Online Money Making Scams - Fact or Fiction

Beware Of Online Money Making Websites

Making one’s way in business is something that requires not only a lot of work on the part of an individual, but some amount of luck too. Starting out as an entrepreneur presents a series of challenges, and it is unsurprising that many businesses fail in their first year. Realistically, if a business is going to fail the that is as likely a time as any. Before you have really found your feet you may come up against some issues that, despite your best will, will prove insurmountable. And what really doesn’t help is the vast amount of supposed “help” that is out there for entrepreneurs, some of which is irrelevant to your own case, some of which is just plain lies.

Among the things that you need to look out for are websites that promise to make your business go through the roof in its first six months just by following some simple advice. While there are websites out there which will be of significant help to any potential entrepreneur, there are just as many – more, in fact – that will be as much use to you as a glass hammer. The latter can be recognized a lot more easily than the former. One thing to look out for is a site which is short on actual relevant detail. These sites are recognizable from the start. Most willhave bright, gaudy graphics, and grab your attention by highlighting seemingly random words and using highly informal language.

The individuals who has set up these website are doing their level best to get as many subscriptions as possible from interested or desperate customers by assaulting their senses and making broad hints while revealing nothing about themselves or their service. The sites have taken little time and cost only a small amount to set up, so from the moment they pick up even a small few subscribers they are already in credit – unlike their customers.

Sometimes you will be offered the chance to hear a talk from a “guru” who can give you the simple secret that guarantees business success. Being a successful entrepreneur is not about simple secrets, and business success is never guaranteed. Always look out for someone who goes out of their way to tell you what they think you want to hear. They may well even give you warnings like the ones in this post – but then they will ask you for money. You cannot buy business success from scratch, and anyone who promises that they can show you how to is simply selling a lie.

The information that will allow you to really build your business and make it profitable is a whole lot more mundane than some big flashy secret that needs to be advertised on a website that looks like it was designed by a room full of drunken chimps. It might even justifiably be called “boring”. The reason is that the people who are furnishing this information do not need to send up fireworks to distract from the holes in their logic – realizing as they do that there is a lot more long term future in giving people a formula that works.

First Published: May 26, 2009 EntrepreneurJourney.com

Mileage Plan 101– Tips, Tricks, and the Basics

Alaska Mileage Plan - What You Need to Know

Alaska Airlines’ Mileage Plan is one of my favourite frequent flyer programs and I use this program to fly Business class across the globe paying very little. It’s no wonder Alaska Airlines and its loyalty program rank at the very top on customer satisfaction year after year.

This Mileage Plan is dynamic in the sense that it’s not part of any 3 alliances; rather it has a pool of partners from all 3 alliances and some non-allied airlines. Here are Alaska Mileage Plan partners:

- Aeromexico

- Air France

- American Airlines

- British Airways

- Cathay Pacific (Hong Kong)

- Delta Air Lines

- Emirates (Dubai)

- Fiji Airways (formerly Air Pacific)

- KLM (Netherlands)

- Korean Air

- LAN (South America)

- PenAir (Alaska)

- Ravn Alaska (formerly Era)

- Qantas (Australia)

Now, let’s look at some basics of Alaska Airlines’ Mileage Plan frequent flyer program.

Stopover Allowed on One-Way Trip - This is one of the most sought-after features in Mileage Plan rewards. It allows stopover on one leg of the journey or 2 stopovers on a round trip. So you can visit 2 countries instead of one on a one-way trip or 4 countries on a round trip if you use this feature wisely. However, some partners do not allow stopover. Visit alaskaair.com for more info.

No Mix and Match – The Mileage Plan does not allow more than one partner on a one-way flight or on one leg of the trip in a round trip. However, it is allowed to combine with one partner + Alaska Airlines.

Generous Mileage Chart – Unlike other programs, the Alaska Mileage Plan has different redemption charts for different partners and different regions. Usually required miles are a lot less to travel business class compared to other loyalty programs. I will provide some examples below.

Avoiding Fuel Surcharges – Avoid British Airways, as their Mileage Plan collects fuel charges on BA flights, which can be hefty (in the area of $500, for example) on even short flights.

Cancel, Change, and Phone Booking - Alaska allows you to cancel or change within 60 days of departure for a $125 fee and no fee if before 60 days. The phone booking charge is $15 per ticket.

How to Search/Book Flights – You can search and book all partners’ award space on the Alaska website except for Cathay Pacific or LAN. For these, you need to search on partners’ websites such as British Airways, Qantas Airways and then call Alaska to book over the phone. You can learn more on how to search for Alaska award flights by searching more online.

Collecting Alaska Miles – Bank of America and MBNA Canada offer Alaska credit cards with other perks and features. From time to time they will also offer Alaska sales miles on discounts.

