Budgeting - The Poor Mans Way: Part1 - Prioritising Your Spending

Over the course of a few Blog posts I hope to discuss with fellow teenagers, students and other folk alike, about the topic of budgeting. It is something that the best of us have to do, whether it be monthly bills, taxes, the food shopping or holiday planning, it something that we will all come across. Many think of it as a chore, but to really get the best result you have to be patient and enjoy it, as well as being productive and methodical.

Now if you haven't got a very mathematical brain, like many others, yo should not be put off by this post, or anything to do with your finances. It is the core of anything in life, as unfortunate as it is to say, and you must understand it and embrace if you are going to succeed.

Please note as well I am aiming these articles on people who are at school or at university, and have other people who support them as much as they need to support themselves, but there is plenty in these to use and implement into your lives, whatever your situation.

The important thing to think about is the fact that you can only spend as much money as you have. For example, you receive a termly student loan payment of £1000. You only have that much money to spend. Just because your overall loan is £3000, it doesn't mean you can spend it all at once. This is something which will catch everybody out and has caught me out too on more than one occasion.

The best place to start with sorting out your budgeting is to take out all the monthly payments and termly payments, such as your accommodation  rent, phone bills etc. that you know you will spend. Once you have done this, you have a ball part figure of how much you have to spend. Now in this you need to find money for all of your other bits and pieces, including food, clothes, going out, presents, holidays, train and bus fares to list but a few. The worrying thing can often be how little money you have.

The next bit is about making sure you can afford everything, no matter how little money you have. You need to prioritise the expenditure that you have. So is that extra night out a week really affordable? Can you really use the posh shampoo in as much quantities as you do or should you settle for the own-brand and use in small amounts? Can you afford to buy a Subway every day for your lunch or would it be cheaper to buy in the ingredients and make yourself up some sandwiches? Is that weekend away to the lake district really worth it, baring in mind the cost of the hotel, travel prices and food when you are there, not to mention the drinking that might take place?

I will show you my 'tree' of spending and you can see an example of this prioritisation of expenditure in action.

Starting at the bottom is all my monthly payments:   

-Phone Bill

-Accommodation

++

-Food

-Petrol Money

++

-Bought lunches

-Drinks out

++

In amongst this I run and maintain a classic car, and this is what I spend my extra money on, like a hobby, as you may spend your extra money on online gaming. This is the last priority and often the thing that I do on the night before pay day is doing a bit of online shopping for a new set of hub caps or some new seat trims, so that I know I will definitely have the money to spend, and it also acts a reward almost for budgetting well that month. I know if I have no money left to spend then I have gone wrong somewhere and feel a tiny bit guilt for that week of have coke in the fridge to drink when I got in, because it was on offer in the Co-op. I didn't really need it and in the end spent about £20 more than I should have done that month which meant that I didn't have the money at the end of the month to buy what I wanted to buy for my car.

And it is that line of thinking which should be at the core of what you are budgetting for. How important are all of my expenditures, and if so, which of my monthly expenditures are neccessary or not. For example, if the shop is only a 5 minute walk away, do I really need to drive, spend about £10 a month more in petrol, or can I use that money to spend on a night out, so for 2 MacDonalds lunches a month?

You should be constantly evaluating how important that handing over of cash is, whether you really need a £4 meal deal on your break at work or whether some toast and a glass of water would be ok, from the out of date cupboard in the canteen, which is then free, not a nice granted, but just as good and probably a little more healthy.

We will go into more detail about food and things in the next part, I hope this has been useful to you and I hope that you have many successes with your financial planning.

Thanks for reading.

Follow me on twitter: @peachy146

                                                                                          

Spotting Business Opportunites

One of the many reasons why people are unsuccessful  and it is something that I have harped on about before, is that people become blinkered to their idea and sooner or later it will fall and they will have to find something else. We live in a world where everything changes and develops at such a speed. Sometimes new things have been developed before the old idea has even been realised.

This is something which we have to consider as businessmen too. I say businessmen in the fact that, no matter how big or small you are working on, you are showing and developing skills and mentalities of a business-lie manner and this is something which you have to be aware of. You may only be selling some kit-kats on the school playground but there are still a set of basic principals that you have to follow.

And this is one of them. You have to constantly self-assess yourself, your sales techniques, your products, and the wider market around you. For example, going back to the kit-kat example: It isn't going to be long before the kid over there gets the same idea and starts doing the same stuff as you. and then you have competition. And then you have to think about where you are going to head.

