One of the foremost determinations you are going to need to make when you are thinking about starting a home based business is whether or not you are going to operate it on a full time basis or on a part time basis. For some professionals, you will be required to work full time in order to launch your business. If you are operating a small business from home in your spare time then you will not need to commit nearly the same amount of time or energy in regards to launching your new business venture. This is especially true if you are starting a business that sells products online. However, if you intend to develop a service based business then you may need to commit a substantial amount of time and capital towards developing your brand name for your home based business. As we have discussed in some of our previous articles, you should focus substantially on the benefits as well as the drawbacks to starting a home based business.Beyond the time factor that is involved with determining whether or not you should start a home based business, you are also going to need to examine the capital costs involved. Although you are not going to be starting an office, you are definitely going to need to have a computer, establish a website, obtain business cards, and have a clearly defined marketing budget. However, while these may seem like large expenses, we have seen home based businesses launch their operations for as little as $1,000. As such, prior to starting this type of business enterprise you may want to focus on developing an appropriate budget that outlines both your anticipated expenses as well as your expected revenues. In many instances, it may be in your best interest to develop a business plan specific to your industry. Within this business plan you should focus not only on the start up costs, but also on your expected profit and loss statement, cash flow analysis, as well as your balance sheet. The more organized you are in regards to your business the more likely that your home based business with be successful.Finally, you should work with your accountant to determine what type of corporate structure that your home based business may need prior to launching operations. This is important as their could be substantial ramifications if you do not launch this type of new business venture appropriately.
The Finer Points of Internet Auctions
WHAT IS A PENNY AUCTION?
Penny auctions have exploded in popularity with the massive growth of the internet. However, few people know the true origins of penny auctions.Beginnings actually stretch back to the Great Depression. Those were hard times for everyone, but even harder for farmers. Farmers struggled to bring in steady income because of droughts and crops not selling as well as they had previously. As a result, the banks would foreclose on the farmers who couldn’t keep up with their mortgage payments.
The banks weren’t satisfied with just repossessing the house, they wanted to raise as much capital as possible, so they resorted to selling off the possessions of the owners of the repossessed houses. There was not much the farmers could do about it so they began bidding ridiculously low prices, pennies, on the items while threatening others who dared to bid higher than a few pennies.
The auctions of today hardly resemble their tremulous beginnings. Being part of a penny auction today is exhilarating, fun, and addictive. It combines the selling format of auctioning with a little bit of chance factored in.Auctions are a game of strategy but also a game of luck.
The premise behind penny auctions is giving people the chance to win an item at a drastically reduced price.Auctions make that possible by spreading out the cost of the product among multiple bidders. In order for a person to take part in an auction, they must pay a set price for each bid. For example, if a person wanted to bid on a fifty dollar Amazon gift card then he would spend a dollar for each time a bid placed. If he ended up winning the gift card, then he would only have spent a few dollars for a fifty dollar gift card. Usually penny auctions sell bids in packages.
HOW PENNY AUCTIONS WORK!
The main foundation of penny auctions is the pay-per-bid format. It is the key that allows bidders to win items at the fraction of their retail value and allows the auction owners to keep their site profitable. Most y auction sites run on the same premise: people pay a set amount for each bid, whenever a person places a bid within the closing seconds of the auction time will be added, the last person left with a unique bid after the clocks runs out will win the item. There are a large variety of items that can be won, but they tend to be popular electronics or gift cards to popular stores.
There are two types of auctions: lowest unique bid auction and highest unique bid auction. Lowest unique auction sounds confusing but it is actually quite simple. A unique bid is when only one person has a bid at a certain price. Bids usually start at one penny, a bidder can then place a bid at two pennies. Until another bidder places a higher bid, the most recent bidder will be the lowest unique bid because that was the only bid at two cents and nobody bid higher. However, penny auctions generally don’t stop at one penny. It is not uncommon to find auctions that end up at a couple hundred dollars based on the popularity of the item being auctioned. However, the same principles apply for those auctions. Highest unique bid auctions follow the more traditional auction format such as eBay. The person with the highest bid at the end of the auction wins the item.
Auction site owners turn a profit by selling bids. Say twenty people are bidding on a ten dollar gift card at one dollar per bid, at the end of the auction if there were twenty bids placed in total then the site owner would have made twenty dollars with a ten dollar profit.Auctions do seem like a win-win situation:The site owner makes money while the bidder gets an item for dirt cheap. However, not everyone wins in penny auctions. The people who paid one dollar each bid but left with nothing to show for their investments will not be so happy.
HOW TO WIN!
Penny auction has a lot of chance mixed into it, but one can incorporate strategy that will help raise the chances of winning. Playing smart can make all the difference between gambling and auctioning.
The first crucial tip to winning penny auctions is to know how to manage your bids. Your goal should be to win as much as possible without spending a ton of money buying bids. Managing your bids means that you should already know how much you are willing to risk in order to win an item. The amount of capital you are willing to risk will determine how many bids you can use. Once you know how many bids you have to spend on an item, then you will be better able to manage how and when you place a bid. That will keep you from blowing away all of your bids in the first few seconds of the auction.
The next tip is to practice time management. When fighting in the trenches of penny auctions, you have two enemies: other bidders and time. Knowing when to bid is a must if you want to have success. Placing a bid when there is a lot of time left on the clock is never a good idea. You have to remember that the key to winning a penny auction is being the last one standing when the clock runs out and that each bid increases the amount of time left. It would be a good practice to wait until the last few minutes of the auction before you begin to bid.
