There is no dearth with what one can do in terms of home based businesses. The number of different ways to earn money from home has grown significantly, thanks to the technology that encompasses us as well as all the different ways in which we can use our skills. In fact, many people who go in for home based businesses are the kinds who have had previous experience at some other job and didn’t like it for some reason. Even if you are inexperienced, there are a number of things that you can do from home which can help you earn a living.Some of the different ideas for home based business today include photography, matchmaker, author / eBook writer, accountant, real estate manager, proofreader and so on. There is no particular limitation on what you can do in a home based business, as long as it is legal and earns you money! Many people continue to find newer ways to earn money, but these are often developed versions of already existing ideas. If you are truly interested in starting a home based business, it should encourage you to know that there is nothing that is holding you back from earning a living through this method.When you do stumble upon a new idea, don’t discard it immediately just because you are having a tough time implementing it. It is always an uphill climb initially and one shouldn’t give up their dreams because of this. Work hard at the beginning and then be rewarded wisely in the end through good profit margins.
Top Home Based Business Ideas – What You Should Consider
The opportunities for building a top home-based business are as endless as your own imagination. While most people tend to immediately think about finding ways to sell things over the internet in order to make money at home, the reality is that there are literally thousands of ways to build a home business to suit you.Do What You LoveSome of the top home-based businesses are those that are set up around the business owner’s passions. Doing something you really enjoy can help keep you motivated and when you’re really having fun it never feels like work.You might love creating craft items, which could lead to designing your own crafty pieces and selling them for profit. You might really love animals, so offering pet-sitting or dog walking services could be ideal for you. You might have a flair for designing great websites, and there’s plenty of demand for freelance web designers on the internet.The point is to find something that you can see yourself enjoying every day and then finding a way to turn that into income.Buying a FranchiseSome people simply don’t want to go through the stress of setting up and building a new business from scratch. If this sounds like you, there are plenty of excellent home-based business models already available for sale.These might include franchise opportunities in such a wide variety of industries that you’re sure to find one to suit your needs. Franchises offer you a ready-made business model to follow and include plenty of support to help you succeed.Fulfil a NeedMost top home-based business success stories come from those who saw a need for a particular product or service and then worked out a way to fulfil that need. For example, computer repair services are in high demand simply because the average person doesn’t know how to fix many of the problems they can have. Book-keeping services are also increasing in demand due to the increase in self-employed people. These people want to run their businesses and work on increasing sales, so hiring someone to do the bookwork for them is common sense.If you can see a way that your own skills or knowledge could be put to good use, you could provide a valuable consulting service for someone.Finding a top home-based business opportunity is much easier than most people think, but it’s important you find one that really suits you.
The Online Home Based Business Opportunities
Earlier, you might get bored by sitting idly in your house as you used to have nothing to do at your leisure time. Now, in the age of the state of the art technology while browsing over the internet, you will find numerous scopes of home based business opportunities on the internet. You will be simply stunned seeing the scopes and chances in the fields home based business opportunities. Don’t get excited! Be very decisive about the type of job you are going to choose as it should fit your style and capability.Before going to choose home based business opportunities, you just think over for a moment about the things you would like to do at your leisure. Think about something that will be admired by the others and they would like to give importance to your opinion. If the subject matter attracts them, they won’t hesitate for a moment to pay for the services you are offering.It should be kept in your mind before entering a home based business that how much time you need to invest in to the business. What amount of effort is required for the venture? Are you comfortable enough for the job? You have to treat it as serious as the other jobs. You may have to set up a budget, work for a long time, and make sacrifices for the betterment of the job.You can choose the promotion of your website and getting back the links as the main concern for your home based business opportunities. The more you will get back the links from the clients, the more opportunities your website will get and the more you will be able to make money in the job. This is the simplest formula you can apply for any online business. The equation is More Traffic = More Money in the job of website promotion. However, there are other things you may have to work on. Those are, the conversion rates, customer support, technical support and the advertising. You should always keep in your mind that getting people to visit your website frequently will be the destination and the milestone of your venture.You can certainly find the various business opportunities coming up to your doorstep in different shapes and sizes. The internet services have paved the way for everyone to start up a home based business and people are taking its advantages. So, don’t get frustrated and scared seeing the crowd on the internet. However, you can be faced with some challenges in promoting your products:* There may be various products of reasonable even of lower prices making their stands on the internet. There might be many types of incentives and commission structure for making the products profitable. You have to compete them with great confidence.* The demands of your product may be sufficient or there may be no demand of your product at the beginning. Don’t get discouraged seeing this negative effects.However, the home based business opportunities are offering a relaxed living to many people in various ways. Just opt for one of those opportunities and go for it if it fits you in the long run.
