I spent many hard earned dollars trying to find a way to earn extra income in a home based business. I bought or invested in many at home possibilities and on-line opportunities. None of them panned out in the least. Maybe I am not a good, independent, home based business person, or a good salesperson. Or maybe my focus was on the wrong thing – - making money. Perhaps I had bad karma.I don’t know what the reason was, but home based business success eluded me. So I decided I needed to make a philosophical change. Instead of focusing on what my business could do for me, I made a shift to what can my business do for everybody else? Instead of helping just ourselves, let’s help others.Network marketing your home based business is all about connecting. In a broad overview, it means telling people you know, your network of friends, relatives and associates, about a product or service you’re trying to sell. And you should try to steadily grow your network of associates and friends as much as possible to expand your potential client base. The really big, successful, home network marketers have a huge network that they always manage to keep growing. Interestingly, they seem to focus it around other network marketers.Well, my idea is a little different. What happens if you don’t want the focus of your network to be other network marketers? Well, not unless they want to help other people who need support. Where there is big need, there are people who want to help – - and usually, lots of people. To me, that means there is a network of friends, family, co-workers or concerned, community people who want to make a difference. What a wonderful group of people! What a network! Wouldn’t it be great to to have those type of people in your home based business network and in your downstream?Our local Women’s Center, which also included the Rape Crisis Center, was always hurting for funds. Every year it was a fight to have enough to stay afloat, much less expand any services. I know there were plenty of supportive people within the community, but their contributions were like one time deals. With the MLM opportunities out there now, these local supporters could grow a strong network of residual income for their special organizations. Their help would continue for year after year and continue to grow. Do you know of any organizations that wouldn’t like that? They would not only have more revenue to keep operating, but would also be able to expand their programs. How cool is that?As for individuals, like wounded veterans or police-people or fire-people, the same would be true. These people’s family, friends, supporters could finally have a substantial, residual building way to help these local heros. There would be a realistic way to try and pay back their sacrifices for us. How? If there are easy, low cost, home based opportunities that use MLM to do the lion’s share of the work, then what a deal. Why not utilize those home based businesses in a new way? Let’s spread the success around and help our communities and heros at the same time.Change your karma. Generate new success in your home based business. Share the dream!
Boomer Entrepreneurs: The Single Most Critical Ingredient to Start a Successful Home-Based Business
Baby boomers starting a home-based business for the first time need to make sure they’re doing it for the right reasons. Just being fed up with your current situation is probably not enough to keep you motivated. Many boomers start a home business because they hate their job, and end up failing because there’s a single most critical ingredient missing that keeps them inspired.That essential missing ingredient is passion. Your enthusiasm, zeal and excitement for your business are what will keep you on the right track, on the good days and, most importantly, on the not so good days.It’s tough, and almost impossible to keep your own home-based business going if you’re not committed to working hard, and wanting to make your new venture a success. Believe it or not, you’re a far tougher taskmaster on yourself. You work harder, and longer hours than you would ever agree to in a traditional job. It’s your love, and complete dedication for whatever you decide to do, that forms a coat of armor around you to protect, and keep you going through thick and thin.For this reason, you need to spend time researching the ideal home business that inspires you. There are a myriad moneymaking opportunities on the Internet for exciting online marketing businesses. Nevertheless, before you take the plunge to become a boomer entrepreneur you want to find a home business opportunity that fits your needs, your interest, and your passion.Be careful not to be sucked into tantalizing promises to make a six-figure income overnight. These ‘get rich’ schemes are much like the lottery, which means that your chances of winning are one in several million. Being on a losing streak before you even get started, will not get on your way to a successful new home business. True moneymaking business opportunities take time to build.There are three further ingredients that you need to thrive in your new endeavor.1. Embrace your waresYou need to fully understand and embrace the products or services you are selling. You need to understand the features and benefits so that you can easily explain them to your prospects.2. Find a nicheYou need to research and decide on a niche market to focus your efforts. Your products or services may well appeal to a vast majority of people, however, it’s far easier to target a specific group to get started. Realize that you can’t sell to the world at one time, even on the Internet.3. Uncover concernsOnce you’ve established a niche market to target, you need to do your research to uncover their concerns and challenges. Armed with this information, you can design the best marketing tools to use to connect to this group. Perhaps the new marketing tools, namely, social media platforms, are the best way to go. Alternatively, you may decide that more traditional marketing is best. Whatever you decide based on your research, be creative.Consistency is key to your success. You must continually take planned actions to improve your business. Like baking a cake, you need the right ingredients and a certain method to make sure that it comes out the way it should every time.In your home-based business, when you follow the right recipe, you have a greater chance of success.It all starts with your passion. This is the single most critical ingredient. Without it, you are likely to burn out and fail. However, a deep love for what you do will guide you. And like magic, your business will flourish, and that six-figure income is well be within your reach.
Advertising For Charities
Do Charities Need To Advertise?
Advertising for charities is a sensitive area, as the advertising is funded by the money that is donated to the cause. Donors get frustrated knowing that the money is not going to the cause, but going to private advertising companies. However, without advertising exposure, the charity would not get the donations and would not be able to function, so advertising is necessary to any charity.
Another reason is that there is a high competition in the charity industry, with over 200,000 registered charities in the UK, they are all competing (during a difficult economic environment) for donations.
Who Do Charities Target?
Most charities are happy to accept donations from any walk of life, whether this be from philanthropists, businesses, passersby in the street, schools, lottery contributions etc.
Depending on the kind of charity, some will specifically target certain kinds of donors (niche charities) whereas the more commercial ‘brand’ charities (such as RSPB or Oxfam) do not target their marketing.
Kinds Of Advertising Available To Charities
Depending on funds, different charities will use different types of marketing in order to boost their exposure and cause (to encourage donations).
TV advertising is popular (certainly around the Christmas period) for some of the larger charities (as it is quite expensive) to create a broad exposure of their cause and goal.
Internet advertising is popular with all charities both large and small most charities these days have websites and make use of paid advertising on search engines (either targeting niche search terms of broad ones).
Sponsorship advertising is becoming more popular with charities (sponsoring the London Marathon for example as McMillan did in 2010) as it creates great exposure and normally there are reduced fees.
Getting Returns On Advertising
It is essential for charities to see a return on their investment for advertising (not just the cost of the fees to marketing agencies, but material costs, staff costs etc.) in order to justify the allocation of donations. Charities do benefit from ‘gift aid’ which allows them to reclaim the tax that would be paid to HMRC; however even with this they do need to see returns and fruit from their advertising campaigns.
The problem is that advertising is very much based on how people respond to the advert (whether it is TV, radio, sponsorship etc.) and this is impossible to control and hard to speculate. As the UK is facing a difficult economic situation, advertising for charities is difficult and is a source of controversy.
Suggestions For Charities
Charities play an important roll in our society and do need our support. Every family in the UK can afford to donate a pound to a local charity, this would mean that all charities would receive over £66 million a year just from one pound donated. However getting this message across is the struggle each charity faces.
By charities talking to local councils, they should be able to get additional support regards local marketing.
Most advertising companies are happy to help local charities by offering reduced advertising prices or contradeals; however it is worth shopping around to find an advertising agency that has experience in doing marketing for charities (as the marketing should be more focused and productive) to ensure the advertising is effective.