Work At Home Business Opportunities Weblog
Some wineries, it seems, are just another variety of “home business” struggling to increase their profits.
Perhaps you need to regain control over your product or service to increast profits?
Do you need to learn how to go directly to the consumer of your product or service instead of depending on a middle man to help you earn a living.
Typical jobs dependent on middlemen to provide work…
1. Loan originators depend on real estate agents for referrals
2. Contractors depend on bigger general contractors for business
3. (Snail) mailing list owners depend on list brokers
4. Cabinet makers depend on home builders for leads
5. Anyone who is not self-employed.
From the Engineering News:
In reaction to the increased frustration of small and micro wine producers owing to the lack of control over their products once they leave the estate, a group of small wine producers have developed a business model that allows wine producers to have control of their brands from inception to consumption.
The model, called ‘Bring It Home’, sees small wine producers cutting out agents, allowing wine producers to move closer to their market and take ownership of their brands.
“The wine industry has inher-ited archaic business methods, resulting in a conventional production-driven approach and, as a result, structural deficiencies and effectiveness have not been scrutinised,� Brugman tells Engineering News.
“Using the conventional business model, producers abdicate their brand responsibil-ities to sales agents who are their only link to consumers.
“The vacuum between pro-ducers and clients carries the inherent risk of producers losing brand control and, for many producers, agents are their only buyers, which results in agents, not consumers, dictating production.� However, with the introduction of the Bring It Home model, producers will have the oppor-tunity to take complete control of their brands.
Read more…
Lance Mock reminded me how “aged” I am when he sent this letter to his email list yesterday promoting this weblog.
Thanks Lance… and tell your wife she is probably the only person in the whole world who still remembers those days!
What sent my wife DIVING into a stack of books?
I know you’ve been online for awhile, so you’ve probably run across a guy by the name of Chuck Huckaby. He got ahold of my book, “How to Make Big Money Giving Away E-books, and wrote a glowing report that I just had to pass on to you.
Here is the link: Adsense Style Profits Await Ebook Publishers
When I mentioned this to my wife, she promptly dove into a stack of books in our home library. She pops back out and says,
“Ta-da!”
She’s holding a big blue binder triumphantly up in the air.
Seems wayyyy back in 1998, when people were still debating the merits of the internet, Chuck was giving seminars on how to get your business online. My wife attended one of those seminars before she and I ever met.
My point is, Chuck’s been been preaching the potential of the online world for quite awhile now. His newsletter is chock FULL juicy money-making tidbits, and he holds NOTHING back.
Thanks for the visitors Lance! (And the memories???? I’d be frightened to read the book. Probably nothing still applies!)
“Big Box” stores like Wal Mart and the big retailers aren’t the only ones who’ll be selling gift cards this Christmas.
CNN/Money reports …
For truckers who haul Santa’s loot to stores all over the country, what better way to express your gratitude than with a 7-Eleven gift card, for an 18-pack of Bud Light, or maybe a Slurpee?
Or, if you need an excuse to make over your “shaggy” someone special, how about a gift card for a buzz from Regis salons.
Whether these gift ideas suit you or not, the growing demand for gifts cards has merchants of all sorts scrambling to get in. The result is a flood of new branded cards in the $45 billion gift card business clamoring for your attention over the holidays.
Bob Skiba, executive vice president with Stored Value Systems (SVS), is forecasting an “explosion” of gift cards sold through outside parties the next two months, including cards from supermarkets, drug stores and yes, even gas stations.
The company is one of the biggest providers of gift cards and card programs to about 350 retailers, including the Gap, Limited Brand, J.C. Penney’s, Costco and Exxon-Mobil.
“In five years we’ve gone from 1,500 locations to 75,000 locations outside of malls, department stores and specialty stores that also sell gift cards,” Skiba said. “We’re working with spas, restaurants and convenience stores. With this phenomenal growth, we’re producing 25 percent more cards than we were for the same time last year.”
Restaurant chains Arby’s, Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr. will also debut holiday gift cards, Skiba said. “One of the more innovative cards is from Regis Hair Salon. You can actually put a picture of yourself on it,” he said. Arby’s, Hardee’s, Carl’s Jr. and Regis Hair Salon are all clients of SVS.
For budget-tight consumers, the expansion of gift cards into non-traditional channels offers the benefit of “one-stop” shopping.
How?
Stopping for gas on the way home, a harried holiday shopper can fill up, pick up a few groceries, and also grab a few gift cards, like a 7-Eleven (Research) card, or an online shopping card from American Express. The cards can be used in lieu of cash.
