I am sure you are like most people today that are feeling the pressures of Inflation. Your income never seems to increase at the same pace as the cost of necessities. It seems like you are digging a rut by going back and forth to work, but you never seem to get ahead. It can be very frustrating.

Many people are considering starting a home based business to help make ends meet. You may have considered this option yourself. What is holding you back? Is it fear of failure? Is it fear of losing money instead of making money?

You are not alone if you have these fears, because most people have them. Especially when you see all the scams that people promote these days. How can you know if a business opportunity is legitimate?

Beware of Wild Claims!

One thing that will help you spot a scam is the claims that are being made. I am sure you have heard similar claims such as, “Make a Million Dollars and never do any work”, “Only work a few hours a week”, “Sit back and watch the money start pouring in”. Let me be blunt here – If it sounds too good to be true it probably is!

Making money online involves a lot of work, especially in the beginning. It will take a lot of work to get your business started and running automatically. Once you get your online business running automatically, then there is less work. This could take a few months to a year. The time it takes to get your business running smoothly depends a lot on how hard you work and how much time you spend each week.

If you only spend a few hours a week on your online business, then it will take a lot longer. Another factor is what you are doing. If you are spinning your wheels or are not focused on one thing, then it will take longer.

Will I Need To Sell Something?

Another wild claim that I have seen many times is that, “you do not have to sell anything to make money through this program!” If you are not selling anything, then how do you make money? Many years ago before the Internet I fell into a scam that is still being pulled. “Get paid to stuff envelopes!” They promise that you can make so many dollars for each envelope that you send. They claim that you get all of the supplies for free. First you may find that they take your application money and run. This happened to me. You may also find out that you only make money when someone buys the offer that you are sending out. You also may find out that you have to pay for the materials and have to buy a mailing list.

A modern spin on this scam is the “Get paid to process refunds” scam. You have to place advertisements online to sell the products, then you have to give refunds to the people that buy the products and you make a commission on each sale. They do not explain all of this until after you pay for the “package”. From what I have seen, there are not a lot of people making money with this, except the people that started it.

The plain and simple fact is that you can not make money unless you sell something. You must sell a product or a service to other people in order to make money. That is how business works. You may be selling other people’s products or services and get paid a commission, but you are still selling something! Even if you work for McDonald’s, you are still working to sell something or in the case of the cleaning crew, you are supporting the sale of something.

I found a great resource that has helped me to start my own home based business. This program has 5 streams of income that have been proven to be successful. You can find out more about this program by clicking this Link.

I wish you success in all your legitimate business ventures and in your every day life too!

Sincerely,

Jim Van Dyke

The King of Scripts

Have you ever been in a situation where you were in unfamiliar territory and did not know how to get to the place you wanted to be? Have you ever looked for something, but were not sure what it looked like? Have you ever felt over-whelmed by your circumstances but did not know how to get out?

This may be some of the emotions and feelings that you have when thinking about starting a home based business or an online business. You may not know where to start or where to turn for help and guidance. You may be over-whelmed by the information available to you through the Internet.

The very first step in starting your home based business is to decide what you want to accomplish with your business. Are you looking to make some extra money to help cover the rising costs of everything? Are you hoping to build a successful full time business to leave your current JOB? Are you hoping to replace lost income from a recent JOB loss or other set back?

You have to be honest with yourself when you think about why you want to start a home based business. How can you progress forward if you do not know what you want? Once you realize what you want, then you can start to look at ways to make it happen.

How much time do you intend to devote to your home based business? If you want to make a few extra dollars a month, then you may only need a few hours every day to accomplish your goal. If you want to create a full time income to replace your current JOB, then you may need to devote all the extra time you have to accomplish this goal. You must be reasonable in your expectations. You can not expect to make thousands of dollars a week, when you only spend a few hours a week working towards the goal.

What time frame are you looking at to accomplish your goal? Do you expect that you will make a few hundred dollars a month starting the first month in business? Do you want to quit your current JOB next month? Once again it is important to be reasonable in your expectations. You can not expect to make a large sum of money in the first month. You can not expect to quit your current JOB in a short time.