Home Based Business That Really Works
Are you like one of the many Americans who, like me over 18 months ago, are looking towards the internet and pondering the idea of starting your own Home Based Business? I know the thoughts that are flowing through your mind, can this be for real? Is it actually possible to buy a franchise of a business, learn to operate it and have it really work and generate money for my family and I, all while I am comfortably lounging around in my own home?The simple straight-forward answer to your question is Yes. Absolutely and there is really no better time to start than now. I know you’ve heard that one before, but in all seriousness, there is no better time than now to take ACTION on anything in your life. It could be fitness or family oriented, as long as your taking action on something in life your gaining experience and knowledge. That is the key and much like all home based businesses, it takes action to make them work, and massive action to make them really work.To many people join business that they feel will earn them money right from their couch at home while they watch their favorite TV show. For some reason people think it’s the “easy” way to make money, but in all straight honesty, for most people its not easy at all. Usually big sacrifices are made, the learning curve is sharp, and putting yourself out “there” on the internet can be very intimidating for most. But…those who commit and push forward building on each failure as a learning block to the top of the stairway of success, succeed.If you are looking at a home based business that really works and generates an income that can replace your current income, do not look for the “quickest” or the “best” business out their. Don’t follow all the hype, and don’t buy into the “now is the best time,” because like I said above, it’s always the best time! If not this month maybe the next, or not this year, but maybe next year. It will always be the best time to start a home based business.I have two suggestions I recommend when investing into a home based business. I take that back…I’ll give you three.#1. If you are going to invest in your FIRST home based business, don’t invest over $1000.00 dollars UNLESS you are EXTREMELY driven, motivated and PASSIONATE about that particular business. I would recommend aiming at the $500.00 dollar area for your initial go. There is A HUGE amount to learn in the industry and using your initial start up capital for marketing education is more important than a business that you don’t even know how to sell.#2. Find someone who is selling the business (yes selling, you can also refer to them as a rep but they are getting the commission) who you TRUST and feel is a good LEADER. Also, before you invest, get the person on the phone, have a few conversations with them, find out what kind of bonuses they may include for you if you decide to join their home business. There are always bonuses in the Home based business industry.#3. Take some time, days or weeks, and really research and learn as much as you can about the company or companies you are interested in. Do your do-diligence and gain as much information as possible so you feel comfortable and begin to build a passion for the company. Because being passionate is a main driver that will make your new business really work and generate the income you desire.Now that you’ve had more information and you understand you company, started a relationship with your “Leader,” not up-line, and feel comfortable that this person will be able to show you the right tools for you to learn, NOW take ACTION and build your new home business right from your couch. Go ahead, make the investment and build the home based business that really works; make your dreams come true.
Starting Home Based Businesses
When you want to start a home based business, there are certain things you must consider first. It is not just like any other business started and operated in the normal and likely way. This kind of business is always unique in some areas compared to the normally formed businesses. One of the interesting features of home based businesses is that it is certainly done from home. There is no need for an office in the business center’s or anywhere else as expected with other businesses. There are regulations on how these businesses should clearly be started. Starting a home based business and managing it successfully may perhaps be the question everyone wants answered to.Before you start a home based business, outline your priorities, talents, skills and considerations of what you want to do. If for instance you want to start an online consultancy firm, access you capabilities, your competence, your talents and whether this is an opportunity ready for the market niche. Are you really ready to work from home? Weigh the probable advantages against the disadvantages of working at home. Once you set a decision, make sure you preview and review your options with the help of a specialist or expert. This is important in helping you analyze the benefits of venturing into a particular business. Professional home based businesses should find needs and expectations of customers and actually satisfy them.Start an internet business by transforming your ideas into realities. Many people are ready and eager to launch or start their businesses than run them. In many instances, their joy comes when they launch new products or services in the market, but they constantly fail to make these products known to customers. After setting your ideas and starting the business, it is important to work on it and improve every possible aspect of the business. A lot of research is generally needed for home based businesses to succeed.Start a home based business from a deeper understanding of what the risks are. If it is not worth the investment, energy and the expected profits, then an alternative can definitely be sought. It is important to carry out research before you start any type of business from home. Some businesses require nothing much while others must always reflect on the expected value of the investment or other inputs into the business. Depending on the type of the home based business, your personal attributes must contribute to the business’ success.
