Business Opportunities Weblog

June 17, 2009 by Angela Shupe | 0 Comments

With Father’s day around the corner, many people have found themselves waiting until the last minute to grab a card for the dad in their life. While some will get the card out on time, others will find themselves in a bind while last minute shopping for that perfect card. Unless they decide to card shop at GreetingBee.com.

For the cost of the average greeting card and stamp, you can visit GreetingBee.com, customize a card, and they will mail it to the recipient for you. There is no hassle and the card shopping is done direct from your computer.

Tell us about GreetingBee.com.

GreetingBee was conceived to apply a fun, fresh, and innovative approach to the creation of one-of-a-kind custom greeting cards and to allow anyone to send environmentally friendly paper cards with the same convenience as sending an e-card.

With our service, there are no more trips to the post office or lost time trying to find the right card. Anyone with a web browser can quickly create a unique greeting card from scratch or from one of our designer templates and have it professionally printed and mailed.

Continue reading Buzz Your Greeting Directly To The Receivers Mailbox, Without Leaving Home

In Internet, Interviews | 0 Comments

June 16, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 12 Comments

Mercury News:

At a time when we’re all looking for bargains, is there a catch to buying a $150 Nikon Coolpix digital camera for 34 cents? Or nabbing a $699 Apple 16GB iPhone for $8.06?

There is: While you stand to get a great bargain, you could be bidding against several thousand others in an online auction for one item, and each time you place a bid, it will cost anywhere from 60 cents to $1.

E-commerce is taking on a different spin with sites such as Swoopo and GoBid that appeal to the bargain hunter with a competitive drive. The giveaway prices on name-brand products, the limited and timed offerings, strategy play and fast pace attract shoppers willing to bid money for the chance to buy something at a fraction of its retail cost.

How do these auctions differ from those on eBay? The sites are selling the merchandise, whereas eBay is a place where sellers and buyers meet — it holds no inventory.

But the biggest difference is that to participate in a penny auction, shoppers must buy a bundle of bids and use one every time they raise their virtual paddle. Bids cost 60 cents to $1 each and are bought in packs of 10 to 700, depending on the site.

The auction companies make much of their money not from sales of merchandise but from the purchase of these bids.

While critics have questioned this form of e-commerce as a blink away from gambling, others have called it a smart business model for the Web at a time when new moneymaking ideas are scarce.

Photo by Swoopo.

In Ebay & Online Auctions, Ecommerce, Niche | 12 Comments

June 16, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 3 Comments

WomenHomeBusiness.com:

Some successful business ideas come from childhood.

As a child, Nicole Simon’s mom would make her special walnut recipe for friends and co-workers during the holidays.

Friends asked for their delectable walnut treats that making it and giving it as holiday gifts became the tradition in their household.

They decided to add a fun element by adding a fortune into each bag as a reminder of how fortunate they felt each year as their giving list grew.

In December 2002, Nicole was urged to find a way to make their nuts more accessible to everyone. She sold her special walnuts, Fortunuts – which she describes as, “a little bit of sugar, a dab of salt and a whole lotta love” — to the public at The Santa Monica Farmers Market, in Los Angeles.

The nuts came in Chinese take-out boxes, with fortune messages, and they were a huge success.

Photo by Fortunuts.

In Food, Niche, Success | 3 Comments

June 16, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 5 Comments

Detroit Free Press:

Amiya Alexander bounds in front of a parked school bus at Bloomfield Hills Montessori Center, her smile so wide it shows off the red and black bands around her braces.

Those braces, her brown Baby Phat high tops and the poof of pink feathers affixed to her hair speak to the accoutrements of any 10-year-old girl.

Except Amiya owns another accessory: the school bus.

At age 10, Amiya Alexander is an entrepreneur — owner, founder and creator of Amiya’s Mobile Dance Academy, which travels around metro Detroit teaching kids hip-hop, ballet, tap, merengue and more.

