10 Multiple Income Streams You Can Create

**This post was updated in September, 2016** I remember the first time I heard about "multiple income streams". It was back in 2005 after I had launched my first business. I had set up shop on my website and planned to sell my products from there. My best friend said, "Are you going to sell them in gift shops and boutiques, you know, at wholesale?". Honestly, I had never heard of wholesaling before. I didn't even know it was an option. I thought about it, researched it a bit and decided that selling my products at both retail and wholesale would be an awesome way to create two streams of income. Ka-ching. Having more than one stream of income not only increases your profit faster, it also increases your security. Because when you have multiple streams of income, you don't have to panic when business is slow or work from a big client dries up or you just need some extra cash. And the best part about multiple streams of income? Every business owner can create them, whether you're a blogger, product seller or service provider. 

Here are 10 streams of income you can create:

1. Wholesale your product

If you only sell your product at retail, consider branching out into the world of wholesaling. Wholesaling is the sale of your goods, usually in large quantity at lower prices, to a retailer for resale purposes. To learn more about wholesaling and how to do it, check out: Get Retail Ready and The Reseller Toolkit: A Guide to Boutique Wholesaling.   

2. Retail your product

Do you currently only sell your product at wholesale? Then consider selling it at retail. You can open a shop on Shopify. This post walks you through how to get started in 15 minutes. Or, you can just as easily sell on sites like Amazon, eBay, and Etsy.   

3. Create an affiliate program for your product

You can reach more customers and add a nice (passive!) income stream by recruiting affiliates to sell your product for you. The Case For Affiliate Marketing is a post I wrote to help show you how to do this. Affiliate programs can be created for physical products (like blankets, blenders, or blazers) or digital products (like e-books, audio files or video tutorials) using sites like SendOwl or Share-A-Sale. You can also set up an affiliate system right on your Wordpress site using a program like Affiliate Royale.   

4. Write an e-book

Do you have knowledge, information or experience in a particular area that you could share with others? Then write an e-book and sell it. As an example, you can find ours right here.   

5. Offer consulting

Share your knowledge, experience and information by consulting with people one-on-one. For example, if you're a successful graphic designer, you can teach new designers how to set up their website, price their packages, buy the software, bill clients, create a portfolio, etc.   

6. Teach a class

Like consulting, teaching a class allows you to share your knowledge, experience and information with others, but on a larger scale. You can teach classes locally or offer them online. If you're not sure how to get started, check out WebinarAlly to help you get a webinar up and running on any WordPress site in 5 minutes or less. And, if you’ve been putting off launching because of the tech stuff, check out the videos at Launch & Profit.   

7. Speak

Are you great on stage? Then launch a speaking career and another stream of income. You can speak at conferences, trade shows, and sales meetings and earn money doing it. Nervous about getting started? This article tells you everything you need to know and includes a free worksheet to help you keep it all together.   

8. Become an affiliate

If you have a blog or website, you can join affiliate programs and set up affiliate links to different products and services on the web. When someone signs up through your affiliate link, you get a small cut of their advertising revenue. That can add up if you get a lot of affiliate sales, and you don’t have to do any of the work to produce physical and digital products. Our absolute FAVORITE affiliate marketing program is through Ultimate Bundles. Read why and jump on board, here. You can join our affiliate program, right here!   

9. Sell newsletter subscriptions

Again, if you have knowledge, experience or information to share, you can profit from it by writing a newsletter and charging a subscription fee for it. Once you build up your subscribers, you can make a nice chunk of change from it. For third party email providers, we recommend Mailerlite.   

10. Sell advertising space

Do you have great traffic on your website or blog? Have tons of newsletter readers or podcast listeners? Then sell advertising. Learn more about selling advertising in Anna Viele's awesome free ebook. If selling ads seems overwhelming, you can grab a plugin to help you every step of the way. We use OIO Publisher because it's free, easy, and it does it all.  

So, what income streams are you going to add to your business? Tell us in the comments.

ONE MORE POST ON PASSIVE INCOME:Profitable Passive Income Made Simpleand... if you're a photographer, check out the newly released Peripheral Vision. Loaded with resources and solid proven ways to pad your pockets with very little effort from you.