Why Investing in Real Estate Made Me a Millionaire and Investing in Stocks Didn’t
Martin, our money man and main investing partner, emailed us last night and said simply “I’ve pretty much lost it all”. We’d been shopping for a commercial property to buy to diversify our investments. Martin was once again partner with us on the deal we found, assuming he was comfortable with the numbers.
At least he was planning to before the markets crashed and Martin lost his six figure down payment! Now, sitting on pennies (o.k., not quite, but definitely not enough to make a down payment on a million dollar industrial property), Martin is probably really wondering what so many other people do, “Is real estate a much better investment than stocks?”
My answer is always a resounding “It depends” or “Diversification is best”… but if you change the question and ask me where my money is invested, 90% of my money and my net worth resides in real estate (even excluding my current home).
And yes, I am young – I’m in my early thirties! I am also a millionaire and it’s all thanks to real estate. It’s not to say that stocks won’t make you rich, Warren Buffet is one extreme example of the wealth that can be created through stocks, but I like real estate because:
You Can Kick It! Real estate is tangible. You can drive by a property and tell your friends or family that it is your property. You can also check up on how it’s doing. That is not as easy if you just own shares in a company. There’s nothing to show your friends and family, and most company’s won’t let you sit in on their meetings to see how they are doing!
Leverage: If you have $16,000 to invest (which is what I started with 7 years ago), you can buy $16,000 worth of stocks and bonds. But, if you buy real estate, you can buy a property worth $160,000 (which is exactly what I did). While some stock investors are able to buy on margin (when you only put down a portion of what the stock is worth), this is a sophisticated and high risk move that only experienced stock investors typically make. If your stocks go up in value by 5%, you’ve made $800. But if your property goes up by 5% you’ve made $8,000! This is on the same $16,000 investment. This doesn’t even take into account the other ways you can make money from real estate….which leads me to my third reason I love real estate.
There are three ways to make money from real estate: Appreciation, which we discussed above, rental income, and other people’s money (your renters) paying the mortgage down. Even if your property is decreasing in value, you are still getting paid rent and that rent is paying down the mortgage, and the surplus after expenses are paid is hitting your pocket!
Control: As a shareholder of a company, you have no control over your investment. And, you never really know what’s happening behind closed doors. I don’t need to start naming the corporate disasters of the last decade like Nortel, Enron and WorldCom for you to really understand what I am saying! But with real estate you do have control! If electrical bills are too high you can change the light bulbs to more efficient ones, seal the windows, and take other measures to reduce the costs. If you are losing money, you will know it very quickly! And you will be able to take measures to improve this situation. With shares, what can you do if your shares in Nike drop 15%? You can sell more or you can buy more… that’s it.
Creative ways to make money. A simple stock investor has two ways to make money from stocks… appreciation in their value and dividends. I owned stock with dividends once. The $30 cheque once per year was incredibly rewarding. Because you have control over your property, and there are three different ways to make money from the property, there are plenty of creative techniques to try to make more money from your asset. Some people rent out the garage separate from the house. In the right location, you could sell advertising space or just get price reductions on work done in exchange for some advertising (ever asked a painter what kind of discount you can get on their work if you put up one of their signs on your lawn??), you can add vending machines or laundry facilities, you can change the density of the property (add more units… more units means more rent), or you can change the usage of the property to sell it to someone who can make better use of it (if you are in a commercial area, an office developer might want to pay big bucks for a properly zoned property to develop on). There are dozens of ways to turn a simple house into a money making machine with creativity. The same can’t be said for stocks.
