Before you start your home-based business there are plenty of misconceptions that you need to be aware of. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that working from home isn’t work.  Sometimes it will become MORE work than your previous job of selling your time to somebody else.

When I first fired my boss and started working for myself, I found that I spent more hours, not less, and worse, I started to worry about my business.  THIS IS A GOOD THING!  It means that you CARE about your business.

Also, don’t fall into the trap of thinking that you can get up at 8am, laze about until 9am before booting up your computer and then having 2 hour lunch.  Anything worth having REALLY IS worth working for.  A few people on this planet get lucky, but  most of us are about average in the luck-department.  Create your own luck by starting as soon as possible, having short lunch-breaks and don’t finish until what you set-out to do that day is DONE.  If you can’t possibly finish your task that day, start even earlier the next day and make sure you’ve completed the previous days work.

Luck is one thing and one thing only; it’s when opportunity coincides with preparation.  Be prepared for what you want by learning everything you can about a subject.  Affiliate Millions is a great place to start.

To start, you obviously need knowledge, but you also need determination.  Without this, nothing will work for you (unless you happened to be born into wealth, which is a LOT rarer than you might imagine).  You also need a stong belief in yourself and more importantly, a belief in your ability to LEARN new things.  In school we are NEVER taught HOW TO LEARN, which are just shown things that we are told that we should learn.

Perseverance is also paramount.  Without the “never quit” mentality, you may well stumble at the first hurdle (don’t you just HATE cliches????!).  But the single most important thing you can have to ensure your eventual success is MOTIVATION.  Your WHY!  WHY do you want a business you can run from home?  Once you can honestly answer this question (and believe me when I say that it took me YEARS to work out what MY “why” was) then you are well on your way to making ANYTHING you want work-out.

Knowing what your real motivation is (your “WHY AM I DOING THIS?”) will give you ALL the FUEL you’ll ever need to keep-on-keeping-on when you have those irritating and sometimes seemingly insurmountable problems arise.

What is YOUR why?  Well, it could be your daughter’s education, or a good retirement for you and your wife.  Find out what your “why” is over the next few weeks.  Think about it and then every time you have a problem with you business, you can simply think about your “why” and I promise you, this will give you all the fuel you’ll ever need to keep going.

Luke

A final consideration is the loading that you expect your site to get.  If only one person visits each day, then there’s almost no load on the server…………and no money coming into your clickbank or paypal account!  If, however, you have thousands of visitors each day, which is what you need to aim for, then there will be a very heavy loading on your server and it can freeze-up (or ‘crash’) making it impossible to anyone else to get onto your site.  This is like have a two-lane interstate when you actually need a six-lane highway.

So, consider your needs before you choose a package or hosting company.

Here’s the Kiosk link again: Kiosk.ws

Luke.

“Time is more valuable than money.  You can get more money, but you cannot get more time”

- Jim Rohn

Selling someone else’s product is one of the easiest ways to start a business online for several reasons:

1. You don’t have to buy a product to sell

2. You don’t have to create a product to sell

3. You don’t have to deal with customer support

You will need your own website of course, using a blog service like Blogger.com really isn’t an option I’m afraid. You need your own website so you can brand yourself.

You also have to learn how to drive visitors to your site using various traffic tactics.  When starting out, I certainly would NOT recommend trying Google Adwords, as many inexperienced people LOSE money doing this.  FREE ORGANIC TRAFFIC is the best traffic you can have, very much like word-of-mouth advertising.

You’ll also need to learn how to use an autoresponder server like GetResponse.  Without a service like this, there’s no way that you can possibly keep up with all of your potential customers.  Also, with an autoresponder, you can effortlessly email hundreds (or thousands) of people once a week with your message or perhaps your weekly newsletter (with your hoplinks and affiliate links in it!).

Don’t make the mistake of underestimating the role of affiliate marketers.  They are basically well-paid commission-only sales people for some of the best products available.  You can develop your own loyal following and present products to them now and again.  Don’t do it too often or they’ll think that the relationship is one-sided.  You need to offer a LOT in return for their continued support.

