We’re living in a digital age. We all know this.
Who would have thought, pre-lockdown, that virtual birthday parties, online pub quizzes and zoom-based classrooms would have become such a widespread and integral part of our daily lives? As the covid-19 lockdown has also shown us, life can be pretty unpredictable!
As an industry of predominantly remote-working business support professionals, we’re well set up to support businesses from the comfort and security of our own homes, but what else can we do to try and maintain our income in these economically uncertain times? One answer is to diversify into passive income streams, like digital products.
Many VAs and freelancers offer service-based products – hours of support in exchange for money from the client, either on an ad-hoc or retained support basis.
But what if you could create a product now that you can continue to sell via your website or social media platforms that doesn’t require time from you in the future (with the exception of general maintenance)? The reality is, you can!
We’ve all got knowledge or skills that enable people to work more effectively and efficiently. Perhaps you are an inbox management whizz or a social media superstar?
Why not create something that is useful and beneficial to your customers – for example, a ‘how to’ guide that walks people through the steps they would need to take to reach the holy grail of ‘inbox zero’, or a selection of social media templates that can be branded really simply and easily with royalty-free imagery so that your customers can quickly create beautiful and engaging social media content? These things may take a little bit of time for you to set up, but could then be sold on to dozens of future clients to provide a regular source of passive income for you.
If this is of interest to you, then why not consider adding a payment processor to your website, and thinking of how you would deliver this digital content to customers in a timely and effective manner (for example, using an email marketing platform like Mailchimp or ActiveCampaign, etc.), as both of these factors are important when it comes to creating a positive user experience around purchasing your products.
It’s not always easy to come up with a product idea for your own business, and it may be difficult for you to create a product without external help, but there are plenty of people within our diverse and talented VA and Freelancer community who could help if you need it.
In fact, we have helped many VAs to create digital products for their business through our online training…
And even if you can’t create your own digital product, there are still plenty of opportunities out there for passive income.
Perhaps you could become an affiliate for another business? This involves you promoting their product/service, and receiving a commission for every sale you make without having to deliver the product/service and/or deal with payments and customer service. There are plenty of organisations out there with their own digital or physical products who offer commission to affiliates for sales, so why not consider this as another potential revenue stream for your business?
Whatever you decide, it is definitely worth your while over the coming weeks thinking about passive income streams for your business? It could provide a useful revenue stream for you service-based VA business that could generate income for many years to come, without too much time and effort from you!
If you want to find out more about our online course that walks you through brainstorming, planning, creating and selling your digital product, you can find out more HERE.