You have to decide whether you think you can move the idea you have onwards and upwards so you become a "market leader" of the playground, or whether you think there is money to be made elsewhere. Now persisting with 1 idea is hard work and not always 100% effective. Sometimes you just don't play your cards exactly right and everything goes down the pan.

My advice is when you get yourself into this position, you need to start thinking about something else. Always have 1 more idea in your mind, so you know there is always something to move to and somewhere to develop. This is a critical part of business. And this is where your 2 categories come in.

Let's take Peter Coates, my local butchers. They are currently in the 4th generation of the family business, about to hand down to the 5th. That is through the persistence and reputation in their area of expertise. The quality of their meat is very good, and the reliability of the sources that they get their meat from are also tremendous. Not only that, but everybody is aware they butchery their meat on their own on-site abattoir and this adds to their established reputation.

However, let's take Alan Sugar on the other hand. Started his life right when the world of audio technology was growing and booming, selling hi-fi equipment. He had that cavalier philosophy of ditching an idea and moving on as soon as he got any competition or opposition. and it was that that lead his busniess to grow, develop and become what it is today.

The difference between the two is the difference between persisting with one idea or moving between ideas and growing upwards all the time. The thing is that hi-fi equipment is not something which is highly skilled to make, it's not a craft like carpentry or stonemasonery, which is where butchery sits. So people are less worries about established reputation and more worried about price and value for money.

You can only make this decision, but my advice to anyone who is selling some bits and pieces small time, would be when it gets tougher, move on. I am not saying move from selling sweets to your mates to selling selling seed treatments to farmers, but just take the other fork at a crossing point.

Follow me on twitter: @peachy146

Wheelin' and Dealin' Part 2

So in part 1 we covered getting to grips with eBay. If you have come to this post first just go back and read part 1, just to gain some basic understanding of the point we are at. Here is a link: tomstopmoneytips.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/wheelin-and-dealin-part-1.html

We had established our bit of reputation. I talked about the importance of this reputation on the internet as this is how customers know they can trust you. a big thing in selling is trust. It is this which drives a person to buy anything. For example when Tesco announed the house meat in the burgers you can bet the sales of their beef and all meat products have fallen and have not yet recovered as it broke people's trust in them.

Now there isn't this word of mouth idea that happens in real life as does on the internet. You really have to advertise. But this is not important until you get a little further on. You have to understand there is a point at which you can't go any further unless you advertise and present yourself better but you can't do any advertising until you work out what direction you are going to take. This is still yet to be decided.

Now think about an area which you found sold well in and are interested in. Some area where you have a little bit of knowledge of prices is always good too. This will help no end with your buying with the aim to sell. Small, garage businesses have to start with a few tactics to outwin those better, more well-known people to gain the internet shoppers custom. It is a difficult market to open a stall at and sometimes the progression between clearing out some rubbish and buying products with the view to selling can be scary and dangerous. At this point you have several options but all of them revolve around you getting you hands on more stuff.


Now you have done reasonably well at selling some stuff second hand and have a vague idea of what people will buy old chess sets for, for example. So go to car boots, bric-a-brac sales and the like to try and get your hands on some more stuff at the same price. If you are shopping looks for similar items in multi packs or bulk buy offers which you think you might be able to make a mark-up on. Work it all out roughly in your head and don't forget to include things like postage and fuel into your calculations.

Don't expect massive profit margins at this stage either. It is just about establishing yourself and searching around for a products and a sales pitch that works right for you. And the more experience you gain and the more varied range of places you visit to try and get stock, the better you will get. Nothing is ever easy to start off with, and I can tell you it doesn't get any easier as you progress, but I can tell you persistence is key.

Going back to that trust idea, it is the most important part of selling online. If somebody can see you are trustworthy you have to make sure you are. So take care in the products you are sending. Think to yourself: "Would I want it to arrive looking like that?" or "Would I buy that over everything else?" Constant self-evaluation with mean that you can assess how well you are doing and look for ways to improve. Don't rot yourself too firmly in your ways, allow them to develop and flow. I know that sounds a very 'hipper' mentality to have, but trust me, you need to absorb the bumps with your knees to save your back from breaking.

