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No Money to Start a Business? No Problem

You might be limited to a strict budget when you want to start a business, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have any options. It is possible to start a business with very little money, if you have the right combination of skills, work ethic and marketing know-how.

According to Chris Guillebeau, author of The $100 Startup, “To succeed in a business project, especially one you’re excited about, it helps to think carefully about all the skills you have that could be helpful to others and particularly about the combination of those skills.”

Follow these simple guidelines to start a business when you have little to no money. Learn how to make money today.

1. Make something.

Yes, making something does take an initial cost in supplies, but oftentimes, these products can be sold for many times over their actual cost. What you decide to make is up to you, but there are several places you can sell your handmade options online:

Abe’s Market deals in natural and organic goods, such as lotions, candles, granola, and more.
Etsy is one of the largest online markets for almost anything homemade, from jewelry to wooden toys for kids. Bonanza is another growing handmade marketplace, similar to Etsy. According to PC World, it boasts over 10 million visits per month.

eBay is one of the biggest online ecommerce marketplaces in the world, and its streamlined store options, easy checkout through Paypal, and customizable listing options make it a great choice for selling items.
Many business owners sell their products on multiple platforms to get the most exposure possible. It is important, however, to make sure your inventory stays updated on all sites you have a storefront on. If you want to learn about more resources for selling homemade items, check out this Lifehacker post.

2. Resell something.

If you don’t want to make anything (or you don’t consider yourself a creative person), many business owners have grown large businesses just be reselling products that have already been made. This can be done through a variety of ways or channels:

Drop shipping: Set up an online store and partner with drop-shipping companies that will do all the order fulfillment for you. Online ecommerce platform Shopify has a great drop shipping guide, and Tim Ferriss does a good job of explaining drop shipping in his well-known book, The Four Hour Work Week.

Thrift stores and garage sales: If you know where to look, you can find items at thrift stores, antique shops, flea markets and garage sales and resell them online or in your local community for more than you purchased them for. One extremely successful example of this is Sophia Amoruso, the founder of Nasty Gal. Amoruso started buying and reselling vintage and unique fashion pieces on eBay, and her company has grown to a net income of $24 million in 2011 with over 200 employees. Her book, #GIRLBOSS, is in inspiring look into how she got started.

3. Sell your services.

One way to start a business with little to no startup capital is to sell your services, instead of a physical product. There’s a huge variety of services you can offer, depending on your background and interests.

Some will require advanced degrees, such as accounting, while others require little more than a working knowledge of how it’s done (such as babysitting, lawn mowing or personal assistance).

Because you are selling your services, you will need a branding plan to make sure your name and company gets in front of the people who may need the service. Some places that are free for promoting your services include Fiverr, Craigslist, Elance, Taskrabbit and Skillshare.

It’s also useful to have a website to show examples of your work, list your experience, and blog about your industry to draw visitors. If you want to learn more about branding and online marketing, check out Buffer’s social-media blog, Hubspot’s blog, Content Marketing Institute and CopyPress.

4. Barter to get what you need.

Unfortunately, it’s extremely hard to start a business without any type of funds at all. Even creating a freelance-writing business utilizing Elance and a free Wordpress or Wix website will still require a computer to work on as well as Internet. However, there are ways to get supplies you need for starting your business without money.

For instance, if you find yourself in need of a used laptop, try to barter for it. Build a new website for a used electronics supplier, or offer babysitting services to your neighbor for their old Macbook.

5. Utilize low-cost services.

As mentioned previously, you can use sites such as Fiverr or Elance to advertise your products and services on, but you can also use these platforms to build up your own company. For instance, many designers offer $5 to $25 logo designs (that come with free revisions). Sort by reviews and look at past examples to find a designer or service provider that matches your style.

This is a great way to get branding materials, printed items (Vistaprint and Zazzle are great places to buy personalized items), or other needed items without much cost. And for additional savings, be sure to look for coupon codes on sites such as RetailMeNot before checking out at any online retailer!

Starting a business requires ingenuity and a passion for what you are doing. Once you find yourself doing something you enjoy, you will be more likely to find ways to make it all come together.

source : entrepreneur.com

How to Transform Your Life in 6 Minutes a Day

Oh, you’re busy? Weird, I thought it was just me.

No matter where you are in life at this moment, there is at least one thing that you and I have in common: We want to improve our lives and ourselves. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with us, but as human beings we’re born with a desire to continuously grow and improve. I believe it’s within all of us. Yet most people wake up each day and life pretty much stays the same.

