Look out for scams

Written by Stephanie Foster


Scams arerepparttar bane ofrepparttar 117242 work at home parent's existence. They abound onrepparttar 117243 Internet and inrepparttar 117244 world in general. Fortunately, there are some warning signs you should always look out for that will keep you from falling for most of them.

WAH Job Scams

Probablyrepparttar 117245 most common scam is to ask a potential "employee" to pay a fee forrepparttar 117246 job. This may be disguised as an application fee, software fee, processing fee, maintenance fee, etc. If you are to be an employee,repparttar 117247 employer should be paying YOU, notrepparttar 117248 other way around. They may try to justify it as a way to weed outrepparttar 117249 applicants who are not serious aboutrepparttar 117250 job, but don't believe it. You wouldn't pay to apply for a traditional, outsiderepparttar 117251 home job, so don't pay to apply for an at home job.

Some legitimate companies may offer equipment that you will need to rent. This can be legitimate, but in general, you should be able to buy such equipment on your own. Check into this option, as it can save you a lot of money.

Home Business Scams

Another popular work at home scam is to offer a kit to start a business, such as medical billing. This kit may contain outdated or irrelevant contact information and useless software. Medical billing is one ofrepparttar 117252 popular areas for this particular scam. It is very difficult to start a home based medical billing service without prior experience,

MLM Scams

There are a lot of legitimate MLMs out there, but there are a tremendous number of scams too. If you decide to start your own business as a part of an MLM, you need to make sure they are legitimate. Familiar names such as Tupperware, Avon and Mary Kay are easily seen as legitimate, but what aboutrepparttar 117253 more mysterious ones?

Some will refer you to a site that tells you all about their wonderful opportunity, but not give you any details about what you will be selling, or even claim you don't have to sell anything. Be wary in these cases. Rather than a legitimate MLM, you may have stumbled across a pyramid scheme. Pyramid schemes earn money primarily through recruiting, not through sales to customers. They may also require you to purchase a certain amount every month or not earn your commissions. This is known as inventory loading and is illegal. See this very useful article onrepparttar 117254 FTC website for more information.

The FTC also offers some excellent advice on selecting a franchise or business opportunity, which applies to both online and offline opportunities.

Simple Steps to Project a Professional Home-Business Image

Written by David A. James


One ofrepparttar more difficult tasks to deal with when starting a home-based business is to decide how to establish your pathways of communication in such a way that you appear organized and professional, yet don’t have to breakrepparttar 117241 bank to get started.

I have found three methods of communication that I use on a regular basis: e-mail, telephone, and fax. These could probably be considered ‘the basics’ for most businesses, large or small, and these arerepparttar 117242 ones we’ll discuss.

As a side note, with technology, of course, there are many variations on these tools. For example, you can now use a cell phone with a built-in camera to take a picture and instantly send it to a friend or business contact. This is pretty spiffy indeed, but this really falls intorepparttar 117243 category of e-mail or telephone communications, depending how you want to look at it. This probably isn’t going to be a main communication method for most businesses, unless you’re an interior designer or an artist and in need of constant visual communications with your clients.

E-mail – I’m assuming you already have an e-mail account or know how to get one. Many people have what are known as free e-mail accounts such as Yahoo (http://mail.yahoo.com) or Hotmail (http://www.msn.com, click Hotmail). While these are easy and free, they don’t portray much of a professional image. Instead, you should takerepparttar 117244 name of your business, for example Home Income Digest, and purchase what is known as its ‘domain name’. In this example,repparttar 117245 domain name would be ‘homeincomedigest.com’. Now you haverepparttar 117246 ability to correspond using djames@homeincomedigest.com, info@homeincomedigest.com, or whatever name(s) you prefer. This is usually coordinated withrepparttar 117247 web hosting company that hosts your domain name. There are many topics to discuss with e-mail, but let me hit another one very quickly: autoresponders

An autoresponder automatically responds to a person who has just sent you an e-mail by sending a message that you have previously composed back to them. Sounds great, but many people take this as a sign that you really aren’t serious about your business or are trying to automate everything torepparttar 117248 point that you don’t have to do any work. Others say autoreponders show you ARE serious and want your customers to know you’ll be in touch as soon as you can. I think you seerepparttar 117249 dilemma here. My advice is don’t use autoresponders if you can generally get back with people promptly (within a few hours, or one business day atrepparttar 117250 most). However, there are situations where autoresponders are perfect, for example sending receipts, since most people don’t expect personal interaction for this type of correspondence.

Telephone – In most cases, you really should get a second phone line. The problem with using your personal phone line is that there is no greeting you can give that will sound correct for all situations. Sure, your friends will get used to you saying, “Hello, this is Jenni’s Interior Designs” but it’s pretty cheesy. Caller I.D. may help, but still. Also, there is really is no appropriate way to compose a voice mail greeting. You could get voice mail with multiple mailboxes, but recording a greeting of “Hello this is Jenni. For Jenni’s Interior Designs press one, to leave a personal message for Jenni press two” doesn’t really impress either. Opt forrepparttar 117251 second phone line, and make sure you use it strictly for business. Also, try to keeprepparttar 117252 phone in a quiet room or where you can shutrepparttar 117253 door if necessary.

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