It may take a month or longer to see your first sale. It takes a period of time before your website will be listed in the search engines. You can do some things to speed up the process, but expect a period of time to elapse. I have seen websites listed within 8 hours, but all the conditions were present for this to happen.

It is very important for you to set reasonable goals that are specific and have a date associated with them. For example you may want to make your first sale in two weeks. You may want to make $2000 per month by the end of the year. You may want to quit your current JOB in 8 months.

Once you set your goals then you want to find ways to make it happen. Keep pushing yourself to make the goal. Once you make a goal, then set another. For example once you make $2000 per month, you can set a goal to make $4000 per month in a 6 month period.

It is also good to set a big long term goal that may take a few years to reach. Set a mid range goal that relates to the long term goal, but will take less time to reach. You can also set more then one mid range goal that will help you to reach the one long term goal. Set more then one short range goals that will help you reach your mid range goal(s).

For example you may want to own your own home with out debt in 3 years. You will likely need to make a certain amount of money to achieve this goal, so you could set the mid range goal to pay off existing debt within 2 years. If you want to take out a loan to get your house, then a mid range goal may be for the down payment for the house and the long range would be to pay it off. Short range goals would include making your first sale, making $1000, Making $10,000, etc.

I found a great resource that has helped me to start my own home based business. This program has 5 streams of income that have been proven to be successful. You can find out more about this program by clicking this Link.

I wish you success in all your legitimate business ventures and in your every day life too!

Sincerely,

Jim Van Dyke

The King of Scripts

On Friday I posted an article about Financial Independence. You may want to read that article first, because this article will expand on the information given.

In order to become financially independent you must make more money then you spend. Most people are spending more then they currently make, so it may be necessary to increase your income in order to pay your current expenses and possibly have extra to put in Savings.

There are many ways to make money online. I will list a few options that are currently available and that others have been able to make money while using.

eBay

This is a very common auction website on which many people have made millions of dollars. You could create arts and craft items to sell on eBay if you have that talent or skill. You could find items in your home that you do not use and sell these on eBay for extra money. You could buy items at yard sales, flea markets, or local auctions. Then post the items on eBay.

You could find a drop ship wholesaler that could store and ship items for you. You could then post items that you can buy through the supplier on auctions. When someone buys the item, then you could make the transaction with the supplier and they would then ship the item to your customer.

eBay also allows the sale of digital information products. You could create your own product(s) to sell. You could purchase the Resell Rights (RR), Master Resell Rights (MRR) or Private Label Rights (PLR) for products that other people have created. Then you could post auctions for these items on eBay. Please note that you must read the declaration of rights that should come with the product when you purchase it. Some products do not allow selling on auction websites as written in the declaration of rights for the product you purchased. Make sure you do not break the agreement, because this could result in legal problems for you.

Affiliate Programs

An Affiliate Program is an agreement with another company or individual to promote their products or services for a commission that is paid when your refferral makes a purchase. Some programs also pay based on clicks made on ads shown on your website. There are many Affiliate Programs available online from big name companies, such as Amazon, Google AdSense, and ClickBank. There are some MLM Affiliate Programs that you can join such as SFI Marketing, Success University, Traffic Swarm, and many others.

Individual Internet Marketers also offer Affiliate Programs for their products and services. You can find these by doing a Google search for “affiliate program” or you can check on their websites to see if they offer a program.

Your Own Website

You could sell products that you create (Physical or Digital). You could sell products from your physical retail store if you have one already. You could promote your services through your website if you offer services only. This also works for promotion in your own area if you only have the ability to offer services in your own area. You could have an online retail store and sell items that you buy in bulk through a wholesaler. You could use a drop ship wholesaler and they would store the inventory and ship to your customer once an order is placed.

You could also sell digital information products or downloadable software. You could create the product(s) yourself, outsource the creation of the product(s), or buy products with RR, MRR or PLR from others to sell on your website.

You could also join the King of Scripts Webmaster Gold Memebrship. This site has an enormous library of videos that will show you how to do everything you need to do to get a working website. This site will also have information products that you can download with Master Resell Rights, Resell Rights and Private Label Rights that you can use for your website and sell to make money for you. More products will be added to the members area on a regular basis.