Painted a searing shade of hot pink, Amiya’s bus has all but four seats ripped out, a dance floor installed and ballet barres and mirrors affixed to the walls. On the ceiling, glitter glimmers.

Since January, it has rolled around metro Detroit, driven by her great-uncle, Sundiata Abdul-Mateen, who was lured out of retirement to help.

Aside from Bloomfield Hills Montessori, Amiya also teaches classes at the Northwest Activities Center in Detroit and has instructed toddlers in ballet and salsa at Island Kiddie Kampus Child Development Center in Grosse Ile.

Photo by Detroit Free Press.

In Kids, Microbusiness, Success | 5 Comments

June 16, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 3 Comments

HarvardBusiness.org:

A recent report listed the happiest nations in the world. Guess what? The US didn’t even make it into the top ten. So much for the American dream.

Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert argues that we can train our minds to be happier.

1. Smile. Turns out, smiling is directly linked to happiness. It may have started as a correlation but, over time, the brain linked the two. Don’t believe me? Try this: smile (a nice big smile) and attempt to think of something negative. Either you will stop smiling or you won’t be able to hold the negative thought.

2. Stop worrying. Worrying happens to be one of humanity’s best traits. It is the underlying emotion behind foresight, planning, and forecasting. We worry because some future event is uncertain and that feeling is a cue for us to start thinking about how to address it. The problem is, we worry too much about things that are out of our control (like the economy, stupid).

3. Take a break. The US is one of the most overworked industrialized nations. But this is counterproductive for a nation of “knowledge workers.” Overworking people to exhaustion is a horrible way to extract knowledge from people. Taking a break provides an opportunity to reflect and often it is during such times when the best ideas, our deepest insights, emerge.

Go here for 4 more tips.

What are your tips for being happier at work?

Photo by jaylopez.

In Advice, Employees, Operations | 3 Comments

June 16, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 2 Comments

Mashable:

San Francisco is hip to Twitter, and not just when it comes to its tech savvy users. Starting June 2nd, the City of San of Francisco has been supporting all 311 services via Twitter, with the help of Twitter CRM tool CoTweet.

Now citizens can send direct messages 24 hours a day to the sf311 Twitter account to report standard non-emergency city-related sightings like pot holes, request street cleanings, and any other service already supported by the phone or website. San Francisco is the first major city to adopt a city-wide Twitter program of this magnitude.

Editor’s Note: Not sure if faster reporting of problems will make repairs faster.

Photo by uniontownshippa.com.

In Government, Services, Twitter | 2 Comments

June 16, 2009 by Angela Shupe | 0 Comments

Work-at-home moms are the ultimate multitaskers. They’re able to handle a business from their home office and raise their children under the same roof. It’s a tricky task but not impossible.

Danica Favorite, the Denver working-from-home examiner, recently posted a list of tips by Marybeth Whalen that are geared toward helping work-at-home women like us.

1. Set Standards. Let the children know when they can (and can’t!) interrupt you.

2. Establish rewards and consequences. For example, I plan summer outings like going to the pool or visiting a new park. However, the condition for the outing is that I have to get my work done. If they interrupt and keep me from finishing, we don’t get to go.

3. Give the kids tasks. If they know what they’re supposed to be doing, they’re less likely to bother you with cries of, “I’m bored!”

4. Set a schedule. If the kids know what to expect each day, they are better able to respect your boundaries. At our house, each day has a different theme. By knowing the day of the week, they know what’s happening without having to ask.

5. Take advantage of the beautiful days. Take the laptop (and the kids!) outside. The kids can work off their energy while you get your work done.

Not enough? Here is one more tip from my own book of tricks:

6. Work an extra hour after your kids go to sleep or start your day a couple hours before your kids wake up. It is amazing what you can accomplish with a little silence. Use that to your advantage! By staying up a couple hours past their bedtime or waking up a couple hours before hand you will be able to get some work done, without the noise.

