Tuesday, January 23, 2007

10 Interesting Facts About Paid Surveys

You may have heard some rumours about Paid Surveys. Here are 10 interesting facts, some of which may surprise you.

1. You can actually earn money with online surveys. In the past, entrepreneurs have been skeptical about the legitimacy of paid surveys, but the fact is that many opportunities are for real and do provide cash incentives for those who are willing to take the time to participate.

2. Online surveys allow you to work at your own pace and in your own home. Forget about climbing out of bed and heading straight to work. Instead, greet your morning with a warm cup of coffee, a nice breakfast and arrive at work in your favorite lounge wear. If you work at home, you can wear anything you want and you can work whenever you want.

3. Companies need your opinions and are willing to pay for them. Whether it's part of a marketing research program or in consideration for changing a product, many businesses need feedback and are willing to pay for it. Everyone knows that time is money and many companies are willing to prove it by offering cash incentives to survey takers.

4. The more marketing research companies you sign up with, the more money you will make. Instead of just signing up with one company, try signing up with several. Many companies offer 5-10 survey opportunities per month, which means your income may be limited if you close yourself off to other options. As the old saying goes, don't put all of your eggs in one basket.

5. Basically everyone is eligible to participate in online surveys. With the exception of certain age requirements, almost anyone can enjoy the benefits of earning money with paid surveys. Each company differs in the type of participants they are looking for, so be sure to read the terms and agreement before signing up.

6. Paid surveys typically require less than 15 minutes of your time. Depending on how quickly you work through the questionnaire, you may end up spending only a few minutes completing paid surveys. Some may be longer, in which case you would be compensated accordingly.

7. Compensation typically ranges from $1.00 to $50.00 for paid surveys. For doing nothing more than sharing your opinion, you can earn a decent amount of money considering the time spent per survey.

8. There is no limit on the number of paid surveys that you can take or money that you can make. The more companies that you sign up with, the more survey offers you can receive. What does this mean for you? Quite simply, it means the potential for more money and a steady stream of opportunities.

9. There are certain tax advantages to earning money at home. If you participate in paid surveys on a regular basis or as a business, you may be able to deduct the cost and expenses associated with your computer and internet access at tax time.

10. You can earn respectable money. It may be possible to earn income comparable to a part or full-time job by completing online surveys in your spare time.

The information contained in this article is designed to be used as reference purposes only. It should not be used as, in place of or in conjunction with professional legal or financial advice relating to paid surveys, online surveys or learning how to make money from home.

About the Author: Brian Dolezal is a contributing editor for TopConsumerReviews.com, a leading provider of independent reviews and rankings for hundreds of consumer products. You can find out how top paid survey programs compare by visiting TopConsumerReviews.com today.

Monday, December 25, 2006

Why You Should Work At Home in 2007

Young children & elderly parents. Being having young children or elderly parents at home is another reason for working at home because some people are looking to combine parenthood with their career. In fact, studies regularly show that many parents would rather stay at home with their children if they could. A home office presents a perfect opportunity for them to have more freedom. In addition, the cost of a 'nanny' or a home daycare may be too high on a low wage, or parents may not wish to leave their young children regularly with someone else whose primary reason is to spend more time with their children. When child care is in the house, parents can have lunch with their kids or take breaks to play with them for few minutes. Full time child care and elderly home care can be expensive. If you are just starting up your business or need your full work at home income to make ends meet, then full time child care is probably not an option for you.

Retirement or redundancy. Some people may have taken 'early' retirement before the state of pension age and feel the need for some extra cash. As an older worker, however, you will feel that the chance of starting in a new salaried position in a new environment is remote, to say at least. You don't want to dig up your roots and move elsewhere, don't you? At this stage, part time work at home or owning a home based business would be the right choice. Additional income while working in the comforts of your home - priceless.

Lower cost. With fuel prices heading towards new heights all the time, everything is going to be more expensive, especially transportation cost. It does not matter if you drive, take the bus or take the train to work, the bottom line is, and it is going to get more expensive. Well, one solution is to spend more time and energy and start walking to work! Another more sensible and practical solution is to work from home. Can you imagine the amount of money you will spend on clothing’s for work at the office? I did my calculations and it was shocking! Working from home will save all that.

Commuting. Another often very compelling reason for working at home is that you're finding the life of a commuter too much to bear. The public transport never arrives on time and you have to choose between leaving home at some ungodly hour before sunrise to arrive hours before anybody else gets into their workplace. Or, you spend hours driving around eating up fuel looking for a parking lot? Sitting in a traffic that can hardly move? What about squeezing with everyone else on that packed bus or train for hours? Surely, there's something you can do which will improve your life style. You've had enough. You'll work from home.

