Building a Sustainable Business – Passive Recurring Income Examples

You may know that in February of this year I purposely closed up my membership site and cancelled tens of thousands of dollars of recurring income. It was a BIG deal. That was a BIG leap of faith. 

My family relies on me to help pay the bills so I needed that income but I had huge trust in my abilities to move the dial and recreate that income. Recreate it I did or in large part. 

HOWEVER I’ve spent the last seven months in a mode of constant SCRAMBLE to earn an income. Every month starting from $0 or close to it in income and having to find the customers I need to meet my obligations. 

It was not fun. Not fun at all. 

I haven’t been in this position since the early years of my business, around, 2009 or so, when I had little to no recurring income. 100% no recommended. 

Building Recurring Income

If you want a business where you are not in a constant hustle for money then I highly recommend you start implementing recurring income into your business NOW. 

I had been working with some form of recurring income since 2010.When you have recurring income you have:

Peace of mind knowing money is coming in no matter what new marketing you do. A baseline of income you can build on. The ability to take a break when you need it, or rest, or plan, create strategies, etc. 

In the months of this year that I’ve been seeking just the right income to recreate I’ve identified four types that you might want to consider seriously. 

Here they are ranked in order of commitment required to implement:

1. Affiliate Marketing
2. Network Marketing
3. Subscription Offers
4. Membership Site

Quick notes on each:

1. Affiliate Marketing:

It costs no money to join an affiliate program. If you pick one that is on a recurring payment, like Aweber (affiliate link), you can get paid year after year for making ONE sale. You did the work one time and then a person pays month after month and Aweber sends you that commission monthly (or yearly if they pay yearly).

Pretty awesome, right?

Take a look!

Here’s my Aweber stats. I haven’t promoted this program since around 2016-2017 and yet I’m still making money. A small bit, for sure, but if I’d had put more than minimum effort in that could still be a nice recurring income right now: 
The key to making this kind of recurring income work is to find affiliate programs that have staying power, like email software. 

2. Network Marketing

I’m not suggesting you join a company that makes it’s distributors buy the product and that’s where the recurring income comes from. 

Find a company with a PRODUCT that is sold to the customers that has some sort of recurring or reorder or add-on order system that creates the environment for you to earn and KEEP a customer long term. 

Network marketing has the additional recurring value of earning a commission on the team you build as well. 

I fell in love with Juice Plus for the products. Initially it was the Tower Garden.

Shortly after I discovered the whole food supplements which are something that people buy already. Knowing the supplements are far superior to most of what’s on the market and that people take them and reorder certainly caught my attention! 

With Juice Plus one customer can stick with me for YEARS, just like you can create in affiliate marketing.

3. Subscription Offers

You can easily add subscription offers to a product or service you offer regularly. 

It’s less of a commitment than a membership site but with the same kind of perks!

 I decided I’m going to do a minimum of one workshop per month at Party Plan DivasDivas so at the same time as launching the first workshop for $35 I also offered a $20/month workshop subscription

About half the people who signed up took the subscription! That was a fast way to start building my recurring income with my own offer. 

4. Membership Site

The membership is the “all-in” option when you know that you want to really dig in with your community and offers for the long-term. 

A membership site has so many rewards but it’s a big commitment so you want to be ready. 

The power of community can’t be denied.

It creates amazing bonds with your community and can lead to even bigger things (think coaching, group training and conferences/ retreats, etc). 

If you want to learn about how to build a highly successful membership site I can’t think of anyone better to teach you than my close friend Cindy Bidar. Cindy’s membership, Six Figure Systems, has over 400 members and she built her membership from the group up just a few short years ago.

That’s VERY impressive! 

Cindy is my accountability partner, we talk EVERY day. There isn’t someone I trust more to deliver you an excellent training on the topics she offers. We’ve met in person several times and have know each other about 15 years or so! Here’s a picture of us at a beach retreat for business owners:

I asked Cindy if she could sneak me a discount on her membership training and she gave me 40% off. If you’d like to grab it at the link below I’ll also include my own training, Membership Impact, for free. 

Here is it:
Membership Site Mastery – Coupon Code: MEMBER40

Whatever you do – please take recurring income seriously. Not only is a lifesaver on the month to month… it’s ESSENTIAL when life pops up. What if I can’t work for two months for whatever reason? Right now I’d be REALLY concerned but I’m on it – I’m building up my recurring income so that when life comes up and gives me a knock (it happens to us all), I’ll be ready! 

Wishing you all the best and lots of lifestyle freedom! 

Angela Wills
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