I’m super excited about today’s post, it’s an epic post in my opinion! I’m going to share with you my personal PPC Ian Money Map. That’s right – This is my personal one page map/plan for getting rich! It’s a map that I study and refer to daily to keep stay on track. Money is always on my mind, period. I wrote this out by hand because writing is power and will ensure my dreams come true.
If you’re in the Internet marketing industry like myself, you know how easy it is to get caught up in the day-to-day. Today’s all about taking a step back and planning for the long term. (By long term I mean 10-15 years out, I’m planning on retiring young and wealthy after all!) I couldn’t be more confident in my plan. It exploits the velocity of money, multiple revenue streams, diversification, passive income, earned income, equity in private and public securities, and so much more more. In fact, it would take thousands of words to fully explain this in a post so I thought that sharing the actual map would be so much easier (and more informative).
This plan is the culmination of years of studying money and is largely inspired by one of my favorite authors, Robert Kiyosaki. Please click here to download PPC Ian’s Money Map or simply click the preview image to the right!
For the remainder of this post, I will highlight some of my major points, but again highly encourage just downloading the free map because my words will not do it justice. I sincerely hope this helps in your own quest towards financial freedom.
Realization 1: Internet Marketing Is Not Pure Passive Income
Despite much hype but top pundits online, I have arrived at the conclusion that web publishing and Internet marketing are not pure sources of passive income. In my opinion, they are a hybrid between an investment (passive income) and a small business. I like to think this is the case, with the investment side really coming out strong in the long run (and with the small business aspect diminishing more and more in the long run). I’m starting to see this happen in my personal domain portfolio.
As a result of this realization, one of my big goals in 2011 is extracting half of my Internet affiliate marketing profits and flowing them into truly passive dividend paying stocks. This has been something I’ve struggled with so far as I have been reinvesting all profits from my Internet marketing business (and then some) back into my affiliate marketing business. Why? I’m obsessed with affiliate marketing and it has been growing rapidly. However, I need to remind myself that this stuff is not bulletproof and that it’s not truly passive.
Affiliate marketing has been a huge help in terms of diversifying my income streams and drives more revenue than my true investment activities at this point in my financial lifecycle. Moreover, I wouldn’t be where I am today in the corporate world without affiliate marketing, the education and learnings have been unreal. All things being equal, however, I’d prefer to have that same money coming from dividend paying stocks versus websites since that provides more freedom, stability, and ultimately time in the long run.
Realization 2: Earned Income Accelerates Passive Income
You hear everyone talking these days about passive income. You hear a lot of hype and there are so many people chasing the dream. Unfortunately, there also exists a lot of misinformation. The first source of misinformation is that Internet marketing is passive income. As explained in the last point, this is not fully the case in my opinion (at least in the short run). The other misnomer is that passive income is really easy and that anyone can do it quickly. I’m here to say that given the unprecedented number of people chasing the passive dream, earned income is easier these days for those with the right talent and skill. With so many people focused on passive, there exists an unprecedented number of earned income opportunities in the field of Internet marketing for those who are highly intelligent and willing to work hard. Is earned income easy? Absolutely not! It’s super hard! However if you want to have true passive income that matches your salary, it’s not nearly as easy as all the hype indicates.
If you’re an A player, my advice is to go for earned income as part of your overall money strategy. You will be able to learn so much from other people, learn invaluable leadership and people management skills, and accelerate your small business/affiliate marketing revenue and investment income. Moreover, you will have access to stock options and 401Ks, two fundamentally critical components of my investment strategy that would not be possible without a job. After all, I made it big in online marketing because of stock options in private companies that had major liquidity events.
Realization 3: Compound Interest Is Extremely Powerful
In crafting your own money plan, I highly encourage you to identify opportunities for compound interest. I have compound interest working in my favor in all areas of my money map. First, I consistently devote the majority of my time and hard work to my job. This has compounded tremendously over the years: I went from Associate of Search marketing to Director of Search Marketing in only five years.
In terms of my affiliate marketing endeavors, I have allowed the earnings to compound. I have spent all of my earnings this year building more sites (via outsourced projects that I have project managed). I now have about 80 active online businesses. Now, as mentioned before, I do plan to scale back and start funneling some of my profits into "real" passive investments in 2011.
Last, my investments are compounding by reinvesting dividends, investing in companies that grow dividends consistently, and also via equity appreciation (although I don’t care about equity as much since I’m in this game for cash flow). It’s really the compounding happening in my investment activities that will truly make me financially free in the 10-15 year timeframe and that’s why investing is going to be one of my top focuses in 2011.
Thanks again for reading and make sure to download PPC Ian’s Money Map!
Money Map image and PDF in this post © PPCIan.com
Great job on the money map! I like how you have the goal “live off passive income from investments” boxed out. Also, based on our conversation the other night, it’s important to add the more money you have to funnel into dividend paying stocks & investments, the faster it is to grow into a large pool of money…and “drip millionaire” status.
Passive/residual income is the best! Awesome game plan also in it’s format.
I feel like I’m too young to be investing but I know that’s not true. It’s a different area in which I’m not educated in 😛
I should take the time to learn. Investors are on top of the world.
D3so,
Thanks so much for the comment! You’ve certainly got that right, investors are on top of the world! 🙂
All the best,
Ian
Ian, have you thought about how to make your internet business go from the S quadrant to the B quadrant. I’ve been considering how I can use Kiyosaki’s model for implementing this paradigm in my own website businesses, but I would love to hear your ideas.
Steve,
Awesome question! I have thought about this quite a bit. In my personal situation, I’ve concluded (at least for now) that I want to “skip” the B quadrant by focusing really hard on the I and S quadrants, and then funneling my money into the I quadrant. One day, I hope to be completely (or at least mostly) in the I quadrant.
This may sound a bit strange, but I’ve found the online marketing career path to be amazing. It is a fast growing career (that provides opportunities to acquire lucrative stock options). I manage a large team at my company and from that perspective consider myself somewhat of a “business owner”. Because of the tremendous upside in the Internet marketing career path (and the ability to scale my affiliate marketing business in my spare time), I have concluded in my personal situation that I can hopefully bypass the B quadrant. That said, this is a marathon and this goal will take me many years, and is something under constant evaluation.
Would be curious on your own perspective on the matter and will definitely check out your blog. Thanks so much for visiting my blog and for the comment, I truly appreciate it! 🙂
Best,
Ian
Thanks for linking it from your recent posts. Your Money Map is cool. I hope I could make big in my Online business and invest half into dividend paying stocks. I am totally green into it, but it makes sense and it’s totally “passive”.
IM is not totally passive. It involves regularly update and all the sudden panda or what google update may slap your site traffic and ranking, and earnings.
I’m planning to reinvest 50% and try to grow some dividend paying stocks. Do you have any suggestion? Thanks!
Hi Kent,
That’s great to hear that you’re getting into dividend-paying stocks. I could write an entire post (or series of posts) on the topic. My main piece of advice is to do your research and diversify risk. Look for companies that make more than enough money to cover their dividend and have a history of growing dividends (and earnings) over time. Stay tuned, I may end up writing a post on this topic sometime soon!
All the best,
Ian