Living The 2-Hour Workday: How To Create Event Independent Income Streams

In the previous article on living the 2-hour workday I , cash created either through saving or selling assets that is designed to give you a buffer of capital you can comfortably spend if you need to while you travel.

Travel buffers are mostly for piece of mind so you can relax while you travel or use in case of emergencies, but ideally speaking it’s better if you don’t dip into your capital while you travel. In order to facilitate this, you need some form of consistent income streams that are greater than your total expenses, including costs to travel.

What Is Event Independent Income?

My largest source of income has come from significant events, either or for a new product.

There’s an inherent weakness with this type of income – you have to do something, often significant work, to get the result, or once you do it’s difficult to repeat, for example once you sell an asset, it’s gone.

Conducting a launch is definitely NOT two hour a day work, it takes a lot more than that. Depending on how you travel it’s quite possible to integrate periods of time where you conduct a launch, for example I did a reopening campaign for while traveling in Toronto, resulting in well over six figures in income. However to complete the work required to conduct the launch, I had to settle in Toronto for a summer, renting a house and effectively living there as a local.

You can choose to travel, stop and work, then travel some more, if you depend on event income like launches, but if you really want true flexibility and never want more than a two hour a day work commitment, then you need to develop some event independent income streams. In other words, you need money that is either completely passive, or nearly-passive, consistent as a result of working only two hours a day or thereabouts.

The challenge with this sort of money is keeping it consistent. So many systems for making money online are fantastic as one-hit-wonders, and they work again and again in different niches, but the problem is the amount of ongoing work required to keep things going or to get started in the first place.

Sure you can outsource much of your work (I’ve got a couple of great podcast interviews about outsourcing coming up soon), which is a great strategy especially when you have a system that is already making money, but it takes time to do this and still you have the challenge of always staying one step ahead of the market or finding new markets to enter once one dries up, or the competition catches up.

In my case I’ve always had a solid independent income stream that’s served me well for almost ten years now.

So what is it? Read on to find out…

The Magazine Model

My very first source of online income was selling things on eBay, a short lived experiment that I had no desire to continue once I ran out of things I wanted to sell (you can read more about my early days making money online in my ).

The next income stream I created has served me well for years, even before I was a blogger, but it works great on blogs too. I’m talking about website sponsorship.

I’ve always been a fan of magazines. Back when I was a kid I spent a heck of a lot of time reading magazines about video games, during the Sega vs. Nintendo days (for you 80s children like me, I’m talking about the Master System, NES, Megadrive and Super Nintendo). I actually enjoyed reading about and anticipating games and new consoles more than I did playing them.

Although I didn’t realize it at the time, my love of magazines very likely translated into a love of web publishing, as owning a website is a lot like owning a magazine. This idea can carry all the way through to today, as owning a blog is a lot like owning your own little fanzine about a subject.

My first successful website, about the card game Magic: The Gathering, was my first successful case study of running a magazine, although it was a bit more interactive than paper, one of the wonderful features of the world wide web. I wrote the content myself and eventually brought on volunteer writers and integrated user-generated content tools like forums and chatrooms.

In the I introduce the concept of the magazine model for making money online and dissect it further inside the . As I explain, most bloggers begin using the magazine model as it is the simplest to get started with.

The magazine model simply means you make money from advertising. Your job is to create an entity that has enough attention that you can translate that attention into an income source. This is exactly what I did with my first successful site, and later did with my blogs and other websites I have owned.

In a way, the Internet is just one massive magazine shop, or like a free newspaper funded by advertising income. Understand this and you will understand one of the oldest business models in the world – the publishing model – and it applies just the same, at least in principle, to the online world. It’s the same model, just with new tools and formats, with the same goals – getting the attention of, and influencing people.

Staying Power

I’m not going to break the magazine model down too much in this article as I’ve talked a lot before about the elements in previous articles on this blog. If you really want a detailed description, check out (in particular read my series beginning here – ), study the again and if you’re really keen, join my coaching program .