Clickbank and PayDot.com are two companies that simply wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for the enormous and ever-growing army of affiliate salespeople.  Companies like these make it easy for affiliate-marketers to locate products that they would otherwise have great difficulty in finding.

Clickbank, Commission Junction and others have made it even easier to make money online but this is a double-edged sword (excuse the cliche), because it means that there are MORE people learning how to make money on the internet than ever before.

And learning IS THE KEY to your success.  You need to better one step ahead of your competition (other marketers in your chosen niche-area) all the time.  One of the best tutorials I’ve ever seen is Affiliate Millions.  Michael does an excellent job of teaching the techniques that make the difference between success and failure.  Don’t learn the hard way like I did.

You also need to learn about the niche that you’ve chosen, and the best place to do this is to visit three or four of the highest ranked forums for that topic.  They’re easy to find, just use a search-engine and type the words that best describe your niche-area and then look for the word ‘forum’.

If you want to learn how to become an affiliate marketer in less time than most, then I highly recommend the Affiliate Millions program.

Luke

Okay, so I’m sure you know by now what a USP is, but do you know how to find the Unique Selling Proposition that is hiding inside YOUR online business?

Unless your company has absolutely no competition now or in the foreseeable future (which is HIGHLY unlikely), you’re well advised to find and then DEVELOP your USP.  As you already know, a USP is something that differentiates your business from all of your competition.

For you to succeed, you have to identify and understand what you or your business does or can start doing for your prospects and customer,s that provides them with a result that is superior to your competitors. This is called your unique selling proposition (USP). Your unique selling proposition is the distinct advantage or benefit that sets your business apart from the competition.

Your unique selling proposition can be based on better quality, faster service, greater convenience, more experience, lower prices, larger selection, or any other attribute you want to be known for.

The important thing to remember is that before you can get a greater share of the market, you first have to get a greater share of your prospect’s emotions. You can do this by selecting and developing your unique selling proposition.

Your USP should be one that is a natural benefit offered by your business. Never offer a USP that is pure baloney. For example, if you sell super high-end products on your website, you shouldn’t consider lower prices as your unique selling proposition.  NOBODY wants to buy a Rolex from a Beverly Hills jeweler at a discount.

So what is your USP?  Here are some ideas to get you started.

1. A broader selection.

2. Less expensive (like Walmart’s “Always Low Prices”).

3. Convenience (location, immediate delivery etc.).

4. Better assistance by phone, email or fax etc.

5. Very BEST products available.

6. Easiest ordering process.

7. Best service.

8. A more comprehensive guarantee.

9. Any other benefit you can offer your customers that the competition doesn’t.

The possibilities for building a USP are virtually limitless, the important point being to focus on one niche area, need, or want that is most lacking in the marketplace.  Above all, never adopt a USP that you cannot fulfill.  You don’t want unhappy customers EVER if you can avoid it.  Rather, you want customers who are delighted with your company, so much so, that they write and say great things about you to all of their friends and business colleagues.

In choosing a unique selling proposition, keep these three things in mind: your competition, your operation, and, most importantly, your target audience . Make sure you pick a unique selling proposition that suits all three.

All of your marketing should create an emotional connection between your company and your unique selling proposition. As an example, you can choose quality as your USP, while still promoting your service and location. But you’ve got to communicate the idea of quality in all your marketing, so when a customer or potential customer thinks of you or your company, they immediately FEEL that they are dealing with the very highest quality (products, personnel etc.).

If you don’t offer a clear and meaningful unique selling proposition, your business will stand for nothing, and you MUST make your web-business stand for SOMETHING.

Successful companies study their market looking for vacant niches. You want to be able to OWN (or almost own) a niche, and you must do whatever is necessary to live up to your unique selling proposition.