“This is great for your non-typical holiday merchants because it will bring customers who maybe have never stepped into their stores,” Skiba said
“Convenience stores and supermarkets could divert gift money away from the classic gift channels,” said Candace Corlett, retail analyst with WSL Strategic Retail.
“Earlier, retail chains would’ve competed with each other or with the larger department stores for gift sales. Now they have to compete with anyone who sells gift cards.”
According to a recent holiday spending survey from the National Retail Federation (NRF), gift cards ranked as the third most desirable category on consumers’ wish list after CDs/DVDs and clothing.
“It used to be insulting to give cash in an envelope but gift cards have taken the stigma out of it,” said WSL’s Corlett.
The only drawback for merchants is that they have to wait until the cards are actually redeemed before they log the transaction as revenue.
Actually any home business or small business can create their own gift cards… you just have to decide if the price is worth it for the volume you do.
A resource like Andreoni’s let’s you design and plastic cards. (I got them by Googling the term “plastic business cards”… I’ve never used them so I can’t vouch for them. Search for that term and you’ll find many options.)
Or you can have good old fashioned “gift certificates” made.
Glenn Osborn, a Baltimore, MD, entrepreneur uses this criteria:
I belong to a Baltimore Networking group. NRG. Networkreferralgroup.com - it’s actually grown to 6 states. I like it more than BNI and ALL the other groups I’ve visited because…
A - You’re in and out with a fistfull of referrals in 60 minutes
B - The Group leader for each group has over 1000 Business #’s and contacts - of all the members. AND U can visit other groups.
C - They negotiate deals that SAVE me moolah.
For Example:
I bought 2 cases of bottled water.
Instead of a Biz Card. I now hand out a bottle of water.
======================
Rentamentor Group
410-235-6789
======================
Cost less than a 1.00 a bottle AND no charge for s & h.
*************************
*************************
ACTION SUMMARY:
#1 - When the bottled water company goes to Trade Shows and events. Guess what? They give away bottles of water. With MY company name and # on them.
Cuz - I’m the ONLY one using their water bottles as a Biz Card. They advertise ME - No CHARGE. (Unexpected - but I’ll take it.)
#2 - At places were I shop - I Thank, Reward and GIVE AWAY to staffers Bottled Water Biz Cards and OTHER goodies that we sell.
(We REALLY do PROFIT from what we SHARE with youse guys.)
I get back all kinds of FREE stuff. Pens, pencils, 15% off cards nobody else gets. INCREDIBLE Service.
#3 - AND - The VIP business owners and managers Start Saying, “HELLO.” And asking questions like, “What do you DO?”
Which is the EXACT opening I’m looking for. To introduce my consulting and marketing services.
NOTICE - with this method - The PROSPECT Chases ME!
NRG has groups meeting in these locations in Maryland and surrounding states.
From the Los Almos Monitor:
Increasingly the biggest obstacle to having a home business is… your neighbors.
Here’s another example…
Citing declining property values and an increase in industrial establishments in their area, the Pajarito Homeowners Association is appealing a decision made last week by the Planning and Zoning Commission which granted a special use permit for a home business.
Residents claim that the home-based business, Waller’s Plumbing and Heating, defies the area’s residential-agricultural zoning as well as the deed covenants as stated under the homeowners association. In addition, residents in the area are concerned that the home business also would increase traffic in Pajarito Acres.
The company is relocating from its offices on DP Road to owner Steve Wallar’s home in Pajarito Acres. Waller, the applicant in the public hearing case, said he recently purchased the White Rock home to also serve the needs of his business.
The commission voted 4-3 in favor of the motion, which included several conditions:
Waste generated by the business may not be treated as residential waste. The business must pay for separate trash collection services or haul waste to the landfill for disposal.
Landscaping shall conform to the Fire Wise Model.
New construction shall meet the requirements of the Wildland Urban Interface Code.
The proposed floor plan and exterior elevation show the addition with both businesses and family-oriented areas and attached existing home.
The business operation will be restricted to a plumbing and service business with no retail or wholesale component.
No commercial vehicles will be parked visible from the street.
No outside storage will be permitted
Major deliveries of the business will not be made into any part of Pajarito acres.
Moral of the story: If you’ve GOT to be a productive citizen, PLEASE “don’t try this at home’!
From StartUpJournal.com…
Ebay Inc. founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife, Pamela, have given $100 million in eBay stock to Tufts University in suburban Boston to create a fund that will invest in microfinance, the practice of loaning small sums to people who are too poor to qualify for traditional lending. The university says it will be converting the stock to cash over the next few weeks.
The Omidyar-Tufts Microfinance Fund will be administered by Tufts, where the couple met and graduated in the late 1980s. The Omidyars’ goal is to accelerate the growth of the microfinance sector and encourage other institutions to invest in it.
