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Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

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201–210 of 236 posts

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is less than I spend on coffee in a month.

That's a lot! :)

Just $2 a day!

I don't spend as much, and yes, coffee can be so much cheaper, but it's also not a lot of money.

Interestingly, the following guy has a recurring theme on how trying to save on lattes is inefficient and distracting (similar to the idea of premature optimization in code):

http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/save-on-coffee/

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#202

Bitcoin arbitrage.

In the Spring 2013 I made $4k in one month on that. Just bought $2k worth of bitcoins and sold them for $6k a month later. But it was way easier back then (because bitcoin price just kept growing without any downward motion), and I was risky.

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#203
post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd prefer not to but I'll check back a few more times to see if there are any questions about my post to answer.

There are lots of people telling others to write reviews without having purchased/used a product. Did you have to do it too? I mean, is your site only side by side comparisons or do you also post reviews?

My site does not have any reviews. Each product overview is just a description of the product and its specifications. Rather than telling people which one to buy I give them the ability to find the one that best fits their criteria. I rank all of the products by how popular they are and I think many people trust this more than they do a review.

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#204
post #17

* Apps with ads in them. Easy enough to churn out, but decreasing revenues and most of the high earning adverts are the scummiest. Low value and of low moral usefulness. * Solar Panels. In the UK, the government pays you per kWh generated. Needs an upfront investment, but stable income and you reduce your own energy bills. See http://shkspr.mobi/blog/tag/solar * Renting out property. Needs a much larger initial inves…

I have had some success in affiliate marketing using an approach that I think many on Hacker News could duplicate. I launched my Amazon affiliate site about a year-and-a-half ago and its earnings have increased by about $100 per month with December being the first time I earned over $2,000 in a month. The approach is to find a type of product where Amazon has thousands of listing but the specifications are not very a…

would love to connect w/ you. My email: kadnan@gmail . com

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#205
post #143

Some overarching takeaways: - niche sites with Google ads is a fading path, but still can work if you hit a good market or produce evergreen content - selling niche e-books through Amazon or direct seems to be a decent option, but is a lot of work unless you can produce quickly and have a feel for the topic - apps are dangerous because discover is nearly impossible. If you want to make apps, make quick little ones be…

My personal opinion is to make niche B2B tools. How does one find what to make? That is actually a harder problem to solve than making the tool itself

It requires talking to people who have these problems ;) Most programmers only end up talking amongst themselves, or attack business problems they themselves experience (hence the large market saturation for developer tools).

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a lot! :)

Just $2 a day! I don't spend as much, and yes, coffee can be so much cheaper, but it's also not a lot of money. Interestingly, the following guy has a recurring theme on how trying to save on lattes is inefficient and distracting (similar to the idea of premature optimization in code): http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/save-on-coffee/

Yeah. I make coffee at home. I'm not really sure what it costs me, to be honest!

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#207
post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I turned off my ad blocker for you site, and clicked on the ads. Hopefully you get 2 cents.

thanks dude, living the vida loca now

Clicked on Namecheap ad because they don't stop following me despite the fact that I'm their customer.

-$0.05 for Namecheap.

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#208
post #66
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is about passive income, and, given interest rates, there aren't really any good options. If you're able to generate significant passive income at the ~2-3% rates[1], well, you probably already have a lot of money already, and should just focus on whatever you were doing to get that much. Way too many comments in the thread branching off yours are answering the wrong question -- "how to grow your money i…

I'm party to this thread branching of which you speak, but yes, it's predicated on not answering the question and using a principle similar to what you're saying: save, invest passively, and get back to work doing what you do. It's probably as a good a strategy or better than chasing returns in other ways that may also end up requiring a lot of work, depending on skillset, demand, and financial conditions.

I have no problem with people giving that advice, and agree with it myself.

However, if you're going to dispute the premise of the question, you need to explicitly say so and connect it to the alternate point you're making rather than expect readers to see the connection; otherwise, it looks like you're just being non-responsive.

And indeed, that's what the thread looks like now.

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have direct experience on the hosting question, but I have often though that if you could come up with the purely simplest way to allow a small, local business to create a one-page website, they would pay $30 a month for the service. Better yet, target a specific niche – Restaurants, spas, landscapers, etc. You could then have a dead-simple template they could type their info into. Not gonna win any design aw…

A friend of mine does that, but there are a few problems with that model: - it's harder than you think and a lot of work to find new customers - customers usually want more than "just a website"; you also need to offer things like newsletters, online reservation, etc. - if you get enough customers to make it worthwhile, you will be get lots of support requests Every time I meet him, someone calls him for help with th…

Agreed. I guess I was thinking more of a "landing-page-as-a-service" option.

Barebones, but enough so anyone searching locally wouldn't have trouble finding their phone number, hours, location, etc.

I don't use Facebook or the yellow pages. If you don't have a website, I probably won't find you. And if your website quickly tells me what I want to know vs. making me click through pages under construction to find it, I'll be much happier.

But, as markyc said, Facebook may be the best strategy for small businesses.

Re: Ask HN: Your Passive Income Suggestions?

#210
post #143

Some overarching takeaways: - niche sites with Google ads is a fading path, but still can work if you hit a good market or produce evergreen content - selling niche e-books through Amazon or direct seems to be a decent option, but is a lot of work unless you can produce quickly and have a feel for the topic - apps are dangerous because discover is nearly impossible. If you want to make apps, make quick little ones be…

My personal opinion is to make niche B2B tools. How does one find what to make? That is actually a harder problem to solve than making the tool itself

I work at a small, non-tech family business. I am the default IT guy, and I have made a ton of internal tools for us. Most of these are either only useful to us or would be hard to make universally for others. However, I have turned a few into B2B web apps that have good traffic and earn a couple hundred each month with virtually no effort or optimization. And the opportunity exists to turn these into more robust SAAS offerings or do contract work, but that would be less passive.

Not everyone is in this position, so it is a very interesting conundrum. If you know anyone that works for or owns a small business or works as a professional in a specific field, ask them about the tools they already use and what tools they would like to have. Tell them to let you know the next time they are facing a problem that they know could be done better/easier/faster through a tool or app. If you can make something that will help them, perhaps it will help others. Custom forms, data collection, etc.

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