
Ask HN: Ideas for a small passive income site - madd_o
I&#x27;m a web developer, happy to use my spare time to build one or several small passive income sites. Looking for ideas for what to build.
======
patio11
Can I suggest that you focus on ways to create outsized value with software?
This puts you several steps ahead of the game. Speaking in generalities, the
"passive income" crowd don't tend to actually build businesses and _often_
don't create sustainable, defensible value in their projects. If you build a
business with sustainable, defensible value, then "all" you need to do from
that point is figure out the right combination of algorithms and employees
such that your personal time investment is sufficiently low such that it hits
your "passive" threshhold.

If you want some more concrete ideas, in lieu of copy/pasting a previous
comment:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5904316](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5904316)

~~~
mrfusion
Just read your list. Awesome. Can you expand on number 2 a bit? Are there
other similar questions that can get people talking about solutions amenable
to a software product?

I like the Excel idea a lot, I'm hoping to have several such questions.

------
rememberlenny
You should build a site that helps people find ideas to gain passive income.
This topic comes up enough that there is a clear market.

~~~
madd_o
Thanks for the reply. I've visited many of the sites that attempt to provide a
fountain of ideas, but never found them to be on point. Seems like a
challenging product to make.

------
andrewljohnson
Fork my Stopwatch app for iOS. It makes just over $5/day, and I never did much
work on it.

Completely open source, no real marketing.

[https://github.com/andrewljohnson/StopWatch-of-
Gaia](https://github.com/andrewljohnson/StopWatch-of-Gaia)

[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/stopwatch-+-timer-stop-
watch...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/stopwatch-+-timer-stop-
watch/id518178439?mt=8)

~~~
pbreit
Is there a way in iOS for one app to trigger the opening of another app? I was
thinking more in an alarm clock situation but perhaps also in a timer
situation. For example, "start my Spotify in 1 hour".

~~~
fancy_pantser
URL Schemes are the only way to communicate between apps. So to launch an app
you'd need to know it's NSURL (for spotify it's "spotify") to build a URL and
do: [[UIApplication sharedApplication] openURL:];

~~~
andrewljohnson
There are also App Extensions now, as of iOS8:
[https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/ios/documenta...](https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/ios/documentation/General/Conceptual/ExtensibilityPG/index.html)

------
bennesvig
Pick a specific audience and build them a platform or a way to connect with
others looking for their services.

Some random ideas I just came up with are below. Not all of them passive, but
might still interest you.

\- Website with WordPress templates for real estate agents.

\- WordPress multisite network that enables real estate agents to create a
site quickly and then pay a monthly hosting fee. You could scale this by
selling to different real estate companies, getting all of their agents a
personal site.

\- Mobile marketing for restaurants. Create a service that enables restaurants
to send text message deals to customers.

\- Pick an audience that interests you and post user generated content. Then
sell ads/sponsorships to companies that want to be in front of that audience.
For example, if you create a site for people to submit cute dog pictures, a
company like BarkBox might pay for sponsorship.

\- Teach people a skill and use Amazon affiliate links to the tools that you
use (if possible).

\- Marketing analytics. Build a tool that integrates with Google analytics and
provides recommended actions to take to improve website performance.

\- Create a stock photo site for a specific niche (doctors, lawyers, start
ups, etc).

\- Create a directory for a specific niche and then sell top placement on that
directory.

\- Create a site that allows people who don't know how to code to make an app.

~~~
sejje
FWIW I built idea #3 here (mobile marketing for restaurants), except I
targeted another, but similar, niche.

I used long codes (short codes are expensive!), and I didn't do the marketing
myself. It's basically a way for them to keep a list of customers, enable
automatic signups by texting the number, etc. They write their own messages
and send them out.

I'm not much of a salesman, but I was able to make a few sales, mostly to
local places via in-person conversations.

Anyway, I have this software built and I'm willing to talk about moving it
into other niches.

------
RickS
Move fast, this one will blow over quick: Ebola supplies/starter kits, either
self-assembled (highest effort, high margin) or just stacks of amazon products
with referrals (low effort, low margin).

Second revenue stream for this - there are lots of "end of the world
preparedness" sites (think of the people who are buying Glenn Beck's gold
coins and you've got an idea of the demographic) that would pay to advertise
on a website that attracts people who want to buy their way out of future-
phobia.

