How To Create Multiple Income Streams in Home Business

Diversify your business with active and passive income sources

A person goes over financial statements.
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If you’d like to build your own business that you can run from the comfort of your home, or if you’d like to make more money with a side hustle, you might not know how to get started. Learn some steps you can take to discover potential income streams and take on active and passive income opportunities.

Key Takeaways

  • You can add active and passive income sources to build your home business and improve your financial stability.
  • You can brainstorm and explore ideas relevant to your experience, skills, and interests.
  • Use your network and experience to build your different streams of income.
  • Examples of additional income streams can include freelancing, blogging, creating online courses, and writing e-books.

Brainstorm Income Ideas

If you can’t figure out how you can make more money from home, evaluate your interests, talents, and resources so you can brainstorm ways to use them to make extra money. In addition, the brainstorming process makes it easy to get many ideas out at once that you can revisit later if necessary.

Using a mind map lets you connect different income stream ideas to your main business concept. Start with your main business concept in the middle, then draw spokes that connect to boxes with broad income stream ideas that interest you. You can continue branching out to list specific activities and ideas that might work for you.

For example, if you specialize in marketing, write down “marketing.” Next, you might narrow down this concept by writing down “freelance consulting,” “online teaching,” and “blogging” since those are ways to potentially monetize your marketing experience. You can then add details for each income stream idea. For example, you might jot down affiliate marketing, sponsorships, and advertisements as ways to monetize your blog, and you could note certain e-learning platforms or specific course ideas.

Figure Out How To Get Clients

Do further research on the multistream income ideas from your mind map. This will help you better understand what each idea involves, decide if it’s viable for you, and plan how to proceed.

During your research, you might find you need training or experience before pursuing a specific income stream. For example, if you’d like to create an online course, you should have some experience as a teacher or tutor. You’ll be better at creating the course, and people you’ve worked with in the past might want to take your course or refer others to you. Toni Frana, career services manager at FlexJobs, also advised via an email to The Balance that having an online portfolio can help you demonstrate your experience and skills in that field.

Also build connections with people in the field you’re interested in working in. That way, you can learn more about the industry, but you’ll also be developing relationships with potential future clients. Consider finding a mentor in your industry who can advise you on their experiences. “Building a successful freelance career isn’t just about your experience; it’s also about who you know,” Frana said.

When you do start to find clients, it helps to test the waters with just a few to ensure that freelancing works for you and you can manage your workload.

Try Offering Related Freelance Services

If you’re already an established freelancer in one field, you might want to start expanding your home business with related freelance activities. That way, you can leverage existing skills and experience to find more work and boost your income.

For example, a marketing professional might offer freelance services in search engine optimization for company websites, serve as a consultant, or tutor students. Frana said, “Being diversified as a freelancer is great, because it allows you to reach various clients, showcase a range of skills, foster different relationships, and tap into new revenue channels.”

You can leverage your existing network, advertise through your website, and use social media to find clients. Frana advised looking into freelancing job boards to find additional opportunities.

Note

When applying to positions posted on freelance job boards, double-check the company’s website to make sure they’re actually the ones posting the position and not a scammer.

Incorporate Passive Income Opportunities

While active opportunities such as freelancing are good, they require significant time and effort to earn money. This can make it challenging to manage several streams at one time. Therefore, you should take advantage of passive income opportunities so you can benefit from an additional cash flow that you don’t always have to work at.

You’ll likely need to do some work upfront to create your passive income stream. Some examples of passive income streams include making and selling downloadable items such as e-books and digital art, creating prerecorded online courses on sites that will pay you when people watch them, and investing in dividend stocks. You’ll need to create the product you plan on selling, or you’ll need to do the research on which stocks to invest in. Although you might need to update your courses, products, or investment portfolio, you won’t have to consistently work at it in order to make money.

Note

You may need to maintain or update the source of your passive income from time to time. However, it will likely be less work than a day job would require.

For example, if you specialize in small business marketing, you might create an introductory course on Udemy. You’d research the curriculum, record video lessons, and make supplementary materials for students. After you set the course price and the course becomes active, you’d receive a revenue share for each student who buys your course. You could market the course on your website to attract more attention. You’ll want to periodically update the content and interact with students to improve the value of the course.

Pursue New Income Streams Carefully

Once you have some income streams going, monitor them closely so you know when you’re capable of expanding or when one stream appears not profitable. When the timing is right, you can replace unprofitable streams or expand with new ones that interest you. However, consider these decisions carefully to avoid harming your current success or becoming overwhelmed with your workload.

For example, you might introduce new freelance services for existing and new clients. These could be related to your business’s core area or something completely new. In addition, you could pursue more business-related passive opportunities such as writing an e-book, making a YouTube channel, or creating an app.

You can also explore passive income streams not relevant to your main business. These could include renting out a room on Airbnb or investing in financial products such as stocks and bonds.

Pros and Cons of Creating Multiple Streams of Income From Your Home Business

Pros
  • Higher income potential

  • Improved stability

  • Flexibility to try new things

Cons
  • Potential lack of focus

  • Management challenges

  • Work-life balance issues

Pros Explained

  • Higher income potential: Each additional income stream can increase your home business’s income. You could use the extra cash to invest in your business, cover your everyday expenses, reduce debt, or plan for the future.
  • Improved stability: Having multiple income streams makes it easier to handle disruptions. If you lose a client or demand weakens for a specific offering, you can refocus on your profitable income streams and face less financial instability.
  • Flexibility to try new things: By tapping into different income streams, you can experiment with different roles and even gain new skills along the way. This means fewer opportunities to get bored since you can explore and test different ideas while you have backup income streams to rely on.

Cons Explained

  • Potential lack of focus: Unless you add income streams slowly and carefully, you risk becoming unfocused and hurting your business’s financial performance in the long term. Therefore, become proficient and stable in one offering before adding another.
  • Management challenges: Juggling multiple active and passive income streams can be stressful and may ultimately hurt your work quality if you take on too much. Frana said that “staying on top of all of your different assignments, deadlines, and client relationships is a must if you’re aiming to foster a positive and professional reputation.” She advised starting slowly.
  • Work-life balance issues: While earning multiple streams of income from home offers flexibility, that doesn’t necessarily mean you won’t find yourself working long hours in the process. This especially applies when you’re just starting and need to dedicate yourself to building each income stream.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

How do I build multiple streams of income?

Examine your skills, interests, and opportunities. You then can carefully pursue active and passive opportunities that fit your goals. You can choose additional income streams as you become proficient managing the ones you already have.

What are five sources of income?

Five examples include earned, royalty, profit, rental, and dividend income. Earned income would include freelance work and regular wages, while profit income comes from product sales minus expenses. Royalty, dividend, and rental incomes are all forms of passive income.

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Sources
The Balance uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read our editorial process to learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
  1. The University of Utah. “Tips for Starting Your Freelance Career.”

  2. Udemy. “Instructor Revenue Share.”

  3. Airbnb. “How Should I Talk to My Landlord About Hosting on Airbnb?

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