If success and fulfillment were measured on a scale of 1 to 10, it’s safe to say that everyone would want to live every aspect of their lives at a Level 10.

Here’s the catch: To create the Level 10 life that you ultimately want, you must first dedicate time each day to becoming a Level 10 person who is capable of creating and sustaining that level of success.

But who has time for that, right? Luckily, there is a method to do it in as little as six minutes a day.

Enter the life SAVERS, a sequence that combines the six most effective personal development practices known to man. While someone could invest hours on these practices, it only takes one minute for each -- or six minutes total -- to see extraordinary results.

Just imagine if the first six minutes of every morning began like this:

Related: Press Snooze? You Lose.

Minute 1: S is for silence.

Instead of hitting the snooze button, and then rushing through your day feeling stressed and overwhelmed, invest your first minute in sitting in purposeful silence. Sit quietly, calm and peaceful and breathe deeply. Maybe you meditate. Center yourself and create an optimum state of mind that will lead you effectively through the rest of your day.

Maybe you say a prayer of gratitude and appreciate the moment. As you sit in silence, you quiet your mind, relax your body and allow your stress to melt away. You develop a deeper sense of clarity, purpose, and direction.

Minute 2: A is for Affirmations.

Pull out and read your page of affirmations -- written statements that remind you of your unlimited potential, your most important goals and the actions you must take today to achieve them. Reading over reminders of how capable you really are motivates you. Looking over which actions you must take, re-energizes you to focus on doing what’s necessary today to takeyour life to the next level.

Minute 3. V is for visualization.

Close your eyes and visualize what it will look like and feel like when you reach your goals. Seeing your ideal vision increases your belief that it’s possible and your desire to make it a reality.

Minute 4. E is for exercise.

Stand up and move your body for 60 seconds, long enough to increase the flow of blood and oxygen to your brain. You could easily do a minute of jumping jacks, push-ups, or sit-ups. The point is that you raise your heart rate, generate energy and increase your ability to be alert and focused.

Minute 5. R is for reading.

Grab the self-help book you’re currently reading and read one page, maybe two. Learn a new idea, something you can incorporate into your day, which will improve your results at work or in your relationships. Discover something new that you can use to think better, feel better and live better.

Minute 6. S is for scribing.

Pull out your journal and take one minute to write down something you’re grateful for, something you’re proud of and the top one to three results that you’re committed to creating that day. In doing so, you create the clarity and motivation that you need to take action.

Start today.

How would you feel if that’s how you used the first six minutes of each day? How would the quality of your day -- and your life -- improve? We can all agree that investing a minimum of six minutes into becoming the person that we need to be to create the lives we truly want is not only reasonable. It’s an absolute must.

source : entrepreneur.com

About a year ago, I was waking up before dark every morning. I had a set of rituals that I knew would put me on course to the life of my dreams.

The only problem was -- and this was a big one -- I was chasing the wrong dream. At the time, I was working at being a life coach, and I was thinking that I would write novels once I retired. I actually wrote this to a friend in an email a year ago, that I would write novels when I retire, and not long after that, my coaching business circled the drain. Although I didn't appreciate it at the time, my prayers were being answered. The Universe always has our backs.

Cue the sound of a needle scratching a record. Is there anything you tell yourself you will do more of "when you retire"? If so, then there's a big chance you should be making more time for it NOW -- not some far off time that might never come.

There's no final resting place during this life when you're free to prance through a meadow. It's imperative we make sure to have fun now, along the way, or we waste the whole shooting match on boring obligations.

Here are the 10 Easy Steps to Making Your Dreams Come True -- today!

10 Easy Steps to Making Your Dreams Come True

1. What's your dream?

This is honestly the trickiest step. We complicate the heck out of it. We think, "What's my life's purpose?" and then we break out into a cold sweat.

Start with the easy stuff. What feels good to you? You don't need to decide everything right this instant, but just start collecting ideas for your life that make you feel excited and enthusiastic about the possibilities. Write some things down. Just keep some kind of simple record of what your dream for your life is.

Close your eyes and see what pictures emerge. Images that come to my mind are sunny nature scenes. I also like the idea of someone wrapped in a cozy sweater and sipping coffee while they smile at a laptop. (That's me right now.) I'm a writer, so I'm now committed to writing every day. One day I will own a beach house. That's about it!

2. Decide and believe.

Many of us will pick a delicious dream for ourselves and then immediately start pecking furiously at the edges with a list of ways it can't, won't, or shouldn't work out for us. Stop that!