Follow me on twitter: @peachy146

Wheelin’ and Dealin’ Part 1

This article is going to cover some theories behind buying and selling on the internet and how best to portray yourself as a small ‘garage’ business using sites such as Amazon and eBay as shop fronts.

I think the most fascinating thing about buying and selling on the internet is watching the patterns which emerge from people’s buying habits, and seeing how different little tricks can change what people buy.

The first issue everyone has to overcome when selling stuff on the internet is competition. I would say this is probably the biggest hurdle. And it is such a big issue because there are so many people doing the same thing. I am currently reading Alan sugar’s book, where he talks about going into the Hardware shops as a Salesman and offers his products. There isn’t the same way of working on the internet as there is in the real world. There is no human contact or traditional persuasive selling patter which can be used.

The internet has its own selling system and it mainly involves the user coming to find you, not the other way around which is the more difficult bit. What you also have to consider is not only is there lots and lots of things which people are selling but also lots and lots of things which people are buying. The range of stuff which you can find is so much more expansive than any shop you may find, no matter how big or small.

So we are in a situation with so much to choose from to start selling, limited funds, and so much competition. I know what you will be thinking now. How do I even start. My top tip here would be to clear out your loft, or under your bed. Have a good old sort through your junk and find a few items to sell. Maybe 4 or 5. Advertise them on eBay. I am not going to tell you how to sell on eBay, that is for other blogs or maybe a later post, but I will tell you the first items you sell will be the best indicator of where your selling path may go. You can really get a feel for what people snap up, what sells and what doesn’t, how the system of eBay works and also how best to market items.

You will find many extra tools on eBay, most of them designed to squeeze every last penny out of the profits you make so you have to be careful with this. Do the maths and make sure you aren’t making a loss. Work out what is effective and what isn’t. Also by selling a few items you will build up some reputation on eBay and people will be more inclined to buy from you.

Let’s all take our parents for example. I know mine are certainly the ones who won’t buy anything of Amazon unless it is fulfilled by Amazon and take extreme care on eBay. They may really want that china teapot somebody bought you for your birthday 6 years ago because it has a tiger on it, but if you don’t have a very good ‘reputation’ they will stay well clear. I could make or break most of your sales.

Even the tech savvy look at this when purchasing. I can’t stress to you the importance of it. And it is built up with you being reliable and professional from the very start.

Don’t miss part 2 of this article where we look at moving you little endeavour on from just clearing out the junk under your bad or in the top of your wardrobe.

Please follow me on twitter: @peachy146

Selling Virtual Stuff

The world of technology is filled with a sea of nerds battling it out for the prime position. They trawl through the internet looking for new ways to conquer and gain ground. At least that's how some people see it. And partly that's true. There are so many nerds who do stuff on ths internet its unreal. And I am one. Admittedly not a very good one, but thats not saying there isn't plenty to do.

Think about the things you do on the internet. YouTube,  social networking, looking though websites, playing games and using addons and stuff. There has to be a way all that is made right? And there has to be a way to do it and people who can't do it, right?

There are many forms of 'computer construction' and the builders are sought after folk. I know someone who is able to make complicated computer programs at a high level in a difficult language and he can make up to £2500 per job. People want taylor made stuff on the internet and that requires people to make it.

If you can learn a skill that people want to use you are quids in. For example, the most basic form of webpage construction, html webpages, can be bought for £50 a page. Now a 4 page website and it already starts racking up. Your challenge is to learn that skill so you can make money off it. You can make web templates for example,  java applets for browsers or games for people. There is so much potential for you in programming even at a reasonably basic level. Remember the better you are, the more you earn.

Another way of creating digital products is that of the stock photo industry. People use stock photos off royalty photo websites for websites and magasines etc to save on taking them themselves. This is a great way of monetising those ameture photography skills.

You can also create eMagasines and newsletters, which can be used as a portal for advertising revenue.

Blogging is another option going down the advertising route. See my article on blogging for more info on this.

I have touched before on writing your own articles and doing freelance writing as a way of generating a little extra dollar. This is very handy and accessible with websites such as eLance.

There is obviously plenty more ways to make money from little virtual products and lots more things you can make with a little bit of skill and a load of creativity.

Follow me on twitter: @peachy146

The Classic Schoolboy Salesman

So I am going to talk you through my best money making scheme at school and tell you what I learned in doing so. Learn from my experience. I got quite into it. I even had an internet payong system set up at 1 point!

