Starting Your Own Successful Home Business With Little Investment and No Inventory
Here are 3 ways that you can start a successful home business with little investment and no inventory that I do and is a great way to make money from home. Initially think of this as a way to supplement your income and as you become more and more successful, then you can think about doing this full-time but its not going to happen over night, so don’t give up your regular job beforehand. The 3 ways I make money from home are: 1. I buy things that I consider totally under priced on Ebay and then resell them at a price thats worth my while to make a decent profit, 2. I own my own Professional E-Commerce Online Stores with their own Individual Internet Domain Name(s) for which people buy products and goods that are owned and maintained by a billion dollar company that processes the sales transaction and sends out the products and pays me 4-6% of the gross sales price for each item sold from my Store without me doing anything! and 3. I write a blog, which you are reading actually where I make money from Google Adsense ads as well as make money by promoting my own e-commerce stores and make 4-6% for each sale I make on those stores (see Item 2).
Using Ebay as “Stock” to Buy and Sell Each Day and Make a Nice Profit
Every day there are some items on Ebay that are vastly under priced particularly Buy it Now Items.
If you are aware that an item is way under priced and that you can make a profit that’s worth its while after buying it and paying shipping costs and then selling it on Ebay and paying Ebay’s fees, then buy it and resell it when it arrives. Of course you should only buy from a seller with excellent feedback who lives in the United States as in my opinion to many things can go wrong if its sent from outside the United States. For example, let’s say you find someone has listed a rare deleted Rock CD in excellent condition that normally sells for $40-50 as its a collectors item for $20 including shipping as a Buy It Now Item. You can make an easy $15 net profit by buying and reselling this if its worth your while. Remember a lot of little things making $15 each add up to a lot more money. You might find a classic state of the art CD player that normally sells for $750 use on sale for $500. That would get you a $200 plus profit. The main thing is you need to know what you’re doing but you can research prices online using Ebays completed sales for these items and prices online from other sources. Worst case scenario is that you can always sell it for what you paid for it and lose little! I recommend using Buy It Now because that way your time isn’t being taken up on auctions where the final price can go up too high for it to be worth your while. Also if you decide to be an “Ebay Day Trader” make sure you get paid by Paypal and insist that you be paid within 2 days or your obligation to sell to the winning bidder ends. If you sell the item using Buy It Now check the immediate Payment Option which means that in order to win the the auction they have to Pay for the Item Immediately by paypal.
E-Commerce Your Own E-Commerce Stores
Here’s the easiest step by step method of owning an E-Commerce Store that I know of, that I do myself:
1. Decide on a specific product you want to sell.
2. Come up with several Domain Names, as close as you can to the products name.
3. Go to a Domain registration site like Godaddy and see if the domain name is available. I would recommend always using a .COM domain and failing that a .Net or .Org. Almost all one word domain names are going to be taken so I would try to use the shortest three word domain name or possibly two if it was available. You may need to put a “Store” or My” with a 2 word combination to get an available domain name. Once you settle on a Domain name you need to register it, which will cost you roughly $8-$12 a year. Again try to get the shortest possible name that emphasizes the product you are selling.
4. The easiest way I know to launch an E-Commerce site is through a program called “The Easy Store” of which I am a customer. This program is put out and installed by Zeus Software and you basically don’t have to do much at all as they do almost everything. What Zeus does is put out an E-Commerce Website that sells all Amazon products and which Amazon is responsible for everything and you make a 4-6% commission for each sale from Amazon. Thus you are investing nothing on inventory, don’t process the order and aren’t collecting the money. Amazon does all that. Amazon then pays you for each item sold through your site. The Easy Store provides you with free web hosting for a year under one of their plans. Basically, if you sign up with the Easy Store, they will do all the entry work for you and walk you through things and give technical advice. You can contact them by phone if you have any technical matters. The Easy Store is not very expensive- note I do not have any financial interest in the company and I’m recommending it strictly as a customer who receives no benefit for recommending it. You do have to become an Amazon Associate which is free and takes less then a day to register. Two of my stores for example are
Discount 2008 and 2009 Gifts, Discount 2009 HDTV and New and Used Discount Software and Computers Click any of the links to see them. All of my stores are listed with links under this article.
5. Essentially the only thing you need to do is to come up with good Keyword descriptions that will come up high in search engines like Google which will draw a lot of your traffic for potential customers. You will also need to submit your domains to search Engines.
6. The most important thing in an E-Commerce Store is that it looks professional. For another $80 or so, The Easy Store will custom design a logo for you. My Easy Stores feature their custom logos as you can see by clicking the links in 4 above or below this article.
7. I would also join Google’s AdSense program which The Easy Store will put on your site for free once you register for AdSense. AdSense pays you a variable amount of money for each Google Ad on your site that gets clicked. Registration for AdSense is free. Do not click any ads yourself and do not have friends and family click because if Google finds out, you will be banned from AdSense.
