Business Plan Update

What, no catchy title? Sorry!

With the amount of time that I spent on my business plan, you would think I would be pleased with the end result. Well, sort of. I did a lot of research and I found plenty of data that allowed me to complete a bare-bones plan. Getting the meat on it is the tough part.

In all that I have read, a mistake would be to complete the business plan and consider it set in stone (er, digital ink?) and forget that the business plan is a living document.

This is especially the case when writing a business plan that involves multiple streams of revenue as I detailed in my last post. Writing for content and selling things on eBay are two very different "products" so the transition between the two can be jarring at times. Nevertheless, I am excited with the prospects and feel closer to success already.

On another note, I am always tempted to click on the Google Ads that line the page, but I think it is taboo to do so. When I read my contract it said that I couldn't ask my readers to click onthe ads and I couldn't click on them repeatedly. I'll have to go back and look at the terms and see if an occasional click is okay.

I'll have another update later!

Plans, Plans, Everywhere there's Plans!

First of all, I have to thank Marsha Collier for personally commenting on my blog entry regarding eBay dropshipping. It was quite a surprise to see a comment, let alone a comment from the author of the book I mentioned. I'm glad I liked the book and said positive things about it!

Since this blog is about my attempts to work from home, it's time I addressed my current situation. I have spent a month researching and analyzing opportunities and the time has come to modify the original business plan I developed at about the same time. Originally I was just going to set up an eBay business. That is still my primary goal, and I will be selling consignment items to begin with as I build up some capital so I can start buying items to re-sell on eBay.

Since then, I have decided to focus on several venture as a means for raising capital and utilizing my strengths. This is called Multiple Streams of Revenue by many of the "Get-Rich-Quick" crowd I mentioned in my first couple of posts. I will discuss each of these "streams" in the next few posts, but most involve writing and hopefully getting paid for it.

I revisited my Business Plan and found some good resources to help me with this. Marsha's book was great for setting up a business as far as what you need to do legally so Uncle Sam doesn't come knocking. Another book I read, Making a Living from Your eBay Business by Michael Miller, has a great chapter on writing a Business Plan, which might come in handy if you are looking for outside people to throw money your way. I used this in conjunction with a website called MyOwnBusiness.org which had a great template for writing the plan (although I had some formatting issues and ended up using a template from Microsoft Office Online, but the site was still informative.

I'll be back tomorrow with additional updates and links to some of my other ventures. Thanks to anyone reading and let me know if you want me to review or comment on anything specific.

Survey says...

As a kid I always wanted to be asked survey questions for Family Feud. So filling out online surveys is kind of like fulfilling a lifelong dream, right?

Okay, Surveys seem interesting. I first signed up for NPDOR a year and a half ago. After about 6 or 7 surveys I got an email saying I won $100. Cool. I actually got a check. I was busy with other jobs then, so I didn't continue doing that many surveys and never really researched the seemingly infinite amount of survey companies out there. But that changed with my recent attempts to work from home.

I went back to NPDOR and now they have an instant win possibility after each survey. So far I have only won bonus points, which I can play in daily, monthly and other various sweepstakes for cash, vacations and merchandise. It seems pointless, but then again, I never expected to win anything the first time around. I am currently researching several other survey companies. I would not fall for any of those emails which want you to buy something that guarantees money for surveys. Vindale.com is a lengthy signup, that seems to pay for pretty much every survey. I got $2 (Whoo Hoo! I know!) for a basic survey. I think they pay you regularly through PayPal and I've seen a 45 minute survey advertised which pays $65. Not bad for working from home. I'm worried that you might have to sign up for packages. The first survey pays $5 and I have to sign up for an eFax trial account. I could see this getting tricky if you are doing a fair amount of these free trials. If you forget to cancel it, I guess your out of luck. That's probably what they are hoping for, which is why the company will pay for the survey.

Bob Barker: The category is: Ways to make money on the internet?
Me: "Um, Online Surveys, Bob?"
Bob: "Survey says...We'll find out after these commercial messages sponsored by Google!"

What I learned today...

I'm reading Marsha Collier's book Starting an eBay Business for Dummies the 2007 edition. This book has some basic information as well as some advanced tips. I have always known there are unscrupulous individuals trying to pull fast ones on eBay but I have learned even more while reading this book. Bid Shielding is just one illicit activity that has apparantly been a thorn in eBayer's sides since it's inception. It basically means having someone you know up the price, then retract a bid to make sure that you, the seller, milks the most out of the buyer using the eBay bid proxy service.

It has gotten me excited about starting my own eBay business, which has been a slow process to say the least.

She seems against the whole Dropshipping idea. Other books speak favorably, but the catch there is that they have deals with these companies. Who to trust? I really wanted to create a dropship business so I didn't have to worry about storage, but I'm thinking it might be a little more difficult than I expected. I haven't tossed the idea completely, but I'm exploring other options.

Later on I'll have another update.

Making Money

So there are as many "get-rich-quick" sites on the internet as there are people, or so it seems. When I decided to work from home, the idea of "multiple streams of revenue" obviously appealed. I mean, who wouldn't want to earn money while working from their yacht?

Trying to find reviews of some of these programs is an exercise in futility (hmm, exercise. Haven't done that yet today. I'll get back to you with an excuse. Really.) Type in the name of the website or the program in your favorite search engine and I imagine you will get a plethora of hits saying one of two things:

1. "This site is great. I'm making so much money I can't believe it. Well worth the investment! You won't regret it. I'd love to tell you more, but I have to tell the pool-boy what type of chemicals I'm allergic to!"

OR

2. "This site is a scam! Don't do it. If you really want to make money use this (fill in the blank with another program) and you'll get a discount for reading MY review."

What to draw from this: All of these programs are basically the same and the people posting the good reviews obviously get a kickback, so the integrity of these reviews is definitely in question.

I know, I know, the first thing you learn when using the power of the World Wide Web is to trust no one. But this has raised some good questions, like:

If there are a lot of people looking for these programs, would setting up a deal like this might be a relatively painlessway of making some extra money?

Are any of these programs worth it?

Am I spending way too much time hitting myself ont he head withthe obvious stick?

Does typing count as exercise?

I'll get back to you as soon as I can with the answers to some of the questions. If anyone is actually reading this, you can expect daily updates. I'm still working out the logistics of what I want to accomplish with this blog, so expect things to get better. I hope.

Diving In (feet first!)

I have been blogging in my mind for a while now. In fact, I was blogging in my mind way before the term blogging was invented. For various reasons (my insecurities for starters) I have not put my thoughts on paper, er, pixels.

What am I going to blog about? Good question.

I have recently had a career change. I am at the point in my life where I tire of working for other people. Working from home has always been appealing, but reality has made it much more difficult. My initial thoughts regarding this blog are to write about my attempts to work from home using my limited skill set. Maybe you'll be inspired, annoyed or moderately entertained by my attempts to be a big boy financially.

My skills are:
writing (debatable at this point!)
editing
customer service
training/teaching
computers (Mac mostly, but I have recently been forced into the PC Vista world)

My interests are writing, hockey, snowboarding, junk-food, reading, TV and movies.

I am currently obsessed with fitness. Note that my obsession with junk food might seem a direct conflict with this, but I am very good at getting inspired to work out at 2:00 AM while watching an infomercial. My goal is to get "ripped" while still being able to eat whatever I want. Hey, this is America, if you're going to dream, dream BIG.

I figure this blog will be for myself, but maybe someone will stop by and share my so called life.

Take care and I'll see you soon!