Online Business Ideas – Drop Shipping

If you are like a lot of people in today’s economy, you are looking for ways to make extra money and are looking at the internet to help you with that. You know there’s got to be ways to make money because others are doing it, but you don’t know where to start.

Research shows that more people are turning to the internet for product research, product and store comparisons, and purchasing the item they want. Even though, for now at least, fuel prices are coming down, people still tend to use the convenience of the internet for their shopping.

Opening a store, even an online store, typically requires inventory, but most of us don’t have the capital to put up a large inventory. Face it, the reason we are wanting to open a store is to make some money. To help people in this position, companies are offering drop shipping services to entrepreneurs.

Basically, it works like this. You create your on-line store showing the products you want to sell. You can either create your own website and domain name, or for a small fee, the supplier will usually offer this service for you. You will have a professional-looking website for a nominal price. Your customer purchases from you and your order the product from your supplier to be shipped directly to your customer. It costs a little to get started, but nothing like purchasing and holding inventory.

As your store profits more, you can make the decision to stock your big sellers for faster turnaround. You can also open a kiosk at the mall with your inventory, or sell in flea markets.

For information on drop ship selling, please see the Home Online Business Guide.

Great Tips on Saving Money

If you are fortunate enough to know anyone who grew up in the Depression era, talk to them. You will find that they really know how to save money. They probably had no choice at the time, but most have carried that with them through the good times that followed.

The biggest obstacle we need to overcome in saving money is ourselves. Most of us have grown up in a disposable society. We have disposable razors, disposable contact lenses, disposable this and that. We use it and throw it away because it is usually cheaper, not to mention much easier, to just get a new one. Well, in today’s economic climate, we may need to take some advice from our Depression-era mentors.

Eat at home: Eating out can cost the average family of 4 anywhere from $30 – $50 in moderately-priced restaurants. If this is done every night, you can easily spend $1000-$1500 per month on supper alone. Plus, you still have to spend money for breakfast and lunch, and other groceries. By preparing meals from scratch (avoid higher-priced convenience meals), you can easily feed a family of 4 on about $600-$700 per month and even less. So, get out those recipe books.

Eat Healthy Portions: Most of us eat way more than we should. By controlling the size of portions, you not only save money on food, but you also will notice beneficial health changes as well.

Freeze Leftovers: Purchase a food vacuum-sealer and portion out leftover entrees. You can then freeze the main entrees (and anything else that freezes well) to use when time is short. A few minutes in the microwave, add some canned veggies and voila! You have a full meal without extra cost.

Do things yourself: Most home improvements can be done inexpensively by doing it yourself since labor costs are a significant part of any projects. Large home improvement stores usually have free weekend classes on home improvement. Also, visit the library to check out home improvement books.

Look for bargains: You don’t need to go to a salon and pay a high price for a haircut. Look for a local beauty college. You can save a bundle and help student beauticians at the same time. Look on the internet for coupons and freebie deals. Shop at thrift stores for clothing. Most clothes are in excellent condition for a fraction of the new price.

Family Night In: Plan a night to stay at home and play games as a family, or rent a movie, pop some popcorn and have a movie night. This is much less expensive and much more fun than going to the theater. Most new movies are showing up pretty quickly on DVD, so you can still remain current. Check out mail-order rentals like NetFlix and Blockbuster. You pay one price for unlimited rentals per month.

Consider Work at Home Opportunities: There are several legitimate home business opportunities, but be careful of scams. Something for nothing is quite tempting, but it very rarely works out. If you are willing to put some work into it, you will be successful.

Take the money you save and put some into a savings account, use some to pay down your mortgage, and remember use some of it to have fun. Everyone needs balance in their lives.

How To Make Money in your Pajamas

More and more people are going online for more of their shopping. It is more convenient and, with fuel prices still high, they can actually save money. This is good news for online businesses. According to some recent findings, online businesses are forecasted to remain stable, or even increase even with the stock market on its roller-coaster ride. As more of us look to make some extra money during this time, we are looking for something legitimate to help us work from home.

The easiest thing to do is to sell what is already on hand. Most of us have things that we really don’t need or use and they are just sitting around collecting dust. You can sell those things on eBay or other auction site and it costs very little to list it. You don’t need an internet site to do this, just an eBay account (or an account with another auction site). My wife easily made over $500.00 just selling clothes she doesn’t wear any more.

If you do have a website or a blog, or are ready to start one, you can take part in affiliate marketing. This is very easy to set up, but don’t expect instant success. Basically, there are a lot of businesses on the internet that sell a product. To help them sell their products, they will join with people who have websites to become affiliates. You put an advertisement on your site with a special link back to the business. This link has information in it that identifies the visitor as coming from your site. If they purchase, you get a commission, some as high as 75%. The trick is that part of the advertising burden is now on you. You will need to drive traffic to YOUR site in order for people to see the ads.

If you create a website or a blog for affiliate marketing, you need to ensure that the content is not static, that is that it changes frequently. You also need to make sure that it contains information that is interesting and timely so that people will want to view it.

If you want to actually sell something without having to keep inventory, there are several companies that will host a storefront for you, for a setup fee and a monthly fee. You are still responsible for marketing your site and driving traffic to your store so you can sell their products and earn a commission.

Marketing is what it’s all about whether you go with affiliate marketing or your own store. This takes a lot of tenacity, but you can make it work. If it works for others, it can definitely work for you. Once your site is established and attracting visitors and making some money, you can enjoy a small break, but you will to spend some time every week maintaining your blog or site. Money can still be made on the internet, so why not you?

For some internet business ideas, please see Make Money Online Reviews and Home Business Guide.