Editor’s note: This is a guest post by HubPages CEO Paul Edmondson on how Hubpages succeeded in amassing visitors.
After the recent TechCrunch post about HubPages, we received several questions about how HubPages got to 39 million unique visitors per month. Here’s how we did it:
Four years ago, during our launch in August 2006, we wanted to do three main things to create a successful social content community: first, we wanted to make it easy for authors to create a one-page topical website; second, we wanted to drive traffic to the author’s content; and third, we wanted to share the majority of the revenue back with the author.
We had planned for natural search to be a major source of traffic, but it wasn’t until November of 2006 that we started to get measurable traffic from search engines. To this day, we continue to refine our platform to help authors on HubPages to have the best opportunity to show up in the natural search results. One of the key metrics we learned was about the longevity of content. Content created on HubPages peaks in traffic on average nearly three years after it’s created. This knowledge helped our business become more predictable. For the author, creating a HubPages article is like putting a little bit of money in the bank that is going to increase its value over the next three years and then continue at that level for the foreseeable future. The large quantity of content that was created early in the life of HubPages dramatically increased in revenue over 3 years, and allowed us to continue to grow the company.
We became a metrics focused company. The two key drivers of our business are Hub production and revenue per thousand Hub views. Based on these drivers, we developed a model that allowed us to do sophisticated micro-marketing including search engine marketing to attract writers. Through analysis of Hubs created by new authors, our models are able to predict a close estimate of the traffic and revenue that a new author will generate over various time intervals. This prediction model has been significant in our growth.
In the early days, we decided we didn’t want to be the arbiter of quality or try to control what people wrote, but we soon discovered that high-quality authors and advertisers did not feel comfortable with the fully open publishing platform that included adult content. So, in July of 2007, about a year after our launch, we modified our terms of service and took leading steps in the social content category to become a porn-free site. The short-term impact was over a 30% drop in traffic, but it reaped long term gains. We also continued to build anti-spam technologies and put in place requirements for publishing on HubPages that improves the overall quality.
Then we wanted to give insight to authors about the type of content we saw working well on HubPages so that they could earn more. We started hosting contests about writing on evergreen topics. We started incorporating analytics into each page of the site that showed authors their traffic sources.
We continue to invest in specialty tools that teach authors what pages to link to with the Interlinking Tool and how to refine the titles of their Hubs with the Title Tuner Beta. By taking the data we collected, and putting it inline with the tools, authors became more successful on our platform.
HubPages is a set of technologies, but we really are about authors. We took pro-writer stances by letting the author choose what they wanted to write on, and giving them ownership of their content, so that the revenue they earn can increase over time. As the author community grew, we built features that fostered communication – like the ability to follow and compliment other authors. As a result, HubPages’ reputation as a writing community continues to grow.
Now, going on our fifth year of business and with nearly 140% growth in the last 12 months in terms of visitors, I can see the site growing well into the future based on our three original tenets of making it easy to create content, driving traffic and sharing the revenue.
When profits are down business owners tend to dwell on formulating the next big idea, a new marketing strategy, and, of course, on what they are doing wrong. But there are other areas that many people don’t think of exploring - or avoid all together. These are the emotional blocks to money, success and happiness.
Money, or the lack of, stimulates fear. Survival instincts are threatened and negative emotions that may have been stored deep inside will often surface, only to aggravate the situation and lessen the ability to succeed.
Let’s take a look at three areas that you can explore to free yourself of the emotional barriers that will keep you from the success and profits that you deserve.
Forgiveness – If you are an entrepreneur then you have most likely suffered your share of financial trauma. After all, entrepreneurs are risk takers and money is one of the first things we put at risk when we have an idea that we belief in. Money loss is a trauma that we tend to minimize because it’s “just money”. But financial security is an important value to nearly everyone because it dictates our ability to survive in this world. For men, who our ancestors labeled as the providers, financial security is often a very important core value. Therefore, losing money can affect them to the core and the guilt, shame and worry may remain embedded within them for a very long time.