Simply put, selling banners and text links and other forms of sponsorship media on a website or blog is a great independent and consistent income stream, providing you are willing to do the work to keep publishing new content so people read your “magazine”.

My Magic: The Gathering website taught me this. During the five or so years that the site was in my charge and big enough to make money, I had banner sponsors, some of whom sent me cash month after month for YEARS.

It was because of this experience that I later developed a near-passive income stream on my blog, although it took a bit of tweaking to come up with something completely hands off for me.

So how good is this income stream?

Well I can say that I’ve been writing to this blog for almost five years, and for almost four years of that time I’ve made at least $1,000 a month, every single month, thanks to sponsors.

For the last three years it’s been somewhere between $2,000 and $3,000 a month, and that’s only from banners and text links, no sponsored reviews, no affiliate marketing, just advertisers paying a monthly fee for exposure to my audience.

Consistency is impossible to judge without time passing, so I’m confident now when I say that unless some major shifts occur online, either to my business or the industry it operates in, the Internet or society itself, this money will continue to come for as long as I keep blogging. It’s stable, independent and consistent, and has been for years.

What Is A True 2-Hour Workday?

When people challenge me that there is no way I can work just two hours a day, I agree, I don’t work those few hours if I counted up the time I spend on projects that have the potential to make me money.

Although defining what “work” is invariably becomes important if you want to get semantic about a true 2-hour workday, what I can say to you is that I have made enough money to live off quite comfortably just by writing my blog.

You could take away my products, the income from assets I’ve sold and even the affiliate revenue and leave just me, my blog and my sponsors, and I’d certainly only need to spend two hours per day to keep it running, and generate what most people in western culture earn in a year.

You could live like a king if you chose to do this outside of the wealthiest countries with the strongest currencies, for example if you lived in Asia, or Eastern Europe or South America.

In Australia where I live, if I earn $3,000 US dollars a month, I’m not rich, but that’s enough to get by. The challenge of course is what would you do with the rest of your time if you only need to work two hours a day, and I expect like me, you might choose to use at least some of that time for more business projects and increase your earnings, or you might just keep doing what works and increase the return you get from it.

There’s no reason why you can’t double your traffic to get a similar increase in advertising revenue, if you keep giving people what they want in terms of content (your magazine becomes more popular).

Stress Free Living

Imagine this: You’ve saved up a nice travel buffer, perhaps $20 or $30K, enough to live on for a year. You’ve got an income stream that’s consistent and keeps coming month after month as long as you spend a little time each day doing something you love (in fact, the money is a by-product of doing what you love, you don’t actually have to do anything to “create” the money, it’s passive as long as you keep creating value for other people).

You’ve got ample time, you enjoy the work you do although you don’t have to do it for long, and you have countless opportunities in front of you.

Sounds good doesn’t it? Yeah, I know it is because I’ve been living it (and then sum) for the last few years.

Making money from sponsors is not the only way to develop an independent income stream, but in today’s content-drive Internet, it’s one of the best ways, especially if you’re passionate about something.

If you really understand what I’m saying here, advertising income isn’t really the “answer”, it’s just one of the options available to you, if you choose a model that results in you becoming noteworthy in your industry.

As Ed Dale recently told his students, you don’t need to be the best expert at something, you just need to have passion. Leveraging passion to establish authority, and build your tribe (ala ), is the key.

This method is so much easier than any other way of making money because it rewards you for being passionate. It doesn’t focus only on the money, or the system or trends that are changing. It’s about you and how that something about you can translate into value for people who share your passion or have a need that your passion can meet.

The reason why you can make money from an income source like advertising, be confident in your future because you know it will be consistent, and work very little to keep it coming in, is because you’ve established status that can’t be easily taken away. That status results in consistent traffic, and thus revenue, because you’re willing to do a small handful of things (create content) to maintain it.