The final tip for successful auctioning is to keep your emotions under control.Auctions have a lot of similarities to gambling, and just like gambling, your spending can get out of control. If you keep your emotions level, it will keep you from making rash decisions and blowing loads of cash. Keep your mind clear so that you can gage the behavior of the other bidders and outsmart them.
HOW TO AVOID SCAM SITES!
Penny auctions are a great addition to the web whether you want to win an item that otherwise you wouldn’t be able to afford or if you simply enjoy the thrill that comes with bidding in auctions. Unfortunately, scam sites have tarnished the reputation of the legitimate penny auction sites. However, there are ways that you can protect yourself from scamers and enjoy your auctioning without having to worry about losing your money due to dishonesty.
Checking the reputation of the auction site before you start spending your hard earned money is always a good idea. Chances are other people have tried the site before you and some of them have left reviews. The reviews are your way to gage whether a auction site is trustworthy or not. If a site is getting overwhelmingly negative reviews, then that is a clear indication that you should steer your business elsewhere.
Another tool you can use to protect yourself is checking the Alexia ranks of the auction sites. Alexia rank will give a solid view of how much traffic the auction is getting. If you see a huge difference in the amount of traffic Alexia is projecting and the amount of active bidders on the site, then warning signals should be ringing in your head. Some auction sites have been known to set up robots that automatically bid on projects in order to keep the auction going and inflate the price. That is known as shill bidding. You can sniff out those sites by comparing the traffic the site should be getting to the amount of users using this site.
CONCLUSION!
New legislation may come out later down the road that will officially make penny auctions gambling, but until then, it is a fun, exciting auction that allows one to win the item they’ve always wanted but couldn’t afford.Auctions are also quite lucrative for the site owners because of the pay-per-bid strategy they’ve incorporated. Penny auctions had humble beginnings with farmers who just wanted to get back at the banks who kicked them out of their house. More recently, auctions have enjoyed an explosion in popularity with the rise of the internet.
There are two main formats fora auctions, lowest and highest unique auction, however they both run on the same premise where the last unique bid wins the item. Winning a penny auction will require a certain amount of mental tactic and a bit of luck. However, you can increase your odds of winning by practicing certain techniques such as managing your bids wisely, learning how to work with the time, and keeping a level head and your emotions under control. When you combine those three strategies to your bidding plan, you will find that you win a lot more often.
It is important that you do your due diligence to protect yourself when participating in auctions. Not every auction is run by honest and trustworthy people. There are people out there who just want to take your money. You can protect yourself by ensuring that you only bid on sites that already have a very positive reputation from real users.
What Is Small Business Administration In A Nutshell?
Small Business Administration is an organization funded by the American government which provides loans to entrepreneurs and businessmen to set up their small businesses. In addition to that the organization also provides some grants and training for the efficient running of business. Another important feature is that they provide legal and administrative help in establishing a business to entrepreneurs who are likely to get entangled in the web of laws and taxes if they do not have proper guidance along the way.They conduct various training for different sets of audiences like entrepreneurs, women business ownership and international trade.The most used and availed service however is one of obtaining loans and grants for doing business. Apart from giving loans out themselves, Small Business Administration will also stand as surety for people and help them get loans from elsewhere. In the case of natural disasters the organization also provides members with grants so that they can ‘get going’ again and are able to face troubled times.Small Business Administration also helps businesses in contracting and it ranges from Business Development, HUB Zone and Government contracting to name a few.The organization also helps businesses to deal with Advocacy and law related matters.How do I get in touch with the Small Business Administration?You can get in touch with them by visiting their website and calling up their number and speaking with an associate their. Apart from this the site has also got a local office locater which you can use to track down the office that is closest to you and then call them up, make an appointment and meet them in person.I need helping in understanding business better?While Small Business Administration takes care of loans and helps out people who have been turned down at other places for money, they also deal with a whole host of educational material and training programs. These training programs are aimed at people who want to learn more about the different functions of business.What can I learn using SBA:You will find resources that will help you to learn about the basics in starting up your business, such as understanding what are the various forms of ownership, checklists, understanding how franchise works and also knowledge about product basics.Planning is an important aspect and you will be guided on things like writing a business plan, understanding what business you are in and the ways in which you are going to use this plan.Financing is probably the most important part for without it the business will not take off. You will need to know where to look for capital, how to estimate costs and understand financial statements.Small Business Administration also deals with education about marketing and the various forms of keeping your customers happy, conducting research and doing competitive analysis.Employees will make or break your company and any help on finding the right people, what to pay them and what is needed to retain them is welcome.Legal aspects like licenses and permits and business laws need the understanding of an expert and you would definitely seek some guidance in this area.Taxes like State Tax, local tax , Sales and Use tax not only form a big part of your cost structure. If not handled carefully, it could get you on the wrong side of the law as well. It is therefore imperative to seek the utmost clarity here.As is seen above when you are going to do your own business there is a host of things that you need to take care of and Small Business Administration can help you there, over and above getting the money for you to start off. What is important to keep in mind is that most entrepreneurs and business men are most of the times busy just scampering for funds that they lose track of most of the other things that happen and because of that, one thing or the other will go wrong and they will unfortunately have to repent later.If you are managing a small business chances are that it’s a one man show and apart from planning and strategizing you have to do the running around after suppliers and authorities to get the necessary approvals etc. In such cases it is best to leverage on the experience of an organization like the Small Business Administration.