So I noticed all the deals going on in the local paper shop and convenience store right by my bus stop. I thought: 'If these companies can sell stuff off so low, there must be a reason why they sell them normally so high.' So I went away and did the maths. It didn't take long. If you can sell 4 mars bars for £1 but sell them singularly for 63p, then something has gone astray. I worked out I could sell a mars bar for 50p, undercutting the shops and making a 100% cut for myself!

So there it started. I bought some and asked guys at school if they wanted to buy. They got snapped up quicker than I could manage and by the end of the week I could buy 4 or 5 packs and sell them all. With a £1 profit per pack this was pretty alright. But of course, little shops sell out fairly quickly. So I had to use a bit of imagination. I realised I couldn't keep the same brands on all the time. I would have to be resourceful.

So I had to look around. Maybe the haribo were on a buy one get one free, or maybe the cans of pop. This is where you should look. Anything that you might be able yo split up and sell. Let me tell you if your mates csn walk into the same shop and buy something for a cheaper price you have lost your sales. You need to hndercut the shops. And the only way to do that is to buy on offer and sell off the offer. Simple.

So I continued buying stock every day. Maybe £4-5 every morning! This was a real slog to get it all into my school bag. I also had to face the disapproval of mum and dad. So everything was bought and sold on the same day. Simple. Nothing went over the threshold of my own house.

It was tricky to do. It taught me a few great lessons. Number one. Being resourceful and creative. Number 2. Judging exactly right. You get to know what your customers want after a while. One of my friends could do kit kats for 40p. There was no way I could do that. So I didn't bother with them. And I knew that if I bought in some pepsi, one of my friends may snatch 4 or 5 cans,  so I could afford to get 2 6 pscks and would be able to sell almost all of them in a day. It was a great lesson to me, about what people wanted and didn't want. And about how people think about money and savings. If someone can buy 1 can for say 63p and 4 for £2, every mug will go for the 4 can option. Even though they may drink 4 in the same day as they would just 1, and therefore they have spent more money, they feel like they have got better value.

And that is how a large majority of people think. They buy in bulk because it is better value and not cheaper overall. The 63p can would have meant people spend £1.37 a day than if they bought 4. Just be aware of how people think about what they are spending and propagate your money tree.

Recently I've Been...

So me and my friend enjoy watching a certain YouTube gaming channel by the name of YogsCast. Some of you may have heard of them. Well if you haven't then you should have.

Every now and again we have a bit of a chat about it and get all too excited. This instance happened to be on a walk down to the local shop to get a drink. As it usually is to be honest with you. We were chatting and it inspired me to write a post about it. I have to say it is one of my real enjoyments, guiltily, to play Minecraft  A little 8 bit game, with no goals apart from to dig up dirt and other resources and build stuff out of it. It's that simple. But because it is that simple the possibilities are endless.

Now I am a mega-fan of the whole gaining wealth and dreaming about money. Subsequently these kind of games that involve building your riches really appeal to me. So Minecraft is a big tick. Now one of the other games which they have just started playing based on it's latest release is Sim City.

Now this game is amazing. In my personal opinion, I may go as far as to say the best game in the world! It just appeals to me so much. Now upon telling this to my other friend, not the one I went to the shop with, but a different one, he said the only the aliens and zombies are good in SimCity. That's to say he is no longer my friend (joking of course).

I disagree with that strongly. I don't really know what it is about it that I enjoy so much. I think it is the excitement of building such great wealth and power maybe? I really do feel the thrill as you start to imagine all the things you can do and build and buy and go absolutely mental with it.

That kind of thing really fires me up I suppose. Like the idea of a growing business empire. So there I have said it. I have told the internet. I am a materialist pig.

Apart from it's not the thought of what I could spend the money on. The lottery really doesn't fuss me. You could put £1 million in front of me and tell me to go and by myself I really nice house and car. Obviously I would take it and do it, but it would be nowhere near as exciting as if you said here is £1 million pounds. Go and turn it into 10. I think it is the creativity and thought which you have to put into little entrepreneurial things that are really exciting. It's almost as if it is the challenge of making money that is what is exciting.

Don't Spend It, Save It!