Access to the Equity without selling the asset. In the example of the $16,000 I used to buy my first investment property, I was holding most of that money in mutual funds and GIC’s. When I cashed out, I had to pay tax on the gains! So, while I actually had just under $20,000, after the government took their share, I only had $16,000. With real estate, when you need a chunk of cash, you can refinance a property or take out a secured line of credit against the equity you’ve built up in the property. This means that you get to continue making money from the rental income on that property AND someone else continues to pay down you mortgage AND if property values are appreciating, you will continue to have an appreciating asset AND you get the money you need – without taxes to pay too!
And speaking of taxes… real estate has a lot of tax advantages. Taxes vary by province and state so I won’t get into all of the different advantages… but suffice to say that there are plenty of opportunities to write off expenses against your income, write off the interest on your mortgages, and reduce capital gains taxes.
With so many reasons to love real estate, I haven’t been able to go back to the markets. It’s not to say you should do that too! Real estate isn’t a very liquid investment, and once you own it you still have work to do (unlike stocks). It’s a personal choice, but I know Martin, our money man, is wishing he’d never put his money in the hands of his trusted stock broker. Even in our absolute worst real estate investment we broke even…and in less then 2 months he lost 40% of his money…and worse for him is he lost a significant portion of the down payment he was going to use to buy the commercial property. Maybe some of the stocks will come back, but he’s afraid that a lot of his money is lost forever.
Investment Options – Is Your Advisor Giving You the Information Needed to Succeed?
How soon would you want to know if your investment advisor wasn’t telling you about the three major investment types? If you’ve only heard of two – Variable and Fixed, then you may have a problem.
Unfortunately, many investment advisors routinely fail to present all three types: Variable, Fixed, and Indexed as valid investment choices to their clients. This is normally because they are unable to offer all three options or they have a personal dislike for one or more of these investment types.
So what is the difference in these investment types and what do the terms mean? The simplest answer is that these terms define how interest is earned on your investment. More specifically, it tells you how your money is invested and if your money is protected from market fluctuations. Let’s take a look at these various investment options.
Variable
A Variable investment is one where your money is typically invested in stocks or mutual funds. The performance of these stocks or funds varies and is not guaranteed – hence the term “variable investment.” Variable investments have many key benefits. They allow you to earn interest by investing in a single company (individual stock), multiple companies, or a specific segment of the market (mutual funds). You can even invest in an entire Index like the Dow Jones or S&P 500. Also, variable investments allow for the greatest return and historically have outpaced all other investment options.
Sounds pretty good, right? It is, as long as you have the tolerance to lose money as well. The volatility of variable investments is a major concern for many investors. The “upside” or growth potential is nearly unlimited, unfortunately so is the “downside” or risk of losing money.
One other adverse factor that Variable investments face is the cost. Most have either fees or loads associated with the underlying investments. These fees or loads can reduce the performance by as much as 3.5%, although 1-2% is more common. These fees or loads are applied even in down years so it is definitely something to consider.
Fixed
A Fixed investment offers a pre-determined or fixed interest rate for a specified period. This is most commonly seen with bonds, CD’s, annuities and universal life insurance products.
Fixed investments have three major advantages over the other options. First, they provide a guaranteed or known interest rate that is disclosed prior to making your investment. Second, fixed investments are generally designed to protect your initial or principal investment.
A Fixed investment also has two major pitfalls. First, because they provide a known or guaranteed interest rate, they generally provide a lower rate than what may be available when you’re willing to risk your principal. Second, they normally have restrictions or penalties associated with any withdrawals made during the fixed interest rates term period. This is especially true with CD’s and annuities.
Overall, Fixed investments can be a great option for those not willing to risk some or all of their money, older clients using the investment interest to provide or supplement their income, and clients looking to provide a hedge against other, more aggressive investments.
Indexed
Unlike Fixed and Variable investments, Indexed investments are somewhat unique to the insurance and annuity marketplaces. An Indexed investment shares traits of both Fixed and Variable investments, but with one major difference – how interest is earned.
With an Indexed investment the underlying funds are not directly invested in the stock market or an Index, nor are they directly invested in a bond, CD, or other fixed investment. They are however, secured by bonds or other conservative investments which provide a minimum guaranteed interest rate similar to a fixed investment.