8. Another way to get traffic to your website, is to write blogs and have them published online by different sites as well as your own.
Keep in mind you won’t get rich quick and the rarer a product is, in all likely hood you’ll get more customers because there are many E-Commerce sites selling the same niche product. I can’t think of a better and cheaper method for gaining work experience for a future employer and making money at the same time.
Starting Your Own Blog (This contains some repetition of some previous points already stated)
Section 1. Registering a Domain For Your Blog
The first thing you need to do is Register a Domain Name for Your Blog. I would suggest you only use a .COM domain and try to come up with the shortest simplest name you can come up with, without any dashes or numbers. You’ll find single names have all been taken, so think of a simple phrase or something memorable and you’ll probably find something available after a few hours. I use Godaddys free domain Search and use Godaddy to register. In my case I used GiftsandFreeAdvice.com because I’m offering free advice on my blog and selling gifts in my Gift Store. I would not recommend using a .net, .org, etc., no matter what the name because people tend to forget anything but .com, and if you use .net, chances are people will put a .COM instead and you will be giving another site free traffic and losing yours. Once you find a .Com that you can register for your blog, I’d go ahead and register it on Godaddy which is very cheap. If you don’t want anyone to know you are the owner of the domain which includes unlisting your name,number,address and email address, it will cost you another $10 a year or so for Private Registration, I would suggest doing this to protect your privacy. Basically, the contact info you give them has to match your credit card and financial information. Once you register, make sure you keep a copy of your Godaddy Password #’s in a safe and secure place. You will later need hosting space for your blog site and blogging software which will be coming up in the later chapters. Do not sign with Godaddy Hosting if you want to use the company I recommend for everything including Hosting.
Section 2. Adsense
Adsense by Google is the easiest found money you will ever make in your life and there is no expense to you, if you wish Adsense. If you’re not interested in making side money from Adsense, then simply don’t put it on your blog, its up to you. The little Google ads and occasional larger image ads you see on web pages are Adsense. The way adsense works is you sign up for free for the program and can cancel any time you want and in return Google puts these ads on your Blog/Website. All a person has to do is click an ad on your blog and you will get paid anywhere from 1 cent to $10+ a click. I usually average about 20 cents which ads up if you get 40 clicks a day or so. How much you get paid depends on a variety of things for which you should read adsense rules and policy. Adsense pays you once you reach the $100 mark and then you start again. I’ve made several hundred dollars in a few months which is pretty good for doing no work! Quite simply, the more traffic your blog draws, the more clicks you’ll have and the more money you make. Google is quite strict about the clicks being legit and if they see you violated their program, they may possibly kick you off permanently with no chance for reinstatement, seriously! You need to read their rules and policys a few times for adsense. The main thing is do not click your own ads and don’t have friends or family do it either and do not ask people to click the ads on your blogs, or you will be kicked off Adsense. The best thing to do is just have them on your site and say nothing. Again make sure you read their policy on what they will allow Adsense on. The Blog software I used already had Adsense in the Program and this Software Program is the one
I will be referring to and giving you a contact address for in Section 4. Most other blogs as far as I know, you have to manually paste the Adsense Codes on the pages. The Wordpress Blog program I use doesn’t require it. www.google.com/adsense/login/en_US/ Explains Adsense
Section 3. E-Commerce on Your Blog
I use a program called The Easy Store that’s a part of my Blog or Vice Versa. The Easy Store basically lets you set up a niche store of any or all of Amazon’s products and for any products purchased you make a 4-6% commission as a general rule paid direct from Amazon. For example see, www.GiftsandFreeAdvice.com The Easy Store isn’t free but it will probably cost you if you have them do a logo for you $200. Without a logo probably around $120. The software isn’t complicated and the Software with the Blog software will be installed for free by Zeus Publishing who will go over everything with you and be available for technical help.
Section 4. Getting the Blog (Wordpress) Software and Adsense, E-Commerce and Hosting If You Wish
As mentioned previously, I use Zeus Publishing to do everything for me and I am very happy with everything they’ve done for me. This isn’t meant as an infomercial as its my unsolicited non compensated endorsement of a company I’m very happy with who does excellent,fast, quality reliable work and are pleasant to deal with. Feel free to deal with other companies, I can only tell you what works for me and your welcome to deal with them. If you want a similar Wordpress Blog set up like mine with Adsense installed, an Easy Store as part of the Blog and Hosting, I recommend you contact Zeus. Here is a contact name and number for you: Jim Foley, jimf@zeusdesign.us, Tel: (401) 625-1550
The price in my opinion is quite reasonable and affordable. Or as I said, feel free to go through different companies.
Section 5. Once You Have Your Blog Online
Here are some of the things I’ve learned if you want better traffic. Remember this won’t happen overnight.
