Archive for September, 2007
by Sergris
Before preparing for your home business
Here are other steps you need to startup your work at home:
Determine Your Niche. Maybe you love interior design, but you’re mostly interested in office interior design. Your niche could be modern office interior design.
Research your niche market and your competition. You need to find out if there are people who want your products or services.
Don’t give up your day job Start part-time until you generate enough income to go full-time. This preparation your home business should be a gradual process.
Find the Right Home Based Business Opportunity One that matches your passion, talents and niche.
Market Your Business For an online business, create your own website and promote it regularly. For an offline business, consider advertising
Keep records of your business expenses It’s beneficial for your money management and tax write-off purposes
Working Capital — You need enough cash flow to survive during the early stages.
Maintain a Business Schedule You need to stick to it and avoid distractions.
Health Insurance Shop for the best coverage you can afford through business or trade organizations.
Although you’re setting up a home business, your clients should think of you as a company, not as an individual. Therefore, always maintain a professional image. In order to accomplish that:
Set a Separate Bank Account for your business (DBA). Don’t mix your business money with your personal money.
Have a Separate Room Dedicated to Your Business At least an area closed off by partitions to separate your workspace from your family life. Avoid child noises, dog barking, etc.
Rent a P.O. Box — Except if you’re going to have physical contact with your clients.
Get an 800 Number It’s more affordable than you think. Besides a professional image, the phone savings for your clients will give you an edge over my competitors.
Set a Second Phone Line - dedicated to your work from home
Get an answering machine for incoming calls and record a professional sounding message.
All the time you spend preparing for your home business will not only increase your chances of success but it will save you time, disappointments, headaches and money.
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business for 10 years. His web site provides information on how to avoid scams, how to choose the best legitimate business opportunity, articles and resources to help others succeed in their home business. Please visit: http://www.legitimate-home-based-businesses.net
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
Millions of companies online offer you to earn money doing surveys, but only a few provide legitimate online paid surveys. Most of them are scams, so the purpose of this article is to help you get started and avoid getting ripped off. When you sign with legitimate companies, paid surveys are an easy and convenient way to make extra money online for stay-at-home moms, students or retired persons.
How it works - Large companies contract market research companies to conduct surveys so they can get reactions and opinions, from people like you, about their products. The market research companies then offer you to participate in these surveys and pay you in the form of a check or electronic transfer of funds through Paypal.
Although you will not become rich taking online paid surveys, normally you’ll earn between $3 and $75, or other rewards per survey taken. Some of these companies will also offer you to participate in focus groups (which pay more), telephone surveys, try new products, or watch movie trailers before they are launched. One great advantage of this type of work at home is that you can select the time to complete these surveys and which ones you want to do.
Your first and most important step is to find sites with legitimate online paid surveys. Some companies charge a one time subscription fee (usually $35). But before you sign up with any company, do your own Internet
Other companies provide you with a FREE list of online paid surveys. Whether you decide to pay a fee or go with the free online paid survey sites, you should sign up with as many companies as possible (at least 10-20 to start) because some companies may send you 4 or 5 surveys a week, while others may send you 1 paid survey per month. Be honest about the surveys you take and be patient because it may take a few weeks for the money to arrive in your account.
Here is a list of web sites where you can sign up for legitimate paid surveys FREE!:
acop.com - You get $4 to $50 per survey or focus group depending on the time it takes to complete it. You can participate on their monthly $250 cash drawing. Everyone 14+ can join.
epollrewards.com - You get paid to evaluate products and preview entertainment before it’s released to the public. You can join only if you’re a US resident and over 18.
shifrin-hayworth.com - You get paid $50 to $250 for studies that typically last from 30 minutes to 3 hours. You can participate in many forms of studies including online surveys, one-on-one interviews, telephone interviews and focus groups.
surveysavvy.com - Pays you cash by check when you request it from your accumulated earnings. They also pay you extra cash for referring others who complete paid surveys.
survey4profit.com - You earn cash ranging from $10 to $250 for each paid survey, plus coupons and chances to win big prizes such as TVs, iPods, computers and cars.
surveyadventure.com - Provides you with a free database of the best-paying surveys from hundreds of marketing research firms. You may earn up to $100 per completed survey.
i-paidsurveys.com — Provides detailed information about free paid surveys, cash paid surveys, and paid online surveys, as well as paid survey directories with legitimate companies, and advice about paid survey scams.
mysurvey.com - A company with some of the most genuine online paid surveys you’ll find. They send a few per week and you also can earn 150 points ($1.50) for each referral you send them outside of your household.
