How To Make More Money

Wat-Tan-Hor

If anyone were to ask me, “Abel, what’s your favourite food?” It will be “wat tan hor” for sure (WTH in short… HA!). For those of you reading this and you’re not familiar what “wat tan hor” is, it is fried kuey teow in soy black sauce, served in thick gravy that has vegetables, pork slices, prawns, fishcake slices and egg beaten in it. I would say that a plate of wat tan hor is as close to a complete meal as it has everything your body need in it – your vegetables, protein and carb.

One of the main factors to a “good” plate of wat tan hor would be how charred the kuey teow is, can’t be over-done, else it’ll be burnt; it has to be just nice, the sesame oil is hot enough when you toss the kuey teow in, there’s where the dish’s fragrance and taste comes from. I used to be able to get a plate for only RM3.50 in Ipoh, that’s about USD $1, but now for such a plate, at a smaller portion, from the same store, it would cost you RM8.

Same goes to curry noodles, it used to be RM3.50 to RM4 a bowl, now there are even servings priced at RM14 a bowl, with thicker gravy and three more slices of roast pork.

It is not the same… anymore. Cost of living has gone up a lot, but our salary remained almost the same.

Johnny

I remember there was a time there were memes all over the Internet on Little Johnny. Memes telling stories how mischievious Little Johnny was. But this Johnny, isn’t “that” Little Johnny.

This Johnny, drew a salary of RM3,500. If you think RM3,500 is a lot, it isn’t. Let me show you why…

Deductions:

• RM413 – EPF (386) + Socso (17.58) + EIS (7.03) + Tax (2.23)
• RM350 – Tithe
• RM500 – Rental (Room) + Utilities
• RM200 – Phone (Instalment + Bill)
• RM400 – Car (Instalment – Axia)
• RM150 – Petrol
• RM60 – Car Insuranvce + Roax Tax (Averaged)
• RM300 – MediCard
• RM200 – Personal Care
• RM750 – Meals (25 daily x 30)

Remainder:

• RM177 – NOT Including: Birthday, Allowance (Parents), Wealth Protect, Investment(s), Snacks, Toys (PS5, PC, Camera, Collectibles), Entertainment/Leisure, GF

Of course if Johnny’s not religious, he would have RM350 more to spend or save, but does he?

Imagine Johnny has a GF, with RM527 extra, would that mean 10 date nights a month, or rather 8, taking into account gifts, flowers, etc.? Going out 2 times a week? Possible?

Johnny will definitely need more than RM3,500 if and when the relationship gets serious, e.g. proposal setup, engagement ring, wedding, house, condo, etc.

But there are only so “many” ways for Johnny to earn more… either he gets promoted, which doesn’t really come that often, or he finds a new job, with a higher pay, but with Johnny’s limited skills and education background, chances are really slim.

Johnny needs other sources of income. But he has nothing else to spare.

The Professional

On the other hand, you might say, “But, I am not Johnny!” “I am a double board surgeon and I bring home 10x what Johnny is monthly!”

So you saying you are earning RM35,000 a month?

My family and I were invited to a house-warming party yesterday. This guy is a member of my Care Group, let’s call him Lee, he’s a doctor, specialist, and he worked very hard to get to where he is at today. Came from a humble family background, he never forgets his roots, and still is humble and kind to the people around him. Long story short, he secured a nice deal on a bungalow for RM1m, spent probably another 200 grand on renovation and fitting, moved into the new house last week.

The new house was HUGE. Porch enough to fit 4 cars. On the ground floor, a very spacious living room, a playroom for the kids, a guest room, a dry and a wet kitchen side by side, a dining area, a study room, and two washrooms, not to mention an island bar beside the living room (something like another dining area). Upstairs, there’s a foyer that’s half the size of a room, 3 other rooms with the size of the master bedroom, a laundry room (about the same size as the foyer), and another room for clothings (size of a room). The whole house is fully air-conditioned, and a maid to service the needs of a family of 5.

Lee is the sole breadwinner of the family, wife stays home to take care of the children; I believe Lee brings home about RM20k a month, if not more. But if Lee only brings home some where RM20k a month, and if Lee doesn’t have any other source of income, Lee would either need to work more hours, or work more years to retire, or charge more, to repay his housing loan (for one), at the same time maintain the new lifestyle he got in.

Earning more doesn’t mean placing oneself on a different field compared to Johnny. The more one earns, it is easy to assume commitments and expenses scale accordingly too.

Side-Hustle

Call it what however you want, extra income, side income, passive income, side-hustle, they all carries almost the same meaning. The question is, how it is being done?

There are many ways but for the sake of simplicity, let’s look at three (3) common ways how one can pursue it… You can either:

• Create
• Purchase
• Partner

1. Create

Most of us starts off as an employee when we step into the “working world” after we graduate. We would be tied to a job for a couple of years before we decide to look for something “better” out there — usually another job that pays more, demanding more hours but sometimes, there is a small handful of us who would think, “Why not I do this on my own”, then we Create something new, hoping that it will put us in a position to earn more money, or even perhaps allowing us control our time, whether with our family, or the time we want to “go to work”.