The small number of businesses that actually develop and incorporate a unique selling proposition always own a larger share of the market then those without one. By developing your USP and incorporating it into every aspect of your business you’ll have a major advantage over your competition.

Luke.

Most if not all of us want something better; a bigger car, a bigger house in a better neighborhood and we want to buy nice things for our family. We keep hoping for more but, in order to get what you don’t have, you HAVE to do something you have never done before.

Here’s one definition of insanity:

Doing the same thing over and again YET expecting different results!

As an employee, you can’t stay at the same job forever and hope that a miracle will happen and your boss will suddenly give you a raise. You will be lucky that there is no downsizing in your company, which is going to happen more frequently over the coming months and years. And of course, switching to another company will only provide a short term solution to your long term problem.

Sure, you can take up a second or even third job, but do you have enough hours and stamina in a day to sustain it? Selling your time (that is, your LIFE) is NOT the way to go.

Trading your time for money isn’t wise financial sense in the long term. You keep on increasing the hours just keep up in the rat race, but in the end, you get nowhere.

To add insult to injury, increasing your wages only puts you in a higher tax bracket. Your salary increases but so does the percentage of your tax. How can you invest in yourself when all the time you spend working for a company AND working for the government paying ever increasing taxes? What if you fall sick and can’t work tomorrow? Will the government take care of your family? Well, the government is bankrupt, so the answer is NO, they won’t and can’t.

So isn’t it time you take your finances more seriously?

People have many ideas about what they think money is. Some say it is a measurement of wealth. In years past, people measured wealth by how many livestock and horses they had. But do people measure wealth today by your cows and horses? Are your dollar bills sitting in the bank going to protect you if a recession strikes the country? No, wealth cannot be measured by dollar bills or digits on a computer alone.

Some people believe money is a form of power.

Yes, money can give you power, but if you are stuck on a desert island with a trillion dollars, what will that money mean to you? If someone offered you water and a helicopter to fly out of there, you would trade all your money in a second. So money is not an accurate measurement of power – it really depends on how you use it.

Many believe money is the root of all evil (which is a mis-quote from the New Testament by the way)… and many people take on this belief without much questioning.

Money absolutely is NOT the root of all evil (otherwise, why do you think churches still accept monetary donations?). Money is an excellent servant but a terrible master. If you are trading your life away for the dollar, money then has power over your life.

Unless you have proper financial intelligence, the lack of money can bring about a lot of warped thinking and produce in you a negative mindset as observed, primarily, in cheats, thieves, criminals, freeloaders, and politicians.

So let me get to the point. What is money?

Money is an idea, backed by confidence. Nothing more.

Those WITH money are willing to part with their money to buy other people’s TIME With this extra time, they can spend THEIR time making more money and doing whatever they want to do with their own time.

While you as you sell your time (i.e. your life) for money, you are enslaved by it!

What most people don’t realize is that there is a part of all of us that cannot be bought at whatever price. Would you chop off your little finger if your boss offered you 24 months of your salary immediately? You and I know we are worth more than that (right?). But when you hear that people selling their body parts for cash in some countries, it begs the question, how far would any of us go to get some more money?

Here’s an idea: learn HOW to make money on the internet and then DO IT!  Take ACTION today.  No more excuses.  Here’s a good place to start: Affiliate Millions.

Luke.

“A fool and his money are soon elected” - Will Rogers

This morning I stopped to get some Gas, only to find that the station was completely out.  So I went on to the next one, only to find that there was a line of cars waiting (and blocking the inside lane!).

Hmmm.  What was happening?  I turned the radio onto the news channel and sure enough, there was a problem in the south of the U.S. (where I currently live).  Apparently, an oil pipe from a Texas refinery supplying the the south-east states had burst so they’d shut it down.  Result?  No gas for the folks in Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia until the pipeline can be repaired.

How does this affect YOU?  Well, it doesn’t directly, however it brought to my mind the facts about supply and demand all over again.  You see, though the price of gasoline had fallen across the country to about $3.70 for a gallon of regular, in the southern states which should have been supplied by the Texas pipe, prices had rocketed back up to nearly $4!