1. Always use a picture or illustration on each of your Blogs. I made the mistake of not doing this the first few months and it cost me dearly. Try to use whenever possible something that will catch someones eye in a good way. I invested $30 in software that lets me merge 2 pictures as one master picture which I couldn’t do without in my blog called Picture Merge Genius
2. Always make the Title of your Blog as exciting and eye catching as possible with important key words.
3. Write whenever possible on current, new and exciting things and ideas and people that are on the news and in the publics minds as opposed to things and memories from your life unless it applies to everyone else. I read the news online about 10 times a day for anything interesting. The Internet is your main news source. For instance, I found a photo of Sara Palin pregnant 20 years ago and I put it next to a picture of her supposedly pregnant with Trig and made that into a separate Blog with my opinion of the whole thing, and I got about 15,000 readers. Mind you, I just got lucky but that beats hardly any readers writing about my favorite HDTV Model! It will probably take you a few months to pick this up. Just remember while you and your family may love your personal stories and your philosophy of life, most people could care less.
4. Try to avoid alienating a large group of people if you don’t have to. I wrote many blogs on Sarah Palin that were not favorable and I’m sure I alienated many people from reading my blog again. On the other hand, I also gained my readers. This was something I had no choice in. However I was going to write a Blog about the kinds of people one shouldn’t date if you don’t want hassles but didn’t publish it as I figured it would alienate too many of my women readers who are a valuable audience.
5. Try to be as prolific as possible. When I originally started, I thought I’d write 3-5 blogs a week. Instead I’m writing over 20+ a week, 2-4 daily. I find its best for me to start writing as soon as an idea comes to me. As I said, the beauty of blog writing is the pieces don’t have to be that long. The more prolific you are the chance you’ll get a larger audience and make more money!
6. For your tags as well as Adsense use Google Keywords Tool Make sure you set this show it shows average CPC in descending order and remember there are 2 parts in this column! Under choose columns pick ALL.
7. It you own any other e-commerce sites like me, list them after your blog ends as people might go to these sites.
8. Log on and Register for technorati.com Each time you publish a blog ping it on technorati. Just use the blogs original URL not the individual url of the blogs post you just published.
9. Log on and Register for Digg.com Each time you publish a blog ping it on Digg. Use the blog you just posted URL which you get by going clicking its title on your blogs home page. In this case it would be www.giftsandfreeadvice.com/free_advice/free-guide-to-starting-a-blog-and-making-money-blogging-step-by-step/
10. Log on and Register for Reddit.com Each time you publish a blog ping it on Digg. Use the blog you just posted URL which you get by going clicking its title on your blogs home page. In this case it would www.giftsandfreeadvice.com/free_advice/free-guide-to-starting-a-blog-and-making-money-blogging-step-by-step
12. I also have http://rpc.pingomatic.com in my blog which automatically pings me.
13. Get listed on Feedburner.com
Note there may be duplications in what I said above If you can do better, great.
14. Many Pings I get are spam requests. Be careful who you accept.
15. I do accept comments.
16. Tags serve as Keywords for indexing in Browsers like Google.
17. I would have a short excerpt summary for each blog
18. You can have more than 1 categories for a blog as applicable.
19. If you use the Hosting Package from Zeus (Madfire) you can check any time how many visits to your blog and see which blogs get the best traffic and which get the worst.
20. I would put the following underneath the ending of each blog post:
If you liked this article, please give it a quick review on Digg, Reddit, Stumbleupon, Propeller, or anywhere else.
Important Last Minute Additions I’ve bolded these so you take notice!
1. Make sure there are Meta Tags in your software for the title of your article and they are picking up the title. Unknown to me for a few months, Google was picking up the wrong titles for my blogs because of some kind of error which I’ve since corrected. The easiest way to make sure this is correct iis spot checking every once in a while by putting your blog post URL into the Google Search Bar like this one: www.giftsandfreeadvice.com/free_advice/free-guide-to-starting-a-blog-and-making-money-blogging
-step-by-step-repost/ and seeing that the title matches the description. The reason this blog post is a repost is because the original one didn’t!
2. Make sure Google in fact indexs your Blog. I find that if you use http://blogsearch.google.com/ping manually each time your blog should appear within 30 minutes on Google or at least mine does. Again to check that it does put the URL of the blog post in Googles search bar as shown in #1 above.
Keep this for Reference and the Main Thing to Remember is it Will Probably Take a Few Months till you Start Drawing Real Traffic. As A rule, you can’t buy real traffic online even if you see adds that say you can. In my opinion you’ll be wasting your money with that “traffic” as I doubt any of them will click adsense or buy e-commerce items.
If you liked this article, please give it a quick review on Digg, Reddit, Stumbleupon, Propeller, or anywhere else. This blog features free computer help and tips, TV and movie reviews, sports, health advice, employment help, gas saving advice, money saving tips, dating advice, e-commerce ideas and more. Gifts and Free Advice Blog Homepage
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