Photo by Gustty

In Advice, Home Office, Mompreneur | 0 Comments

June 16, 2009 by Angela Shupe | 3 Comments

The sun is shining, the temperature is rising, and people are grilling outside instead of cooking indoors. This is also the perfect season if your business is in grill cleaning.

You might recognize The BBQ Cleaner from earlier this month when we profiled them on the website. We wanted to learn more about this interesting opportunity so we went directly to the source, Jeff Krentzman.

What is The BBQ Cleaner?

The BBQ Cleaner is a proven business opportunity to clean BBQ grills. Our unique barbeque cleaning system removes all traces of grease, fat and carbon deposits especially in areas that can’t be seen. We remove key components and deep clean them in specially-equipped trailers, using environmentally-friendly treatments.

When was it launched?

The BBQ Cleaner was launched in 2006 in Bergen County, NJ.

Continue reading The Business Of Barbecue Cleaning Is A Profitable One

In Biz Ops, Interviews | 3 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Dane Carlson | 8 Comments

photo credit: el__vaquero

This guest post by Amber Riviere really exemplifies how to start a business during a recession. She fell into entrepreneurship naturally because she had a talent that other people were willing to pay money for. She didn’t spend months planning her business and crafting a business plan. She just started.

Do you have a story like this to tell? Send it to me.

To be quite frank, I started my web design business on a whim. I had experience starting businesses before…the “right way,” but this time was much different.

I had been designing my own sites for quite some time, years in fact, and had heard many compliments about my work from friends, family members, and business associates. They’d ask if I’d ever considered doing it for a living, and I’d always say, “No, I only do my own.” They’d ask why, and I’d answer without hesitation, “Because I don’t want to turn a hobby into a job and end up hating it.”

Things went on like this for a while, until it literally got to the point where people were frustrated with me for not pursuing it. They’d say, “You have talent, and you’re not using it, and you have the business sense to make this work. What are you doing?”

Finally, my accountability partner asked me if I’d consider helping a friend of hers with her site as a favor and that the friend was willing to pay for my time. “She’d gladly write that check,” she said. I can remember it like it was yesterday.

I said that I wouldn’t even know what to charge. My accountability partner and I came up with what we both figured was a reasonable fee. I said, “Okay, present it to her and see what she says.” (The friend was allowing her to be middleman, since they were really having to twist my arm to get me to do it – really.) The friend gladly accepted my fee.

I did the work in a day. She was ecstatic, and she asked me to promise her that going forward I would, at a minimum, charge double for what I had done for her. A day’s work, and she was willing to pay me $500?! I was beside myself with disbelief. (”People are willing to pay me for this?!”)

In the meantime, she and my accountability partner were trying to convince me to do web design professionally. She said she had three other people who needed my help, but that she’d wait for me to give her the go-ahead. I said that I’d think about it for a few days and get back with her.

That weekend, I built my website and sent off the paperwork to create my LLC. Once the LLC was set up, I opened a business account at my bank, and that was it.

I didn’t have any funding. I didn’t have a business plan. I didn’t even have a logo. Two months later, I had $7500 worth of work lined up, and the rest is history.

Bottom line for me, I guess, was that I had gone the traditional route – planning, meticulously planning until…well, until nothing got done. This time, I was doing something I loved, I was having fun at it, and people were actually willing to pay me for it! I jumped and didn’t hesitate, and that has made more difference for me than any business plan ever could. Sure, I still have to treat this like a business, but it’s the action, the forward movement that makes it a success.

And in case you’re wondering, it’s still like a hobby to me!

Amber Riviere is a web designer with BrownBugProject.com. You can follow her work through her blog and through her newsletter, Inside Brown’s Brain.

In Entrepreneurial Lifestyle, Featured, Guest Posts, Startup | 8 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 2 Comments

smallbizbee:

I hear this a lot, “do you think my idea is good enough to start a business?”…and normally what people mean is “do you think I’ll make money doing this?”.

The short answer is- most ideas you can think of are good enough to start a business around – in short you can probably make some money doing almost anything.