If there's a word for both deciding and believing in one fell swoop, the word would be commitment. You have to commit to your dream. Don't just put it in a box and close the lid, never to see the light of day. You have to take it out and fondle it... every... day. Take it out, play with it, give it some air.

Decision + Belief = Commitment

Decide you want your dream to happen. For real. Believe it will and can happen. For real. This is the magic sauce that will help propel your dream into reality. If you don't decide and believe, and therefore commit, well then... as Henry Ford said, "Whether you think you can, or you think you can't -- you're right."

3. Release fear.

This next step isn't a one-time event. It's probably something you're going to have to do over and over, every time you notice you're stuck and you've stopped forward momentum.

We disguise fear under logistics all the time: "Oh, I don't have time to go after that dream, I need to make money!" Sure ya do. So get up earlier.

"Well then I don't have time!" Sure ya do. So get up earlier.

"But then I'll be exhausted!" Here's the thing. Last year, when I was getting up early, it was a bit of a battle. I was always feeling like it took heroics to drag my limp carcass out of bed that early.

It's all in the attitude. This go round, I decided it was going to be easy and exciting to get up early to write every day. I decided it's not going to be difficult. I decided to get the sleep I need, and not be so dramatic and sacrificial about getting up early.

Choose the right attitude. Release fear. Repeat.

4. Take action!

Eegads, finally, the part where we actually DO stuff.

Figure out what you need to DO to make your dream happen. Then go do it.

Every day.

To sum up step four, take action daily.

5. Love yourself.

It's really easy to lose the plot in the frenzy of daily living. Just slow down, pump the breaks, relax. Listen.

Take quiet time alone every day -- again, early morning if need be -- to reflect, read, write, and to hear yourself think. Give yourself the time and space to feel your feelings and organize your thoughts so that you may stay in touch with your own needs and desires for your life.

6. Use other's success as inspiration.

When you notice someone more fortunate, practice saying to yourself, "You know what? I want that, too! I'm going to figure out how and make it happen!"

If we want good things to happen to us, we have to stop judging others negatively for the good things they bring into their lives. Judging and criticizing others is such a silly energy drain. I will go out on a limb here and say that the majority of people who judge others negatively for their success don't realize they do it, or they don't realize there's anything wrong with doing it.

I saw a Facebook comment the other day that basically said all rich people are thieving, greedy liars and that all poor people are generous and would give you the shirt off their backs. Nonsense. NONSENSE. That's a waste of breath right there. Bill Gates has donated $26 BILLION to philanthropic causes. I would rather imagine all the good Bill's money is doing out there in the world than to take one second to consider accepting the smelly shirt off some guy's back.

Instead of being Judge-y McJudge Pants, use others as inspiration: see what you want, and figure out how to make it happen. When you paint everyone who is rich with one brush (bad) you are going to repel money like it's your job. Money isn't imbued with magical good or evil qualities. It's just money. It helps you live comfortably. Accept it without making bizarre value judgments.

7. View mistakes as lessons, not an excuse to give up.

This happened to me last year when my coaching business took a nosedive: I panicked, and then I gave up. Which was fine, because I realized that coaching wasn't my dream after all. When things didn't go well, I didn't think, "Just a bump in the road, let me fix this." Instead I thought about all the hours and days I'd spent on the administrative junk: the web pages I developed, the excruciating task of writing sales copy, and the PDFs I'd created, and I realized that this wasn't my dream. I hated that stuff.

I just like writing.

I didn't learn that lesson right away. Instead I spent lots of time saying, "Woe is me," and panicking about money, and panicking about finding work, and just generally spending all of my time panicking. In case that's not clear: I panicked.

It took me a really long time to simply view my mistakes as lessons. Instead, I did all the stuff I coached other people not to do. Like when you make a mistake, it's not a reflection on your character. It's just data about what you should do next.

Finally, after close to a year of panic followed by wallowing, I'm back!

8. Value tiny decisions.

The decision to get up early every morning is a momentous one. The tiny decisions happen every single day, when I look at the clock. Do I get up, or do I stay in bed?

Every little decision, everything single thing we do, matters.

Because what you do determines who you become. And who you become means either your success at achieving your dream or your failure. Choose wisely.

9. Don't let bad habits win.

It's so easy to blame our small lives, our tiny, chronic failures on our bad habits. We get sucked into the couch for TV marathons. We get sucked into pizza boxes and chip bags and some of us (ehem) even get into the habit (and then out of the habit and into the habit) of using beer or wine "to relax" when the going gets tough.