One of the most effective ways of making money is believe it or not, saving it. Just think about the amount of cash you may spend on grub from the tuck shop or the newest COD, and think about how much that all adds up to. Try putting the £2 a day you might spend in the shop on your way to school in a pot and see how quickly this adds up. Also think about all the unnecessary purchases. Music, games, stuff like that. You don't have to pay such a price for some things as well.

I am not saying you should just give up all your little luxuries that you buy with the money from delivering the local newspaper, but just think about what you are spending and try saving it in a jar or pot to see how much you really do spend. Trust me, the results are outstanding. You may be able to save up in 2 or 3 months to buy yourself a new x box, or an iPod, or a new Bike.

If you just have a little bit of sensibilty when thinking about each time you spend money, then you can save a packet! Also, cutting down on those sweets will make you a little bit healthier too, which could also be a little benifit! 

Remember, SAVE IT, DON'T SPEND IT!

Link shortening sites: Potential as a money making scheme?

Everybody on the internet is making money from just about anything that you can do on the internet. One of the popular ways which seems to be very popular is link shortening sites such as adf.ly and other similar sites.


There are many different variations on this subject. Adf.ly is currently the most popular and essentially, you register your link, and then get people to click on it and they show the viewer 5 seconds of adverts and then they can redirect to your actual link. The pay is around $5 for 1000 clicks, which to be honest with you is really not very good. If you think about it, you have to be pretty popular to get 1000 views to something. Obviously if you are linking to an internet app or an indie game or something which you have made yourself, and are giving it away for free, then you are making money off the people downloading your app. This I think is a really good way of creating a win win situation for the creator and the consumer, as the creator gets paid for his work, while to consumer doesn't have to fork out money. The trouble is, the amount of recognition the creator gets for his work is peanuts, and doesn't really make it worth it. You have to feel sorry for the creator.


Another way which I have found is a website called DollarUpload.com, which is really quite good, as it pays you between $0.70 and $0.90 per download, which would be a better way to get paid for your downloads. This amount is just under the cost of a song or an app on the iTunes store for example, which getting paid that for your work is very good. Trouble is with this, is getting the views and hits to make the money worthwhile. You can spend days making an internet app or a song or a video or something similar, but if only 1 or 2 people download it you are only getting $1.50 or so for it, which is not a very good hourly rate. However this could be said for any venture of this nature, if you are creating it to generate money, which kind of evens it out.


The question is: Is it all that?


My answer is unless you have a significant amount of views per day, then no. Say you get about  100 downloads a week on a specific app or song or whatever, that is about $70 on DollorUpload, which does become a little worth it, but how are you going to get 100  downloads a week consistently. Lets face it, if you put something like that on the internet, interest in it will die off after a very short space of time, which means you will loose out very quickly. The whole issue with link sharing websites which offer you bags of gold in return for 1 little link is it isn't the money making scheme it is cracked up to be. By no means am I saying it isn't a good way of getting money, but it only is if you get large amounts of hits, which let's face it, this takes a lot of work and really good idea, which unfortunately every one of the 4 billion people who use the internet every day can't come up with a good idea and get it to make money, because it stops being a good idea unless it stands out from the crowd.


If you do choose to use these services, don't expect goldmines to come rushing through your front door the instant that you create the account. It takes a lot of time and a lot of effort and a lot or perseverance to see any kind of results.

Slicethepie.com: Get Paid for Listening and Reviewing Music

In my endless trawling through the internet for ways o make money, I have found many different claims of get rich quick schemes and many different people offering me services and items which cost to sign up for and don’t really offer that much in return. All they are essentially is somebody else trying to make money off other people trying to make money. Quite a logical and simple idea right?

One thing that has really caught my eye though is this service called slicethepie.com. Basically, you sign up, they ask you a few questions about yourself and your musical tastes and then you get presented with a screen with an mp3 music player and a text box. The instructions are simple, listen to the music, and write a report on it and after 45 seconds you can rate it between 1 and 10 and move on to the next.

It is not a simple as it may seem at first, you have to comment on a variety of musical elements including texture, harmony, melody and lyrics to be able to submit your review, but once you get the hang of using these keywords, it is relatively quick. The automated system which checks your review is also very clever in picking up whether your report accurately reflects your scoring too. This is the bit which I find most intriguing, as it is spot on.

Because of the way the website is designed, you don’t get to see any of the information which your are inputting, like the word count or the amount of keywords, which is good as this makes you add as many as possible. If, like me you have a basic understanding of music, this is really quite easy and also enjoyable, but I suggest you do some background reading on musical elements before you start this endeavour.

