• Low or No Cost Set-up • No Product Costs • No Inventory • No Fees to Join or Licenses to Buy • No Monthly Minimums to Meet • A Product or Service for Virtually Every Conceivable Market Niche • No Employees • No Merchant Account Needed • No Order Processing or Product Shipping • Little or No Direct Customer Service Involved • 24/7 Business • You Earn Money While You Work, Play or Sleep! • Unlimited Territory! • Income Potential Limited Only by Your Personal Marketing Efforts

Could you make more money selling a product that you developed yourself? Probably, but unless you have some experience with running a business already you might want to start out with an Affiliate program. By promoting an existing product you will keep both your site development costs and your ongoing overhead to a minimum while you learn the ropes of marketing and getting traffic to your site. By working with an Affiliate program, you will be able to take advantage of their sales tools and experience start generating some income while you are learning.

With an affiliate program, you don’t have the headaches of getting a merchant account or dealing with unhappy or even fraudulent customers - this all falls under the responsibility of the merchant.

There is one truly wonderful advantage to Affiliate Marketing that few people ever really stop to think about - but it is a big one! Simply put - if you don’t like the results that you are getting with one product, you can quickly dump it and substitute another one.

Starting to see why Affiliate Marketing can be so attractive? For sheer ease of starting an online business, and with a lot less money than a full blown website with lots of content and goodies…you can quickly be online with products and websites - leaving you to devote yourself to the more important things…like marketing and figuring out what on earth Google is up to this week .

The Downside of Being An Affiliate:

The main problem with MOST (but not all) affiliate programs is that you will not build any residual income. You must always be marketing the product and looking for the next best seller.

There are a few exceptions to this rule however, such as membership sites, but many of them only pay on the first month or initial sign-up of the referred customer.

The Bottom Line:

Affiliate programs are a great way to take your first step, and learn about marketing online, the basics of running an online business etc. It’s a good way to supplement your income and start building up your confidence in your ability to run an online business.

It’s also good way to create those multiple streams of revenue and be able to quickly add to your portfolio of businesses whenever you see a great new product or you simply need to create some extra revenue!

There are lots of affiliate programs to choose from - stay tuned as our Affiliate Directory will be launched in just a few weeks!

In the meantime - the best book you can read on Affiliate Marketing is a true story - by a woman (!) named Rosalind Gardner - if this doesn’t get you excited about Affiliate Marketing, nothing ever will!

And yes - it CAN be done

Men and women both are finding the internet a great place to start a business - the costs are low, and you can work the hours that fit your schedule, allowing you to start a business while still keeping your job if necessary, or around the kids schedule if you are already a stay at home dad.

Here at DadsConnect, we will not only be reviewing a wide variety of work at home ideas and home based business opportunities, but actually sharing our own stories of working at home - both the successes and the failures.

Fortunately, in the almost 10 years that we have been working online, we have had more winners than losers - and it’s a lifestyle that my wife and I would not trade for anything.

Who wants the corner office when you can have the padded lounge by the pool??

Have fun and great success in all that you do!

Sometimes, it’s even hard to know whether or not you really need to change your life. Everyone TALKS about being self-employed, or starting a home business…but how many people do YOU know that really do it?

The truth is that there are more and more people quitting their jobs and joining the ranks of the home business success stories every day. Being self-employed is not easy, but it can be personally fulfilling and satisfying for those that put forth the effort. Starting an onine business takes work, and dedication - but it can also lead to financial security and a great lifestyle for the person willing to put forth the effort and take the plunge.

And if you weren’t looking for something different…something better…you would not be here in the first place!

The reason you are here may be one of many things. It could be simple curiosity. Maybe you just don’t enjoy your current career as much as you used to, or perhaps a change in your family’s financial needs (a new baby? a new home? a child heading off to college?) means that you need more income than before…or maybe you just simply feel a vague but deep sense of dissatisfaction with something in your life…

Or maybe like us, you honestly want to have more control over your time, your life and your income. Maybe you want to actually HAVE a life for a change. We have spent so many years working so hard for others that we finally decided it was simply time to take the plunge and move on to other things.

We did and we have never looked back or regretted the decision!

We are not going to tell you that every day is a “wonderful new adventure”, nor will we will tell you that creating other sources of revenue that will eventually replace your current job is going to be easy, or that it will happen overnight.

We have worked diligently, and with careful planning, to get to this point in our lives. We have invested time and money and LOTS of effort, and yes, we have made more than our share of mistakes and missteps along the way - but the rewards have been more than worth it.

