Avoiding Home Business Opportunity Scams

Home business scams seem to be growing on the internet and in late night infomercials as the economy continues to behave in an unstable way. This growth in home business opportunities is partly because these scams prey on the desperate. When we are scared, uncertain, on the verge of losing the roof over our heads, we want to believe that all of these amazing promises of $379 per day are really true.

People who run work from home scams are, in my opinion, some of the worst scum because they prey on those in need and they use their ignorance against them.

Several years ago, a friend was asking me about a specific work from home program she was constantly seeing advertised everywhere. She wanted to know if I thought it was a good idea.

Well, the thought of working only four hours per week and making a whopping $379 dollars per day is a lovely idea, but you know what they say. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Curiosity got the best of me, and so I signed up for it. After all, they had lowered the price just for me for a limited time on down to $19.97. As soon as I signed up, they immediately started to forward me to other sales pages for the “super premium membership offer” which was another $20.After I got my “free” website from them, I found out that if I wanted to “unlock” all of it's features, I had to shell out another $47.

Do you see the pattern emerging?

The actual “product” was a poorly written 18 page ebook on weight loss, with a recommended price at $49. The website was a terribly coded hype filled squeeze page that didn't even have an SEO friendly title, domain name, or set up, and whose coding I was unable to access as to edit it. Yet, this site specifically told me how they had hired a team of experts to make my site as Search Engine friendly as possible. It wasn't. The web designer in me wanted to scream for mercy.

Most bad ideas don't want you to take the time to think (or pray) about the idea before making the decision. They count on you deciding now. Right now, “before it's too late.”

There are also many legit, though perhaps not wise, business opportunities that also work on urgency over really giving this some careful consideration. If something is a great idea, the opportunity will still be there tomorrow. Procrastination is not good for our success but recklessly rushing into something isn't either.

In this case, the price was lowered “for a limited time” and “just for me”. Through some clever scripting on their website (remember, I'm a web designer and programmer myself), they were able to note that I was trying to click away, so they gave me a new offer with a “limited time” lowered price. Of course, the original price of just $30.00 (actually 29.97) was also said to be a “limited time” low price, with the “actual” price crossed out (it was $79.97).

They also noted on their site that there were only 5 offers left in my area. Through some clever scripting again, they noted where I connected to the internet (a very small rural town), and made it seem like, while I waited, someone actually signed up for the offer. This also puts pressure on you to sign up now. In my case, living in a small town of less than 500, a town in which most people I know still have dial up, I highly doubt anyone signed up for the offer. They just wanted me to think someone did, to turn up the heat on me.

Then there's that amount they are listing: $379 per day. I'm not sure what it is about the magic number of $379 per day, but every time I have seen that magic number, it's been in connection with a scam of some sort. This may sound cynical, but whenever you see that number, run!

The real trick to making money from home is not finding the right opportunity to sign up for, but first assessing what it is that you are both passionate about and very good at, and trying to figure out how to market that in some way.

For me, there are a few things I am passionate about and good at. I'm also good at writing and design work. Thus, I've been able to make some money writing not only hubs like this one, but also some ebooks I sell on my website about Gardening, Christian living, and cooking. I've also created some Art Instructional dvds too. This provides me with a residual income. Most of my income comes from designing websites and logos for other small business people.While making websites and logos, I've gotten to know others who have been able to turn their passions into growing home businesses too, in all different areas, from creating smartphone apps, teaching old fashioned skills, selling t-shirts, and creating sewing patterns for aprons.

Find out what you are good at and brainstorm with a friend how you could come up with a way to begin to make money from that. You may not start off making $379 a day (or even a month), but by starting small, and doing what you love, you will slowly grow your business to work for you.