The real question is whether or not your business idea is worth the risk, and will provide adequate reward if it works out. For sake of argument let’s say adequate return is enough money for you to live on, at least replacing your current income.

So now the question changes once again, this time to “given my idea, what is the potential?” We’ll talk about potential in a minute, but first let’s dispel some myths about what your business idea should be.

You can make your adequate return, and then some, if within your business idea you can see your unique selling proposition.

Simply put your unique selling proposition (USP) is the reason I’d buy from you and not a competitor.

Continue Reading: “Is My Idea Good Enough to Start a Biz?”

Photo by nookiez.

In Advice, Ideas, Startup | 2 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 1 Comment

SmashingApps:

Onyaka is an online staff time planning software service that takes all the pain out of staff scheduling. Onyaka provides you with easy to use staff scheduling software, with no downloads, no expensive license fees, and no installation hassle.

It has a simple drag and drop interface and you can use all of the features absolutely free. As Onyaka is online application that’s why you can use it from everywhere without any restriction on standard web browser.

Photo by Onyaka.

In Internet, Operations, Paperwork | 1 Comment

June 15, 2009 by Jaclyn Wells | 0 Comments

photo credit: DavidErickson

We have all seen a number of logos whether it be on billboard signs, products, doors of a company, flyer’s and more, we have all at some point stopped and said to ourselves “why on earth would you pick that for your logo?” Logos can do wonderful things for your company if the appropriate one is picked, however, they can also cause a lot of damage to your company if they are not such a great logo.

A good logo withstands the test of time. It may need some touchups to keep it fresh and prevent it from looking dated our out of style, but that’s all it should require. Changing your logo when it already has memorability in place is bad for your branding.

Create a logo that is unique and hard to forget by your customers, make it a memorable logo that stands out in the minds of your customers no mater where they are. Another component of a great logo is one that further follows up on your brand and the marketing message you send out, the logo should be like an extensive to those two things already set in place, as suggested on Men With Pens.

In Advertising, Advice, Creativity | 0 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 2 Comments

Loveland Connection:

Twitter and other social media sites are easy to get addicted to; just ask entrepreneur Angie Shafranek.

“Ha, I’m on it like five times a day,” Shafranek admitted when asked how often she uses Twitter.

However, that Twitter habit has given a boost to her online children’s clothing business, Shafranek said.

She went from four people following her “tweets” to nearly 1,000 in no time, and since then, more and more people go to her Web site to check out what she’s selling.

“It’s growing my business, and that’s a big thing,” Shafranek said. “Twitter is the water cooler for the 21st century.”

People go there to talk about anything, and savvy businesses owners can take advantage.

Photo by Loveland Connection.

In Sales, Small Biz, Twitter | 2 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Dane Carlson | 5 Comments

A reader, Paul Rusnak, wrote in with the following account of his failed attempt at marketing:

I am a subscriber of you weblog and I enjoy reading all the stories, many of which give me new ideas to market my business.

Here is something that happened to one of my creative marketing ideas… that didn’t work or maybe it did work and I don’t know it yet.

I own and manage a local pack and ship store called Goin’Postal in Washington NJ and I am always looking for new marketing ideas. Since I am only open 6 months, my main goal was to make people aware of my location and the services I offer.

The annual car show seemed like a great opportunity to get my word out. They were asking local business owners to pay $300.00 to help sponsor the event. Alternatively, I can put a giveaway in one of the “goodie bags” that would be given out to each car registered.

I thought about the typical pen with my name on it or the travel mug with my logo on it that most people may or may not use but I wanted to do something unique. I notice giving away money really worked for the time-share industry so I decided to try that on a smaller scale.

I printed 150 coupons that offered a FREE $ 2.00 bill. No purchase necessary – no strings attached. Just bring the coupon to my store and I will give you a brand new $2.00 bill. Remember my goal was to get people aware of where I was located. I was two blocks from the car show. A 5 minute walk at most for $2.00. I was open early with my 150 $2 bills wondering how fast they would disappear. 1 hour, maybe 2 hours at the most. Well to my surprise, giving away money, even in this economy only brought in three people.