We work from home, and we often work some pretty odd hours, we often answer email at 1am because we took off most of the day to watch our son play football, or to spend time with our grandson when his parents bring him over to play in the pool.

We are not what one would call ‘technologically savvy’…but we have found the tools and resources that allow us to make the most of our efforts with minimum expense or technical expertise.

We aren’t just another couple of “overnight internet successes” - we are real people and we really do enjoy a very nice lifestyle, thanks to our various home business opportunities…and we are always on the look out for more home business ideas, too!

If you are willing to put forth some time and effort to make a change in your life, if you understand that there are no ‘instant roads to wealth and fame’ - then we are willing to give you our time and hard-earned knowledge to help you get started.

Take a look around our site, and use the information here as a starting point in your decision making process. While we have listed some of the more popular businesses that we are involved in, these are by no means the only ones that contribute to our “multiple streams of income”!!

Essentially, there are only three prices that can be set for an eBay auction:
the “buy it now” price, the reserve price, and the starting bid price. Of these three, the starting bid price is the only one that is required for an eBay auction. The reserve price and the “buy it now” price are optional. The starting bid price is fairly simple - never set it higher than $50 or so - no matter what your item is really worth. This low opening price will get bidders to your auction.

Setting low starting bid prices creates the need for a reserve price. A reserve price is the absolute lowest price that you want to get for your item. You may sell the item below the reserve price, but you will not be required to. In other words, if you set your reserve price at $100, and your highest bid is only $50, you do not have to sell the item to the highest bidder. You can close the auction without any negative feedback or repercussions. Set your reserve price at the absolute lowest price you are willing to sell your item for. Keep what the item is worth, as well as what it cost you in mind.

The “buy it now” option will allow you to set a price, and buyers can buy the item immediately, without bidding, for that set price. This option can be used for any type of item, and it should be set to match your reserve, give or take a few dollars. This option is great if you have multiple identical items to sell.

Shipping has a price, and potential buyers take this into consideration when they are looking at an auction. If you can see your way clear to offer free shipping, you will find that people are placing more bids. Make sure that your potential buyers realize that you are offering free shipping!

Before setting any prices, you need to determine what the item is really worth. The value of the item in different markets might be quite high. However, you are selling on eBay, and it is a different world altogether! Find out the price that similar items sold for on eBay before setting any prices. If it is a collectable, or a high ticket item, have the item evaluated to ensure that you aren’t going to lose money!

All you have to do is set up your auction, and sell the product. You then pass the customer’s information on to the drop shipping company. The drop shipper does the rest, and they will even use your company information, as well as your company logo if you have provided it to them. When the product arrives at your customer’s home, they will have no idea that your company didn’t send it.

The drop shipper will package, label, and ship the products that you sell, allowing you more time to set up even more auctions, for greater profits.

You must establish a relationship with several drop shipping companies in order to become successful. In the beginning, most companies will require you to pay for the items that your customers order before they are shipped. You need to fill orders in a timely manner, so you should pay for the items with a credit card for speedy service. Eventually, you will be able to have the drop shipper fill your orders, and then bill you for them later.

When you set up your eBay auctions, make sure that your reserve price is set higher than the price that the drop shipper will be charging you for the item. The idea, of course, is to earn a profit! Depending on the item you are selling, a markup of about 10% to 15% should be about right, but you should do some research to see if the item is selling for a lower price in another eBay auction, or through other online sources.

A WORD OF CAUTION: Make sure you add in all of your expenses before setting your price! eBay (or any auction site for that matter) will charge you a variety of fees for listing and selling, and your dropshipper will also add on a fee above the cost of the product and shipping for the dropshipping service)

By starting an eBay business using the drop shipping method, there is essentially no financial risk involved. The product will be sold before you pay the drop shipper for the item. This is one of the few businesses where you can actually turn a profit before you have expenditures!

Party Plan Sales is another type of structure often used by direct sales companies (TupperWare for example!), and may or may not pay the same “multi-level” commission structure, it just depends on the particular company and whether or not you have the ability to recruit a sales force or downline - just different names for basically the same structure.

In any of these types of companies, the emphasis is on product sales - and most importantly - there IS a legitimate product or line of products to be sold. These are NOT to be confused with the illegal structure known as Pyramids.

