5 powerful income streams for solopreneurs
5 powerful income streams for solopreneurs
Each has a $100K per-year potential.
Solopreneurship is almost perfect.
If there’s one caveat, it is this: lack of stability.
What if you can’t find new clients?
What if your products stop selling?
What if your content turns meh?
Solopreneurship is ups and downs, but there is a way to fix this.
Imagine this…
You always know you’ll make enough money to cover your expenses or more.
You have the freedom to focus on the part of the business that brings you the most joy.
You can afford to quit your day job or remain part-time.
The secret?
Develop A LOT of income streams. This way, when one income stream fails you, you have others to count on.
Plus, you can choose what you like and what you don’t.
Here are the 5 income streams I’m working on, and how you can make them a part of your revenue portfolio.
Secret to Success: Develop Multiple Income Streams
In this newsletter:
How to get a constant stream of clients on Fiverr (my “secret” to making $230K on the platform)
How to write high-earning articles on Medium (even if they don’t get boosted)
How to get your first 10 paid subscribers on Substack.
How to start selling on Gumroad.
How to start selling on Amazon with Kindle Direct Publishing.
How to get a constant stream of clients on Fiverr.
I started selling on Fiverr in 2014.
My first successful gig was for writing About Pages. I charged $5 for a 200–300 word about page.
It was ridiculous, I know, but I was still a struggling newbie.
Now, almost 10 years later, I’ve made over $230K on the platform. I’m consistently making $50K per year on Fiverr.
These days, when I talk about success on Fiverr, a lot of people ask me if they’re late to the party.
My answer? No!
If anything, you’re coming right on time — the average order value is $200 now, and not $5.
If I have to give you the one secret to success on Fiverr, it is this:
Offer amazing service.
Why is this so important on Fiverr?
Because Fiverr puts a lot of focus on buyer satisfaction.
So always try to exceed clients’ expectations. You can do that by:
Delivering a day early.
Offering an extra revision.
Being open to meetings.
Communicating promptly.
And, of course, offer a great core service.
To learn more about how to start and grow on Fiverr, watch this interview with Kristina God where I spill the beans.
You can also click here to register for Kristina’s Online School and attend our live talk today (where you can ask me anything directly).
How to write high-earning articles on Medium.
I started writing on Medium in 2019 and hit the jackpot in the 3rd month.
I published this article that made over $2000 and had a few more hits after that.
But when I got pregnant with my second, I stopped writing.
I returned to the platform in June last year and it took me 4 months to get my income back up to $100+ per month. A lot had changed.
I briefly considered giving up on Medium, but I decided against it.
The platform helps me meet amazing people, gets me a constant stream of e-mail subscribers, and if it also makes me a little money, I’d be an idiot to leave it.
I kept writing to the best of my abilities. I currently strive to write 3 articles per week, but I sometimes, I don’t manage more than 2.
By doing the best I can, I finally got my first boosted article in February and it made $900 in a month!
I also have 3 articles that aren’t boosted but have made over $100.
Want the same results? Here’s a list of winning strategies (which will also up your chance of getting boosted):
Write for your audience. Finding your audience is more important than finding your niche.
Write better headlines. I use Monster Insights Headline Analyzer (free) and always try to hit 90 before I choose a headline. If I can’t hit 90, I must find a headline that’s at least over 80. This takes some learning, but it’s worth it.
Write like yourself. People say longer is better, but my best-performing stories are 3 to 5 minutes long. I’m just that kind of a writer.
Publish in big publications. I’m a writer in 15 publications, including Better Humans, Start It Up and Age of Empathy. This helps with exposure and it helps with getting boosted.
How I got my first 10 paid subscribers on Substack.
Starting and growing an e-mail list is the most important thing you can do online.
The fact that platforms like Substack and ConvertKit now allow you to monetize your e-mail list through paid newsletters is still amazing to me.
Most people teach you how to grow your Substack newsletter, which is important. You can’t have paid subscribers if you don’t have subscribers.
But!
Getting free subscribers and getting paid subscribers is a different game.
For example, my newsletter isn’t big. I’m currently just short of 800 subscribers (I’m a turtle, I know) but I have 13 paid subscribers for a yearly revenue of $1750.
Some people with my subscribers count haven’t even turned on their paid feature yet. Substack used to recommend waiting until you hit 1000 subscribers. Now, they make you answer these two questions:
I’m happy with my results. I’m making over $100 per month on Substack, and it’s been less than a year since I started.
Can you do the same? Absolutely!
I’m not an expert on all the ways to grow your paid subscriptions (yet) but I can tell you how I got mine.