Did it work? NO. But it only cost me $6.00 to find out. I could have spent $300 to be one of the sponsors but now I have $294. back for an idea that didn’t work.

Can the economy be that bad if people will not even come in for free money? Maybe they thought it was a joke because of my store’s name. Who knows?

In Guest Posts, Marketing | 5 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Dane Carlson | 0 Comments

Have you ever wondered what goes into making, marketing, and selling an iPhone app? I have. PCWorld has an interview with Joel Rosenberg, the author of an addictive puzzle game for the iPhone called Blocked.

Here’s a snippet:

PC World: Let’s get the big question out of the way. Will you be able to retire based off the success of your first game?

Joel Rosenberg: Although I really enjoyed developing and selling my first iPhone game, I’m happy where I am right now.

PCW: But you have had some success…

JR: Well, when I was number one for that nice little period last month, I was seeing 10,000 to 15,000 downloads a day. But even at number ten they dropped off significantly, and two months ago I was selling 5 to 15 units a day, so it’s hard to make predictions.

PCW: That’s not shabby at all. How much of that 99-cent sale do you get?

JR: Apple gives developers a 70 percent cut of the sales across the board, so about 69 cents.

In Games, Software | 0 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Jaclyn Wells | 1 Comment

photo credit: h.koppdelaney

Many business owners find themselves a few times a year in desperate need of a vacation even if it’s just for one day, they get over stressed, overly tired, worn out and begin to miss the things that matter the most such as family, friends and fun time. However, many of them feel guilty if they step out of their business for even just one day, recently talked about on OpenForum.

I feel that it is really important to mentally and physically step away from your own business, and every time that I have forced myself to do so, I have come back energized, full of new ideas, and not feeling the least bit guilty.

Everyone needs a little down time every now and then, there is nothing to feel guilty about. What good are you really to your business and all of it’s functions if your so stressed, tired and generally worn out that you cant even focus at work? Not taking a “mental health” day for yourself to recharge once in a while could actually prove to be harmful to your company.

You may find yourself snapping at employees or customers, you may make mistakes here and there or bad judgement calls from time to time and so on. Remember that yes your business is important, but the number one thing that is most important is you and your health in and out of the work place.

In Advice, Entrepreneurs, Health, Small Biz | 1 Comment

June 15, 2009 by Dane Carlson | 3 Comments

photo credit: boliston

Jaclyn’s last post was about a proposal floating around Washington DC that would mandate that all employers provide health coverage for employees. I disagree strongly with her take on it.

The truth is, the fact that employers often pay for their employees healthcare costs is what has made medical care in the United Sates not only so expensive, but also so full of bureaucratic delays and red tape. When someone with employer-paid health insurance goes to the doctor, they don’t care how much the doctor charges. All they care about is their copay. Because of this, doctors don’t have to compete on price. Since they’re not competitive on price, there’s no reason to offer any additional benefits or perks (like inviting waiting rooms, cozy exam rooms, house-calls or appointments that doctors aren’t routinely 45 minutes late to) to their costumers.

Because the doctor doesn’t bill the patient directly, they don’t think of the patients as their customers. The insurance companies and health maintenance organizations are their clients. It is to their whims that the doctors must bend.

Getting rid of all employer-funded healthcare would turn us into a nation of healthcare costumers overnight, instead of just consumers. Doctors that provided warm and quality service for a low price would succeed. Those that don’t, wouldn’t.

In Government, Healthcare | 3 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Jaclyn Wells | 2 Comments

photo credit: a.drian

If you run a small business and employ people, under one of the proposals floating around for healthcare reform you’d be required to provide health insurance for employees.