Surveylot.com — Here you can get paid surveys, online jobs, and work at home opportunities. Topics are updated continuously, so you see new listings every time you visit their site.
You can find many other legitimate survey companies, just follow the guidelines above to avoid scams. It’s a good idea to have a separate e-mail account as you will get a lot of new e-mail. Some people make a very decent income doing surveys and you could too, if you sign up with a lot of companies and are consistent. In a few weeks you’ll see your earnings increase. Good luck!
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sheila Nelson
The first thing people think about when they start a new home based business for the very first time, is how to get the word out about their business. The most obvious place to start is with your family and friends. These are the people who love you, trust you, and want to see you succeed so starting with them should be easy. You can say something like, hey Ann, I want you to see what I’m doing now and I want you to give me your honest opinion of it. Can you come by my house on….? Ask a simple question and make sure you are being yourself. You do not want to make them feel you are up to something or you want to sell them something when you are inviting them to your home party. You just simply want to invite them over to show them something so do not try to sell them anything when you are inviting them. You can tell them that they may or may not be interested but you want to get their honest opinion on what you are doing. Once they agree to come, change the subject so you do not tell them anything about your products or services. You want to save that for the presentation. If they ask, tell them you just got started and you do not know enough yet. Then you can change the subject and talk about the refreshments you are planning on serving, and maybe ask them to bring something because you are planning on having other guests, or ask them something about one of their family members.
Home parties are very popular in the home based business industry, and a great way to advertise and get the word out about your new home business
Having a home party to introduce your new home based business to family and friends could help you generate your first paycheck with the company. Many of your guests may like the products or services and place an order with you immediately. This can also lead to future orders. Once they try the products or services, they may decide to continue to order from you. They may also tell other people about your products and services, and give you referrals on a regular basis. In fact, you can later ask them for referrals after they have tried your products or services. Home parties can definitely be the beginning of your word-of-month advertising
If the business opportunity is apart of the presentation at your home party, do not be surprise if a few of your guests want to join you in your home based business and become apart of your team. They may see your business as a way for them to earn more money and work from home as well. You just never know who may be interested in the business so the business opportunity should be apart of the presentation. Working with family and friends could be a wonderful thing.
When you have your first home party, let your sponsor give the entire presentation to your guests for you. Your first home party should be a training session for you; therefore, your sponsor should be trained and prepared to teach you how to give an effective presentation. You should be able to sit back, watch and take good notes while your sponsor give the entire presentation so you can learn how to do it yourself. If your sponsor can not train you, you should find someone who can. You want to learn how to give the presentation yourself so you can teach other people on your team how to do the presentation.
If some of your guests want to join your business at your home party, this would be the perfect time to schedule the next home party at their home. Then you can practice the presentation which you just took notes on, and be prepared to give at least half of the next presentation for you new business partner. You can do half of the presentation and let your sponsor do the other half if you are not ready to do the whole presentation. This way you will still teach your new rep how to give the presentation while you are still learning it yourself. Just make sure they are able to sit back, watch and take notes during the presentation so that they can learn just like you did at your first home party. Don’t worry; the presentation does not have to be perfect. Just do it!
Having home parties to generate income and to train new reps starts the duplication process in your home business with home parties. You can make this process even more exciting and speed up the duplication process by taking a few of your own guests whenever you give a presentation for someone. This will help your business grow faster and teach others how to do the same. It is important that you and your team continue scheduling home parties so your business grows and go into momentum, and also start making you and your team an incredible income.
Although you want to really conduct business at your home parties, do not forget to make it fun too. It is a party to launch you new home based business so have fun!
Sheila Nelson is a professional network marketer and enjoys working part-time from home. She also enjoys sponsoring, mentoring, and helping others succeed with their home base business. Click here to learn more.
Get your Free Special Report here now!
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
The phenomenal growth of E-commerce is a fact and you could be a part of the amazing advantages and potential of a home business
Before exploring further the benefits and future possibilities a home business, let’s look at the other alternatives:
A Traditional Mortar and Brick Business — This type of business would take you much longer to start up and requires a lot of capital. Starting with furniture, equipment, space rental, employees, etc., and then, operating expenses. You can only reach and profit from customers around your location and you can operate it only at a fixed physical location. I had such a business and lost $140,000 plus 5 years of my life.
