In stock portfolios there are usually a combination of investments included to earn money. They ideally balance each other out more or less. Some vehicles are riskier (stocks) but can make (or lose) more money and some are more stable or less volatile (bonds) and therefore earn less. What usually drives the decisions made to develop the portfolio are whether you need to accept the higher risk to earn the most money, or whether you want to (and can afford to be) more conservative with less risk.
This is the same type of concept you should consider when developing a business with multiple streams of income. You should balance it out with some free programs, some inexpensive programs, and as you build your portfolio, you could add some programs that have the capacity to earn higher commissions. These higher-earning programs probably cost more to participate in. Sometimes you can make money quicker with one-time-only sales and to build your downline with free programs while you take the time to develop more permanent, long-term relationships with higher-value programs.
Another consideration is that although residual income is better for your bottom line than one-time-only sales, at the same time it is easier to make one-time-sales than it is to find people willing to make a long-term commitment for residual income. Residual income is income that you make after the initial sale, from that same transaction. For example when you refer someone to a program that has a monthly fee to participate, you usually would receive a percentage of that. One-time-only sales are just what they sound like. Each one has its good and bad points and therefore that is why you want to balance things out.
On the one hand you could say you might have to do less marketing and advertising with residual income as the one sale keeps generating income over time. However there is a great deal of turnover where people quit after a month or two or more, and you shouldn’t wait for that to happen before you start trying to find more sources of income.
On the other hand you can say since it takes longer to build residual income, it really works if you have some quicker sources of income to tide you over in the meantime, at least to cover your operating expenses. Some examples of these are survey programs (cash), clicking for credit programs (advertising), and selling tangible products for free affiliate programs like Amazon and Clickbank (cash).
Naturally if you can provide some services as well, this just adds to the many ways you might be earning money online. Examples of this are ghostwriting, doing SEO campaigns, posting to blogs, creating social network campaigns (ads, posting links, etc). If you really stop and think about it you can really have a nice mix of income sources which may be temporary or permanent depending on your preference.