It’s time to forgive yourself. Plain and simple; being an entrepreneur isn’t always a choice – it’s who you are. Taking risk is a part of the learning and the experience that takes you toward success. If that means that you “fail” from time to time, so be it. Releasing this emotion and pain is critical to your future success. Guilt and shame create a heavy burden, how can you let it go?
Consider some less conventional techniques like hypnosis or the emotional freedom techniques. Sometimes talking about it and rationalizing it isn’t enough. Take another risk and find a new way to let go so that you can let success into your life.
Feeling – If you can’t feel wealth, you won’t attract wealth. How much do you believe that you were born to achieve success? Can you close your eyes and feel, smell – truly experience wealth? This is something to practice on a daily basis. The more you believe it and experience it, the more your behavior and thinking will shift to allow for wealth. Begin with only 30-60 seconds of imagining your life of success. Create a snapshot of your successful future and practice stepping into the feeling of it. You might notice a swelling of the heart, the sensation of excitement and expectation, or a sense of overall peace. Hold this positive feeling in place and get used to it. Increase the time of your visualization as you become more adept at it. Before long you will begin to notice opportunities coming into your life or things may just begin falling into place for you. It’s a simple attitude adjustment that will make a difference.
Fearlessness – Fear has a paralyzing effect on our creativity and ability to act. If you are living in fear you are less likely to have a clear picture of your next action steps. You may find that procrastination and overwhelm are your daily companions and at the end of the day it seems nothing notable has been achieved. Sound familiar? It’s time to let go of the fear and step into your fearless state. I’m not suggesting that you become reckless, but that you find creative ways to rectify your situation and act from a collected, rational, and confident place.
If money is an issue you’ve probably run circles in your mind trying to think of solutions but haven’t acted on any of them. Is it time for a part time job? This doesn’t mean you are quitting your dream, just allowing it to become a bit more accessible. Do you have another skill that you can put to work while you build your business? Can you market to past customers to create a boost in sales? Think outside of the box and act on your solution.
Do you have a fear of success or failure? If you perceive that there are any negative consequences to success it's time to explore this limiting belief. Again, try something that may be considered “unconventional” to explore if these fears exist so that you can let them go. Ask someone who you see as successful what they’ve done to combat their fears – believe me, they’ve had them too! And try stepping out of the box to experience a different type of risk and reignite your energy. Is there something adventurous that you’ve always wanted to try but never have? What will “shake it up” a bit to unearth your courage and commitment to moving forward? How can you break the pattern and step into your fearless state?
These may sound like simple steps, but this type of change is a tall order. Surround yourself with support as you make create change; a coach, mentor and mastermind group are all a tremendous source of support and fresh ideas.
Have you found your way to a “Million Dollar Mindset?” Share your experience and tips with us here!
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seiger Editor’s note: This is a guest post by HubPages CEO Paul Edmondson on how Hubpages succeeded in amassing visitors.
After the recent TechCrunch post about HubPages, we received several questions about how HubPages got to 39 million unique visitors per month. Here’s how we did it:
Four years ago, during our launch in August 2006, we wanted to do three main things to create a successful social content community: first, we wanted to make it easy for authors to create a one-page topical website; second, we wanted to drive traffic to the author’s content; and third, we wanted to share the majority of the revenue back with the author.
We had planned for natural search to be a major source of traffic, but it wasn’t until November of 2006 that we started to get measurable traffic from search engines. To this day, we continue to refine our platform to help authors on HubPages to have the best opportunity to show up in the natural search results. One of the key metrics we learned was about the longevity of content. Content created on HubPages peaks in traffic on average nearly three years after it’s created. This knowledge helped our business become more predictable. For the author, creating a HubPages article is like putting a little bit of money in the bank that is going to increase its value over the next three years and then continue at that level for the foreseeable future. The large quantity of content that was created early in the life of HubPages dramatically increased in revenue over 3 years, and allowed us to continue to grow the company.
We became a metrics focused company. The two key drivers of our business are Hub production and revenue per thousand Hub views. Based on these drivers, we developed a model that allowed us to do sophisticated micro-marketing including search engine marketing to attract writers. Through analysis of Hubs created by new authors, our models are able to predict a close estimate of the traffic and revenue that a new author will generate over various time intervals. This prediction model has been significant in our growth.
