7 passive income ideas for your small business or entrepreneurship
What is passive income? Passive income, also called residual income, is revenue earned when you’re not actively working. With this type of income, even if you’re sleeping, you can still earn money.
7 Smart and Lucrative B2B Passive Income Ideas
In the olden days, the most common residual income for businesses came from rental income. A company owned a commercial building. They rented office space to other companies. Revenue came in each month from rental collections.
Today, thanks to computers, and especially the World Wide Web, small business can earn passive income from a number of sources. This article focuses on seven of those lucrative passive income ideas.
1) Participate in Affiliate Marketing
Is there a specific small business solution (product or service) that has really helped your company function better? If so, check their website to see if they have an affiliate program. You may even want to email them to be sure, if nothing’s listed on their site.
As an affiliate, they’ll provide you with a special code or link to place on your company’s site. Whenever sales are generated from someone who clicked the link, you’ll earn a commission from the sale. This is one of the most common passive income ideas around today.
2) Sell Website Ad Space
You can sell ad space to other companies on your business blog or website. It works much like TV and radio ads, who charge based on the popularity of the program airing during the ad placement.
Your small business can charge based on just how popular your site is at the time. In other words, the more visitors you get each month, the more you can charge monthly for ad placement on your site.
3) Place Pay-Per-Click Ads
Pay-per-click (PPC) ads are another passive income idea for small businesses. You earn revenue just as the title suggest, with each click. All you have to do is place the ad code where you want the ad to appear on your business site, and you’re all done.
Pay-click-advertising was made popular by Google AdWords. But, today, PPC ads are offered by both small businesses and large corporations. These days, Facebook ads are extremely popular. You can offer these same types of PPC ads on your site as one of your company’s passive income ideas.
4) Publish eBooks
Websites like Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Lulu and Smashwords allow authors to self-publish eBooks for free. Small businesses are utilizing this passive income idea to sell eBooks related to industry information, standards, tips, tricks, etc…
Of course, most companies are not in the writing and publishing market. That’s where hiring ghostwriters come in handy. For more information, check out “How to Self-Publish Ebooks on Lulu, Smashwords and Kobo” to learn how to self-publish your company’s eBooks today.
5) Sell Themes, Graphics and Templates
Does your small business design its own WordPress themes and other graphics and templates for the company’s site? If so, why not sell them to others as one of your business’ passive income ideas?
WordPress themes are a hot market these days. Both consumers and businesses are willing to pay for specialized themes to make their sites stand out from their competition. Just set-up a WordPress theme store on your business site, or sell them among various marketplaces to earn more residual income.
6) Teach a Course through a Webinar
If your small business is an industry leader, others in your industry want to hear from you. If you have mastered a solution that’s so unique it requires special education to use it, why not be the one to teach it?
Don’t let your industry expertise go to waste if you know you could help others flourish. Instead, create an educational course and turn it into a webinar. You can charge for exclusive access to the live webinar through your site. Then, placed the taped webinar on the site and sell access to it as well.
7) Create an Exclusive Membership Site
Does your small business hold the key to success? Do you have industry secrets, data, news and information so valuable that you couldn’t possibly give it away for free? Then, don’t. Use it as one of your small business passive income ideas.
Why not create an exclusive members-only website for people willing to pay for access to such valuable data? Your paid members can have access to people, places and things outsiders can’t get ahold of online. Set up exclusive blogs, communities, forums, eBooks and webinars designed specifically for these members.
Share Your Passive Income Ideas
Unless you’re lucky, passive income is very rarely a substitute for hard work. If you want your small business or entrepreneurship to be successful, you need to do what it takes to stay on top.
However, passive income is a lucrative way to supplement your income for your small business. All you have to do is put in a little initial work in the beginning. And, if you do it right, you could possibly reap the benefits for years to come, possibly indefinitely.
Do you know of any other passive income ideas for small businesses? Please share your passive income ideas in the comments section below.