Sponsors may come and go, but if you are a leader, there’s always another company who wants to be associated with you and willing to spend money to do so. What’s important is what you’ve built and what you continue to accumulate day after day, even though it only takes a little time to do so.

This is yet another reason why, as I traveled for 8 months of 2008, I was financially secure. I have an income source that covers all of my expenses as long as I write a handful of articles to my blog each month, which I love doing of course. This income stream means that most of the other money I make becomes capital as my expenses are covered. It’s all gravy from there.

How Can You Create Independent Income Streams?

If you want to develop some kind of independent income stream, owning a website – which a blog is a great option – and then selling advertising from it, can work really well. Hopefully since you read my blog, you’re already taking steps to achieve this outcome.

If you don’t make much money from advertising right now on your websites or blogs, don’t worry too much, everyone who has ever made money from advertising grows through this period. When I first wrote this blog I didn’t make a penny from advertising for a good six months, and even after that it took a long time to get things going.

The challenge with advertising is that it’s relational to traffic. If your blog has low traffic, it’s harder to get sponsors and you can’t charge much. Once momentum kicks in you can charge more and it becomes easier to get more sponsors, in fact you may not have to do anything at all, they will come to you. Just as you do with your target audience/customer when you , consider your target sponsor and their motivations (a “sponsor avatar” if you will), and you will understand what it takes for your blog to be worth spending money on in their eyes.

Your job, is to focus on value creation and marketing. You must blow people away with what you give them, asking for nothing in return and then, and this is work, put in above average effort to get out there and use the marketing tools available to show people what you offer. Doing this every day, provided you are operating in a market with enough people, will work, I guarantee it.

If you’re looking for more specific advice regarding selling advertising on your website, including how much traffic you need before you start making money, have a read of one of my earlier pieces (May 2005 – this blog really is getting old!): and once again, if you are really serious about making money from a blog, taking my is definitely the fast track option.

So now you have two components that can help you lead a 2-hour workday and travel the world if you so choose. Travel buffers give you piece of mind and independent income streams keeping you going. It’s not easy, but this lifestyle is available to ANYONE who wants to go after it. The first step is to commit making it a reality by taking action every day.

66 Comments

Thanks again for the inspiration. It’s been about a year now since I started my blog since joining Blog Mastermind and everything you say is true. Blogging is great – a great way to make money online. It takes consistency and PASSION as you mentioned.

I know for me, I reached points of discouragement, but I always seem to find a nice blog post or something else that encourages me to push beyond. Advertising is definitely a good way to earn passive income. It’s something I’ve been doing ever since I got to the Blog Mastermind Lesson talking about direct advertisers. Once you have the traffic, advertisers are willing to pay for the exposure.

Haven’t reached the point of having that travel buffer of $20K – $30K, but I know that it WILL come in time.

Blogging for money is a very easy thing. The most important and the difficult part is to make the blog set up. Once you have overcome this hurdle, you will have an easy flow of money in your hand. The thing is that you have to post more and more number of posts because it will enhance the number of traffic.

Yaro, thank you for this encouraging article. I like the concept of event-independent income; I suppose it’s a little bit like the freelancer’s version of the steady paycheck. And I also agree that this form of income doesn’t have to make you rich – especially if it only takes a few hours a day.

That’s really what I’m after myself – a way to do what I love and make a difference in the world – while making enough to get by comfortably. Event-independent income is one half; the other half is just simple, frugal living.

Your Message The 2 most important things in life are:
1: What you do about what you think is most important.
2: What really is most important.

Human life basically a balancing act between emotions and logic,
(what you want and what you need). The more you do what you
want and get what you need, the healthier, wealthier and happier
you are likely to be.

“If 2 people agree on everything, 1 of them is unnecessary!”

Of course, if you agree with me on everything that’s great because
then, I can have my way with you and keep telling you how great
you are, so I can keep having my way with you.

If you don’t agree with that, it indicates that you are necessary but,
for what and to whom?