Generally, this minimum or fixed rate is lower than what is available in a purely fixed product. This is because Indexed products offer a higher maximum interest rate over Fixed investment products. The Indexed products determine the maximum interest earned using a formula based on three factors, all part of an option purchased by the insurance or investment company. They are the participation rate, the cap rate, and the reset period.
The maximum interest earned provides “upside” potential while at the same time eliminating “downside” risk. In essence, it is like having the growth potential of a Variable investment with the “downside” protection of a Fixed investment. There is however a trade-off.
An option, sometimes referred to as a call or put option, provides investment returns (interest earned) based on the growth of a specific market Index like the S&P 500 or Dow Jones. The option allows for lower initial costs, a pre-determined strategy for establishing current and future interest crediting, and ensures that money can’t be lost due to market fluctuations. The option also caps (limits) upside potential or growth.
Many opponents of Indexed investments point to this limiting of growth, especially in years were the Index or stock market exceeds the Index (option) cap or participation rates, as the Achilles heel of these products. There is also some controversy over the way the Index rate is determined in future years.
While Indexed products do have a minimum cap and participation rate that is known for the entire term period, the current or maximum cap and participation rates normally reset on an annual basis. This makes it difficult to determine what will happen in subsequent years. Some advisors avoid these products claiming that the difference between the current and minimum rates creates client confusion.
No matter which type of investment you choose, it is important to get the facts and options available for each. Each of the investment choices outlines provides different advantages that need to be weighed against their disadvantages, however they all have different uses and can all be viable choices when planning your financial future. As always, it is important to consult your “Financial Professional” to find out which of these investment choices is right for you.
How To Succeed At Online Product Creation The Easy Way
Product creation could be a frightening subject for a lot of Internet marketers to face. Some folks who get in the game with the intention of making a full time income are completely ignorant as to how an online business operates. One of the most profitable ways to create online cash is by creating a product that others are happy to pay for.
Product creation is legitimate method of generating money through internet marketing but many entrepreneurs get it wrong. They start by imitating their Internet marketing gurus by creating information products on Internet marketing in hopes of getting rich the way their heroes did. The problem is that they usually don’t know what they are doing and enter a highly competitive niche with very little marketing experience or connections.
Here are a few tips for effective product creation that may help you get on the right track:
Start by finding a profitable niche with low to moderate competition. If you conduct some rudimentary market research and keyword research, you’ll find many opportunities in areas that will surprise you. Amazon and eBay are two great places to brainstorm for product ideas.
Developing Your Product does not have to be a difficult project. You can find experts in the right field for your niche and pay them to write the material while an artist designs the packaging and website or blog. You can outsource the entire product creation part of the project after you conduct the research and testing to ensure profitability.
Sales and marketing strategies should be created while developing the product and learning about the market. Some experienced marketers use pay per click to drive traffic to their offer page; some folks outsource the entire marketing campaign to affiliates through ClickBank or other affiliate programs.
Product creation does not need to be hard, particularly when the merchandise is electronic. E-books, videos, audio and multi-media products sell very well. They are distributed immediately to customers electronically. Once you have a good feel for a niche market, try to service your customers with associated products and upgrades. If you want to earn money online through product creation, you must understand supply and demand. The majority of new online marketers fail miserably because they go after highly competitive markets or forget to research their chosen niche properly. You have to create your products according to the needs, wants and desires of the prospective customers.
Information Product Creation: Never Compete on Price Because There Is Only One You
Information product creation requires extensive preparation, no matter which niche you work within and you want to make sure that your information product has a successful launch. That probably sounds scary and intimidating but here’s the thing: this is a one time effort and it will pay off in a foundation that is strong enough to get your ideal clients to invest in your high-end programs and services without the perils of a traditional funnel. This article will teach you a few of the things that you need to remember if you’d like to invest in yourself and start on the information product creation path using your unique talents and abilities. Remember that you never have to worry about anyone ripping off your ideas because if you understand how to properly position yourself around your story.
Understand Both Strengths and Weaknesses: It is good to have an impartial view of your own strengths and weaknesses when lay the foundation of selling yourself within the information product creation process. It helps you figure out where you are, what you lack and how to move forward so that you get as much growth as possible. It is more than important, it is urgent if you want to create fast success for yourself to have personal positive reinforcement and deep belief to provide yourself the support you need so that you can get over your own limitations to ensure that your information product is as valuable as it can be.