I really like the way you are rewarded for you work as well. It states you will earn between $0.05 and $0.20 for each review, depending on how much you write and how well written it is, so these are always good point to bear in mind. I have not yet got it into double figures yet, and get around $0.08 per review, but this is still good. In 30 mins, I racked up about $3, and I did this for a week and got myself about $12 in return. You can only withdraw money of $10 or more, which does mean you have to work for a substantial amount of time unfortunately, however there wards are well worth it.

This is definitely something to consider if you enjoy listening to new music and getting paid for doing just that. I find that it really is inspiring listening to new music and enjoying what people have to offer outside of the mainstream eye, and getting paid a little for it as well. It isn’t really hard graft and the rewards are very pleasing and I think fair for the amount of work that you do.

How to Make money from Article Writing

There are many ways to make money online. Many you can learn all about from websites and articles online, but there are some, the very best, which aren’t covered. Article writing falls into this. There are many people who make a fantastic living off article writing. Take me for example. I provide article writing services and such like, and make a perfectly comfortable living off it. I don’t need any other jobs to live the life I want to live. I also have an incredible passion for article writing and this makes my job even more worthwhile and enjoyable.

Many platforms allow you to start out article writing, some where you publish articles, others where you can submit proposals for people looking for something specific writing, whether that be for a website or a magazine or something. One of these very portals, where I started article writing, is squidoo.com. On this platform, you set up an account, and create a lens, which is essentially a page on which you place your article writing on. You can then choose if you want to put extra widgets and things on, including ad sense advertisings and affiliate links to Amazon and eBay, which sell products linked to your article.

The most important thing to remember when doing this is to have an interesting and creative style of article writing, yet also make sure your article writing is informative and flows well. For example, if you are writing a music review or instructions on how to take a photo, they both require a different style of article writing, so make sure that they suit the style you choose to use. To publicise your article, post a link on facebook or twitter, and be active on some forums which link to your niche, and publicise that way. Another really good way to get public notice for your article, is a free service called amplify, or you could even use Google Ad Words to get hits to your article.

If you would prefer to work on a more couture and bespoke environment, the best place for freelance writers to get work is eLance.com. This provides a service which connects clients and writers together and because of the volume of people using this site, there is always somebody for you. There is a great workroom interface and it is a really powerful tool to make money in article writing.

Setting up a Business on eBay

So you will arrive at this article with some intentions of having stuff to sell on the eBay store. This might be due to a clear out of the attic or garage, or you have a valuable item you would like to get rid of, or you may have arrived here by reading our article on yard sales, and feel you are ready to get stuck into setting up a business on eBay. Whatever, this article will guide you through how to sell on eBay and how to set up a business on eBay, along with other sites that you can use to sell your stuff.

With your items gathered, you will be able to analyse what sells well and what to put on at what prices. Now anything techy sells really well. There are loads of people wanting to pick up a bargain on iPods or cell phones or old TV monitors and even assorted cable spaghetti. Other things which sell well are watches and jewellery, along with toys and games. While these sell best, pretty much anything that you would buy second hand will sell on eBay, because the target audience is so big that the chances of people viewing a certain item each day are high enough for everything to be covered and craved on the eBay store.

While that sounded very nerdy and mathematical, essentially you have a good chance with anything, just a better chance with some things than others. For example, I tried to sell a clarinet reed on eBay just to see what happened, and I didn’t sell. Not a big enough audience wanting clarinet reeds because half the population don’t even know what 1 is, let alone have a use for it!

So with your selection of items sorted, you now have the tedious task of putting everything up. First I would advise that you take a photo of everything you need to sell. A good photo means a good sale essentially, and no photo means no sale. Or there about. So get a clean piece of white or black paper (white is better because it is happier and more inviting) and slope it against a wall on a table or something so you have a nice homemade studio. Now you don’t need a fancy camera for fancy photos, it is all about the light and the background. With background sorted, make sure there is plenty of natural light and place your desired selling object in a reasonably artist manor if you can manage it, and snap away until you get a photo which looks nice. I really enjoy this process and take ages over it, but if it isn’t your thing don’t make it last too long, however this is paramount to your eBay lot’s success.