Then we spend all our precious energy on CRAP like trying to lose weight or break these bad habits. What you think about is what you get. If you spend all your time obsessing about your bad habits, your whole life is going to be a Sisyphean task of rolling the boulder up the hill while you resist, followed by getting steamrolled when you get tired and give in.

And yes, I'm speaking from experience. I say this with the utmost kindness and respect to both myself and to you: GET A LIFE. It's only when our habits stand in the way of the life of our dreams that we will be compelled to chuck the now-annoying habits to the curb. Dream big, take action, worry about your habits some other day, like when they prevent you from getting up early.

Oh, and see step 3: release fear. Usually our bad habits are nothing more than a tepid attempt at escaping fear, but then we've really gone down the rabbit hole INTO fear when we do things that are self-destructive as an escape. Release fear, don't try to numb it; it doesn't work that way.

10. Believe the Universe is friendly.

I'll leave you with this quote:

"And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it."

-- Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

In light of this quote, it's possible to boil this post down to three steps: 1. Dream big. 2. Act consistently. 3. Be amazed as the Universe conspires to help you achieve your dream.

source : huffingtonpost.com

How to Become a Millionaire by Age 30

Getting rich and becoming a millionaire is a taboo topic. Saying it can be done by the age of 30 seems like a fantasy. It shouldn’t be taboo and it is possible. At the age of 21, I got out of college, broke and in debt, and by the time I was 30, I was a millionaire. Here are the 10 steps that will guarantee you will become a millionaire by 30.

1. Follow the money.

In today’s economic environment you cannot save your way to millionaire status. The first step is to focus on increasing your income in increments and repeating that. My income was $3,000 a month and nine years later it was $20,000 a month. Start following the money and it will force you to control revenue and see opportunities.

2. Don’t show off -- show up!

I didn’t buy my first luxury watch or car until my businesses and investments were producing multiple secure flows of income. I was still driving a Toyota Camry when I had become a millionaire. Be known for your work ethic, not the trinkets that you buy.

3. Save to invest, don’t save to save.

The only reason to save money is to invest it. Put your saved money into secured, sacred (untouchable) accounts. Never use these accounts for anything, not even an emergency. This will force you to continue to follow step one (increase income). To this day, at least twice a year, I am broke because I always invest my surpluses into ventures I cannot access.

4. Avoid debt that doesn’t pay you.

Make it a rule that you never use debt that won’t make you money. I borrowed money for a car only because I knew it could increase my income. Rich people use debt to leverage investments and grow cash flows. Poor people use debt to buy things that make rich people richer.

5. Treat money like a jealous lover.

Millions wish for financial freedom, but only those that make it a priority have millions. To get rich and stay rich you will have to make it a priority. Money is like a jealous lover. Ignore it and it will ignore you, or worse, it will leave you for someone who makes it a priority.

6. Money doesn’t sleep.

Money doesn’t know about clocks, schedules or holidays, and you shouldn’t either. Money loves people that have a great work ethic. When I was 26 years old, I was in retail and the store I worked at closed at 7 p.m. Most times you could find me there at 11 p.m. making an extra sale. Never try to be the smartest or luckiest person -- just make sure you outwork everyone.

7. Poor makes no sense.

I have been poor, and it sucks. I have had just enough and that sucks almost as bad. Eliminate any and all ideas that being poor is somehow OK. Bill Gates has said, "If you’re born poor, it’s not your mistake. But if you die poor, it is your mistake."

8. Get a millionaire mentor.

Most of us were brought up middle class or poor and then hold ourselves to the limits and ideas of that group. I have been studying millionaires to duplicate what they did. Get your own personal millionaire mentor and study them. Most rich people are extremely generous with their knowledge and their resources.

9. Get your money to do the heavy lifting.

Investing is the Holy Grail in becoming a millionaire and you should make more money off your investments than your work. If you don’t have surplus money you won’t make investments. The second company I started required a $50,000 investment. That company has paid me back that $50,000 every month for the last 10 years. My third investment was in real estate, where I started with $350,000, a large part of my net worth at the time. I still own that property today and it continues to provide me with income. Investing is the only reason to do the other steps, and your money must work for you and do your heavy lifting.

10. Shoot for $10 million, not $1 million.

The single biggest financial mistake I’ve made was not thinking big enough. I encourage you to go for more than a million. There is no shortage of money on this planet, only a shortage of people thinking big enough.

Apply these 10 steps and they will make you rich. Steer clear of people that suggest your financial dreams are born of greed. Avoid get-rich-quick schemes, be ethical, never give up, and once you make it, be willing to help others get there too.

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