Create a special offer. I’m not a fan of discounts. Instead, I always try to provide more value. I launched my paid newsletter in December 2023 and offered one-on-one coaching to everyone who bought a yearly subscription by the end of the year. I advertised that offer every day and got my first 3 paid subscribers.
Have a paid strategy. Some people send one free e-mail per month, and everything else is locked. Some writers send everything to everyone and count on their true fans to support them just because. To each, their own. My strategy is this: the first part of all my newsletters is free. The second part is locked. This way everyone gets a peak of my strategies and ideas, but only my paid subscribers get the full picture.
Keep inviting people to subscribe to your paid newsletter. This is not the moment to be shy. Remind people what they’re missing and keep inviting them to subscribe. Put calls to action on all your newsletters, and write on Notes and other platforms. More calls to action = more money.
Talk to your subscribers in the messaging section. Ask them how you can help. Offer a personal touch for everyone interested. Remind them they will get even more help from you as paid subscribers.
How to start selling on Gumroad.
I’m new to Gumroad myself, but it’s the easiest place I found for uploading digital products.
Unlike other platforms:
It allows you to upload as many products as you want.
It allows you to sell them to as many people as you want.
It allows you to send e-mail blasts to past customers and followers.
It allows you to offer free or paid products.
It allows you to offer different types of products: eBooks, video courses, workbooks, PDFs, anything.
The platform has its own audience and can promote your products through its Discover feature.
In the beginning, I wondered if the platform offered good enough user experience. Then I saw many top online creators use it to sell their products. Even Nathan Barry, the founder of ConvertKit, uses it to sell digital products.
Currently, I have two mini products uploaded on Gumroad. I’ve only made $20, but that’s because I stopped advertising my products.
The reason? I can’t set up the payments properly. My $20 is still with Gumroad and can’t be sent to my account for some reason. Until I figure this out, I’ve stopped advertising my products.
But I’m sure I will figure it out.
So. If you want to start selling on Gumroad, here’s how you can do it:
Start with mini products. Go with $10-$20 pricing.
Promote your products to your existing audience. If you can’t monetize Substack because you’re in India, for example, you can start selling products through Gumroad.
You can also set up coupons so that any premium users can get your Gumroad products for free or with a discount. For example, my paid subscribers can get my Gumroad products for free.
To reach Gumroad’s audience, you can offer to give the platform a higher percentage of your income. You can set that up in the SHARE menu when you’re creating a product. Scroll down to Gumroad Discover, set the appropriate tags and choose a percentage of the sales you want to offer. The minimum to get featured on Gumroad Discover is 30%. I’m currently offering 50%.
How to start selling on Amazon with Kindle Direct Publishing.
Kristen Walters is a one-person publisher on Amazon.
(Stop for a minute to marvel at the awesomeness of this world that allows people to be one-person publishers.)
“This year, I’m focusing most of my time on growing my little one-woman publishing business.
I aim to reach $25k per month with this project by the end of 2024.
After many months (er, years) of Amazon keyword research and testing, I’ve decided that the most efficient way to reach this goal is by focusing on the “activity book” niche.
These books are incredibly easy to make.
As you’ll see in a moment, the profit potential is very high.
For example, last month, my top three activity books (combined) brought in over $5,608.
Not too bad for an amateur self-publisher.”
Kristin’s results are impressive, and there’s a reason why.
She doesn’t publish books she wants to publish. She does in-depth research to figure out what her audience wants.
To learn how to do research on Amazon and publish books that have the potential to become best-sellers, you can read Everyone Should Publish On Amazon here.
If you have read it, then you’ve heard of Helim 10 — the ultimate Amazon keyword research tool to help you identify winning niches.
In one of her recent Medium articles, Kristen teaches us how to use it for free. If you’re a Medium member, you can read Kristen’s full article here.
If not, here’s the gist for you as a paid subscriber to One-Person Business Success.
How to use Helium 10, the best keyword research tool for Amazon, for free — by Kristen Walters.
To get started, click this link — which will take you directly to the page where you can get the free account.
Next, scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page, where you’ll see this:
Click “Start Now” and create your free account.
Once you’ve set up your account, the next thing you’ll want to do is install the Helium 10 Chrome extension.
Note: You must be using a Google Chrome browser.
Once you‘ve installed the Helium 10 Chrome extension, you can see additional product data on Amazon like keyword niche summaries, BSR rank, and category rank for each product.
Once you click on a product, you’ll see more information like historical ranking performance data and price history.
What’s Next?
Now that you know how to activate 5 different income streams, you can:
Choose one or two you like best
Try them all and see what works for you
Start or expand your one-person business
Make more money and get financial stability