Pyramid schemes mimic multilevel marketing in that they compensate their so-called “distributors” on a multilevel structure, providing incentive to sell the business opportunity to prospects. The difference, however, is that pyramids focus primarily on recruiting new salespeople for your downline, not on selling products or services. In fact, in many cases there is no real product or service. ALL gifting or loan programs fall under this category, there are no exceptions.

Any program that requires an investment that you will get back simply by bringing in other “investors” is also a pyramid. There have been attempts to work around this by offering ebooks, “loans”, etc, etc…but most of these programs tend to work in “cycles”, “circles”, “phases” etc - where your position rises as you bring in bodies, then drops you to the “bottom” level again after you get your pay-out…and the cycle starts all over again. The problem is that sooner or later - the pyramid runs out of prospects ….and the bottom level loses everything. Over the past two years some very well known people have been arrested and convicted for running pyramid scams. Although the prospect of easy money may be tempting - it is not worth the risk.

There are enough legitimate network marketing companies to choose from that you should have no problem finding one that will fit your needs, personality and work style!

The Benefits Of MLM:

Successful MLM companies understand the importance of training their distributors and creating systems that assist their distributors in making sales and building their businesses, online and off. With A good MLM company, you receive support from your upline (the person that originally brought you into the company) as well as the company itself.The systems provided are usually easy to follow and duplicate with little technical skill.

But above and beyond any other benefit of joining MLM opportunities is this one - the creation of residual income. There is no other way to put this - find a good product or service that people will buy and use month after month - and you are on your way to creating streams of income that will last a lifetime.

As you have probably guessed by now, we believe in spreading our income streams across several different types of products with several companies. In this we minimize the risk of market changes, or popularity of a single product declining. By creating residual income streams, we offset the risk even more!

The Downside of MLM -

There are two main downsides with MLM, the main one is that a lot of people have misconceptions about what it really is. Many people want to lump true, legitimate multi-level marketing companies with the illegal scams and pyramids. Fortunately, as the growth of MLMs online has expanded - this myth is being quickly reversed, as ordinary people are changing their lives through network marketing online!

The second issue? MLMs DO require a monetary, and usually ongoing investment. But don’t let this deter you - some of our most successful ventures have had very minimal expenses, and most of them are for products and services that we spend money on monthly anyway. The expense was already in our budget - but now we have the added benefit of building a business with those dollars at the same time!

He may or may not be the “primary breadwinner” for the family . And chances are that today’s Dad may be either sharing custody of the kids - or Dad may even be the primary custodial parent.

All of these situations are things that were virtually unheard of a generation ago!

When most of us were growing up, a good father was expectedto bring home the bacon and maybe pitch a few balls to us on the weekends but that was pretty much about all that was expected. Dad provided a good example by having a good work ethic and good moral values, but the meals, laundry and housecleaning were all done by our “good Mom”, because “Mom” stayed at home and her “job” was to “keep house”…Dad’s job was, well to have a job!

Oops….fast forward to 2005 - today’s Dad is a LOT more involved all aspects of raising the kids and running the household. Today, many fathers stay at home or work at home, and are now either sharing all of the household duties with Mom, or he might even be providing them ALL as the primary parent. Mom might be out in the professional world, while Dad works from home and is the “primary caregiver” for the kids and household. Or, as is often times the case today - due to divorce or other circumstances - today’s Dad is often the primary custodial parent, a situation quite uncommon just a few years ago.

Whatever the situation is, today’s Dad is just as likely as Mom to be the one attending PTA meetings, dropping the kids at soccer or football practice, fixing dinner, helping with homework or doing the laundry.

In other words, the keyword for Dad today is “involved”. A father is no longer just handing over the paycheck and observing from a distance, he is an active participant in raising the kids and handling the day to day functions of the household.

But since most of us didn’t have Dads like this - we are struggling to figure out how to juggle it all without dropping a few balls - so DadsConnect was born. This is stage one - with much more soon to come!

DadsConnect will feature stories on home business and freelance ideas and opportunities, ways to work at home so you CAN stay at home, balancing home business and kids, health concerns, sports (everything from coaching to fantasy sports!) even a few easy to cook recipes (all tried and tested in my own kitchen!). Eventually, we will even have a forum for involved Dads to chat with each other and find out what works…and what doesn’t…in this new way of life we have!-

No matter what kind of Dad you are - part-time, full time, work at home, stay at home or career dad, whether you are looking for homework help, coaching tips, or financial advice - we hope you will find something here to help you be the best Dad you can be!