An unmanageable boss. Do you ever work under a boss who thinks he is always right and your ideas are always left in the air? His or her management skills are no longer used by other peak performing companies. Simply put, his or her methods are out of date. Communications between him or her and the staff have degraded and the true potential of the staff cannot be fulfilled. Same routine for work everyday looks like dressing uniforms for you. You know there's no chance for you to climb above your boss's head, moreover, there's still 30 years to go until retirement. Thinking of suffering 30 more years? No way! If you are trapped with such a boss, fight back! How? Look for new opportunities to start out on your own. Such reasons for beginning a business often produce very good results. When you run your own business, you are the master. You take all the decisions and get all the rewards. Start working for yourself, not for someone else!

Stress is another factor. A looming deadline, work overload, a demanding client, a vague manager or a constantly ringing phone... The most stressful jobs are, no surprisingly, the ones in which you are under a lot of pressure and have very little control over your schedule. You might need to cut down meetings or get an assistant. A period of excessive work can lead to emotional and physical burn-out. Some people often feel that they must work for long period of times. For example in UK, most people work over 46 hours per week, that's much more compare to any other EU countries. This is always linked to a perception that it is necessary to be seen as working long hour in order to justify a decent salary. Unlike working at home, you set your own hours and work when you want if you have a good time management.

Tax deduction. Working at home and owning a home based business reaps many wonderful tax deductions that other businesses may not claim. If you live in the United States, did you know that even if your home business doesn't make a penny, it can put $5000 or more in your pocket every year in legal tax write-offs? It's true! Many expenses related to your business can be added to your tax deduction such as your advertising cost, either newspaper ads or magazines ads you run, internet access and long distance calls or other business expenses, keep your receipts for each bill paid. These are items that may be written off. Just be sure to consults your accountant or tax advisor to see if you are qualified for the deductions.

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About The Author:
Bibi Liew, a Work At Home Expert helps to assist you in finding the right work at home business opportunity or starting an online business. Visit her 2007 Top Work At Home Directory: http://www.work-at-home-sites.com or her Home Based Business Directory at: http://www.ebusiness-insights.com

Sunday, December 24, 2006

Home Based Business - Niche Marketing Opportunities Made Simple

There is an interesting area of internet marketing for the online home based business that is referred to as niche marketing.. While niche can mean different things, it is used here to indicate a very specialized market, a targeted market. Retail stores are an excellent example to illustrate what niche marketing is. A large department store can sell thousands of different products in the same building. A corner store only offers a limited number of products, but it is very likely that these items are limited to a special brand or are unique in some aspect. The home based business can also offer a multitude of purchase opportunities, but is more efficient if practices some focus since the competetion, and the rewards, are so great with respect to internet marketing. That's exactly how niche marketing works.

Niche marketing is the ideal choice for new internet marketers and home based business opportunity owners who don't have a lot of money or are limited in time. A major retail store would cost a lot of money for merchandise and require a ton of effort to be put forth. Niche marketing, on the other hand, offers drastically less costs and a much more manageable workload. These things will help someone who is new to this area.

This is how niche marketing works in the home based business opportunity venue. First, you find out what products are needed and what people need them. Then you find out where these people tend to congregate. Forums, interest groups and chat rooms all offer people with a specific interest to get together. Posting to these boards by non-members is often allowed. Know the kind of person you are seeking in a customer and it will be easy to find them online. Join in the board discussions and eventually make a comment about the product you are offering with your home based business and where to find it.

A paid ad on a website that focuses only on the area that your product fits into is another option. Before placing such an add, check out the website and make sure it is a place where you would want your ad. Is it a reputable site? Will they offer a good spot for your advertisement? Is it a site your target audience would actually visit?

If you are into internet marketing in a big way, and have a website of your own, you can always practice your trade by building a new niche web page and promoting it to the first page of the search engines as well.

When you specialize by marketing for a particular niche, you don't have to contact people in all areas, like walking through an entire department store to get to what you really want, but only those who would be interested in your niche product.

Your efforts aren't spread out but can be intensely focused on a specific market. This enable you to increase the sales of your online home based business by being more likely to reach those who are interested in your particular opportunity.

Leonard Bartholomew, B.S. Computer Science. Find all of the elements of an extraordinarily simple online home based business opportunity that you can prosper with.