Small Biz Trends recently posted an article regarding one of the new laws that is  in process of trying to get passed, all employers being required to provide health care coverage for their employees. It is suggested that this is an unfair practice that could take part as most small businesses can not afford health care prices. I do agree with the fact that health care prices are too high.

The health care companies do need to come down off their outrageous prices. But at the same time I agree that every employer should be required to provide their employees with health care coverage. Think about, as employers we expect our employees to come to work every day on time no buts, we don’t want them sick as a dog while they are at working infecting everyone else.

How are our employees to do this every day all year or at least not be sick as often or so sick to the point they infect others due to lack of antibiotics if they have no health coverage? Have you seen some of the costs of prescriptions without insurance, or the cost of a doctors bill without insurance? We can not expect our employees to follow our standards of working conditions if we do not help them on their way as far as health coverage is concerned.

Update: Dane strongly disagrees with Jaclyn on this one. Read his explanation of why Forced Health Care is Bad Bad Bad!

In Benefits, Employees, Health, Healthcare | 2 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Jaclyn Wells | 0 Comments

photo credit: allie pasquier

It is no surprise that with every new month comes new websites, new tools, new businesses, and so on. But one must also ask how many different web tools that do pretty much the same thing do we need in business. Yes it is good to have variety, but it is also important to avoid that new “shiny object” syndrome. New technology is always a good thing because it does provide variety for people, just remember that just because it’s out there does not mean you have to pick it up and use it along with everything else you already have.

Box.net is a new secure filing sharing program. This allows you share files and transfer files in any format and rest assure that your information is safe. A good tool to have yes, but there are several secure filing sharing tools out there for you.

Word processing is something that everyone needs on a regular basis. New to word processing is Google docs, a free online tool to do everything and more than Microsoft office. However, what if you are writing a simple letter without being on the Internet, Open Office is an inexpensive program that also does everything that Microsoft office can do.

In Internet, Software, Technology, Tools | 0 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 0 Comments

Inventors and Entrepreneurs from all over the country are invited to submit their US Patented or Patent Pending products to the Inventors Club of Kansas City’s National Invention Contest for a chance to win the opportunity to have their consumer product marketed and sold in retail stores.

Only 20 invention spots are available. Go here for more details. Contest is August 4th, submission deadline is June 30th.

Photo by Inventors Club of Kansas City.

In Competition, Inventors | 0 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Jaclyn Wells | 0 Comments

photo credit: R.B. Boyer

Being in business for yourself can make several decisions regarding your business difficult for you to make. One of the biggest things that business people have a problem with is setting prices for their services and products. They never really quite know where to start or go about it. Most think that the right approach is to add the costs of that particular service or product and then they add on a profit margin at the end, as stated on My Venture Pad.

The truth is that when pricing you should set a price based on the value your business, products and services offer to the customers. A big pricing mistake that people make is setting their prices due to the economy around them. I think this is a very bad idea, when the economy turns back around your customers will be use to those low prices.

Paying your sales people based on revenue stats rather than the profits that are brought in. These are definitely two different things, you may have great revenue to cover all of your expenses, but that does not mean your making a killing in the profit world.

In Money, Pricing, Sales, Value | 0 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Rich Whittle | 1 Comment

Fortune:

As he had promised to do, President Obama selected a judge with enormous breadth of life and career experience – experience that dwarfs not only that of Wood or Kagan but, indeed, that of any of the justices on the current Court.

In addition to her extraordinary life story – raised poor by a widowed Puerto Rican mother in the Bronx; graduating summa cum laude at Princeton; graduating from Yale Law School as an editor of the law journal – Judge Sonia Sotomayor has served as a state prosecutor in Manhattan (five years); as a partner in an international business law boutique, where she handled intellectual property cases, including trademark and counterfeiting matters, and international litigation and arbitration of commercial and commodity export trading cases (eight years); a federal district judge (six years); and a federal appellate judge (10 years).

Some litigators believe that, no matter what the specific issue may be before the court, a range of experience is a better background for a judge to have than a lifetime spent seeing the world from a particular, homogeneous perspective – that of, say, a prosecutor, or an academic, or appellate judge.

