Acts of Service for Money

There are various ways to acquire financial wealth in this world. Many people think working hard and scraping and saving every penny and over time they’ll accumulate wealth. This is, in fact, the hardest and arguably the worst way to try and acquire wealth. Others will invest in stocks and now in modern times crypto currencies. This can indeed bring you wealth, but there’s not really any control over markets and you need to be vigilant as a day trader. There are dividend stocks that will pay over time. This is a good option for long term planning to accrue wealth over time.

But there is one way where you can acquire wealth faster, and that’s what we’re going to talk about this week in Deeper Thoughts. The act of offering services.

The most successful businesses you see all have one thing in common. They all offer some kind of service. A great example known world wide is Amazon. What started off as an online source for buying books rapidly expanded into a website that allows you to buy just about anything you can think of. It created a service of convenience that rivaled stores like Walmart or Target at the click of a button.

Another prime example of services that make money is again, Amazon Prime with their streaming services, alongside others like Netflix and Hulu, which offer the service of entertainment. All of these platforms offer a vast online library of movies and shows. This branch of services even inspired major corporations in the entertainment industry such as Disney and Paramount.

But what about some more practical services that most of us can get into? Well let’s look at some examples. 

So when looking at services to offer you need to look at something where there is either a demand for those services or create a demand for those services, like a product that makes day to day life or doing a job easier.

After that you need to be honest about what types of services you’re willing to do. Not everyone wants to be a surgeon and have to operate on someone. Not everyone wants to be an electrician and deal with wires that can shock you or worse. Not everyone wants to cut down trees and have to climb up heights. What are you willing to do?

The next thing you need to do is assess if you have the knowledge, skills, and tools to fulfill that service. If not, and it’s something you want to do then you’ll have to invest in acquiring that knowledge, such as going back to school or taking a few needed classes, going to seminars, or buying books or sourcing other material to get that information. You might need to get tools required to do these things, so you’ll have to invest in them as well.

So if you want to do healthcare or even be a doctor, a major service that’s been around for centuries you’ll have to get schooling and training for that. You also have to be okay with all the tasks doctors have to do, dealing with sick people, people dying, etc.

You could go to trade school or get an apprenticeship and get into being an electrician. I recently was taking out the old garbage disposal in my house, but the unit was hardwired into the circuit. I don’t mess with electricity in that capacity and I know it’s a very unforgiving element. So I instead opted to have an electrician come in and disconnect it for me. The man came in, checked the wire with a meteor, cut said wire, put some caps on it and installed a metal box so it wasn’t sticking out touching anything. Less than 10 minutes of work and I coughed up $250! But he provided a service that I needed and I was able to change out the disposal in my kitchen.

Sales is another good way to get into a service based industry. If you’re selling a product that can help make a job easier, you can get good money from that. If you’re selling a point of sales system to restaurants and other small businesses that can help improve the quality of their own services, people will want that if you know how to sell. Some people and companies need promotional items, and if you can sell those, they’ll seek you out.

How many people know how to fix their cars? Personally, I can do basic maintenance, but when it comes to anything major, I’m taking it to the shop. Even some things like changing the oil I can do, but I’m lazy and I take it somewhere so they can do it for me to save my time and energy.

Several friends of mine have started home cleaning services. Not only do they clean the houses of residents, they make a lot of their money cleaning for vacation rentals. They come and clean the house, wash all dishes, do the laundry, put fresh bedding on, clean the hot tubs, etc. This is important because no one wants to vacation in a dirty house or condo.

This segways into another service, renting real estate. Now yes this one you might have to do other things to get the money for, or take out a loan to make happen, but renting is not only a great service to offer, it’s also passive income. It doesn’t matter if it’s long term renting or vacation rental, it’s money that keeps coming in. You just have to advertise, and keep things maintained. It’s not like a plumber or electrician where you have to do a job to get paid each time. It requires a massive investment upfront, but long term it can bring in massive income.

If you want passive income but don’t have the money for something as large as buying property yet, there are other ways. Some examples can look like if you have knowledge of something, you can create an online course for it. It will take some time and work upfront, but after that it’s just marketing yourself. You don’t have to keep remaking the course. Each purchase goes to the program you already created. Or if you have a flair for storytelling, you can write books. If you’re a woodworker, you can create build plans with cut lists, angles, pictures and diagrams of the products you’ve made and sell them online.

While I myself am not a millionaire (yet), and this isn't a source for financial advice, these are guidelines I look to when what I can do to provide extra income, which over the last few years has been steadily growing. I’ve been in the food service industry for 10 years, which is great money in the right restaurants. I started selling my necklaces on this website, and then added divination reading services. Now I’m expanding into woodworking to build custom products not only for myself but for customers. There are things I’m willing to do that others can’t/won’t do just as there are things others can do that I can’t/won’t. It will vary from person to person. Check your skill sets or what’s interesting to you and start trying things out. Don’t expect to blow up overnight, but put in consistent effort and you’ll find that through selling acts of services, you’ll increase your cashflow.

Hopefully this week’s article will give you ideas of where to start to begin increasing your own cashflow, specifically in ways that utilize your talents or in ways that feed your soul. Thank you for reading, and once again, I hope you all have an enlightening day.