Working For An Employer - Usually a 9-5 job plus the morning and evening commute, a fixed schedule, fixed vacations, co-worker problems and a boss telling you what to do. Look at your job as a temporary inconvenience necessary to support your living expenses and pay for your “toys” but it rarely leads to financial independence. Looking for “job security” is relying on someone else to provide security for you when you could be creating your own security.
On the other hand, the benefits and potential of a home business give you much better chances. You can start it in a few days and with a very small capital. You need a computer with an internet
I’m not trying to suggest that it’s easy because nothing worthwhile is ever easy! You just need to work smarter in order to reduce risks, wasted time and money. The internet provides you with all the information, resources, and guidance you need, and it’s all FREE!
Start by choosing the right business opportunity for you, and with the proper knowledge, hard work and dedication you can succeed in your internet home business.
The rewards and possible growth of a home business are too great and numerous for you to pass up. No commute time, plus you save money on gas and automobile expenses. You can have more family time or take time off any time you want to, and the money keeps coming in even if you don’t work. There are no limits to what you can earn with a work from home business. It’s your ticket to Freedom!
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business for 10 years. His web site provides information on how to avoid scams, how to choose the best legitimate business opportunity, articles and resources to help others succeed in their home business. Please visit: http://www.legitimate-home-based-businesses.net
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
Marketing is a must, especially if you have a home business
Although this article is about online marketing, content should be the first step in your advertising
Once you determine the product or service you want to promote for your business, spend some time doing your own research. Find out who’s your competition, and compare your products, services, prices, information, quality, customer service, etc. to those offered by your competitors. What makes your products or services unique? Then find out who your customers are and what their needs are. You must have an exclusive selling proposal that answers the customer’s question, “What’s in it for me?”
Now you’re ready to promote your site, but before spending a lot of money in advertising, you can reach potential clients through some free online marketing strategies.
The next step is to list your site in major directories, such as Yahoo and Dmoz.
Yahoo — A listing here would cost you about $300 a year. Go ahead if you can afford it
Dmoz — Very popular directory and the listing is FREE! However, they have so much demand that it may take 3-6 months for your site to get listed.
Your next move is to get a listing in the smaller directories (such as JoeAnt and Skaffe). Your entry is easier and they’re affordable, generally about $40 and a guaranteed 48 hour review! Usually you can get a good listing in a relevant category and at a higher level than you would in a major directory.
Another good alternative are theme directories, and one big advantage is that they cost you little or no money. The links to your site are specific to your business subject and come from a resource regarded highly by search engines. Select directories that are specific to your business niche.
While planning your marketing ideas you need to take into account that there is a huge variety of online businesses and some aspects of your marketing efforts require particular strategies that are more appropriate for your type of business.
The final part of your marketing plan is analysis. You need to find out what activities are working and which ones aren’t. You must be able to determine what features of your site are bringing customers and compelling them to purchase your products or services and which ones are turning them away. Only then you’ll be able to make the necessary changes and/or improvements for the continuous growth of your business.
Successful marketing of your home business requires time, effort and patience. This is not an easy task, but with enough preparation, knowledge, work, and persistence you’ll obtain excellent and satisfactory results.
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business for 10 years. His web site provides information on how to avoid scams, how to choose the best legitimate business opportunity, articles and resources to help others succeed in their home business. Please visit: http://www.legitimate-home-based-businesses.net
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
The main purpose of your home business
Do you know search engines look for original content on the websites and those websites with original content rank better than imitator sites? In fact, a site can be penalized if its content appears on many other sites. Search engines can’t see pictures or layouts, so the only way to let them know what your site is about is through text.
Most large and small businesses don’t understand the importance of providing great website content. Instead, they concentrate in providing a “sales pitch”. However, you must always remember that your home business is serving two masters: your visitors, and search engines, and you’re pleasing both through informative, valuable content.
With a content-rich site, you’re showing your visitors that you want to provide answers to their questions and that you care. So you’re not only building trust and credibility, you’re also a source of knowledge for them.
What do you write about?
First, you need to select a subject you’re knowledgeable about because you like it. You should also select an area where you can use your natural talents. In other words, you need to combine your knowledge with your passion.
