One of the first things I ask any of my Ultimate Bundle™ members who are trying to build their businesses is “what are all your streams of income?” If they don’t already, I want to work with them to create multiple streams of income to their businesses. If you’re a coach, I want to create ways for you to make money outside of working 1-on-1 with clients. If you have a product-based business, I want to create a way people can work with you in other ways.
Why is it important to have multiple streams of income? Well for one, if you’re a coach who offers 1:1 programs, there’s only 1 of you and only 24 hours in a day. So at some point in your business, your sessions will be booked and you’ll top out your income. But there are so many more ways you can make money in your coaching business.
It’s also good to diversify your revenue streams so there’s not so much pressure on any one area of your business. You can have multiple revenue streams coming in, all at the same time, from different sources (courses, coaching, products, affiliates, etc.). It’s like the stock market — you’re hedging your bets and spreading your chips around so if any one area slows or stops, you still have other areas of your business model thriving.
I can’t tell you how crucial it is, no matter what stage you’re in in business, to create multiple streams of income or revenue.
If your business is solely dependent on you working in direct exchange for money (i.e., a 1-on-1 coaching session with a client), you already know that there’s only so much time in the day and only 1 of you. If you ever want your income or business to grow, you have to diversify your streams of income.
Maybe you’re happy with the amount you’re making now with your 1-on-1 coaching, but what if you want to grow your business? What if you want to start a course, and you realize you’ll need to invest in the video, copy, and landing page design? Maybe you’re doing just fine with how you’re running things now, but you want to save a little capital so you can invest in your business’s future.
Or maybe you’d like to make more, but you’re struggling with building your 1-on-1 practice (don’t fret — in my humble opinion, solid businesses are built slowly over time, with lots of hard work + love). Having a few alternative streams of your income can really take some of the pressure off building up your 1-on-1 practice. Actually, some of the things I’m going to suggest below may actually indirectly help you build your 1-on-1 practice, if that’s what you want to do.
Here are a few ways you can add additional or multiple streams of income to your business…
1:1 Coaching
If you’re not offering any 1-on-1 coaching service or sessions with you in your business yet, now’s the time! No matter what type of business you have, 1-on-1 time with you should come at a premium. Once you start adding additional streams of income (like some of the suggestions below), your pricing structure should reflect this.
Time with you is sacred — or at least it should be. You’re offering an amazing service and bringing your years of education, experience, or knowledge to the table. Your prices should reflect that, however, that feels right to you.
Passive Income
Passive income represents something that sells in the background, without continuous effort on your part. Some examples of passive income you could create for your business are:
- Evergreen online courses + programs that don’t include any 1-on-1 coaching
- Instant download PDFs/documents, like recipe books, guides, journals, etc.
- Done-for-you programs or downloads, if you sell to coaches
- Affiliate marketing, like sharing the links to your favorite business tools and making money off the sales.
Once you create a passive income/evergreen product, course, or download, here are some places you could advertise it:
- An email funnel or sequence that leads to the sale of a small product (i.e., ebook, PDF, etc.)
- Go back through your most popular blog posts and add in images + opt-ins
- Create an upsell process where your entry-level passive income product (a PDF or eBook) leads to an upsell passive income product (an evergreen course)
- On your “Thank You” pages when someone opts-in to your email list
- In your email signature
Group Programs
When you’re first starting out, it can be really overwhelming to think of creating multiple products, an email sequence, etc. And you might not be ready to sell things as an affiliate or make money from affiliate links/ads. So what’s a girl to do in the meantime?
Create a group course or program that still offers you time with your clients, but not 1-on-1 (unless they opt to do so at a premium).
When you come up with your profitable e-course idea, you might design a course that includes group calls or group coaching sessions. This is a great way to work with the maximum number of people, all at the same time. But here’s a huge bonus: so many of those people, once they see how amazing you are to work with, will want to work with you 1-on-1. You’re also creating a community with a number of people who will now turn around and tell their friends & family about you, your business, and your services. Win win!
I always recommend adding a premium option to your group program for the client who wants a little 1-on-1 time with you. Create an option that works for you and your course, but giving someone the option (throughout the duration of the program) might be a way to boost your income on that program.
Intensives / VIP Days
Some people aren’t going to be ready to dive into a 6-month coaching program with a membership fee with you off the bat. I like to offer an entry-level, but premium, option to work 1-on-1 together so someone can see if they like it. I’m confident that if we’re a good fit and we work together once, they’ll want to work together again.
You could offer a one-time intensive (like a 60 or 90-minute 1-time session) or even an entire VIP Day. This is such a great option to have on tap because it works for 2 different types of clients: a) the client who just has a few questions or wants to work through one area of her business/life/health/finances and b) the client that’s not ready to commit to your premium offer, but is still interested in working with you.
After a 1-time solo session, if a client wants to work together on a long-term basis, you could just credit her the amount she paid for her 1-time session towards her purchase of your larger investment option.
Affiliate/Ads
If you use certain programs or services in your business or life that you really love, see if they have an affiliate program! For me, it makes sense to become an affiliate of certain programs or services I love, because I’m often referring clients or friends to programs I use. I take it super seriously though. If I don’t like something, I don’t care whether they have the best affiliate program around. It means more to me that people come to trust my recommendations and opinions on a product. Trust me, it’s not worth it in the long run.
Here are a few ways you can share your affiliate links/promos with your community…
- On social media, when chatting about their benefits
- In your welcome packet to new clients
- Through your blog posts
- An email campaign when the affiliate company runs a promo
- On your blog page sidebar
Side note: if you want to generate more income for your own products or programs, think about creating an affiliate program of your own! In exchange for a small percentage of your sale, you’ll have so many people out there helping you offer your products! Just don’t forget to have an affiliate agreement to protect yourself + your business with you and your affiliate.
If you want to, once your business or website has enough traffic, you could start to use ads on your website as a source of recurring income. It’s my understanding that your website needs a significant amount of traffic to actually generate some income off of ads. For me, I don’t want to disrupt the aesthetic of my site in exchange for what would likely be minimal financial gain. I also don’t love the idea of having ads on my site that might not jive with my business or opinions expressed. You could, however, post some affiliate-type ads in your sidebar that relate to some of the services/programs you use to run your business or blog!
Speaking/corporate
Offering a workshop or talk at a business, school, or to a group is a great way to generate additional revenue for your business. If you’re in the wellness sector, offering wellness workshops or lunch-and-learns to companies is a great way to grow your business. Not only is it really efficient financially, but many of the people who attend your speaking engagements can be potential clients for you.
Side gig that feeds the main gig
Finally, I think one of the most brilliant ways you can feed your business is to have a “side gig” that relates to your business. I have one client who works at a physical therapy practice because the practice allows her to tell people about her health coaching business. She gets paid for the hours she works at the practice, and also generates potential client contacts through her work there. Another one of my clients teaches fitness classes and gets referrals to her health coaching business. It’s not necessarily the reason they work there, but just a huge bonus.
How Many Streams Of Income Should You Have?
I hope this was helpful! The possibilities of having multiple streams of income are endless and if you want to learn more about how you can create multiple streams of revenue in your business, comment below!👇
Before you go, make sure you catch my free legal workshop “5 Steps to Legally Protect & Grow Your Online Business” right here! In it, I’ll teach you my 5-step strategy to legally protect and grow your business using legit contracts, website policies, trademarks & copyrights, & so much more!
You’re only 60 minutes away from the peace of mind that comes with having a legally sound business…
