Journey to Financial Independence with Passive Income Part 3: The Waiting Game
At this point it’s been about two months since I started this journey, specifically the YouTube Automation channel and investing in stocks. Nothing too spectacular has happened since the last update, but there are a few things worth mentioning.
YouTube Automation
I haven’t gotten any subscribers, likes, or comments yet, but I had a call with someone else on Caleb’s team who specializes in search engine optimization (SEO). He gave me a rundown of the basics and how videos rank using my channel as an example, and he had me install VidIQ so I could see how my videos specifically rank and how tags help the rankings. Apparently the videos ranked #1 in search results for certain terms that were specified in the tags, so it was nice to see that my videos were yielding at least one positive metric. He then assured me that having no audience yet was normal, as it would probably take around six months at least. I’ve decided as a set point, if I haven’t made any money within a year of starting the channel I will close it, since that should give the channel enough time to make at least a little bit of money. The videos themselves are pretty well constructed, but my main doubt is that they have the same format as a lot of other “automation” channels.
Teespring
I haven’t gotten any sales yet, but to be fair I haven’t been posting designs nearly as frequently as I should, since I only have about seven. I’m not sure how long I’m gonna continue because I haven’t found it particularly fun, but I might post a new design every once in a while when I feel like it.
Motley Fool
My investing has seen the most luck so far. The past couple months my yields have fluctuated but right now I’m up about $700 in Motley stocks and only about $100 in SPY from investing $15,000 (so far) in each.
Empire Flippers
I recently found out about an online marketplace called Empire Flippers, where you can buy and sell online businesses, like drop-shipping stores, affiliate blogs, subscription software, and so on. Each listing has its average monthly profit, suggestions for growth opportunities, describes the ideal buyer profile, and goes over what kind of support the buyer can expect from the seller during the transition. This website could be a great backup option for me if the YouTube channel doesn’t pan out after a year: I’ll just save and invest (using the method I outline from the first post) the money from my 9–5 and eventually buy one or two businesses to gain monthly income greater than or equal to my current job. Of course, this could take a time, because the cheapest business listings are around $50,000, and it only goes up from there. To make significant passive income through the site, I probably shouldn’t even consider it until I have at least $200,000 ready to throw around. But, even if the YouTube channel does find success, I might still want to buy a business to “diversify” my internet portfolio, depending on the level of maintenance and risk of each business.
Affiliate Blog
My original idea was to have some kind of blog with affiliate links, but I did some research with SEMRush (one of the best SEO research tools available, according to Greg Gottfried). The niches I wanted to write about were not that profitable, and it wouldn’t be very sustainable to just suck it up and write about things I have zero interest in, not to mention the (albeit small) monthly website hosting cost. However, I noticed a significant number of listings on Empire Flippers were affiliate blogs, so those could be an option for buying as well, especially the ones that don’t need to be updated or have freelancers working on them. Since Empire Flippers gives suggestions for growth, like creating backlinks or building an email list, it might be beneficial to learn how to do these things and maintain an affiliate blog. Right now, I’m deliberating whether I should start an affiliate blog about a niche that I enjoy, learn how to do an affiliate blog, and just risk the $36 for a year of hosting (which of course is nothing compared to the over $20,000 risk of YouTube Automation) or just rely on the channel and maybe some Teespring for now. You’ll find out what I chose in a month!