Some Alaska Rewards Flights Examples

- Cathay Pacific (CP) to Asia on business class for 50,000 miles with a stopover in Hong Kong

- You can fly to Africa for 50,000 as well with a stopover in Hong Kong on CP. This is real, not a dream.

- CP to Australia or New Zealand with a stopover in Hong Kong for 60,000.

- Qantas business class to Australia or New Zealand for 55,000 miles. Or you can fly to Auckland and have a stopover on Sydney.

- Japan Airlines luxury first class to Asia with a stopover in Tokyo for 70,000 miles.

- Fiji Airways business class to Australia or New Zealand with a stopover in Fiji for 55,000 miles.

- Fly Air France business class for 60,000 miles to Tahiti from LA.

There are so many other possibilities the Alaska mileage plan offers that I find it hard to believe. With proper planning and research, you can see the world in style with Alaska miles.

Don't Buy Toothpaste, Food and Cosmetic At Dollar-Type Stores

What Not to Buy at Dollar Stores

Colgate-Palmolive company recently reported that counterfeit toothpaste has been found in some dollar-type stores in the U.S. The counterfeit toothpaste may contain diethylene glycol and may not contain fluoride at all. Diethylene Glycol is a hazardous chemical, which is also found in antifreez and Colgate-Palmolive does not use diethylene glycol in toothpaste anywhere in the world.

In the past, investigation revealed that many brand names products found in dollar-type stores were not the same as from a reputable chain store. In Canada, as far as I know, nothing has been reported like the U.S. but it does not hurt to take precautions to avoid counterfeit products. I ask you to avoid buying food products, cosmetic products and chemical products at dollar-type stores. These products may contain potentially harmful ingredients and may pose health risks.Saving a few dollars is not worth the risk.
First Published: June 17, 2007 ADawnJournal.com

PayPal Is One Of The Most Powerful Forces In E-commerce

What Is PayPal?

The way the world is at present marks a quite significant change from how things were even ten years ago. Here is a little exercise to do with Internet surfing habits. When you got on the ‘net, chances are that you used Google to find pages – but did you use it as exclusively as you do now? When you were looking for fast, detailed information on any one of a range of subjects, if you were on the Internet ten years ago you certainly didn’t use Wikipedia. It wasn’t invented, even in its most basic form, until the turn of the century. And as for financial transactions, it’s almost certain that you were using credit card details, because PayPal was in its absolute infancy.

The list goes on. Only programmers of a certain level of ability were setting up websites of any real intricacy, and maintaining them. The word “blog” would have led someone to look at you with barely concealed fear for your mental health – although LiveJournal did exist and Blogger.com was on its way. The very concept of “blogging”, though, was a very niche market and idea up until the middle of this decade – but is now at the fingertips of thousands upon thousands of people. All of the above concepts, and others, have become common currency only in recent years but, now they are in vogue, they are immensely powerful and shape a lot of our working life and everyday lifestyle.

Business is never slow to react to a trend. In all honesty, if you want to see what will be on everyone’s minds, desks and t-shirts two years from now, it is well worth looking at what the business community are doing now. This requires some amount of judgement on your behalf as well, of course – not least because large sections of the business community are busily ramming documents into shredders, crying and booking flights to countries that have no extradition policy. But if the business world decides thatsomething will be big, it is worth getting on board, because the likelihood is that it will play a big part in all of our lives in time to come. Of the above Internet concepts, one of the most powerful is PayPal.

There are few of us who have not sat in front of a monitor preparing to send payment for a service or an item and thought “Do I really want to send my card details over the Internet?”. It’s safe, ninety-nine point nine (recurring) times out of a hundred, but there is always that little jag of doubt. But for the entrepreneur who wants to sell online, the joy of PayPal is that people have far fewer qualms about using it. It is tried and tested, efficient and speedy, and it is becoming accepted by more and more companies. As time goes on this is set to increase, and the people who use PayPal now will be in a stronger position than the late adopters, as they will know how to run an account efficiently.

First Published: May 11, 2009 EntrepreneurJourney.com

Money Saving Tips

How to Save Money

Following these tips will put some extra money in your wallet right away. Not sure what to do with the money you will be saving? How about investing for the long run? If you are 30 and start investing $100 a month at 10% interest rate – you will have roughly $380,000 when you reach 65. I will discuss the following areas where you can save money. Let’s talk about cable today and I will discuss Lunch in the next posting.