In the early days, we decided we didn’t want to be the arbiter of quality or try to control what people wrote, but we soon discovered that high-quality authors and advertisers did not feel comfortable with the fully open publishing platform that included adult content. So, in July of 2007, about a year after our launch, we modified our terms of service and took leading steps in the social content category to become a porn-free site. The short-term impact was over a 30% drop in traffic, but it reaped long term gains. We also continued to build anti-spam technologies and put in place requirements for publishing on HubPages that improves the overall quality.
Then we wanted to give insight to authors about the type of content we saw working well on HubPages so that they could earn more. We started hosting contests about writing on evergreen topics. We started incorporating analytics into each page of the site that showed authors their traffic sources.
We continue to invest in specialty tools that teach authors what pages to link to with the Interlinking Tool and how to refine the titles of their Hubs with the Title Tuner Beta. By taking the data we collected, and putting it inline with the tools, authors became more successful on our platform.
HubPages is a set of technologies, but we really are about authors. We took pro-writer stances by letting the author choose what they wanted to write on, and giving them ownership of their content, so that the revenue they earn can increase over time. As the author community grew, we built features that fostered communication – like the ability to follow and compliment other authors. As a result, HubPages’ reputation as a writing community continues to grow.
Now, going on our fifth year of business and with nearly 140% growth in the last 12 months in terms of visitors, I can see the site growing well into the future based on our three original tenets of making it easy to create content, driving traffic and sharing the revenue.
When profits are down business owners tend to dwell on formulating the next big idea, a new marketing strategy, and, of course, on what they are doing wrong. But there are other areas that many people don’t think of exploring - or avoid all together. These are the emotional blocks to money, success and happiness.
Money, or the lack of, stimulates fear. Survival instincts are threatened and negative emotions that may have been stored deep inside will often surface, only to aggravate the situation and lessen the ability to succeed.
Let’s take a look at three areas that you can explore to free yourself of the emotional barriers that will keep you from the success and profits that you deserve.
Forgiveness – If you are an entrepreneur then you have most likely suffered your share of financial trauma. After all, entrepreneurs are risk takers and money is one of the first things we put at risk when we have an idea that we belief in. Money loss is a trauma that we tend to minimize because it’s “just money”. But financial security is an important value to nearly everyone because it dictates our ability to survive in this world. For men, who our ancestors labeled as the providers, financial security is often a very important core value. Therefore, losing money can affect them to the core and the guilt, shame and worry may remain embedded within them for a very long time.
It’s time to forgive yourself. Plain and simple; being an entrepreneur isn’t always a choice – it’s who you are. Taking risk is a part of the learning and the experience that takes you toward success. If that means that you “fail” from time to time, so be it. Releasing this emotion and pain is critical to your future success. Guilt and shame create a heavy burden, how can you let it go?
Consider some less conventional techniques like hypnosis or the emotional freedom techniques. Sometimes talking about it and rationalizing it isn’t enough. Take another risk and find a new way to let go so that you can let success into your life.
Feeling – If you can’t feel wealth, you won’t attract wealth. How much do you believe that you were born to achieve success? Can you close your eyes and feel, smell – truly experience wealth? This is something to practice on a daily basis. The more you believe it and experience it, the more your behavior and thinking will shift to allow for wealth. Begin with only 30-60 seconds of imagining your life of success. Create a snapshot of your successful future and practice stepping into the feeling of it. You might notice a swelling of the heart, the sensation of excitement and expectation, or a sense of overall peace. Hold this positive feeling in place and get used to it. Increase the time of your visualization as you become more adept at it. Before long you will begin to notice opportunities coming into your life or things may just begin falling into place for you. It’s a simple attitude adjustment that will make a difference.
Fearlessness – Fear has a paralyzing effect on our creativity and ability to act. If you are living in fear you are less likely to have a clear picture of your next action steps. You may find that procrastination and overwhelm are your daily companions and at the end of the day it seems nothing notable has been achieved. Sound familiar? It’s time to let go of the fear and step into your fearless state. I’m not suggesting that you become reckless, but that you find creative ways to rectify your situation and act from a collected, rational, and confident place.