------
tpae
I was thinking about starting an open source project like Wordpress, Ghost.io,
etc.. Then create a market for templates. There used to be more "production
ready" open source projects back in the day.. Not as much anymore.

Some open source project ideas:

\- subscription commerce (open source birchbox model)

\- location based platform for mobile apps (open source Uber/Lyft model)

\- host your own airbnb page (open source airbnb)

etc..

essentially, any type of successful business model that can be replicated in
other industries, open source it, then monetize on templates.

~~~
RickS
Disclaimer: I have no stats to back this up, at all. Just been in the game
awhile.

The entry level commerce space (shopify, opencart, woocommerce, etc) always
feels overcrowded, but few things really nail it.

Opencart is the only truly free service that's a contender, and it's
_terrible_. Granted - ecommerce, especially security, is very difficult, and
asking for that in a free product is lofty.

If you can build a commerce platform that's as low-investment as opencart
(read: free) with the UX quality of shopify, and just let it into the wild,
you can make an absolute killing by owning the plugin and template market
associated.

------
aaron987
This has been written about so much there is really no point in repeating it
here. Just Google Pat Flynn. He has a whole blog about it.

~~~
madd_o
Thanks for the tip, I'll do that.

~~~
vijayr
Short overview of what he does:

He has a wildly popular blog, and he is an affiliate for a few products, most
notably, hosting. He makes 30K or more per month, from this one affiliate
program.

He sells an ebook, something related to green architecture.

He also builds info sites, with Adsense on them and makes a few thousand from
those.

He has a couple of iOS apps I believe, built with outsourcing.

As far as I can see, none of the above is passive or even close to passive
(except may be the ebook). He worked hard to get where he is, and still does.
He shares much of his numbers - good inspiration if you need some.

~~~
joverholt
Passive does not equal no work. I think the passive comes in after you put in
that initial work, creating ebook, adsense sites, etc. and then only needing
to devote a minimum of time to maintain that income.

------
schnevets
I feel like there's a ton of untapped potential in online store affiliates,
beyond the usual "blogs and reviews". Maybe something that imports the
wishlist for one particular "big box online retailer / cloud services
provider" and notifies the user if any product on the list goes down in price
at one of many different vendors?

I have a few other ideas in that vein, but I am curious of any traps that may
be encountered.

------
nh
Do research on fast growing internet markets (think Asia/Africa - may need to
go one level deeper like a region or major city).

Then see if that country or region has a dominant job board/classified
website/real estate listing etc.

Millions of users are just coming to the internet in those countries and have
room for growth. Many of the existing websites offer horrible experience.

------
user24
Try pg's list of "ideas we'd like to fund".
[http://www.ycombinator.com/rfs/](http://www.ycombinator.com/rfs/)

Ancient, but here's a blog post I wrote with some ideas:
[http://www.puremango.co.uk/2010/10/ten-
ideas/](http://www.puremango.co.uk/2010/10/ten-ideas/)

And Jacques Mattheij's post that inspired me:
[http://jacquesmattheij.com/My+list+of+ideas+for+when+you+are...](http://jacquesmattheij.com/My+list+of+ideas+for+when+you+are+looking+for+inspiration)

~~~
andrewljohnson
None of this looks small or passive to me.

------
pokpokpok
dropship items that cater to an unsavvy market (old people, hobbyists, memes,
videogame/fanship communities). People less inclined to seek things out on
amazon themselves. alternatively, work on something YOU care about and make
something worthwhile. You might even make a buck

------
spking
Look through some of the sites and apps for sale on Flippa.com and
SideProjectors.com. You can get some ideas and maybe find an existing project
to take over and build on.

~~~
andrewdubinsky
I've bought a couple of domains on Flippa that had a 'built in' business
purpose. SideProjectors has been very hit or miss in that some of those
sellers don't respond back to any questions (for me at least).

------
vishalzone2002
make some tool/app for people in lesser known occupation.. maybe plumbers or
mechanics .. where they can exchange things,etc..

------
archemike_
go to blackhatworld.com and In under a week you can build something since you
have web skills that hits $10/day passively. Then scale parallel until you've
got a salary, then work on your dream.

