Updated: October 14, 2020
Studies reveal that a typical millionaire has around seven income streams. How many do you have?
If you have a job, a savings account, stocks, and mutual fund investments — that’s four sources of income already. One is an active source, while the other three are passive sources.
Unfortunately, passive sources of income like paper assets can’t immediately generate a big cashflow. You need to regularly invest for many years to build a significant amount of income from interests and dividends.
Fortunately, active employment can provide a good and steady stream of cash for us. However, if most of your income comes from just one job, then imagine what would happen if your company suddenly decides to let you go.
I’ve met a lot of people who lost their jobs because of cost-cutting, job redundancy, company politics, and other reasons. As always, none of them knew nor expected it to happen.
That’s why creating a second active income source is crucial for better financial stability. Additionally, diversifying your income allows you to survive the ups and downs of economic and industry cycles.
However, I don’t recommend getting a second full-time job because it would use up all your free time and could compromise your health. What I do suggest is finding a freelance job.
Why Become a Freelancer?
Most freelance jobs are part-time. This gives you more breathing space in your daily routine and calendar.
Secondly, freelance income is directly proportional to your skills and effort.
Unlike a corporate job where you earn the same monthly salary even if you work harder, a freelance job earns more if you give more of yourself to it.
Lastly, freelance jobs are often the best platform to jump into entrepreneurship. It’s pretty common for freelancers to quit their office jobs to focus on building their own business.
And what’s great with having your own business?
It has the potential of becoming a passive source of income someday. And you’ll gain time freedom and the financial capability to start another business.
That’s really how millionaires achieve those seven sources of income.
Steps to Freelance Job Success
So are you ready to look for a freelance job? Then just follow these steps.
Step 1: Secure your finances
Study your cash flow, and make sure that your primary income is enough for your needs. If not, then it might be better to instead, find another job first that can.
Step 2: Track your expenses
It’s important to know where exactly your money is going every month. Establishing a freelance career will require spending at the start, so you need a budget surplus.
Step 3: Choose your niche
Each person has a set of skills and life experiences that make them unique. List them down and choose which among them do you want to leverage into a freelance career.
Step 4: Identify your market
Decide on who your clients will be. Describe your best customer. What is their demographic? What is their lifestyle? And more importantly, how are you going to reach them?
Step 5: Price your offer
Survey your target market and decide on your price based on their responses, the current industry rates, and your preferred rates.
Step 6: Market your product or service
Start selling. This is where your budget surplus becomes handy because oftentimes, you’ll need to spend first before you can close your first client or customer.
Step 7: Grow your freelance career
After your first client, the second one will be easier to find. Continue marketing your offer. Leverage on referrals. And soon enough, your freelance career will earn as much (or even more) than your day job.
Freelance Job Success Stories
The one who cooks
Cathy works as a bank teller. At home, she likes to cook and her specialty is roast beef. One day, she decides to make money from her recipe and asked herself how she can do it.
After several studies and consideration, she chooses to sell her roast beef to wedding caterers — offering it as an addition to their menu for their clients.
Her roast beef slowly but surely became the most requested item on menus. Now, she’s planning to put up her own food catering business.
The one who writes
Michelle works in an ad agency, but her true passion is writing. Although she loves her job, she feels that her true calling is to become a writer.
One day, she read an article online about self-publishing your own book. She researched further and decided to write her first novel.
It was time-consuming but it was worth it. After almost a year, she finally held a mockup copy of her first book. It was an emotional moment.
Currently, our author still works in the ad agency, but she’s busy writing her second novel during her free time.
The one who teaches
Roy works as an insurance agent. It was a job that he didn’t expect he’ll enjoy, after working as an office clerk. Each day, his passion for personal finance grew.
He took every opportunity to learn from seminars and company training because he’s interested in going into teaching financial education to young professionals like him.
Now, he conducts corporate training on money management and investments on the side. Furthermore, he has also partnered with other institutions as a licensed broker.
The one who’s reading now
[This space is for your freelance job success story. Go ahead and create it now.]
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What am I going to do if I want to be a financial advocate too.. and teach young professionals about financial literacy?
Truly inspiring. Thank you Fitz.
@Dine
You can start promoting your advocacy on social media and perhaps create a blog too (which is how I started). Focus on building a community. You can earn from advertising at the start, and later on through other means such as speaking engagements or selling your own products.
This is very true, especially sa mga ofw, sana all OFW’s can think of starting a second income source while working abroad, like freelancing, and when their freelancing income surpass or equal their family expense and needs, they can go home na.
Thrilling.
This segment literally gave me goosebumps.
thank you Fitz!
Thank you for this Fitz. This is very true. There is no need to resign from your job before going freelance. I recently started a business and a website with my business partner. But I have one question, which one should you follow, the money or the passion?
Walang link sa 199jobs.com @brodfitz, haha
Spot on, we 100% agree with this article. Most of my working life, I worked various contracts and was well paid for my specialties. My beautiful bride of three plus years began her academic writing career in college when she learned other students were paying to purchase their assignments written by others by not always original and verified non-plagiarized work. With the exception of a few short work gigs in the areas of her three college degrees, my wife has been at this now for eighteen (18) years and has NO plans to quit. Master a few specialties such as statistics, multiple regression, specialized areas of nursing or engineering etc and you are SET. You can work from anywhere in the world there is an internet connection. If you plan things well, you can get projects any time of the year from clients around the world.