Doing Your Homework: How To Get The Facts On A Small Business Franchise by Candice Clem

Public relations play a major role in today’s business world. Each year, businesses spend hundreds of millions of dollars, paying highly skilled men and women who know how to make everything from hamburgers to airlines look as good as possible in the public eye. It’s not that most businesses, products, and services aren’t as outstanding as they present themselves to be, but it can be hard to tell which representations are most accurate. So when a hopeful entrepreneur browses through a list of franchises and finds that many work at home businesses appear too good to be true, he may have a difficult time deciding which one to choose. That is, unless he has resources at his disposal to confirm that these business opportunities are legitimate. And as it turns out, though many potential franchisees don’t realize it, such resources are available; a person just has to know where to look.

The Franchise Disclosure Document

Because it can be so hard to determine a viable home based business from a total scam, all franchisors, by law, are required to have a Franchise Disclosure Document (or FDD) available to any prospective franchisee. It provides a complete overview of everything about the business, its goals, its history, and its practices that anyone could ever possibly want to know. In fact, a quick jaunt over to the Federal Trade Commission’s website shows exactly how precise and complete a disclosure the government expects from all franchises: they provide a 150-page Franchise Rule document to clarify exactly what information a business must supply in order to comply with the law. If there is anything fishy about the franchise you’ve got your eye on, the FDD will reveal it to both you and the government.

The SBA Franchise Registry

Another easy way to spot potential franchise trouble before it hatches is to check out the Small Business Administration’s Franchise Registry. The SBA is a very helpful branch of the US government that specializes in supporting small businesses, including franchises, in any way they can, and one such way is by providing financial backing to small businesses that otherwise couldn’t get off the ground. In the case of a franchise, the SBA asks for company information to ensure that the business model is a sound one, there is a history of success, and future success is fairly certain before they provide the financial support. What this practice has inadvertently produced is the Franchise Registry: a list of all the franchise companies that have already submitted their businesses for financial support when a new franchisee starts out. If a franchise is on the list, then the government has given it their stamp of approval and their trust, and so can you.

Learn From Other People

This seems like the most straightforward way to get information, and it truly is. If you want to find out what Adventures in Advertising is really like, talk to one of their franchisees. There is no one who will know better what the strengths and weaknesses of the franchise are, how effectively the business runs, and whether or not it’s a worthy investment. Of course, talking with only one DVDNow dvd rental kiosk franchisee may not give you a true perspective on things; because if one person has a negative opinion simply because a work from home vending business just wasn’t a good fit for him. But if you talk to a dozen franchisees, you should be able to figure out exactly what your future franchise will be like. You don’t have to stop at franchisees, the Better Business Bureau can also offer you information on the franchise you’re looking at, based on the reviews of concerned consumers. If, in their database, the BBB has 200 negative consumer reports in regard to the internet business that’s recently caught your eye as a potential opportunity, you may want to rethink the choice, because that many unique negative reports probably means there is some merit to the complaints.

When you’re looking at franchise businesses, there is no such thing as over-researching. Truly, most opportunities that you’ll find, especially through franchise brokers, are trustworthy businesses. But even if research doesn’t unearth a huge moral or professional flaw in the infrastructure of the business, it might just tell you some things about the way they practically run that won’t mesh well with your personality, lifestyle, and goals. There are plenty of factors to consider when starting a new business, and any knowledge you can get along the way will inevitably be helpful.

Internet Marketing For Online Businesses tips to sucess by Samuel Clark

A new industry brought about from the growth of the internet called internet marketing for online businesses. Internet marketing is now a major industry in which businesses are either learning how to bring traffic to their sites on their own or finding internet marketing experts to help them. There are literally tons of ways to drive traffic to your website. Your marketing plan should include a nice balance of paid advertising and also proer SEO techniques to bring you free traffic.

We have found that if you employ various traffic generating techniques at once with your business it will allow you to see what works and what doesn't. Make sure you stick with your marketing strategies long enough to see if they work or not. Typically not sticking with your marketing campaign long enough is a pitfall many online businesses fall into.

You can pay for traffic through a program called Google Adwords. MSN and Yahoo offer similar programs. Google Adwords is a very popular advertising system where people pay per click to get traffic to their websites. Keywords are search terms that people type into the internet and you must have this knowledge before building out your internet business strategy. You only pay when people click on your ads. This is pinpoint advertising at its best and allows you to bring people who are already interested in what you have on your website if you have done a good job on the keyword research. There are many criterias for setting up your adwords campaigns and it is best to get training on how to do this before you jump into the fire. You can blow alot of money very quickly if you don't know what you are doing.

Another way to obtain traffic is through article marketing. This is one of the most important and best ways to build a solid marketing campaign. Article marketing is a proven and viable strategy for internet marketing for online businesses. Content is king online and so when you have a website, you must plan to develop content and information for your visitors and for the search engines. There are article directories online like Ezine Articles that will post your article on their site. Ezine Articles is an Authority site online and is a great place to get your information noticed.

Finally, Back links are the most important component to a powerful and popular website. By creating a hyper-link with your targeted keyword on someone elses site you will gain lots of visitors and search engine rankings to your website. I can not stress enough the importance of doing this everyday.

internet marketing for online businesses is a complex game online today, but if you stick with it and keep leanring how to generate backlinks, you will do very well. As we discussed here, article marketing is a simple but very effective way for you to build backlinks to your website. Lastly, we used to hear the phrase, the one with the most toys wins. Internet marketing for online businesses is, the one with the most links wins.

How to Network Market with a Rock Solid Downline System by M Murphy

If you have tried and failed before using MLM (or network marketing) then you should read this article and learn how to use a downline system to boost your business to new levels.

What is a Downline System?

A downline system or builder is a website that offers you the opportunity to promote certain multi-level or affiliate programs. Once you become a member, you will be given a website template and materials to create your own site. Once setup, you can then edit the affiliate links to promote the programs under your name.

By promoting and marketing this new downline system, you will create a highly responsive and rock solid downline of your own.

A good downline system will use a database or some sort to record all the email addresses listed for your downline and should give you access to that database for backups or transfers.

A good downline system will provide you with the opportunity to automatically add new members to your downline with little effort from you. You can easily earn several hundred dollars a month using this method if you have a large base and are an active member.

But in order to develop your downline faster and you can try out these 4 free traffic boosters: Write Articles â€" write articles that solve problems or answer pressing questions and submit them to online article directories.

Forum Posts â€" Search out high traffic forums that cover your target market. Sign up and write helpful posts for members. Use your signature line to direct people to your downline link, Post Comments - Search out blogs that cover the niche market you would like to work with. Locate a couple of blogs and write useful comments on them as least every other week or so. Use the linkback function to bring interested readers to your sign up page.

Create Podcasts â€" Use freely available audio recording software and microphone to record your own version of a “talk radio show”. Every week record a new tip, how-to or informational “broadcast” that people can download and listen to for free. Always include a commercial break, asking to people to signup for your email list or to get more information about your networking plan.

Now you know how a downline system works, you can start exploring to find one that matches your needs and your budget and will fit in with your network marketing plan.