Think of your website content as a vehicle to solve your visitors’ problems and/or questions. For example, suppose you’re really good with cameras, you could write about how to select a good digital camera or how the new ones compare to the old ones.
Once you write with passion and knowledge, your visitors will trust you and then they’ll buy your products/services or click-through to your merchant recommendations. Creating your own content is not that hard if you practice and follow some simple guidelines:
• Get the necessary information about your topic
• Convey that you love your topic
• Think of your customers’ needs first
• Write your content clearly, using a unique style
• Don’t go off your subject
• Don’t make your text shorter or longer than needed
• Don’t use long sentences and 3-4 sentences per paragraph
• Review your content and be objective
• Develop an outline
• Keep practicing and learning about your topic
The best way to optimize your site is to focus on how it functions instead of how it looks. You can’t have an efficient website without lots of traffic and content is the best appeal to draw it. Remember that your site is an extension of your business and also an extension of you. Therefore, it should reflect your views and personal style.
Your home business will grow at a faster pace when you provide your visitors with excellent website content. Search engines will notice your site and will increase your rankings. You’ll attract more visitors and they’ll keep coming back. In turn, those visitors will become customers and the snowball starts rolling. That’s the power of content, informative, focused, targeted content.
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business for 10 years. His web site provides information on how to avoid scams, how to choose the best legitimate business opportunity, articles and resources to help others succeed in their home business. Please visit: http://www.legitimate-home-based-businesses.net
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
You can have an environment favorable to your work from home by avoiding conflicts between your business and family activities. Business demands can interfere with your parental responsibilities and vice versa however, there are some steps you can take to combine both efficiently and satisfactorily.
You need to establish time and space boundaries between your business and your home. For instance, you should set aside a specific area in your home for business as well as a schedule for business matters.
Clearly outline your business and family needs as well as activities on a daily basis. Then, plan ahead and block out time for each so they don’t interfere with each other.
Also, determining whether you’re more productive during the morning or afternoon hours may help you set a more convenient schedule. Although when you have young children around it’s difficult to avoid interference of business tasks with family activities.
Gradually teach your children to respect your work at home, work space and work schedule. You can make them feel involved by giving them job titles and small duties such as drawing a business logo or helping you shop for supplies.
One of the appeals to start your home based business was to be close to your family. Don’t let your work at home interfere with your family and vice versa. Business and family conflicts could take such a personal toll on your family that you may decide to relocate or cancel your work from home business
Be creative and think of new ideas to avoid conflicts between your home business time and your family time; then try them out and if they work, implement them. Be patient and with good planning and consistency you can have an appropriate and happy balance between your family and your home based business.
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business for 10 years. His web site provides information on how to avoid scams, how to choose the best legitimate business opportunity, articles and resources to help others succeed in their home business. Please visit: http://www.legitimate-home-based-businesses.net
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
Your customer keeps giving excuses or refuses to pay you. What can you do? Here are some tips to collect your money.
When you’re not sure if your client doesn’t intend to pay you, try the first following ideas. Perhaps there is a misunderstanding or your debtor may be going through rough times and you could loose a potential good client. As your invoices become more past due, you can use more pressure.
• You should call the customer directly, instead of sending him/her e-mails, invoices, etc. and create a sense of urgency.
• Be precise with your client. You must give him/her a definite deadline for payment in full.
• You may want to offer your client a payment option: cash or check.
• Also, you could use a third party as an excuse. Tell your client that you need the money to pay one of your suppliers or service providers.
In case these tips don’t work, then go to the next level:
• Become a nuisance to your client. Send frequent e-mails, letters, faxes, calls, etc., and let him/her know you’re not going to give up easily. This annoyance may be incentive enough to pay you.
• After you have exhausted all these resources, hire a collection agency. They charge between 35-50% of the amount owed to you but that’s better than nothing. Remind your client that the BBB tracks late payments through collection agencies, and this will affect his/her credit.
• When the dollar amount is not too large, small claims court is a great option. You need to file a small claims action for a small fee and the court will set a date to hear your case. Sometimes just filing the case will urge payment.
Now that we’ve covered the tips to get paid, here are some other ones to prevent this from happening:
• Your first step is to do a credit check on your prospective client by calling the accounting office and ask for a list of his/her regular vendors. When this is not possible, ask your client to complete a credit application form.
• Then, you may request a 50% deposit in advance and the balance due upon delivery.