Cable TV
Lunch
Phone
Internet
Magazine Subscriptions

Cable TV

If you can cut cable TV, you will be able to save at least $480 annually. I am assuming you pay $40 per month for cable subscription and multiply $40 by 12 months, which will give you $480 savings annually. $40 per month is very low assumption. Most of the cable subscribers pay $50 to $80 per month. So based on what you are paying, your actual savings will be more than $480 a year. Living without cable is not utterly unthinkable. Many people are doing it and so can you. If watching TV is something you can’t live without, spend $40 on an indoor antenna and you will still have channels like CBC, CTV, Global and PBS.

If you are doing lunch outside everyday, you are pouring money down the drain. Let's take a look at the cost of doing lunch outside (instead of packing lunch from home) daily. Work-day lunch usually costs from $8 to $12. Let’s assume your daily lunch costs you $10. I am using $10 to make our examples simple. If you eat out everyday, your cost would be as below:

Weekly Cost = $10 * 5 = $50

Monthly Cost = $50 * 4 = $200

Yearly Cost = $200 * 12 = $2,400

$2,400 annually is a lot of money. If you are in a 42 per cent tax bracket, you keep 58% of each additional dollar you earn. When you consider all the taxes and costs associated with earning that after-tax $2,400, saving $2,400 annually means actually saving of $4,000 in pre-tax savings. Let’s put it another way – if you can brown bag your lunch, think of it as you are giving yourself $4,000 raise annually.

Above example looks good but it may not be possible for you to cut eating out everyday. What you do in that case? Cut above number in half. It means instead of eating out 20 days a month, brown bag your lunch for 10 days and eat out the remaining 10 days. You still will be saving half of the amount you were spending before.

Save Money On Phone Bill

Depending on what type of plan you have, you can save money on your phone bill. Here is how to slash your home and cell phone bill.

Home Phone

If you have home phone with features you don’t use, it’s time to get back to basic service. You will be able to cut $10 to $20 dollars per month. Keep your eyes open for same type of service offered by other phone companies at a lower cost. Before you do the switch, call your existing phone company and chances are high that your existing phone company will match other companies’ offer to keep you.

Cell Phone

If you have a monthly plan, added features such as caller ID, voice mail, call forwarding etc can cost you extra bucks. If you don’t use your cell phone in the daytime, switch to Pay As You Go. I have unlimited evening and weekend Pay As You Go which costs me only $30 a month. If you don’t need unlimited evening and weekend plan, use Pay As You Go $20 a month plan. It costs only 1 cent per minute in the evening and weekend and will save you a lot of money. Pay As You Go already includes caller ID, voice mail etc and you don’t pay extra.

Internet Phone

If you have high speed internet, you can use it to have home phone service. This type of phone called VOIP (voice over internet protocol). Plans start at $10 per month  for basic service. You can have phone service with 10 to 15 features for a fraction of land line cost. You can save 35% to 60% on your phone bill with VOIP. Before you jump into VOIP, do you research first. VOIP has some disadvantages as well. One of them worth mentioning - it won’t work in the event of a power failure.

Save Money On Internet Subscription

The easiest way to save money on your internet service would be degrade your service to a lighter version. Most likely you will not even notice the lower speed and you will get used to it within a couple of days. How much you can save doing this? Let me give you an example.

Rogers EXTREME : Approximately $55 Monthly
Rogers Lite: Approximately $35 Monthly

As you can see, it’s a $20 recurring savings right away. This will only work if you are able to switch to a lighter version. I understand that for some of you switching to a lighter version may not be an option. How do you save in that case? Yes, still there are ways. You have to do a little homework. Do a Google search by putting Canada Internet Service or Internet Provider Canada etc. Research search results on first couple of pages and pick a non-brand name internet provider at a lower cost. Yes, you will be spending a few hours doing your research but it’s worth spending a few hours to save money every month.You don’t need to stick to brand names like Rogers and Bell. You can switch to small internet providers and you can get the same speed at much lower prices. Let me give you an example. I performed a Google search by putting Canada Internet Service. I got about 298,000,000 matches for this search. I only checked first two matching websites, Acanac and Canadian ISP, as they looked promising. You can keep researching until you find something suitable.

Save Money On Magazine Subscriptions

Are you a magazine junkie? If you are, probably you are spending $30 to $50 on magazines every month. If you are buying magazines at newsstands, you can be spending even more. Stop buying magazines here and there. If you are subscribing to a few of them annually, take a good look at all of them and keep only one. You choose which one you want to keep. A smart way to read magazine instead of buying would be to read online. You will not find recent articles online buy if you wait a few days, it will be available for free.

This is my last post in Money Saving Tips series. After reading all tips, decide which ones you can do and start doing it. If you absolutely can not do some tips (let's say Tip 1 or Tip 3), that's OK. No worries. Just follow only those which you can. I will be writing about tips like these often. 

First Published: July 2007. ADawnJournal.com