Next you need to create an eBay account if you haven’t already done so and go to the sell an item under the sell tab. I also advise at this point you set up a PayPal account if you haven’t done this either, as this will help to maximise your sale chances further. The Listing Creation form is very intuitive and just requires a little knowledge around the bidding price area. With the start bidding price, it is free to list if you start at 99 cents or less, however you may want more for your item, so you have to weight up the risks and the value of the item.

The one thing I would say is don’t go to high, but don’t go to low either. Think about how much you would want for it, then how much you would pay for the item if you were going for a bargain and take of about 10%. That is the golden rule really. Also if you have purchased the item previously with the intent of selling on eBay, then you need to make sure you know how much you paid for it in the first place to avoid loosing money.

Another handy tip is to look around and see what the same item is going for on other listings on eBay. Remember people buying on eBay go for a bargain, not to splash out lots or else they would buy the item brand new, so this is important to consider as well. Make sure you are well clued about cost and type of delivery too, or else you could end up losing money by posting it for more than you bargained for.

While this may seem a lot of information to take in at once, they are small things that you need to think about to get that perfect sale. If you are considering buying on eBay as well with the hope of reselling, look out for things which you could split or join together for more money, or collectable items which you know a lot about that are going for a bargain. It might then be worth taking these to a specialist website or dealer for the chance of a better return.

While this article largely covers eBay, there is also the option of selling on Amazon and Play.com which would be more useful for books and CDs and DVDs, as these websites, especially the latter, specialise in these items and therefore getting specialist traffic to them. You just refine your target audience by doing this. Another website to look at is online classified ad directory, Loot.com, but expect more content about these websites at a later stage.

Make a bomb on Web Businesses

Making money is all about making the most of your skills. One way I did this was by making websites. If you know how to code websites from scratch using html and php, or even just have a basic understanding of Dreamweaver, or a similar website package, and an idea which could prove successful, then you could be in with the chance of making money yourself. This may seem a daunting task, but it is the perfect way to create some extra revenue and there are many people out there who would be willing to buy it off you.

All you need is to be able to use a basic program, and a good solid business idea. Easy, right? Although it sounds it, I should warn you of some major pitfalls of this adventure. While it requires outgoing cost to start off with, it is a risky business and needs a good head and a good eye. You need to be able to time your site right as to when to sell it, and know what sites sell well.

When I say it needs no outgoing costs, I am lying a little bit. The user will want to buy the website complete with a domain name and in most cases a web hosting package. This means you need to make sure your domain name for your chosen website is available and ready to go before you put in a whole load of hard work and realise that somebody has already created a business which you are trying to sell to somebody.

People also like to see, if you are going to sell at the higher end of the market, a set of domain names which relate to the name of the site in your possession which they can save so nobody can copy their site. If you don’t understand then an example is Google. They own thousands of other web domains so that nobody can get even close to them. They even own the web domain googlesucks.com!

Next on the list in the internet business purpose. If you try and sell somebody an online store selling cakes and cookies, it will never sell, as somebody would have to make to goods to sell. What I am trying to show you is that the best subject matter for an online business which you are going to sell is always something which is virtual, like a service or a blog, or even something like a program store or a domain store.

The reason why making websites to sell on to other people is such a good money maker is because they sell for lots of money, and this is because people buy the whole package, as I have said before. Now I will explain this in a bit more detail. As you would when you buy a business in real life, an internet business has it’s own corporate identity and it’s own logos and marketing service as well, which would have to be produced to sell with the website.

The other really important thing that surrounds a business is popularity and on the world wide web this is measures in page hits. I would strongly advise, spend a couple of months developing your website and getting it to function as a business before you even attempt to sell it because the thing which will make it sell is an already established customer base, because this means an already established source of income. Everybody knows the hardest thing in the business process is setting it up and people are lazy. The more established it is, the more it will sell for, and the more worth it is for the hard work you have put into it. It is like investing: you have to wait for results. My motto in business, which I have learnt, often the hard way, is that patience is a virtue. And that really is all there is to it.

I have also written an article about making website templates to sell, which is less complicated, but a smaller return than selling web businesses, so please check that out if you like the idea of creating an income from your skills in web design. Thank you for reading and I hope this has been of help. For any further questions please contact me at peachy146@gmail.com.

