Welcome to Online Business Income!
Welcome to Online Business Income. The Internet has brought numerous opportunities for businesses and people to generate more income. At the same time, it has become a minefield in trying to identify legitimate businesses and scams. It may be because some people call such income, “passive income” but I don’t see anything passive about it. You have to work hard to earn it. It is not like putting money in the bank and receiving interest. This may be the reason that many people become victims of scams because of the perception that online income is passive and you have little or nothing to do to get it. In other words, no active involvement in the business!
This site showcases and reviews online business OPPORTUNITIES THAT ARE UNIQUE and provide genuine opportunities for people to earn income online.
However before being able to to spot legitimate business opportunities online, it is important to be able to spot scams because if you can select the bad eggs out of the lot, all you are left with are the good ones. So, letting people understand how to spot genuine opportunities will help them to avoid scams.
How to spot online business scam
Business opportunity scams are prevalent, especially online. In the US, it is reported that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has investigated a lot of these schemes and during the past 6 years the FTC has taken actions against 200 of these schemes. The FTC estimates that losses resulting from these scams are $200 billion per year. This is conservative estimate. The losses suffered by investors are estimated to be an average of between $5,000 and $10,000. This is a huge amount!
There are ways to check whether an online business opportunity is genuine or scam.
Doing research using search engines such as Google, Yahoo, Bing etc.
With the widespread use of the Internet, It has become helpful to check the legitimacy of any business online before doing anything with them. The Better Business Bureau (BBB) suggests checking for the following:
- The links of the business – This can be the starting point by using their social media icons to check their links and pages. An example is a Facebook page that is www.facebook.com instead of facebook.com/business name. Also, the social media page will show whether they are active or not and whether there are negative comments by others. These are signs that there might be something wrong.
- Privacy policy – By law, Internet businesses in some countries are required to have privacy policy. This policy should state what personal information is collected, what they intend to do with the information and how such information will be protected. I think if a business fails to comply with the law, it is an indication that there is something wrong.
- Checking the business address – With Google and Apple maps, a business address can easily be verified. If a business does not have a business address, this is an early warning that there is something wrong.
- Bizarre claims – What is very common these days is what is called influence marketing where a person of influence in that segment of the market is used. Also it is important to check endorsements by well known companies and business people to ensure that they are real or whether the business is using them as a cover up.
- Images and grammatical errors – If there are improperly sized images on the site or a lot of misspellings and incorrect sentences, this may be a sign that the site is a scam. Spelling mistakes and wrong sentences are inevitable but where these are too many, care should be taken to find out more before committing yourself.
Reviews, testimonials and complaints
The emergence of reviews have made doing business online easier than it would have been. There are many sites devoted to reviews, like this one and also individual reviews. This is one of the first places to go before deciding to join any online venture.
Online business opportunity too good to be true?
One of the main reasons, if not the main reason, that people do not take time to evaluate an online business opportunity is the lure of quick easy money. This is a very powerful technique that many scammers employ because they know that people are vulnerable to the promise of making a lot of money with little or no effort. After all who does not want to be a millionaire cruising around the world while the money keeps falling like the Biblical manner from Heaven!
In reality, that is not how things work. The idea of seed and harvest is a natural law. You have to sow before you reap! People may win the lottery or luckily and miraculous make money from one deal, but these do not happen all the time.
References
Better Business Bureau, (2015). How to Spot a Fake Online Business.[online] Available at: https://www.bbb.org/sacramento/news-events/consumer-tips/2015/07/how-to-spot-a-fake-online-business/ [Accessed 11 Nov. 2017].
Missouri Business Development Program, (2014). Business scams. [online] Available at:https://missouribusiness.net/article/business-scams/[Accessed 11 Nov. 2017].