We all have heard the statement, “Work smarter, not harder.” But how does that actually apply to us? Is it possible to work smarter and see a financial payoff?
I believe that for far too long people have embraced the concept that if they work harder they will get better results. So they put in long hours and work themselves so hard that they can’t even enjoy the results of their hard work. It becomes a never-ending grind. The reason for this is that is that many people believe that retailing their product or service in the traditional form of marketing is the way to go.
Granted, traditional advertising will make money, but the downfall is that you have to do the same thing day after day to make it. If you stop selling your products and services, you don’t make money. It doesn’t matter if you had record sales last year; if you don’t have at least the same amount in sales this year you will make less and may have to lay off employees.
That’s why I believe in residuals. I am a huge proponent of selling products and services that produce revenue for me every month and that continue to produce revenue every month—whether or not I sell another product or service again.
What if I told you that you could sell the same products and services you always do … but you could set it up in such a way that you would have a residual income coming in that is not dependent upon your sales?
Work smarter, not harder …
Building a network or community of people online who trust you and look to you as the obvious expert enables you to continue selling your products and services to them for the long term. It is much easier to sell a new product to an existing and loyal customer than it is to attract new ones.
The fastest way to build true wealth and a residual income is to get people to purchase a low-cost, high-volume retail product and train them how to be successful with their own dreams through the use of that retail product. Then you sell them your primary product later, once the relationship has been built.
The most common way to generate a continual residual income stream is to find an affiliate program that pays you an ongoing percentage every time someone purchases a product or service that you recommend.
For instance, let’s suppose I am passionate about cell phones and technology. I could start an online community based on researching the best cell phone service providers, available plans and current deals throughout the country. I could then work out an agreement with each of the cell phone service providers to give me a fixed percentage of the sale of any of their products and a percentage of every rate plan purchased by people I refer to them. My Web page would carry links to those carriers and phones which I recommend—those with which I am affiliated.
Now, in the interests of keeping everything aboveboard, I would disclose my affiliation with the phone companies on my Web page. As is current practice for many bloggers, I would also disclose that my page is monetized by referral links, and that if someone makes a purchase via the links on my page, it will help to enable me to provide these reviews and other similar content.
The key to maintaining a good relationship with your readers, as with any relationship, is honesty. If you are upfront concerning your affiliations, it will accomplish two things. First, it will avoid any appearance of potentially tainted or slanted reviews, since you are affiliated with several different companies. Second, it highlights the fact that if readers use the links you provide, they are helping to keep your content available. This will make them more likely to use your links than to navigate off site to the phone companies’ Web sites.
Now, let’s look at the huge benefits of how this can work in practice.
For example, let’s assume that I am an affiliate of Carrier A. If I review a specific Smartphone—Phone B—and give all the compelling reasons why it’s a great phone—convenience, functionality, variety of apps and so on—then people will naturally gravitate toward purchasing my recommendation. After all, I’m the expert who is familiar with the various phones, so obviously it makes sense for them.
Now, let’s say Carrier A is willing to pay me $25.00 for every Phone B sale I refer and 10% of every rate plan for the duration of time that my referral is a customer. Furthermore, they are willing to pay me 5% of every sale generated from everyone that I initially referred.
If I was able to refer 20 new customers who purchased a Phone B and signed up for the $150.00 monthly plan, as most Phone B users do, here is what it would look like for me:
In 3 months I would have earned $1,500.00 in commissions for simply reviewing and recommending the Phone B as the phone of choice. That may not sound like a whole lot, but let’s explore a little further. Remember, I worked out a deal to earn 10% of every rate plan sold as well.
* Rate plans