would you say that you are looking to make a quick return or would you say that your activity is more focussed on longer term reward? I think it is important to get this straight in your own mind.

    When you launch a WSO, for example, hopefully you will make money if your product is good and - very important - if your sales copy is good. That is an example of a short-term focus. Nothing wrong with it, of course, but it is essentially short term unless you also build in a back-end i.e. you use the WSO to get people into your marketing funnel, your membership site or whatever.

    Personally, I would rather spend one whole day doing something that will generate 28 cents per day recurring income, than doing something that returns a $100 one-off payment for that one day.

    Why did I choose that figure of 28 cents? Because after 1 year of doing something that yields a 28 cent per day return, you would also make $100. But if that thing continues to generate 28 just cents per day for you consistently, the recurring income strategy will offer a much greater return in the long run.

    Is it impossible to do something in one day that would generate you just 28 cents per day recurring income, consistently? The answer is of course, no. But you do need to think long term and you need to have a strong work ethic if this kind of approach is to pay off for you.

    If you identified a task that you could complete in 1 day that delivered 28 cents recurring income and you simply repeated that task every day for 1 year, you would have built a business that would be earning you 365 x 28 = $102.20 per day passively, recurring. And if you did this for 5 years consistently, your business would be earning 5 x $102.20 = $511 per day passively.

    * So this approach hard work? Yes!
    * Is it for everyone? No!
    * Is it easy to understand? Yes!
    * Can you do it? Yes!
    * Will you do it? You have to answer that one yourself?

    Does that make you think?

    Do you have a membership or continuity site now?
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  • Profile picture of the author mr2monster
    I think it's important for any business (and individuals too) to learn about ASSET ALLOCATION

    There should be BOTH short term, higher risk/accountability, strategies adding cash flow injections into your business, along with long term, lower risk/accountability, strategies that add stability and long term financial compounding...

    That being said, you should also be taking a % of that profit from your STHR (short term high risk) activities and investing into scaling your LTLR (long term low risk) activities.


    At least that's how I run my ship.


    Or, to answer your question more directly, absolutely. Passive income is completely possible.

    I currently have adsense revenue coming in at about $8 a day that I haven't even looked at for months and months and months.. It's only $8 a day, but it comes in EVERY day.

    That's an example of a super low maintenance passive income... Almost zero risk, but very low reward.

    The next step I have is moderately passive, which is my offline clients... They don't take much to manage and they pay me monthly.. Not completely passive, a little higher risk, and a lot higher reward...


    Then I have more short term strategies that I'm basically required to be present for, but that earn me significantly more money... Not passive at all, but great for cashflow injection to expand the other two.
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  • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
    I believe 'passive income' is possible, but I'm not so sure that it's the best approach. With increased competition online, I do think it's becoming increasingly difficult to set something up and expect it to continually earn over at least 10 to 20 years. "Passive", to me, implies working hard now, and then completely removing the element of work and effort. Are there really people here who spend ZERO time on their business, after an initial injection of effort, and expect it to GROW?

    I'm not sure that, when faced with doing something versus doing nothing, that it is the wisest choice to maximize profits. I do believe there was a time, online, where one could write an article and have it earn residual adsense and affiliate revenue, however, I do think that it is becoming increasingly difficult to rank for even many long tail keywords. As people online become more skilled, I do think that even that method of passivity is becoming quite difficult to secure.

    One thing that I have noticed immensely, also, is that my revenue goes UP when I exert effort through marketing, writing, promoting, etc.
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    • Originally Posted by x3xsolxdierx3x View Post

      "Passive", to me, implies working hard now, and then completely removing the element of work and effort. Are there really people here who spend ZERO time on their business, after an initial injection of effort, and expect it to GROW?
      Agreed.

      I settle for sort-of-passive income, like sending books to FBA on Amazon. I'm in the middle of this 14 day cruise, while Amazon sells and ships my books every day with no further effort on my part. It's nice to get email telling me another couple sold, but I'm not kidding myself: I'd run out of books eventually (in about a year).

      I think any passive income asset has to be kept shiny and bright. If you're a writer, you need to keep promoting your articles -- you can't count on people to stumble across them. We have rental property with tenants who do most of the maintenance but there's still paperwork and taxes to be paid.

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      • Profile picture of the author mantrixx
        The affiliate marketing strategy entails passive long-term income, although additional backlinking proves to be more and more necessary.
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  • Profile picture of the author michaelgrisso
    Interesting piece. I think the most important goal is to utilize several income strategies. The old "don't place all your eggs in one basket" would apply.

    .28 cents a day passive income sound more like a hobby when you see the end result. However, over a long stretch I'm sure it would be beneficial for supplemental income to those retiring or on a fixed income.

    Intuitive post.
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  • Profile picture of the author Pixel Minisite
    I can work on something that generate passive income, but I always focus on short term projects cause they take less time compared to the long term projects and you get the results faster..
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  • Profile picture of the author Affiguy
    possible. But not that big, I should say.

    In my case, I ran some site offering services with 6-month subscription to it. Then I abandoned promoting it but I have some loyal customers you keep extending their subscriptions to the service through my site. It works for me, but the revenue is not very high, still it's pleasant to have some extra cash out of the air now.
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    • Pursuant to the 28 cents a day for a year theme, I went back to my FBA account and annualized my profits.

      Turns out I'm making about $10 a day, 365 days a year, sending books to Amazon. You guys who are in for a quick killing would scoff at that, I'm sure, but I didn't realize it was that much. Better than AdSense. And scalable. The more I send, the more I sell.

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