Working at home advise....

In my years of working with the internet and building my own business, there are literally MILLIONS and MILLIONS of possibilities that I have found out there.  Let’s face it, if you can think of it, someone else has already written an article about it or thought of it themselves!  But, then the question becomes, “now what?  What do I sell now?”  And, that is a tough question.  Unless you are ready for the very hard reality that will come at you, in a very short and quick amount of time, you will crumble to the floor, weeping, crying, screaming, you name it, you will feel those emotions!  That sucks!  And, then the reality will hit when you realize that you have spent money on all these ‘schemes’ and gotten absolutely NOTHING in return.  You are just plain, out the money.  So, you gotta suck it up and move on to the next thing on the to-do list.

Now, we have the hardest part over with, for now.  Believe me, there is so much more to come.  The truth about the internet market is that it is one tough cookie.  And, if you aren’t prepared for it, believe me, you will fail and you will fail miserably.  But, hey, you don’t have to believe me; you can check it out for yourself!  There are literally thousands and MILLIONS of people out there on the web that would love nothing better than to take your money, sell you a ‘song’ or a product, or an “instant website, that can be up and running in as little as 3 days”!  O.k.!  Then what?  What those lovely, so helpful marketers don’t tell you is that, once that site is up and ‘live’, you are ON YOUR OWN!  So, good luck with that one.  You won’t get any support, of any kind, unless of course, you ‘upgrade’ to another package; that usually ranges in the neighborhood of $3,500 - $6,000.  Trust me; I have been through all of this.  I have been through this so often, that I know all the marketing ploys and I know all the ‘scripts’ by heart when they call me.  And, yes, they still call me!

Now, after having gone through all of this, I can speak from my heart as I write this and tell you that now, after many, many frustrating years at trying to make a little extra money from the web, I am now here!  Here is what I refer to with respect to my writing ‘gig’ as I call it.  My writing gig is something that I just happened to fall into so to speak.  And, what a ride this has been!  But, I wouldn’t trade one single moment of this for anything.  This experience has taught me so much!

Here’s a thought for you:  When you consider selling your ‘stuff’ on the net, consider that when you begin this journey, don’t forget the most important part of this….and that is YOU!  YOU will control whether or not YOU are a success.  It really does depend on YOU! 

Yes, you will get discouraged, trust me on that one!  Yes, there will be days when you ask yourself, ‘why me?’!  But, if you continue through all of this, you will come out on top.  You will be a success.  I know this to be a fact because I have been EXACTLY where you are now!  It has taken me over 3 years to finally begin to see a little bit of a return for all of my hard work.  Not to mention the ‘sweat equity’ that I have had to invest.  Writing is something that does not come easy to a lot of people.  You actually ‘have it’ or you don’t!  It is that simple!  You can choose to write boring, poorly-written content, or you can CHOOSE to write content that you are proud of.

I never would have thought of myself as a writer.  But, if it hadn’t been for a chance ‘meeting’ so to speak, via the web, I might never have gotten into this myself.  I was so down on myself and so depressed because of the money issues and the fact that I didn’t feel that I would be a good enough writer to be able to ‘hang with it’ so to speak.

Fortunately, for me, a really beautiful, wonderful person came into my life through another website that I had joined.  She saw my capabilities.  She encouraged me to start writing.  And, with her compliments, support, and always having something POSITIVE to say to me, I began to grow and experience the joy of writing and the joy of expression through WORDS! 

Some artists paint, some artists build from their designs, and then there are the artists, like myself, who are WRITERS.  Trust me; writers are a truly gifted breed.  Because, just like with an artist who paints, you either have this ‘gift’ or you don’t!

This is how I recommend that you cope with negative sales experiences:

 ·       Sell stuff that you have personally reviewed, and will be able to believe your own pitch.

·       Be honest, even when those you tell the truth, are thinking every word is b.s..

·       One nice person weighs as much as three jerks on the:  “it’s-fun-to-work-with-the-public” scale.

·       Think like a proctologist.

One of the MOST IMPORTANT things that I have learned (and trust me, this is a valuable lesson) is that, every single time your phone rings, and trust me it will ring off the hook with salespeople wanting you to buy their products to build your website; when that phone rings and you know it’s a salesperson, get in front of your computer IMMEDIATELY!  Look up the website that they are talking to you about.  Look up the company name and Google the business ratings for that company.  That, in itself, will immediately tell you whether or not this is a good company or a fly-by-night company.

If the company has no rating, then I would suggest that you tread very cautiously!  Otherwise, you are going to get yourself into a whole bunch of financial troubles that you cannot get yourself out of.  Also, be sure to tell them that you need a couple of days to think about it!  They hate that!  They hate that because it means that they aren’t going to make a commission off of you and the phone call!  They will be pushy, that’s their job, they will be blunt, but, they also HATE it when you say, “I’m going to have to think about this”; or, “I have to speak with my husband/wife about this before I can make a decision”!  They really HATE that one!  In fact, that is usually when they will become extremely pushy and try to do everything that they can to get you to give up your credit card information.  DO NOT DO THIS!!!!!! 

Just because it may sound good at the time, doesn’t necessarily mean that it is a good deal.  And, besides that, you have to be extra careful in this day and age because of the cyber criminals that are out there.  All they want is your credit card information and they are off and running!

I will close this by telling you this (although this saddens me the most):  You have to be EXTREMELY careful of people that call you from Nigeria, Africa or some of those Countries.  Sadly, these are the “CYBER-CRIME Capitals of the World anymore!  And, these thieves truly only ever want your credit card information and they are off the phone and on to the store or a website to run you into financial ruin!

And, that my friends, is the truth and the reality of working from home.  It is not glamorous, it is not a get-rich-quick sort of thing.  It takes hard work, dedication, time, commitment (and I don’t mean the looney-bin kind of commitment either), and a definite belief in what you are doing and that you are making a service available for others.