If money is an issue you’ve probably run circles in your mind trying to think of solutions but haven’t acted on any of them. Is it time for a part time job? This doesn’t mean you are quitting your dream, just allowing it to become a bit more accessible. Do you have another skill that you can put to work while you build your business? Can you market to past customers to create a boost in sales? Think outside of the box and act on your solution.
Do you have a fear of success or failure? If you perceive that there are any negative consequences to success it's time to explore this limiting belief. Again, try something that may be considered “unconventional” to explore if these fears exist so that you can let them go. Ask someone who you see as successful what they’ve done to combat their fears – believe me, they’ve had them too! And try stepping out of the box to experience a different type of risk and reignite your energy. Is there something adventurous that you’ve always wanted to try but never have? What will “shake it up” a bit to unearth your courage and commitment to moving forward? How can you break the pattern and step into your fearless state?
These may sound like simple steps, but this type of change is a tall order. Surround yourself with support as you make create change; a coach, mentor and mastermind group are all a tremendous source of support and fresh ideas.
Have you found your way to a “Million Dollar Mindset?” Share your experience and tips with us here!
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seigereric seiger
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seiger Editor’s note: This is a guest post by HubPages CEO Paul Edmondson on how Hubpages succeeded in amassing visitors.
After the recent TechCrunch post about HubPages, we received several questions about how HubPages got to 39 million unique visitors per month. Here’s how we did it:
Four years ago, during our launch in August 2006, we wanted to do three main things to create a successful social content community: first, we wanted to make it easy for authors to create a one-page topical website; second, we wanted to drive traffic to the author’s content; and third, we wanted to share the majority of the revenue back with the author.
We had planned for natural search to be a major source of traffic, but it wasn’t until November of 2006 that we started to get measurable traffic from search engines. To this day, we continue to refine our platform to help authors on HubPages to have the best opportunity to show up in the natural search results. One of the key metrics we learned was about the longevity of content. Content created on HubPages peaks in traffic on average nearly three years after it’s created. This knowledge helped our business become more predictable. For the author, creating a HubPages article is like putting a little bit of money in the bank that is going to increase its value over the next three years and then continue at that level for the foreseeable future. The large quantity of content that was created early in the life of HubPages dramatically increased in revenue over 3 years, and allowed us to continue to grow the company.
We became a metrics focused company. The two key drivers of our business are Hub production and revenue per thousand Hub views. Based on these drivers, we developed a model that allowed us to do sophisticated micro-marketing including search engine marketing to attract writers. Through analysis of Hubs created by new authors, our models are able to predict a close estimate of the traffic and revenue that a new author will generate over various time intervals. This prediction model has been significant in our growth.
In the early days, we decided we didn’t want to be the arbiter of quality or try to control what people wrote, but we soon discovered that high-quality authors and advertisers did not feel comfortable with the fully open publishing platform that included adult content. So, in July of 2007, about a year after our launch, we modified our terms of service and took leading steps in the social content category to become a porn-free site. The short-term impact was over a 30% drop in traffic, but it reaped long term gains. We also continued to build anti-spam technologies and put in place requirements for publishing on HubPages that improves the overall quality.
Then we wanted to give insight to authors about the type of content we saw working well on HubPages so that they could earn more. We started hosting contests about writing on evergreen topics. We started incorporating analytics into each page of the site that showed authors their traffic sources.
We continue to invest in specialty tools that teach authors what pages to link to with the Interlinking Tool and how to refine the titles of their Hubs with the Title Tuner Beta. By taking the data we collected, and putting it inline with the tools, authors became more successful on our platform.
HubPages is a set of technologies, but we really are about authors. We took pro-writer stances by letting the author choose what they wanted to write on, and giving them ownership of their content, so that the revenue they earn can increase over time. As the author community grew, we built features that fostered communication – like the ability to follow and compliment other authors. As a result, HubPages’ reputation as a writing community continues to grow.
Now, going on our fifth year of business and with nearly 140% growth in the last 12 months in terms of visitors, I can see the site growing well into the future based on our three original tenets of making it easy to create content, driving traffic and sharing the revenue.
