What to do during downtime

What to do during downtime is a common question to ask after you become an independent consultant. As a consultant you may find yourself in a feast or famine work cycle where you are very busy at some times and in a lull during other times.

When in a lull you may wonder what to do during downtime. Of course, downtime can be a great time to catch up on your personal life, take a breather, ramp up your marketing, reorganize your office or catch up on old business. In fact, a friend wanted to become a small business consultant, and she now spends her downtime meeting with small business owners in her community.

But when I think about downtime I think about diversifying my income, and I tend to work on passive income projects.

Passive income is income that doesn’t require any additional work on your part. In other words, "passive" income is not directly tied to your time or energy (hence the concept of "passive" income). Generally, passive income refers to something that can be sold over and over without any additional effort on your part.

Some examples of passive income are:

  • Selling advertising on a website
  • Selling e-books
  • Selling software
  • Selling graphic design templates
  • Selling digital art, such as icons
  • Selling packaged digital goods
  • Earning referral fees

What to do during downtime is up to you. But if you know more projects are around the corner and you don’t need to be hitting the pavement marketing your services, I encourage you to think about building passive income streams.

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