Current microfinance initiatives, which are targeted most often to developing countries, largely rely on private donations and support from nongovernmental organizations. The Omidyars want to get institutional investors involved by demonstrating that investments in microfinance can provide a competitive rate of return. Tufts will lend money to institutions offering microfinance loans, such as banks, which will in turn pay interest to the university; in addition, they will invest in institutional equity funds and loan guarantees.
“It’s a fundamentally different way of looking at how to make a social impact,” says Mr. Omidyar, 38 years old. “It’s using business as a tool to make that happen.”
Encouraging Entrepreneurship
Mr. Omidyar has long encouraged entrepreneurship as a way to improve the economic status of small-business owners. He says that personal philosophy played a role in the founding of eBay, an online auctioneer that supports many businesses that depend on the Web site to attract new customers. The Omidyars have been active philanthropists, giving $85.9 million last year to programs such as MicroVest, a microfinance institution.
About a year ago, Mr. Omidyar called Tufts University President Lawrence Bacow to discuss how institutions could support investments in microfinance. Mr. Omidyar later approached him with the idea of creating the microfinance fund, emphasizing that not only would Tufts benefit by receiving income on the investment, but that the university would be creating a new type of investment that would appeal to other institutions. “People will be interested in our returns, in how we do financially,” Mr. Bacow says.
The $100 million gift is the largest amount that Tufts has ever received. The fund will be managed separately from the university’s $880 million endowment and will be governed by a board of five trustees, including Mr. Omidyar and Mr. Bacow, an economist.
The fund will be invested entirely in microfinance — in a diversified portfolio that spreads the money among different microlending institutions — in developing countries in Asia, Latin America, Africa and Eastern Europe. The university says it has not yet decided in which institutions it will invest. It plans to divide the funds between existing providers and new initiatives it will create.
Tufts says it hopes the Omidyar fund will provide a similar rate of return as its endowment. The school’s endowment has a target return of 9%; as a rule, the school uses a 5% return on its investments to fund university operations, and reinvests the rest into its endowment. Similarly, half of the interest generated each year by the microfinance fund will go to the university and the other half will be reinvested into the fund.
I’m glad he’s “Giving Back”… but will the media acknowledge how much he’s given and already prospered “micro enterprises” by giving them an international trading platform for the price of an online auction?
Read it all…
Glenn Osburn via the David Frey forum…
A friend in Los Angeles bought a Jiffy Print store.
To PUMP up sales
from the Businesses
in the surrounding
Hi-Rise Office buildings.
He looked for business owners ALREADY selling to the businesses HE wanted to sell printing to.
He found a Pizza Store owner.
The guy was delivering Pizza to 100’s and 100’s of the day and night time - over-time staffers in offices ALL around his print shop.
Here’s what He did:
#1 - He went to the owner of the Pizza store. Offered to DO ALL His Pizza box and other printing. AT COST.
#2 - He made the UP-front offer in #1 FIRST. Then asked the man to do a Test. When the proposed Test started to make a profit. He offered to SWAP services. No charge printing - for No charge AD insertions.
#3 - He Tested flyers that were stuck INSIDE the pizza box.
So the Jiffy Print Store Flyer rode along - on top of the Pizza - to every nearby office.
#4 - The flyers got Greasy. Covered with cheese and Tomato sauce. But they started to pull in LOTS of business.
200%
Then 300% more business. (When he refined his flyer a bit)
So much EXTRA that my Jiffy Printing store friend - had to put on a late shift at his printing store.
I dunno why this wouldn’t work for you.
Right now.
Today.
They KEY is having a proven flyer to put on TOP of the Pizzas.
Which is EZ to do.
Glenn Osborn
Millionaire Mastermind Marketing Association
This is an old post from the sowpub.com forum by Don Alm…
There are lots of great ways to make lots of money.
Unfortunately, they all involve selling of one form or another… even website monetized by Google Adsense are about selling Google on why your website has unique content or some other search engine on your site’s value to the reader.
The last lie we overcome in business is the lie that says we need not learn how to promote ourselves. Or should I say, we overcome it if we want to survive.
Don Alm started out headed down the traditional “corporate man” route until all the 50 year olds were getting canned and living on peanuts.
How could he escape - to use our modern phrase - the “cubicle”?
I now consider myself a “successful Direct Salesman”. I can take a mock-up sample of an advertising product…show it to businesspeople and in at least 1 out of 3 tries…get an order.
It hasn’t always been that way.