I wish you success in all your legitimate business ventures and in your every day life too!

Sincerely,

Jim Van Dyke

The King of Scripts

Today is July 4, 2008. In the United States this day is called Independence Day, because it was on this date in 1776 that the Declaration of Independence was signed. People celebrate this day in many ways, but most eat picnics and launch fireworks.

Take a look at your financial records. Are you free? Are you enslaved to your JOB? Most people will say that they are enslaved, because Just Over Broke is a good description of their finances. You go to work to earn money to pay your expenses and buy gas so you can go to work. With the high cost of gas many will choose not to travel this summer, because they just can’t afford it.

This is how I view financial independence. It is not necessarily how much money you make.

Can you go to the store and buy what you want or what you need?

I remember a few years back when my children were young and I would go grocery shopping. I did not take the time to add up the items in my cart, and just put in what I felt we needed for the week. When I got to the register and they added up my total it was more then I had, so I had to put back some items. Let me tell you that was embarrassing! This happened more then once I am sorry to say, but I decided that I would eventually make enough money that I would never have to do that again.

I am not saying that I want to be able to buy out the store. I am saying that I would like to be able to buy what me and my family needed for the week without worrying about whether I have enough to pay for it. It would also be nice to have enough to buy something extra that I may not need at the time, but is what I want.

Do you have any extra left over at the end of the week to put into Savings?

This is something that many people over look in their life. Life is full of surprises and mishaps. If you are not prepared for them, then you could loose everything you have when the first big problem arises. What if you get sick and can not work for a period of time, do you have enough saved to carry you through? What if your car breaks down, do you have enough to fix it? These things can happen any day to any one, even you.

My goal is to make more money then I spend, and to put away as much as I can in Savings, Bonds, or Trusts. Save up for major expenses that may come along. Plan ahead for the expected things too, such as College, Weddings, Children, and anything else that you can foresee.

Do you Save up for major purchases, or do you take out loans?

Take a look at your mortgage if you have one. Say you borrow $100,000.00 to buy your home, you could actually pay the bank back over $300,000 depending on your interest rate and the time to pay back the loan. That is a huge difference. The way the payments are scheduled you pay almost all the interest in the first few years of the loan. This is why after paying on your loan for several years your principal or the amount you still owe has not gone down very much. That is robbery when you consider how much they are making from just your loan, now consider a thousand loans. It is no wonder there are so many banks and loan services.

Take a look at your automobile loan, if you have one. Say you borrow $20,000 to buy a car, you could actually pay the bank back over $30,000 depending on the interest rate and the time to pay back the loan. This may not be as much as the home loan, but most car loans are only 3 – 7 years, instead of 20 – 30 years for the home loan.

When you owe money to the bank, then you are enslaved to them. True financial independence would mean that you save up your money and pay cash for even the major purchases. This will take discipline and penny pinching, but it can be done. Check out most other countries in the world. People there do not have home loans or car loans, and they must pay cash for everything they buy.

Do you take out loans or use credit cards to go on vacation?

Using a credit card is not bad in itself. As long as you can pay off the balance every month, then the credit card can be very useful. On vacation it is so much easier and safer to use a credit card instead of carrying a lot of cash. Using a credit card and then only paying the minimum payment is bad. Credit card companies charge the highest interest of any type of loan company. Just paying the minimum payment is only paying the interest for the month, and very little goes toward your principal. It would take a very long time to pay off a credit card at that rate. This is definitely enslavement.

Taking out a loan for a vacation is a bad idea from the start. As discussed earlier, the interest on the loan means you will end up paying back a lot more then the vacation cost. Not to mention the enslavement to the loan company. It is far better to save your money in advance to pay for your vacation.

My opinion on Human Nature

This is my opinion and is actually based on observation of myself and others. People will always tend to spend what they make. As they start to make more, then they will tend to spend more. Once you get locked into a certain lifestyle you do not want to go back to the previous lifestyle. The tendency will be to advance to a higher lifestyle, because we are not satisfied with what we have.

