If your desire is to become rich, the safest and easiest way to accomplish that feat – as has been proven time and again – is to know and learn about what rich people do that brings them their enormous cash.

 

“So, what is it that rich people do that makes them rich?” I can feel you wanting to find out very quickly. And without wasting your time, the answer to the question can be found in the article, “No Rich Man Has One Income Stream… Neither Should You!” authored by Dr. Emmanuel Sunny-Ojeagbase and first published in the February edition of SuccessDigest in the year 2000.

 

Enjoy the reading – Editor

 

DEAR SuccessDigest Reader, This is a special letter to you. And it is a letter I want you to take seriously. If you know me very well, you’ll know that I wouldn’t waste my time bothering you on things that wouldn’t be of any importance to you: I get to bother you ONLY when I feel strongly about an issue. And, believe me, I’ve never felt stronger about any issue than I feel about Multiple Streams of Income (MSI for short).

 

Robert Allen, the boastful guy who almost got himself into ‘trouble’ by shouting on top of the roof that he should be sent to any city in the United States, “Take away my wallet, give me $100 – for living expenses- and in 72 hours I’ll buy you an excellent piece of real estate, using none of my own money”, first brought the relevance of MSI to me.

 

A real estate expert and author of the bestselling book, No Money down For The 90s, Robert Allen made the point that whereas a family once existed on one income stream – that is either the husband or the wife earning the money which the whole family depended on – inflation has ensured that that is no longer the case. For a family to live comfortably these days, both husband and wife must be bringing something to the dinner table. And even that, he also pointed out, is already going out of fashion.

 

Forget what I said about Rob being boastful. He knows exactly what he’s talking about. For instance, Los Angeles Times, one of America’s oldest newspapers, took up the bombast Allen and demanded that he prove his claim.

 

Well Rob, who until then probably didn’t think anyone would go as far as asking him to walk his talk, as they say in America, found himself in a strange city with only a $100 bill in his pocket and a Los Angeles Times reporter watching every move he made to be sure he wasn’t up to some tricks.

 

In less than 72 hours Rob had purchased not just properties, but choice properties. Of course, Los Angeles Times had to report their findings, and yes you guessed right: Rob Allen became an instant celebrity with the sale of his hardback book going through the roof!

 

Rob wasn’t done yet. Riding on the wave of fame that his achievement had brought him, he boasted again: bring anyone out of the unemployment queue and within 72 hours I will teach the person how to buy real estate and the person will actually buy properties without spending any of his money.

 

I am sure Rob expected to be taken up this time. The good news, for Rob, was that again, he got an unemployed housewife, trained her on how to deal in real estate and she actually bought a property within the specified time with no money down.

 

If a man could accomplish things like this in public view, I’d be an unserious person not to take what such a person says seriously. Anyhow, serious or not, I myself soon had such a profound real-life experience of what not having a MSI meant in 1998 that l am now an evangelist of the idea. Although I cannot relate to that experience now – having just written about another real-life experience in this issue – I can tell you in all honesty that it wasn’t an experience I want to go through again. Tufiakwa!

 

That was why, first in May last year, I had to do a cover story that brought my readers‘ attentions to the danger of not developing a multiple streams of income; and second, in November last year, l had to get one of the best MSI developers in the country, Mr. Biodun Shobanjo, Vice Chairman and CEO of Insight

Communications Limited, to deliver the keynote lecture at our 4th SuccessDigest Entrepreneurs Conference.

 

Now, this is where I was going. Until Mr. Shobanjo showed up at the CAP Training Centre at Ikeja where we held our Super Conference, in his sleek, Jap-made jeep, with his trademark bow tie complementing his very simple dressing (hear this, reader, don’t be fooled by Mr. Shobanjo‘s simple dressing, he’s so loaded with brilliant, fortune-generating ideas that he could afford to dress flashily, but that is not his lifestyle!), I wasn’t prepared for the electrifying lecture that he delivered.

 

Let’s see if I can capture what actually took place that morning. Okay, I knew that Mr. Shobanjo was a master creator of MSI. I mean, he’s behind the industry giants, Insight Communications (the top-rate, award-winning advertising agency that now grosses over an N1billion revenue annually); MC & A (another multi-million naira grossing ad company); Optimum Exposures (this company is so good at outdoor advertising that SuccessDigest Enterprise Awards organizers couldn’t resist giving them The Most Innovative Business of the Year award for 1999), and several others (which you will find out in his lecture starting on page 16).

 

Okay, I also knew he was happy to be at the conference because, in his letter to me accepting my invitation for him to be our keynote speaker, he did say: “Even if my schedule will be very tight during the period under reference, I cannot afford to turn down a request from you, given our long-standing relationship.”

 

But let me level with you: all I expected was the usual stuff where the big name speaker comes to the platform, gives you a run around about what he has accomplished without actually telling you how he went about it.

 

But, boy, how mistaken I was!

 

The moment the Insight Com supremo stepped into the hall, complete with his top drawer presentation gadgets, power point et al, I knew we were in for a treat. And from the second he started his delivery up to the second he finished it, no attendee as much as took their eyes away from the podium where Mr. Shobanjo was piecing together the process of creating a sustainable MSI.

 

 

First published in March, 2013.