When I was in high school and college I was a “football star”. I was well liked AND because of a “personality-fault” called “A Terrible INFERIORITY COMPLEX” (which I call ABSOLUTE SHYNESS BORDERING ON ABJECT FEAR OF CONTACT WITH OTHERS)….I was called “CONCEITED” or “STUCK-UP” because I wouldn’t say “Hi!” to fellow students I’d pass on campus. They didn’t know I was TERRIBLY SHY!
From contact with others at college and from my experiences I realized that “SALES” had the greatest potential for me to earn a GOOD living…PLUS…if I could master the art of selling….I would NOT have to be dependent on one company or one product line…I could apply my sales abilities to almost any product or service…just a matter of becoming familiar with the product or service…then I’d use my sales skills to sell.
So…because I realized I HAD TO learn “How To Sell”….in the summer of my Junior year, instead of working “construction” like my fellow “jocks” I decided to get a one of the toughest jobs there is…”Selling Encyclopedias on Straight Commission”. I would either learn how to sell or starve.
The first couple weeks was TERRIBLE. I had to draw upon every ounce of “inner strength” to walk up to doors…COLD…talk my way into setting an appointment…make the appointment…give my presentation and close the sale.
Again…this was totally against my “personality”. I HATED IT….but I knew I had to do it if I was to have a “successful” life. And I couldn’t see myself sitting in an engineering lab for the rest of my life.
I not only made money that summer…I made GOOD money…probably three times as much working construction.
Any private citizen in the UK should be alarmed.
But in particular, folks operating a business from their home may be in for more of a shock should the value of their inventory or business equipment be used to justify higher property taxes.
From the News Telegraph
England like the US is slowly trashing the rights of citizens to be secure in their own “castle” just to feed the insatiable tax man…
Council tax inspectors will be able to enter people’s homes and take photographs even of their bedrooms, it emerged yesterday.
Whitehall documents reveal that they will be allowed to “obtain factual information from internal inspections” as part of the enormous exercise to revalue 22 million properties in England.
When council tax was set up in 1993, most valuations were done from behind a desk and property inspections were largely external.
Caroline Spelman, the Tories’ local government spokesman, said: “Labour’s council tax revaluation will mean an army of nosey clipboard inspectors invading people’s homes, including their bedrooms.
“The privacy of law-abiding citizens will be ignored because of Labour’s compulsion to levy stealth taxes on hard-working families and pensioners.”
She said a “Big Brother” database would include new inspection codes that would allow the Valuation Office Agency, an arm of the Inland Revenue, to check which properties had been inspected and the degree to which an internal or external inspection had been recorded.
The disclosure follows the revelation that John Prescott, the Deputy Prime Minister, is planning to charge higher tax on homes with patios, multiple bedrooms, conservatories and scenic views.
The Valuation Office Agency sought the advice of the office of the Surveillance Commissioner on entering homes. The commissioner replied that inspectors taking photographs of properties would not contravene the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act or the Human Rights Act, even though those laws were intended to protect citizens’ privacy.
But Miss Spelman said: “Most people will find it offensive that intrusive bureaucrats sent by John Prescott will be taking photographs inside their home to find out the number of their bedrooms and the size of their patio, garage or greenhouse.
“Not only will homes face soaring council tax bills but everyone will pay the price for this Orwellian bureaucracy.
“I am concerned that invasive inspections on such a large scale will place the elderly at risk from conmen pretending to be from the Government. The case for cancelling the unpopular and unwanted tax revaluation has never been stronger.”
Read more…
Google is unveiling it’s GOOGLE ANALYTICS service…
Google Analytics helps you find out what keywords attract your most desirable prospects, what advertising copy pulled the most responses, and what landing pages and content make the most money for you.
Free.
Spend on marketing, not on web analytics.
Sophisticated Analytics.
Google Analytics has all the features you’d expect from a high-end analytics offering. It also provides tightly integrated AdWords support, so you can view AdWords ROI metrics without having to import cost data or add keyword tracking codes.
Easy to use.
Google Analytics is easy to use for novice marketers, while delivering all of the capabilities that experienced web analytics professionals expect.
Scalable for any size site.
Google Analytics is a hosted service that runs on the same servers that power Google. From large, high-traffic corporate sites to small sites, Google Analytics delivers consistent service.
Integrated with AdWords.
If you have an AdWords account, you can use Google Analytics directly from the AdWords interface. Google Analytics also calculates ROI metrics from automatically imported cost and keyword tracking data, saving you time.
Tracks all campaigns.
Google Analytics tracks all online campaigns, from emails to keywords, regardless of search engine or referral source.
Safe.
Google takes the trust people place in us very seriously, and is pledged to safeguard the privacy of your corporate data. We understand that web analytics data is sensitive information, so we accord it the ironclad protection it deserves. Read our industry leading privacy policy.
