Working from home has become so popular that today thousands of companies are selling businesses-in-a-box type opportunities. Usually sold through television infomercials, magazine ads, or seminars attended by tens of thousands a week, these businesses generally are easy to understand and explain and place a premium on your ability to sell a product or service. Popular ones include 900 numbers, personalized children's books, scholarship matching, various services employing voice mail,and bi-monthly mortgage payments. However, others are actually in established fields or actual careers such as medical billing, and some may involve months of training.
So while some business opportunities are of legitimate value, many of those sold through ads demand that you proceed with caution if you don't want to be disappointed. Eighty-five to ninety percent of what is advertised has no business value. Typically they're cheaply produced booklets eight to ten pages long containing little information of real value. Business opportunities sold through seminars may pump you up and create group feeding frenzies with $50,000 changing hands in minutes.
Business opportunities are not franchises. Although they may promise the buyer will make money from the business activity, they usually cost less, don't require payment of ongoing fees, and offer far less training, legal protection, and use of exclusive trademarks and procedures for operating the business.
Because the price is generally under $500, buying a business opportunity can be an economical way to get a business. You can think of the investment as similar to one you would make in buying an expensive workbook or training program. However, we offer several cautions. Just as with a business you would start from scratch, make sure a business that sounds simple and easy is also one you will enjoy doing. Chances are good that much more hard work is involved than you might imagine or are led to believe. Few businesses prosper just by placing ads in newspapers and magazines. And because business opportunities are being sold by the thousands each week, you can expect plenty of competition from other people offering the same product or service in your area. So chances are your ad will be alongside a number of others offering the same thing. Remember you're not buying a business, you're buying an opportunity.
States are increasingly passing laws that provide consumer protection for buyers of business opportunities, generally for those costing more than $500. These require vendors to register with the state and disclose information to prospective buyers. Alabama, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Virginia, and Washington already have laws regulating business opportunity vendors, and other states will be joining them as more and more people battle to keep their middle-class standard of living. It only makes sense that the more money and time you will be asked to invest in a business opportunity, the more you owe it to yourself to check out its validity.
Listing # 0160 |