The natural-law of SUPPLY AND DEMAND is immutable.  It doesn’t matter what people (politicians especially) say about the economy, the law of supply and demand will continue to hold true.  Nothing can change that, as was proven to me yet again this morning.

When only a few people want something (low demand), the price MUST be low.  However, if lots of people want something (high demand), the price WILL BE high if the supply is low.  Please don’t ever forget this.

How can this help you?  Simple, think about what will be in great demand over the coming months (or years) during a recession and then SUPPLY it!  What types of things will be in demand?  Well, for starters, people will be looking for advice on HOW TO MAKE MONEY because they will need to survive.  They will still need food and shelter of course, but to get these things, they will need money.  Show them how to make money on the internet and they will buy from you without hesitation.

If you STILL don’t believe we’re in a recession (and heading for a DEPRESSION) then just listen to the former Federal Reserve Chairman.

Alan Greepspan, has finally admitted that the country is in a recession and headed for a major-recession (read depression?).  While this hidden depression has been around for a few years now, its ugly head has finally started to emerge in the form of a mortgage/housing crisis and inflation.

You NEED to start looking at better ways to MAKE MONEY, and making money ONLINE is without doubt one the easiest ways for you to start a business from home.  But you need to know WHERE TO START.

Here’s a great introduction to starting an online business, teaching you how to make money as an AFFILIATE:

AFFILIATE MILLIONS

This is one of the best ‘How To’ video tutorials I’ve seen. I urge you to get it.

Luke.

I know I’ve already discussed some aspects of writing articles to get people to visit your website, but there are a few things that I’ve been thinking about that I’d like to share with you.

In traditional writing, your headline determines a huge degree of the success of a book or magazine article. This statistic takes into consideration what makes the book title successful, that being whether or not a human purchases it.

Article marketing success on the internet must take into consideration how the article is FOUND by reader.

Don’t believe the lie that most people will read your articles because they came to a website and started browsing just like they do if they were at a local book store; that’s NOT how it works.

People search the Internet using one of the major search engines like Google or Yahoo. They will type several keywords that are related to the topic of the article or information they are trying to locate, then search engine will then deliver results that are most appropriate to that person’s interest.

Your aim of course, is to have your articles by the people using the search engines for the keywords and topics that are most relevant to the CONTENT of your article. Most search engines give more weight to the first 3-5 keywords and a lower priority to the rest.

These first few  words of your title determine the success of your article in terms of how much traffic your article will generate back to your site. Create keyword-rich article titles that match the most commonly searched keywords for your topic.  BUT,write in a normal, easy-for-humans-to-read, style.  Latent Semantic Indexing, or LSI, is making this ever more important.

You can increase the effectiveness of your article marketing strategy by understanding keyword research and creating KEYWORD-rich, article titles. You can create massive amounts of traffic to your articles and website thanks to the search engines who love smart, keyword-rich titles.

GOOGLE KEYWORDS tool is a good place to start your research.  Though this tool is designed to help Google make more money with Advertisers using Adwords, it’s a truly excellent tool for doing the kind of KEYWORD research that you will need to help you write properly formatted articles.

Luke

Making comments on other people’s blogs is a great way to get links pointing back to your own site, which will, in turn, help you rank higher in the search-engines.  The easier it is for the search-engines to find you, the easier it is for PEOPLE (potential customers) to find you.

Just remember that when you do this, ADD something to the conversation.  You wouldn’t just tell somebody you were talking what a good job of talking they were doing, would you?  No, of course not, so don’t do it when commenting on somebody’s written work.  ADD something of interest and people will see that you are a person of substance and knowledge and then they will come to visit YOUR website.

Here’s an excellent case-study done by my friend Cenay Nailor, one of the most genuine and competent tech-based internet marketers out there.  I strongly recommend you check it out.

behindthecurtain.bycenay.com

Luke