What does it take to make money online?Written by Darrell Knox
What a loaded question! Let’s narrow that down a bit and take it from perspective of someone who wants to work from home and make money online in a home business. That will make it an easier question to answer. Let’s assume you’ve never had a website, don’t know how to get a merchant account, don’t know html, and are pretty much stuck with being an expert on sending and receiving email. What’s there for you to do online to make money? Lots, in fact! These days are not at all like a couple of years ago or even six months ago. If I only had all opportunities to make money online when I started marketing! Here is a list of things you can do with just a website and a hosting account today: Sell affiliate products (products like reports, ebooks, hard goods of every conceivable make, model, size, shape and function, and much, much more). Sell services (do you know how big a business being a Virtual Assistant is these days? It’s quite amazing what you can do for people without ever meeting them face-to-face, anywhere in world!) Online auctions (Ebay has made thousands and thousands of people full-time incomes from auctioning collectibles, antiques, and even brand new equipment and gadgets of all imaginable types. You name it, it has been sold on Ebay!) Membership sites: Know of any groups of people that would love to get insider information on virtually any topic? You could make money online with a membership site!
| | SHOULD YOU START A HOME BASED BUSINESS?Written by Andrea Hayhurst
Whether or not to start a home based business is probably one of most important questions that you will ever have to answer. If you are even seriously pondering question in first place, then it probably means that there are circumstances in your life which are causing you to consider undertaking a venture which will have a significant and far reaching impact on your own life and on lives of your immediate family memebers as well. Before you take a leap of faith into becoming a small business owner, there are a few areas of your life which will be impacted and which you should seriously consider before coming to any final decision as to whether or not a home based business is right for you. FINANCIAL Starting your own home based business can have many financial rewards and put you in control of your own financial future. However, there are a few things to consider before beginning your undertaking. First, will you start your home based business on a part time basis and keep your day job until you are making enough profit to enable you to quit and devote your full attention to your business? Or would you rather quit your day job now so you can devote your full time and energy to building your business? There are pros and cons to both approaches and only you can decide which one you will feel most confortable with in long run. If you have enough savings to meet your living expenses for a good six months to a year then it might be worthwhile to quit your day job to focus on growing your business. You'll see results a lot faster and that will give you momentum you need to keep going. Starting a home based business requires a lot of up front work and if you are doing it on a part time basis it is easier to get discouraged when results don't materialize as quickly as you had originally planned. On other hand, having a full time income will enable you to spend more on your business without having to worry about meeting monthly living expenses. You will also have to set a start up budget for your business as well. Any home based business will require some start up costs, even if they are only minimal at first. For example, if you are going to be doing business on internet, you will need to register your domain name and pay a monthly fee to have your website hosted. Domain names can be registered for as little as $7.00 and monthly hosting can be obtained for a minimum of about $25.00. You'll also need to determine how much money you are going to devote to advertising your new venture. While there are some very good ways to advertise your business for free, eventually you are going to have to lay out some money to advertise if you hope to see kind of profits that will make your online business worthwhile. While we are not talking about massive amounts of money here, a few hundred dollars would be a reasonable sum to get some quality advertising to promote your business and allow you to start making some sales which will generate even more cashflow to reinvest in your business. PERSONAL Most people who are interested in starting their own home based business cite personal reasons as one of their primary motivations. It seems that more and more people are getting fed up with corporate America these days and it's no secret that average workday continues to get longer and longer, lunch hours become nonexistent, and financial security that once came with retirement is no longer a reality for most people. Not only does having your own home based business put you in charge of your own financial future, it also allows you to start spending real quality time with your family. Most people are so exhausted at end of a typical workday that just getting through dinner without nodding off is a real challenge. With a home based business, you control hours you work and you automatically add at least one or two additional hours to your day that you would otherwise spend commuting to and from work. Of course, getting your family adjusted to having you working from home may take some effort in beginning. If you have very small children at home it can be a challenge to keep them out of your office while you are trying to get work done. If you are primary caretaker, you will need to work in small spurts throughout day while kids are napping or watching a video and then put in a few hours after they go to bed for night. Once they are in school, routine becomes a lot easier because you can adjust your schedule around their schoolday and have most of your daily work completed by time they get home from school.
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