When profits are down business owners tend to dwell on formulating the next big idea, a new marketing strategy, and, of course, on what they are doing wrong. But there are other areas that many people don’t think of exploring - or avoid all together. These are the emotional blocks to money, success and happiness.
Money, or the lack of, stimulates fear. Survival instincts are threatened and negative emotions that may have been stored deep inside will often surface, only to aggravate the situation and lessen the ability to succeed.
Let’s take a look at three areas that you can explore to free yourself of the emotional barriers that will keep you from the success and profits that you deserve.
Forgiveness – If you are an entrepreneur then you have most likely suffered your share of financial trauma. After all, entrepreneurs are risk takers and money is one of the first things we put at risk when we have an idea that we belief in. Money loss is a trauma that we tend to minimize because it’s “just money”. But financial security is an important value to nearly everyone because it dictates our ability to survive in this world. For men, who our ancestors labeled as the providers, financial security is often a very important core value. Therefore, losing money can affect them to the core and the guilt, shame and worry may remain embedded within them for a very long time.
It’s time to forgive yourself. Plain and simple; being an entrepreneur isn’t always a choice – it’s who you are. Taking risk is a part of the learning and the experience that takes you toward success. If that means that you “fail” from time to time, so be it. Releasing this emotion and pain is critical to your future success. Guilt and shame create a heavy burden, how can you let it go?
Consider some less conventional techniques like hypnosis or the emotional freedom techniques. Sometimes talking about it and rationalizing it isn’t enough. Take another risk and find a new way to let go so that you can let success into your life.
Feeling – If you can’t feel wealth, you won’t attract wealth. How much do you believe that you were born to achieve success? Can you close your eyes and feel, smell – truly experience wealth? This is something to practice on a daily basis. The more you believe it and experience it, the more your behavior and thinking will shift to allow for wealth. Begin with only 30-60 seconds of imagining your life of success. Create a snapshot of your successful future and practice stepping into the feeling of it. You might notice a swelling of the heart, the sensation of excitement and expectation, or a sense of overall peace. Hold this positive feeling in place and get used to it. Increase the time of your visualization as you become more adept at it. Before long you will begin to notice opportunities coming into your life or things may just begin falling into place for you. It’s a simple attitude adjustment that will make a difference.
Fearlessness – Fear has a paralyzing effect on our creativity and ability to act. If you are living in fear you are less likely to have a clear picture of your next action steps. You may find that procrastination and overwhelm are your daily companions and at the end of the day it seems nothing notable has been achieved. Sound familiar? It’s time to let go of the fear and step into your fearless state. I’m not suggesting that you become reckless, but that you find creative ways to rectify your situation and act from a collected, rational, and confident place.
If money is an issue you’ve probably run circles in your mind trying to think of solutions but haven’t acted on any of them. Is it time for a part time job? This doesn’t mean you are quitting your dream, just allowing it to become a bit more accessible. Do you have another skill that you can put to work while you build your business? Can you market to past customers to create a boost in sales? Think outside of the box and act on your solution.
Do you have a fear of success or failure? If you perceive that there are any negative consequences to success it's time to explore this limiting belief. Again, try something that may be considered “unconventional” to explore if these fears exist so that you can let them go. Ask someone who you see as successful what they’ve done to combat their fears – believe me, they’ve had them too! And try stepping out of the box to experience a different type of risk and reignite your energy. Is there something adventurous that you’ve always wanted to try but never have? What will “shake it up” a bit to unearth your courage and commitment to moving forward? How can you break the pattern and step into your fearless state?
These may sound like simple steps, but this type of change is a tall order. Surround yourself with support as you make create change; a coach, mentor and mastermind group are all a tremendous source of support and fresh ideas.
Have you found your way to a “Million Dollar Mindset?” Share your experience and tips with us here!
eric seiger
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seiger
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seiger eric seiger eric seiger
eric seiger eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
big seminar 14 So many people have the dream of making money working from home. The reasons vary. For some it is more of a necessity while for others it's more of a want.
A former housewife may find herself a newly single Mother and the job she landed in a hurry barely covers the rent and utilities. A second income is must to survive and will determine whether she and the kids have to move in and crowd in a room with her Mother or whether they can stay in their own place.
