Whether you are brand new to network marketing and want to start your own home business, or you are already involved in a company and you are looking for another home business opportunity, you will do some research. And of course you want to avoid scams.

A real scam is a fraudulent scheme designed for making a quick profit, and a fraud is a breach of confidence perpetrated for profit or to gain some unfair advantage. You also have the pyramid schemes that are illegal because there is no product or service offered, but only the exchange of money to be part of an organization. For sure there is a lot of garbage on the internet, and this is really critical to do some serious research before joining any business opportunity. And it is important to keep in mind that there are scams that do look like perfectly legitimate business opportunities, and on the contrary there are opportunities that seem to be scams but are actually legitimate opportunities, and that is exactly why you need to be careful.

What happens when you search the internet is that you find a whole bunch of ads, videos, articles reviewing opportunities, and people who say they have been scammed and are telling their story. You did your research seriously, you found a company that looks perfectly legitimate, and one day you stumble upon one of those ads or websites where a guy is telling you that such company is a scam and that you should stay away, and you end up totally confused.

There are 2 important points here:
- first, you need to recognize that anyone can write anything online, and that just because something is on the internet does not mean it’s true. There are even websites posing as consumer-helpful resources that are anti-home business to such an extent as to render any information on the site useless. There are much better ways to find more objective information from reliable sources, starting with the company’s own website.

- then, it is a very common tactic on the internet to promote a business opportunity by discrediting other ones, especially if these are good ones. You will often stumble upon an ad where someone is telling you that such company is a scam and that you should look at HIS business opportunity instead because HE is the one who has found the real deal. This is especially true of successful network marketing company, because as they are perfectly legitimate and successful, they tend to attract network marketers, and people in competing companies will do their best to discredit the company in order to attract people to them.

You should NEVER trust someone who is discrediting a business opportunity just to pitch his own. Why? Because it is someone who lacks ethics, and ethics is important if you want to be successful in business in the long run. Then, would you buy a product because the advertiser is telling you that his competitor’s product is not good, or would you buy it because he can show you what is in it for you?

The point is that these techniques actually happen to work pretty well because those people are playing on our emotions, as nobody likes to be scammed and have his dreams crushed, and it does work because people are driven by their emotions more than anything else.

The best thing to do when you want to avoid scams is to do your own research and not rely on misleading comments or judgments made by people you actually don’t know. They might as well make you miss the opportunity of a lifetime.

More about scams and legitimate business opportunities:
” I Got Scammed” .
Legitimate Home Business Opportunities: What You Should Know .

When you want to start your own home business, you are looking for a legitimate home business opportunity, and you must be able to make the difference between different internet business models. The choices for a work from home business in today’s home business industry are almost unlimited. There are two different categories of home businesses: you can decide to start your own business offering your own product or service to consumers, or you can become an independent distributor or affiliate for an existing product or service. In this article I will focus on the second category, as this is the most chosen by people who start in the home business industry.

The home business industry can allow ordinary people to match or even exceed the earnings of executives and CEO’s of corporate America. Choosing the right business or company can propel you to a five or six figure yearly income, regardless of your educational background or your previous experiences. It gives motivated people the opportunity to start and build a business on a small budget, and to then go on to earn a significant income.

It can also be the playground for many deceptive businesses, so it is important to know how to tell the difference.

First I want to address the issue of “pyramid schemes” and how to spot one, because they are not legitimate businesses, they are scams and you should avoid them. An illegal pyramid scheme is a situation where there is no product or service offered, only the exchange of money. It’s a situation where you are encouraged to join an organization for a certain amount of money, and the promise is that your “investment” will grow to several times that amount. You don’t buy a product, you don’t sell a product, you simply find other people who agree to pay the same amount to join the organization. Sometimes these programs are called “gifting” programs…just “people helping people.” It’s still an illegal pyramid scheme and not a legitimate business. So the first thing you want to look at is if there is a product or service offered. If not, stay away.

Then, there are the multi-level marketing (MLM) companies, who offer a legitimate home business opportunity, and who use network marketing as a distribution model. Network marketing is often the distribution method of choice for companies with unique and high-quality products. This is a person-to-person method of distribution that allows for more product information to be given to the consumer than what could be accomplished by selling the product through retail stores.

Before starting a home business in the MLM industry in 2009, however, you should keep this in mind: first, the attrition level facing MLM’ers is very high. 97% of people in this industry are still failing to make money. And  people get started in your team but drop out within the first 90 days, all the more so as the initial investment is often so low that people don’t loose much money by quitting. Then, the old-school methods of prospecting (buying leads, doing surveys, handing out flyers, cold calling, chasing friends & family) are far from attractive and most of the time will not bring you any results. You can be very successful in MLM, but if you really want to succeed in an MLM business, you’ll need to have access to a very good training and a marketing system that will enable you to generate leads, brand yourself and attract people to you.

Eventually, there is what is called GPT (stands for Get Paid Today). This model gives serious entrepreneurs the opportunity to quickly achieve 5 to 6 figure incomes. Most of your commissions are paid upfront by the company, and you also have the opportunity to earn a substantial residual income from your team. The initial investment varies from a few hundred dollars to several thousands, and entrepreneurs who join at the higher levels of investment are less likely to quit because of their investment. Now, if they do quit it isn’t such a big deal for you because you have been paid your commissions upfront. This commission structure tends to attract more committed entrepreneurs than the MLM model. You also have access to a turnkey marketing system that eliminates or highly reduces cold calling, selling, pitching, as well as a complete training and support system you can depend upon to actually train you on how to market and leverage the internet.

So, when you want to start your home business, make sure you do your due diligence. There are some awesome companies out there that meet and exceed all the principles above, but there are also plenty that don’t. If you do your research then you can find the company that suits you and have the success and the lifestyle you are looking for.