The work of freelancing is what I call “transactional” work. That is, you create whatever it is that you create (copywriting, graphic design, website content, etc.) and you earn money for the hours and effort and talent used. You’re transacting a batch of time, effort, and talent for money.

But there are other ways to make money without putting in the time, effort, and talent. That’s not to say that these are “get rich quick” schemes. On the contrary. However, they often require a short period of time, effort, and talent, and can produce ongoing (sometimes called “passive”) income for you.

1. Information. This is one that many people think of right away and it does hold promise. The key here is to have a compelling message written for a specific audience. These might include ebooks, subscription newsletters, and paid webinars. Now, I’ve seen freelancers with a wide variety of ebooks available on their site. I’d suggest you stick with information products that are related to your area of expertise because they will help to position you as an expert, allowing you to charge a higher rate (even if people don’t buy them).

2. Advertising. Think about putting some Pay-Per-Click advertising (like Google AdSense) on your blog. You may not make much but as you market your business, you’ll be marketing your blog (of course) while presenting clickable money-making opportunities. If the technical side of it is too much for you, try using Blogger or WordPress, which offer fairly easy-to-embed advertising systems. Squidoo is another way to create a site that helps your SEO and offers advertising income.

3. Find some places that give you passive income opportunities for your work. Helium (http://helium.com) or Suite101 (http://suite101.com) are good examples for writers, ThemeForest (http://themeforest.com) or TemplateMonster (http://templatemonster) are good examples for website designers, and istockphoto (http://istockphoto.com) is a good example for graphic designers. These have the advantage of advertising your business while helping you to sell the work you’ve created.

There is another option I like, which is a hybrid between the transactional income you currently earn and the passive income ideas I’ve outlined here: If you create a lot of proposals, that can be time consuming. So one way of solving that is to develop packages. There is still the transactional work involved in creating the deliverable, but you’ve minimized the marketing and selling effort dramatically (which makes for slightly more profitable projects). Gather together a handful of related services and offer them as a single package for sale. For example, a freelance graphic designer might create a business logo, business card, and customizable ebook cover and sell it as a “start your own ebusiness” package.

The key to making more money without raising rates is to reduce the amount of time you work on a project. And this “saved time” could be anywhere along the spectrum from reducing your marketing and selling time (as in the last example) to reducing your production time (as in the first three money-making ways).