I believe that happiness is making others happy. How can I make you
uh………………………………………………………………………………..happy?

Yaro, once again it’s so refreshing to read the real truth! There’s so much hype out there, and reading about how you found it necessary to settle in practically for the summer in one place to set up your launch is tremendously encouraging.

Creating passive income is definitely one of the best ways you can allow you’re self to have a 2 hour a day work. Or even creating a passive income that only requires 2 hours of work per day, but yet generates a high income for you =D

While I don’t agree w/ everything you say in regards to MMO, you certinly are a gifted writter and thats why i keep comming back. Your success is what a lot of your readers dream about.

2 hour work week is nice, but not if you want to dominate. I think most peoples goal is time flexibility: maybe work an 7-8 hour day, but have the ability to wake up on wed at 11 pm, or meet for a cup of tea at 2 pm in the afternoon. Do what you want, when you want, and adjust your scheduel accordingly. Instead of being dictated to sit in a cream color, fuzzy box, sitting in front of an ms excel file for 9 hours a day between set hours.

Interesting post Yaro! Thanks for directing various ways on how to make money online that too creating event independent income, that fetch you sufficient amount of money just by working for 2 hours a day…

Oh wow, it sound so great! You know Yaro, it is not like you say so easy to blog just like you two hours per day. I think that when we begin, we need tons of time to learn things of blogging, I think that two hours per day is not good engough, we need more, expect we have a very good guide, just like you Yaro. Luckily I found you.

This is great if you have been building a reader base.. But when starting off it’s a lot harder than most would think… Meaning time spent advertising your blog building a strong link base and finding loyal readers..

Good stuff Yaro, I started out with affiliate sites, which is kinda like selling space. I still think it’s a great model, especially for newbies, but the magazine model is something that I’m wanting to try out.

I’d love to own my own AskMen.com style site. Can always sell your own info products on the backend. It might seem funny coming from someone who owns a site with my name, but I like “working”. Thinking up stuff, creating products and watching money come in is really fun.

I have tried the 2 hour workday, but got bored pretty quickly. It’s definitely something you need to try out though.

Creating passive income is my main goal and dream. I’m constantly looking and trying to develop new ideas of earnings in the Internet, and I hope that I would find an ideal option, which will generate income, and would not require my intervention.

I really enjoyed this article. Your greatest asset is your sincere heart and humble way in which you desire for other to add value to their lives. Your blog is a remarkable find. It is a jewel hidden in the web and I am glad to have found it. I am new to your site. I am a professional artist & teacher in Florida, USA where I live with my wife and two kids. I commute to work for one hour every morning through a country road and while I am driving I link up to your blog site and tap over to your podcasts and listen to them over and over via my web-phone. I have worked for over 22 years as an artist & art & design instructor. I am a professional freelance artist and have sold my work successfully for years. I am fascinated with marketing. That is why I enjoy your blog. I have shared the link with many of my dear friends, some of them have yet realized what treasure sits in their inbox. If I had to say that there is one thing we have in common it would have to be “passion”. I see it in Gideon and Andrew. I thank you for your inspiring words and I challenge you to dig deep and think big because the gift in you will only get wiser.

Interesting as always, Yaro!
I have to disagree or comment on one thing: Writing a blog or running a site and making money from ad spot is NOT passive money, I think most people misunderstand that. I know guys like you, Yaro, understand the diffrence, but just to make it clear for the audience, t’s not an asset/passive income, IF you need to keep posting on the site or you need to invest your personal time on it. Advertisers will only pay you money if your site draws traffic, if you stop updating it the traffic will slow down of course. So it’s not a classical asset like stocks, real estate etc.

Your Message Thanks Yaro for your valuable information about blogging and making money
by creating a consistent advertising revenue income stream. I have submitted an excellent
article on “How to become a leader on Twitter?” on my blog site=> .
Feel free to read and comment on my blog. I look forward to your insightful articles.