“All have great credentials,” says Diana Parker, a New York lawyer who studied the records of all of the judges reportedly being considered for the nomination on behalf of a group of women litigators she belongs to. “But in terms of breadth of experience she was clearly the one.”

For the business community, the starting point in any analysis has to be the judge Sotomayor has been selected to replace, Justice Souter, who was by no means a particularly pro-business judge to begin with.

So, if Judge Sotomayor were to prove anti-business, the business community would only have something to lose in those relatively few categories of cases in which Justice Souter would have been expected to vote on the pro-business side.

Photo by The White House.

In Government, Legal, Small Biz | 1 Comment

June 15, 2009 by Angela Shupe | 0 Comments

MyCentralJersey.com:

Giving birth to four children within seven years did not dampen Michelle Mackie’s love of working with hair.

“About 13 years ago, I started to work out of my home, doing the hair of family and friends so I could keep my skills up and raise my young children,” Mackie said.

Even before that, Mackie, 42, had years of experience at salons in Central Jersey after earning her certificate from the Hair Fashion Institute in North Plainfield.

Finally, after looking more than a year for a place to open a salon, Mackie found her ideal location.

Michelle’s Salon of Style & Serenity occupies a home on well-traveled Washington Avenue. Prior to the salon opening there, the house was used to operate a chiropractic practice.

“It’s perfect because it’s separate from the other businesses, has its own parking space and gives a homey feeling,” said Mimi Olsen, the salon’s receptionist and bookkeeper.

Photo by didbygraham

In Mompreneur, News, Success | 0 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Angela Shupe | 0 Comments

eMediaWire:

Men make up 82% of the recession’s job losses, which means countless women are out there looking for work to make up for the lost paycheck. The problem is it’s almost impossible to find a job right now, so for many women their only hope is to get a home-based business up and running as quickly as possible. The internet provides these women with endless options and increased flexibility.

Kim DeYoung, an entrepreneur, business coach and the founder of Metromom.com, believes that having a website is now a necessity for every entrepreneur – even the mom working part-time in her basement. She is passionate about providing women with tools and training to make the extra money they desperately need.

DeYoung found herself in the same situation as thousands of other women when her husband was laid-off five months ago. She took a proactive stance and stepped up her commitment to her business and the various internet marketing options available to her.

Kim understands and explains the challenge facing work-at-home moms, “Most women I speak with are overwhelmed with the internet – they’ve heard about great tools like blogs, Twitter, Facebook, podcasts, and YouTube but don’t know where to start. They don’t want to waste time on things that won’t have a direct impact on their bottom line.” Due to the monumentally increased financial pressure on moms, these women need help figuring out how to use the internet to generate an income quickly.

Screenshot from the Metromom Online Success Summit

In Internet, Mompreneur, PR | 0 Comments

June 15, 2009 by Angela Shupe | 3 Comments

The plus sized market is a growing one, especially among children. While we, as parents, want our children to be healthy, it is impossible to ignore their needs. They need age appropriate clothing.

As a former plus sized kid, I was intrigued by RealKidz. Merrill Guerra has gone after the underserved above average market in childrens clothing and created an option that so many parents have not had for their kids before now. Furthermore, she has taken her unique approach and turned it into a direct sales opportunity.

Tell us a little about RealKidz.

RealKidz, Inc. is a direct sales party planning company that provides age appropriate clothing for 5-12 year old above average and average sized girls, soon to be coupled with an online social network for the families of these children to help them support their daughters and make healthy lifestyle choices for their families.

Our Mission:

To enhance children’s self esteem by providing them with clothing they look good in and are excited to wear and by providing their families with the support and encouragement to incorporate healthy lifestyle choices into their daily lives.

Continue reading Real Clothing Sizes For “RealKidz”

In Biz Ops, Clothing, Direct Sales, Interviews, Kids | 3 Comments