• You can use a check guarantee service. Telecredit charges a small percentage for each check and although they have a monthly minimum, you don’t have to process all your checks through their service.
• You may include a delinquent interest on overdue accounts as part of your payment agreement. This is legal if you include it in your written agreement or credit application.
• When you have doubts about a prospective client, request full payment in advance.
Hopefully you won’t have to use these measures to collect money from negligent clients. Remember, your best protection is prevention. However when the client can’t or won’t pay, you deserve to collect what is rightfully yours.
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
You want to begin a home business
“A loser is not someone who fails, but someone who stops trying”
First, you need to identify your fear. Maybe you’re afraid of not having a steady income if you work at home, losing money, lacking the knowledge to get started, etc. All of these boil down to fear of failure. But where does fear of failure come from? And how do you conquer your fear?
Our fears come from bad previous experiences. We’ve been taught that wining is good and failing is bad. By not acting, you continually avoid failure, but you also prevent success. We fear what we don’t know, and one of the best ways to avoid fear is by obtaining knowledge.
Knowledge will reduce your uncertainty and therefore, your fear. However, knowledge alone is not enough; once you get it, you need to act on it. Gradually and carefully start applying all this knowledge and ideas to your home based business.
Failure is an integral part of success. Nobody who has achieved significant success has done it without some failures. Your goal shouldn’t be to avoid failures, but to reduce the frequency and degree of risks.
The most common fears when starting a work from home business are insufficient starting capital and poor planning. An Internet
Start by getting some knowledge about your chosen field or “niche”. Then outline a general plan breaking it down into steps, and as you discover what you need, make your plan more specific. Read articles, books, participate in forums, get advice from people with more experience and, above all, get out of your comfort zone. Fear is not the problem…the problem is how you respond to your fear.
An online business is your golden opportunity and the Internet is loaded with knowledge, and most of it is FREE. Besides, what’s the worst thing that could happen? You may loose a few dollars but if you succeed, the rewards will be plentiful. Face your fear, take the first step, and with prudent and informed actions you will get over your fear of starting a home business.
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business for 10 years. His web site provides information on how to avoid scams, how to choose the best legitimate business opportunity, articles and resources to help others succeed in their home business. Please visit: http://www.legitimate-home-based-businesses.net
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
by Sergris
Realistically, you can’t expect to start any kind of business for free however, you can start your online home business
That being said, a lot of online businesses fail and you could be part of this statistic and end up wasting money and a lot of valuable time and effort for nothing. In order to avoid this, you need to work smarter, not harder.
The first and most important step to a successful online business is to take advantage of your natural talent and find a type of work you love to do. This principle alone will greatly increase your chances of success.
Here are some ideas to start your Internet
A Website - This could cost you from a few hundred to thousands of dollars. To get the most for your money check out SiteSell. Their fee (a fraction of what other companies charge) includes a guide, books and technical support to select, create, and run an internet business that’s right for you. It also includes your domain name, hosting, and an abundance of resources to monitor and improve your site; but don’t take my word for it, shop around and do your own comparison.
eBay — Another way to start your Internet home business with little money is with eBay. Millions of people are looking for all kinds of products on eBay, so the traffic is already there and the advertising
Affiliate Marketing - You place links on your site and refer visitors to other web sites, called affiliates. When one of your visitors purchases a product or service from one of your affiliates, you get a percentage (5%, 25% or more) of that sale. You don’t need to store or ship the products, or process transactions, and you get paid.
Article Writing - It’s one of the best ways to rank high in search engines and send traffic to your site. Write articles about your area of expertise and distribute them to as many article directories and editors as possible as free content for their newsletters or websites. Provide a link to your website and a brief description of your product or services.
The examples above are only descriptions of some ideas to start your online home business
Sergio Ferreira has been writing articles related to family issues and home business for 10 years. His web site provides information on how to avoid scams, how to choose the best legitimate business opportunity, articles and resources to help others succeed in their home business. Please visit: http://www.legitimate-home-based-businesses.net
Article Directory: Article Dashboard
Pages
Admin
- June 2008 (24)
- January 2008 (117)
- December 2007 (382)
- November 2007 (467)
- October 2007 (403)
- September 2007 (338)
- August 2007 (385)
- July 2007 (300)
- June 2007 (315)
- May 2007 (260)
- April 2007 (48)