Get paid to do stuff

This is as simple as it sounds. You do stuff, people pay you. Simple right? However I know there will be a lot of people going, 'I haven't got any skills that I can use to make money.' Wrong. There are always people wanting something, with the sheer amount of people and complexity of the human being it is impossible to suggest that there isn't something which you can offer soebody that nobody wants. There are so many different things that you can do to help people out. 

So your a maths genius, or a history geek. Great but what good is that knowledge doing in your head (apart from passing your exams and getting you somewhere in life, I admit that's a point). But it could be making you money. You could offer tuition in a subject for say £10 an hour, once a week and there you go, £10 of profit for you. I have an article about revenue and profit, but essentially, all the money you make on this is yours to keep because you are not paying anything to start off with. 

There are many other things which you could "teach" as well. For example, musical tuition is always a winner, people are willing to pay about £10 for a 30 minute lesson with music, and if you have the skills, then it is really easy money. I do 2 lesson a week at £8 each. So I get £16 for doing what I am good at, and what I love as well. One of my friends teaches piano for £10 a lesson. I also know somebody who charges £15 for an hours tuition of maths, to somebody who is in her class, but is struggling a bit. And she gets a box of chocolate when the student does well on an exam as a thank you. for me a free box of chocolate is enough of a bribe for anything!

There are also other things you can do, if your sat there thinking I don't really like school or work, and I am not very good at it either. Write a note saying you will wash people's cars every couple of weeks for a fiver, or mow lawns in the summer. Anything which you think is a chore, people would be willing to pay a reasonable price for somebody doing it for them. Humans are lazy, take advantage of it.

Another thing to remember when thinking about this, if your writing a note to put through people's doors or just in conversation with your neighbours, is that if you mention you are saving up for something relevant and educational, or something that will enrich you in your growing up, like a new cricket bat or a new violin, or whatever it might be, people are more than willing to part with the money out of their pockets. make sure you always add this is as it will win over anybody with enough of a leaning! I am not saying lie, but twist the truth if you have to. Obviously there is a point at which this wears off, and that is usually when you leave school and move onto university or a proper job, so do bare this in mind!

This article was just to open your mind about the possibilities of what could happen if you put your mind to it. I am not saying that you will think in your head you will do some lawn mowing, and then you will get about 16 people knocking on your door 15 minutes later asking for your service, but with a little bit of work, some free time and some hard work you can make a decent amount of money from this and remember it is all profit for you so you are quids in whatever you charge.

Thanks for reading! If you have any questions, then please email me at peachy146@ gmail.com.

The Money Tips Index - Updated 02/03/2012

1. Get paid to do stuff: Click here

2. Make a Bomb on Web Businesses: Click Here

Jargon Busting - Revenue and Profit

First of all I would like to clear up a few keywords. There is lots of jargon that comes with business and it's quintessential that you understand what everything means, so you can translate it back into English and use the information it comes with usefully.

The first is the difference between revenue and profit.

Now they both concern making money, but they are slightly different. Revenue is the total money which is made from a sale, while to profit is the money which is made on top of all the original payments for purchasing, manufacturing etc. For example, lets say we have just sold a bar of chocolate to somebody. Say we bought it for 30p a unit for a wholesale market and have sold it on at 50p a unit. That is a total revenue of 50p, as that is the amount of money that we have taken for that sale. OK. We had a chocolate bar, now we have a 50p coin. However we paid 30p for that originally, so not all of it is profit, so we do seller price - the bought price: 50p - 30p, and we get 20p. This is the amount of money we have made from selling the item, so that is the profit. This is one of the most simple, yet fundamental concepts which we have to understand in business, as everything requires us to be making a profit, but we can only be making a profit once all of our expenditure costs have been covered.

To break even, as it termed as, where you balance the amount you paid for a unit to the price you sell it for, we would have had to have sold the chocolate bar for 30p. we have not lost any money on the sale, and we have not made any either.

This is an important point to consider when choosing a process of making money, or when pricing up items which are to be sold. I would suggest, think of how much money you would like to make off the sale and add that onto the initial item cost, and how much you would pay for it, and then find somewhere in between. A standard guide is a mark-up price (mark-up is the price which the item is sold at) of 125% - 150% of the purchasing and manufacturing costs, but we will go into a lot more detail at some stage in the future.

So we have covered the basic principals of what this all boils down to. Making Money. I hope this has cleared the waters, rather than disturbed the silt. 

Thank you for reading. For any furthr questions please email me at peachy146@gmail.com.