This philosophy is mirrored in the TV commercials. You are considered an outcast if you do not have the latest cell phone, mp3 player, clothes, accessories, etc. etc. etc. Then there is the whole keeping up with the Jones’s. Your neighbor buys a new car, so you have to get one better, etc. etc. etc.

There is nothing wrong with spending money, if you have it to spend. The problem is when we become insolvent, meaning our debt is much higher then our assets or income. This happens with cars and houses, when you owe more money then the property is actually worth.

True Financial Freedom Comes With Effort

You must change they way you think in order to become financially free. You must break the cycle of spending more then you make. You must make the effort to put money away for a rainy day. You must make it a practice to save for major purchases.

Making a million dollars every year will not give you financial freedom. Making a million dollars a day will not give you financial freedom. It is only when you decide to spend less money then you make, that you will find true financial freedom.

Look for my post on Monday and I will give you some ideas for making extra money online to help you in your goal for financial freedom.

I wish you success in all your legitimate business ventures and in your every day life too!

Sincerely,

Jim Van Dyke

The King of Scripts

Have you ever considered starting a home based business? You could probably use some extra money to pay some bills that have piled up on you. The price of gas has created problems for everyone. I am sure that you have needed to make some cut backs just to feed your car so you can go to work.

It is a vicious cycle when you look at. You need more money to go to work, but the money is not quite enough to cover all of your expenses and you go further in debt. The rising costs of gas has caused other necessities to also go up in price, so the money you were just getting by on is no longer enough. We call this a JOB, because you are Just Over Broke.

Ideally you should be making more money then you spend, and should be putting money away for the problem that may be looming over the horizon. What if you get sick and can’t work? Do you have enough money saved up to carry you through, or will this devastate you? What if your car breaks down, do you have enough to cover the repair costs? If you have children, then the possible problems escalate. Braces. Sickness. School. Sports and other activities at school. College. The list goes on.

It is better to plan for a problem then it is to scramble at the last minute and go further into debt. What can you do when you do not have enough money coming in to pay your existing expenses and can not save money? Many people are turning to the Internet to find ways to make extra money. But you must be aware that there are scammers and scams a plenty. A good rule of thumb is that if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is not true.

Late Breaking News!

You will not become a millionaire over night! Anyone that makes the claim that you can, will always follow with a sales pitch. “Buy my item and you will become a millionaire.” “New system will make money for you with no work, no sales, no cold calling, etc. etc.” If you are not selling anything then how do you make money? Whether you are offering a product or a service, you are still selling something.

Always look into what they are telling you, and never accept what they are telling you with out checking it out. Look them up on the Better Business Bureau website. Check out the information on the Federal Citizen Information Center concerning scams. Check out the Federal Trade Commission website to find a list of current Internet scams. Do a general search on the company name and on the product to see if there are any reports of fraud or illegal activities. You may not find any information about this company or their product, so it may come down to your own judgment. You may consider calling the company or sending an email to request more information about the company and their products. Make sure you ask for referrals or testimonials. Make sure you ask how long they have been in business and if they were known by any other names. Make an informed decision, never make a spur of the moment decision.

You Can Make Money Online

There are some legitimate home based business opportunities out there. There are a few people that are making millions online. You have the same potential to make millions online. The key is how much do you want that? How hard are you willing to work to achieve that? It will take effort and it will take time. You need to find a good home business opportunity, and then you have to work to make the opportunity become a successful business. Just sitting back wishing the money will come rolling in is not enough.

Your efforts also need to be applied to the right activities to make your business a success. Just building more websites and adding more content to your website will not be enough to get people to your website. You need to also focus efforts on getting traffic to your website. The initial stages of building your business are the hardest and require the most work. It will get easier and require less work, but this will be after some time has elapsed.

When it comes down to it, making your home based business work depends on you. You have to have the initiative to want to make it succeed. You have to have the drive to push your home based business to make money online. No one else can do this for you.

I wish you success in all your legitimate business ventures and in your every day life too!

Sincerely,

Jim Van Dyke

The King of Scripts