Other people simply hate a boring routine of going into work everyday and working to make someone else rich. They don't need to work from home but they have a need deep inside themselves to do their own thing and be their own boss and not be stuck in a boring routine everyday.
Some people may find themselves laid off from good jobs in our uncertain economy, some people want to save up for that vacation or new car, some have a big pile of debt to pay off, some working Mother's want to stay home with their kids but can't afford to not have an income and the list goes on and on.
The problem most every one faces who wants to start working from home is how to start? The truth is, it is overwhelming. It will usually take a lot of searching to find out what is right for you.
The most common trap people face when starting is falling for scams and hype. The hype is everywhere. Do an internet search on make money from home and there's no shortage of websites and hype to tell you exactly what to do. There are infomercials all over TV. If John Doe can make thousands of dollars working a few days a month why can't you?
There are all sorts of programs that promise easy and quick money if you just sign up for their program for a certain amount of money. There are some opportunities which you have no clue what you are supposed to do, but whatever it is, you are sure to make a ton of money. There's no shortage of testimonials of common everyday people who are now living a life of luxury. You get excited and imagine all your money worries are over and you are living in a nice beach house.
The truth is, these so called opportunities full of hype are just people getting rich off of the hopes and dreams millions of people have to work from home. Don't fall for it.
If you really want to make money from home, the first thing to do is realize it will actually take time, work, and investment and don't fall for anything that promises easy money or never, ever sign up for anything where you don't know exactly what you will be doing first.
The hardest part of being your own boss may be deciding what to do. There's so much out there to choose from and it will most likely take a lot of searching to find what is right for you.
What works for one person may not work for another. Several factors determine what will work or not. Two of the most common factors are location and personality. What works in one area doesn't mean it will work in another. The only way to find out if something will work in your area is to try. Some areas may be oversaturated with the business you are interested in and will not do good. Another area will not have this business available and will do well. You may be highly successful with a certain business in one area, but in another, you may do terrible. That's just the way it is. Know when to fold 'em. If you have put your very best effort into a business, if you have advertised and gotten your name out there and promoted yourself like crazy, but you still can't get customers or make a profit, then you either have to move or try something else. It's better just to get out than to keep losing money every month. It will be disappointing, but take it as a learning experience.
Another factor is personality. Different people have different strengths, weaknesses and passions. What works for Tina may not work for Jodie. Some people are outgoing natural sales people while others are shy. Different people have different skills and interests and should use those when looking for a business to start.
Never start something just because it worked for your friend unless you are genuinely interested in it. If you are not interested in doing something, don't do it. Why work a business you hate? You will be happier and make more money if you do something you enjoy.
Don't put everything you have into starting your own business. Some businesses fail. Actually, a lot do unfortunately. Try testing it out before you really go all out and see what the response is and do your research. Figure out your costs. How much will it cost to advertise? How much will supplies and anything else you need cost? Check out your competition.
Some people can get started right away into a business with a little investment and start making money right away. Some people. This is the exception and not the rule. Some people can join a direct sales company for little or no cost, buy a bunch of catalogs, have home parties and pass them out to everyone and start seeing good profits right away.
Whatever you decide to do, it will definitely take work. You can't just pay a fee and start making a large amount of money right away for doing almost nothing no matter what those people on TV say.
After you know what you want to do, it will take time and a lot of work to get your name out there and to get business and start making profits. If you can get a loyal customer base, you can find that working from home can be very profitable and lucrative.
What it will cost to work from home depends on several factors. There are some opportunities you can start for a very nominal fee and others will require quite a large investment.
If you decide to join a direct sales company, where you get paid a percentage of what you sell and also make a percentage off of people you recruit in the business, there are some companies where it is completely free to join. Many however require you buy a starter kit which will contain products and some business supplies. Even if you find a company that is free to join, you still will have to invest money into catalogs, business cards, and advertising.
If you want to offer your own service, your investment will be the products/equipment required as well as the basics of advertising. Some businesses will require that you be licensed and insured. Some businesses to start from scratch are your own craft business, cleaning business, baby newspaper business, pet sitting, computer repair, graphic design, home daycare, sewing/alterations, and tutoring.