Sadly, not all who chose this path is met with success. Most return being an employee, instead of being self-employed.

We know what AirAsia is. For those who don’t, AirAsia is a business in the area of air-transportation. The thing is, even if we have the money to create a business like AirAsia, we still lack two things which are vital to the success of the business — the business education, and a mentor. Unlike other business out there, there is little room where we can afford to “trial and error” until we come to understand how the business works. For example, it is much easier to keep trying at the oven, until the point we take out a tray of beautifully baked cookies — golden brown, cooked in the inside, holds and not crumbles when you pick it up, melts in your mouth exploding with sweet-goodness flavours.

Business Education

Every type of business has their own distinct way of running it. From a noodles store, to a 7-Eleven outlet, to an international corporation that has a networth of millions, they all require an unique different set of skills, talent, knowledge and most importantly mindset. A 7-Eleven outlet operator may be only looking towards to the time when his/her shift ends, or to pay day, never or rather rarely would this operator would spend time thinking how to make the outlet generate more income, or being the most outstanding outlet in the region. All that may be required of the operator, is to ensure that the shelves are refreshed and stocked, the money in the cash register tallies with sales for the day, and maybe a some manners — like “Hello” and “Thank you”.

Whereas for someone who runs a multi-million corporation, he/she would be constantly thinking of expanding, building the corporation’s image/brand, generating more income, managing those under him/her, et cetera.

You get what I mean.

Mentor

Say you want to learn how to make cookies, you would Google it, and usually you would prefer a YouTube tutorial on it, in comparison to a website that only gives you intructions but not show you how to get it done. Whether it is a YouTube video, or a set of instructions on a website, that is mentoring at work. Having gone through the video and/or set of instructions, gives you a much higher success rate at making/baking those cookies, in comparison to if you tried it on your own — you might have gotten the measurements wrong for a start.

Same goes to creating a business of your own. It gives you a higher success rate if you go at it with a mentor by your side.

Hit or Miss

Sad but true… Not many people see success to what they have Created. What is even “sad-er” (I made this up hahaha) after having experienced failure, these people who has the very potential to be in control of their own lives, decided to give up on their dreams, and went back to be an employee.

There are many things involved when one decides to Create something on their own:

• Niche
• Research
• Business Plan + Strategy
• Branding + Awareness
• Marketing + Publicity
• Accounts
• Logistics + Distribution
• Rental

On top of that, Creating something new, or from scratch, usually requires both Time and Money, before you can finally reap what you sowed. Having considered the many factors in play, it could be seen as “Hit or Miss”.

2. Purchase

Or you could be like many others, while keeping your job, Purchase a space on some established platforms, and you sell products and/or services on it. There are many Platforms you can use to do this, most of which you have already heard of:

• Lazada
• Shopee
• Amazon
• eBay
• TaoBao
• AliBaba
• Facebook
• TikTok
• Instagram
• Twitter
• Fiverr

Listed above are some of the Platforms which are familiar to us. These Platforms allow us to sell our products and/or services, in return, they get a certain percentage from our sales. A common yet big problem many people face on Platforms like these is, competition. Like yourself, there are many others out there who are selling the same things/services as you do, probably cheaper than you do, or even with a much higher rating than you do (especially when they’ve been on the Platform longer than you).

Customers are just a click away from your shop! The profit margin is small, and the amount of work that you might get yourself in, could be much, much more e.g. helpdesk, stock and warehousing, packaging and distribution, handling returns, etc.

3. Partner

Lastly, through Partnership, where you leverage on successful industry leaders with proven credentials.

Franchise

Even though a Franchise involves a lot of money, yet there are people who and if they are able to, jump into it. With a Franchise, you are literally paying money to be able to copy everything that works to run a franchised business, example McDonalds. You would find almost all McDonalds outlets identical to one another, same colours/identity, same workflow (as in how food is prepared, where they’re at), same taste/flavour… basically anyone will know a McDonalds just by the yellow colored M and the red background.

If you bought a McDonalds franchise, you are “sorta” guaranteed that the business model will work because the franchise is based on a working system; therefore predictable outcome.

License

Pay a nominal fee to get a license to represent a certain business for example real estate agents, insurance agents, fund advisors, etc.

Affiliate

This form of partnership can be with any business out there, literally. All they require of you is to drive traffic (people) to them, their business, and for every one that you brought in (leads), you will be given a commission (in a percentage). Sometimes affiliate programmes are also known as referral system.

I have attached a few links for you below if you’re interested to know more on Affiliate. Check them out:

1. How Eran made $11,000 in 7 Days:
2. A-Z Guide to Affiliate Marketing:

Being an affiliate has literally no risk involved.