Thanks for the reminder. I’m lucky that my blogs provide me the extra income that I need to travel, especially since I’m retired with a “regular” check coming in and PLENTY of time to traipse all over the place.

When I first got started as an information marketer, I was guided by Corey Rudl’s advice to build evergreen infoproducts, and marketing systems that ensure they keep on selling. Build them, tweak them, and set them on autopilot – then move on to do something else, maybe create another one like it.

That’s the infopreneur’s dream – and I’ve been living it for many years, and teaching it to many others too. Yes, there’s some work involved up front, but then there is to a blogging profit model like yours too. The good news is that you’re not exchanging time for money after a while – and the upside is unlimited!

Dr Mani, I just want to take my hat off to you for the work that you are doing. You are truly an inspiration. I’ve just downloade your passion manifesto. Thank you so much for the free gift. God bless.

Generating PASSIVE income is so crucial to the longevity of an online business. And it’s important to point out that there isn’t JUST ONE WAY to do this. Most people think getting sponsorships is a real pain – negotiating with companies, cold-calling, etc. However, you point out that a good blog can ATTRACT sponsors, which is so key!

Well yet again, a jem of an article, which many will visit in the coming years. Thanks agin for consisely putting together these very important points. We often get lost in the various online offers and advice around but article from you and Darren are always worth reading and following.
Thanks for sharing.

Great blog post as usual Yaro. Thank you for the value you provide all of us. I definitely try to model myself after you, as far as value. I always look forward to your e-mails, they surely provide the best information by far.

Yaro, great article, pilar content, I am about to get “The Dip” from Seth Godin. sounds like a good book and something I ahve been in it seems for alittle while. but still sticking to it.
Larry
BTW been reading your blog from start to finish, Love it! I like seeing your transition.

The most powerful messages I walked away with after reading his books:

* Do not get stuck in the way things were or are.
* Get busy turning things into what they could be.
* Change isn’t made by asking permission.
* Change is made by asking for forgiveness later.
* The Web makes it easier to connect with people and create your own micromovement.
* True leaders understand that change is not only omnipresent, but the key to success.

Knowing about how you got started and the amount of effort you actually put in in order to get to where you are today is the inspiration I need to keep on going.
“There’s always light at the end of the Tunnel” indeed.

Despite your current source of income, most people desire to create another independent source of income. As opposed to dependent income that requires your presence and attention, the independent income will offer more opportunities to create money.

Therefore, this is one step you can take towards attaining your desired financial freedom as it continuously bring in money. Experts believe that you are more likely to get financial freedom once your passive (or independent) income exceeds the amount of your expenditures. As soon as you have fully established this particular source of income, you are sure to earn money even if you are not doing work

Thanks Yaro, I have a popular site and I rely on Adsense but this articles has given me the inspiration to directly approach potential advertisers who I know will benefit from the traffic. I just haven’t had the confidence to believe in getting out there before.

Good stuff Yaro. I’m on month 5 of blog mastermind. At this point I’ve had over 4000 unique visitors, 8000 page views, and had guest posts on the major blogs in my category. So, I think I’m well on my way. I have to admit at times, I want things to progress faster. But, I think your point about the 2 hour work day is spot on. Most people see my lifestyle ( I spend about 6 hours a day surfing-ocean, not internet), and they wonder when I write blog posts and apply for jobs. Most people suffer from having too much time rather than not enough. in fact when we have less time, we tend to be much more efficient.

There is no more blogging for fun. Only a few use the platform for fun, most are using it as an Independent income stream. You continue to inspire me and everyone that reads your blogs. You don’t just offer a good article or two, your entire blog is a learning platform that never loses its professionalism

Passive income is also a goal of mine. It fits perfectly into the “lifestyle design” way of thinking.

By blog is not at the stage yet where I can sell advertising but I do have an information product for sale (which I’m selling on a separate site), and I plan on developing a couple of more this year. It’s all about having different income streams which don’t necessarily rely on the other.