An exclusively online business is great for shy people who are uncomfortable selling, but this is a whole different ball park. Profits usually come quicker and easier in the real world than online. If you want an exclusive online business, that will require a lot of research. You will need to spend hours and hours educating yourself to avoid costly mistakes and disappointment.
Don't get me wrong, if you can learn how to do it, that's great. Nothing beats waking up in the morning and finding out you just made money while you were sleeping. But you will need a theme to build a website on that isn't oversaturated, something to make it stand out, and most importantly you have to learn how to get traffic. Without traffic, your website will be worthless. Remember you will have fierce competition so that's why educating yourself is important.
Once you know what you want to do, you will have to either build yourself a website or have it built for you (which is usually expensive). Then you will have to find a host and pay for hosting. And last, you will need to do a lot of marketing to drive traffic and hopefully customers to your site.
Many people who really need money, desperately, look to making money from home. They may invest money they can't afford thinking they will make it back plus a lot of profit, just to find themselves more broke and disappointed. They probably just fell for some hype and wrongly thought it would be quick and easy to make money.
If you are desperate for money, or are looking to make money fast, then it's not a good time to actually start your own business. If you are unemployed then you should spend your time looking for a regular job as disappointing as this sounds, so you can have a steady paycheck, then try working from home on the side. For fast money, there are ways you can still make some money from home.
You can have a yard sale. If you enjoy children, put out ads and flyers offering to watch children in your home. There is always a big demand for childcare. If you have furniture or any bigger items you don't need, sell them. Put out flyers or ads in a local (small) paper offering services you can provide such as house cleaning, pet sitting, ironing, sewing, cooking, painting, or handy man jobs. Ads like these usually work best in small town papers and are cheaper but don't do so well and are more expensive in big city areas.
Or, if you are a good salesperson and know a lot of people, a direct sales business is probably a fast way to make money. Find a company that offers a good percentage, find a company that is free to join or offers a plan where you can get started for free and buy the required kit later. Then buy some catalogs and sell away to everyone you can. This way, your only cost will be the catalogs and you can make a profit on the very first day. This of course is for an outgoing person who is good at selling.
If you have a green thumb, grow flowers, herbs and plants and then sell them. If you are good at crafts, sewing, or knitting, make and sell your crafts. You can do this through newspaper ads, flyers, word of mouth, and online at www.etsy.com.
Online, you can set up a blog for free and put Google Adsense on the blog. Everytime someone clicks on an ad, you get paid. The hard part about this is actually getting traffic to your blog. You can do it, but it does take time and effort.
If you enjoy writing you can also write articles for Associated Content, (like I'm doing now). If you article is accepted, you get paid. What you get depends on what they decide your article is worth.
You can also be a freelance writer. There is a great need for writers with the explosion of websites and people looking for original website content for better search engine rankings. Be prepared for fierce competition however and be prepared to work for low amounts in the beginning until you get established.
Whatever you decide to go with, the truth is there is no secret to getting rich from home. There are two ways to really make an income from home. Good old fashioned hard work and effort or scamming people with a get rich quick scheme. So I am sorry to disappoint anyone who thought they could learn how to start making a thousand dollars a week instantly working only a few hours. But if you have a valid credit card, there are several guys willing to sell you ebooks promising some sort of secret to getting rich easily and quickly.
The moral of the story is, it takes time, effort and hard work to make a decent income from home. It's not easy and it doesn't happen overnight regardless of the hype that's out there. If you aren't willing to work hard at it, it probably won't happen. You need to have determination to make it work and you have to keep at it. You reap what you sow and if you put the time and work into it, you will be rewarded once it pays off.
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seigerThe mathematics of the monthly payroll report don't always make sense, since it's actually two reports: the household report, covering employment and unemployment status, and the establishment report, showing the number of people being ...
Fox News was the top cable network during prime time on Wednesday night, the day after the midterm election, ahead of USA Network's highly-rated NCIS re-runs. Bill O'Reilly had the most-watched show on all of cable, while Sean Hannity ...
Most of the big media companies have big stakes in digital games, except News Corp. But Rupert Murdoch's company is trying to catch up--without spending a lot of money.
eric seiger