You also need to know exactly who your competition is so you can study them and use their methods to help you improve your own standings. Down recreate the wheel, but understand the wheel and position yourself going uphill from the competition. Check out which kinds of opportunities you’ve already got and try to figure out how best to use them while taking care to remember your strengths and weaknesses. This is a great way to figure out where you stand against your competition which helps you figure out how best to grow.
Launch on Time: No matter what, even if you haven’t officially announced your “launch date” you should launch the site when you’ve said you would. This will force you to stick to your goal and actually work on it. Thinking that “I’ll launch it when I think it’s ready to launch” will only hinder your efforts. You’ve got a responsibility that you need to live up to with your launch, and you can’t move back on that one. If you get close to your launch date and you are getting hung up on your self limiting beliefs in your information product creation, don’t worry this about getting it out there and not perfection. As long as it is usable you should launch it. Launching on time is the professional thing to do and it is more important than creating a “wow” effect in your site visitors. You can always update/upgrade your website when you have to, so there shouldn’t be any issue with that.
Analyze Your Own Concept: If you want to make your information product creation successful you need to understand how good your concept is: is it really going to work for your chosen audience or would something else be better? You already know about your competition; how does your concept measure up? If you haven’t come up with your own idea and are trying to work with someone else’s concept, do some more work on your own before your launch. People want original ideas because they’ve seen too many other me-too websites already.
Test Your Concept Before You Commit To The Information Product Creation Process: One of the biggest failures people have with information product creation is not testing an idea before putting a lot of effort into producing an information product. PPC to a small 5 page site with a landing page is a great way to test an offer before you even produce it. If people will sign up to get it, you can be sure that you can create an information product that will target eliminating the pain of your target market. The small amount of money will be invaluable in using crowd sourcing to direct the final outline of the information product creation process.
You’ll have lots of hurdles to clear after the launch of your information product and the only way to truly take care of them is to follow the advice in this article to work smarter. Plenty of people work hard, but it is the ones who work smarter who make real money online with the information product creation business model.
Plan To Succeed With Information Product Creation: Why You Need To Split Your Process Up
One of the keys to succeeding in information product creation is to break the process up into discrete steps. This frequently isn’t an instinctive reaction for the typical information marketer. Especially on the internet where small sized learning products are the norm.
However, it is extremely important to your ultimate success. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if you don’t do this you probably won’t succeed… even when you are starting out let alone as you move forward.
Your product creation system should do this for you if only to help you to understand the overall task.
But why?
In this article, I’m going to ignore chunking and focus on the practical aspects. That’s not to say that chunking isn’t important. It is. It’s important to understanding and to learning the process. But while you can use the same chunks as you move forward, long term your focus needs to be on the operation of the system not the understanding of it. Unless of course you are constantly training new people!
So why is chunking important to long term use of the product creation process? (Yes, I know systems design uses a different term for this process but I’m not teaching you systems design. So I’m going to use the word learning content designers use.)
The first reason that having individual discrete tasks is important is one of schedule estimation. Frequently it is very difficult to estimate how long the total task of creating a product will take. After all, the size and type of the products matters as does the number of products in your product funnel. And those are just the most obvious elements. However, estimating a discrete task is often much easier. The total can then be estimated as the total of the discrete tasks.
Secondly, scheduling a large task can be problematic. However, by segmenting the task into a number of discrete tasks, you gain a much greater flexibility in scheduling. Not only that but as your business begins to add people you are able to schedule multiple people to the product creation.
Finally, segmenting a large task into smaller discrete tasks allows you to have much better control over the product creation. This affects two different areas — status and quality.
By segmenting your process into discrete tasks you are able to schedule and record the progress at much more detailed level. As a result you are more in control of the status of the product creation. You know what everyone is doing. When they should complete it. And how much it should cost. You also know exactly what has been done.
You also improve your overall quality. Instead of waiting until everything is done you can check quality as you go. This allows you to immediate react to low quality products without absorbing their costs. This means that you have less rework and your rework costs less. And if the product is not going to meet its quality requirement you will know about it in time to stop the development, change the requirement or fix the product.