That is great that you mentioned Ed Dale, he is the greatest expert on buying and selling websites. I bought his course Dominiche that is all about the art of buying and selling websites, it was great.

Great points about event independent income. Many people want to get rich with doing little work, but their plan is flawed as they rely on the kind of events that you mentioned. If you want to succeed with little weekly work, you need to setup some kind of passive income that will keep coming in regardless of what you do. Once you build up these income streams, then you have the freedom to travel or focus on bigger projects.

Great Post. I’m a newbie seeking some answers before joining your program. I know it’s great but how about folks like me from West Africa where power is epileptic and the internet access is even worse a sometimes?

I’m a little concerned about how these might affect me once i start. I’ve sent some Tweets to you but haven’t gotten a reply yet.

i’ve been a blogger for 3 years now and i want to take it to the next level.

I just started using affiliate sites and blogging to increase my sales. And I would like to thank Cheryl Clausen’s post Your Small Business Can’t Survive without Effective Marketing which explained to me clearly how to start a marketing blog. I’m impressed with how you make that much money off with your blog. Me too, had become fond of reading magazines but I still need some guides on how to make my blog look like that of a magazine.

Hello Yaro,
I just wanted to say that I finished reading, “The Richest Man in Babylon” a few days ago and it was an interesting book for one that is small, but informative. What I think is the most important in the book is: Where the determination is, the way can be found and work is the best friend. I believe in working, but being smart about it. Thinking smarter, not harder and doing something that you enjoy. When I heard about passive income from Robert Kiyosaki from RichDad PoorDad and you, I knew that was the way to do things. Make money work for you instead of you work for money.
Another book that you recommend is the, “E-Myth” by Michael Gerber that I want to read.
Thank you for telling about sponsors. I want to contact some from a forum for my blog, but I keep putting it off because I don’t think they will accept my proposal and I think I’m holding myself back. I keep putting it off and I just need to TRY. I want to make a big first impression. If I never do it, I will never know. I will just have to keep putting out the intention until I succeed.
I will read your other article in this email and see what you have to say.
Keep writing those posts and delivering great content.

All very true here. Living a 2-hour workday is really great – this is why we are all in this Business, right? 😉 To work less, and spend more time with our families and doing things we love.

The sad thing is, many people when starting out, believe it will take them just a couple of months to reach that.

It took me over two years to get where I am now. It took me many hours of research and implementation, research and implementation again. I failed and succeeded. And I can say – it`s achievable, but not easy for sure. Although when you get there, you`re the king of the world 😉

While a 2 hour work day is a dream for most, it is very hard to turn it into reality. In my experience I become addicted to working more than 2 hours – not because I have to, but because I want to. I am constantly reading, learning, expanding, and acting.

Sustained income requires a lot of upfront work, as you mentioned, but once the goal is accomplished it is a truly great feeling.

A 2 hour work day would be absolutely ideal, but for some reason, I just can’t get myself to do it. I am always bombarded with fresh ideas that interest me. So even though I could probably get away with the 2 hour work day, I don’t do it, because I enjoy what I do.

Once again, this is a great article. Love the way you break everything down. Going to have to purchase blog mastermind just because of your posts. Absolutely great. You have to wonder, if he is giving this much good information away for free, imagine what he will be offering when you give him some money 🙂

Your Message
Working for just 2 hour a day is a dream for most and it is very hard to become a reality. Most people sometimes become addicted to working more than 2 hours – not because they have to, but because they want to.

I think, before one can achieve the 2 hour workday or 4 Hour Work Week, one would have had to lay the groundwork, which would take more than 2 hours a day — more like 40 a week! Only then, when one is successful, do you then relax enough to simply monitor and maintain your business.

The key would be to build in systems that can help ensure the work is automated as much as possible.

Like always you have once more proved Yaro that you are one of the best teachers about IM. I’ve read about magazine model before also but after reading this article i understand it much better.Thanks for this article