Tired of working for somebody else? Have the thought of your own work from home business crossed your mind? Well, then you have to do some serious thinking.

Work from home business success is the biggest dream for people all over the globe. The thought of being their own boss, schedule their own hours. To make the dream of owning their own business a reality.

Now,to be honest, not everyone is fit to be an entrepreneur. The rewards are tremendous, however, they will not come for free, the work you have to do before you can enjoy the rewards can be both long and hard.

The financial independence coming with a successful business, are great motivation when you search for options that can release you from your current situation. You have to temper the rush you get from the financial excitement. You must set your self up, so you're able to spend the necessary time, money and efforts, to succeed with your work at home opportunity.

One solution is to keep your current work at the side. That will give you the finances for the daily needs. If you have enough savings, you can realize you dreams without having another income at the side. Bear in mind though, your savings must be able to carry the costs for your business start up, along with you material needs.

You have to realize how much time you need to spend at you new work from home business. If you make the right choice, something you're passionate about, it might be that you have to be told when to spend time with your family. Before you get started, make a calculation if you have enough time for : Your new business, family and friends, your current job etc.

You need to keep in mind that you have to spend more time and efforts before your work from home business become profitable, than any other time in your business career. Sure, you will be busy once your business is up and running, but by then you're also able to reap the rewards. It's much harder to work when you don't see any immediate results.

This is the point where you have to bring out all your psychological strength, you do everything necessary for your work from home business success, but you can't see the results. Don't let this imaginary wall stop you.

If you're fit as an entrepreneur, you will look up on this as an obstacle to overcome, not as a dead end for your business. Your passion for your work at home opportunity, and your desire to work for yourself will help you come through.

If you're able to stay persistent through this phase, you'll be able to reach the rewards of your labors. You'll prove to yourself and others that the lifestyle coming with a successful work from home business is by far, superior to the never ending mind numbing 9 to 5 cycle.

It all boils down to that you're able to be your own boss. You make the calls of : what to do, what to wear, when to start, when to stop, when take a day off, when to take a vacation and so on.

There are a couple things to consider before taking advice that is found on money making message boards, it is important to research this advice to be sure that it will lead to earning more money. Many times the advice posted is not fact. There are a few things to consider when looking at money making message boards. The first is how realistic the advice is to a person. If the advice requires a person to invest a large quantity of money in order to start a business or invest in a start-up venture, it might not make any money, but may cost a person money instead.

The next item to consider is where the advice is coming from. There are many people who mean well, but they do not give advice that people can utilize. Take advice only from those who are experts in making money. Money making message boards can offer unique ways to make money that actually work, but it is important to make sure that those who are giving advice know what they are talking about. The third item to consider is the length of time that the advice has been on the message board and the responses it has received. Many times people can find out what will not earn a person more money by reading other postings from those who have taken advice or who have had other bad experiences.

The last item to consider when reading money making message boards is the amount of work that is involved in making extra money. If a person does not have a lot of time to start a new business or invest in an existing one, they should not pursue this advice. While money making message boards can be beneficial in many ways, people need to be aware of possible pitfalls along the way.

What is GAAP?

GAAP, or Generally Accepted Accounting Principles, refers to rules and parameters set by the Accounting Practices Board of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. GAAP also includes certain established ways of accounting, which may or may not have been set by any authority.

Aim of GAAP:

GAAP aims toward making the accounting procedure transparent and make it easier for investors and creditors to get information. Here are some of the goals of GAAP.

1) To make information available to investors and lenders so they can make sound decisions regarding loans and investments.

2) To make information available about resources, funds, and finances.

3) To help investors and lenders assess the viability of an investment or a loan.

Principles behind GAAP:

This section discusses some of the principles behind GAAP.

1) Historical Cost Principle: Companies should make financial statements based on costs related to acquisition of assets and not fair market value. This removes any confusion regarding value of liabilities.

2) Revenue Recognition Principle: The financial statement must state whether revenue is realized or earned.

3) Full Disclosure Principle: The extent of information disclosure is based on analysis of tradeoff.

4) Matching Principle: Expenses have to be proportionate to revenues.

GAAP Suppositions:

In order to make GAAP implementation effective, here are a few basic assumptions regarding the rules.

1) Going Concern Assumption: The business is long term.

2) Economic Entity Assumption: Business is an independent entity and has an identity different from its owner.

3) Monetary Unit Assumption: The monetary currency that is going to be used for recording financial statements will be the stable currency.

4) Periodic Reporting Assumption: Business operations are to be regularly reported, and there will be a regular gap between reports.

GAAP Limits:

GAAP puts some limits on financial reporting.

1) The advantages of financial reporting need to be considered along with cost of giving the information.

2) The procedures need to scrupulously follow GAAP practices.

3) Given two financial reports, the most accurate one should be selected.

In addition to the above principles and conventions, the financial statement needs to be relevant and reliable, since investors and lenders will make decisions based on it. The report should follow prescribed norms so that reports of different businesses can be compared. Reporting should be consistent, and the accounting method should not vary too much over time. GAAP helps financial reports achieve all of the above and prevents financial misrepresentation. If you need to know more about how to implement GAAP in your financial statements, you can consult small business professionals, who will help you draw up a financial report that implements the major GAAP norms.

What is Event Management?

Event management refers to methods of outsourcing business occasions, social occasions, or a combination of both. There is no limit to the business development ideas for an event management business. It is possible to organize every kind of event ranging from wedding to a political rally. An event management team can be retained for any type of business meeting.

500 Billion Dollar Industry:

Last 15 years have witnessed a tremendous growth in the field of event management. If we add the amount of money spent on event management all over the world in one year it comes to a whopping 500 billion dollars. Gone are the days when we could do with hiring only a small catering team that supplies the food for a business event. If you wish to make an impression on your potential clients today, hiring a meeting management company is a necessity.

Events of Any Range Can Be Managed:

If you wish to start an event management business and you are looking for business development ideas for it then you will be happy to know that you can start this business for any range. It is possible to manage an event for only a small group of people. On the other hand, you can manage mega events for five thousand people and more.

People prefer to choose an event management team that is known for its expertise in this field. When you plan an event, it not only consumes your valuable time but also produces much stress. Event management business owners have contacts in this field and they can offer you the best possible services at the most competitive prices.

Manage Accommodation and Entertainment:

As an event management business, when you organize an event involving five thousand people for a whole day, you should not assume that catering is the most difficult thing to manage. Accommodation and entertainment are also very important for managing such large events. You also require sufficient and efficient staff for the event. Moreover, you also have to plan about the size of the room, seating arrangements, and the total budget of the event. If you do not have enough expertise to deal with all of these factors, you may face difficulties in running event management business successfully.

External Factors Affecting Event Management Business:

Several external factors also affect the growth of the event management industry. Some of these factors are the rate of the growth of economy, lifestyle, and changing characteristics of the people living in the area. Tourism and branding activities like festivals and corporate activities such as conferences, product launches, award ceremonies, and gala dinners are under the scope of event management business. Key factors for the success of an event management business are reputation, network, service promotion, links with the suppliers, and high quality managerial skills.

Companies often seek cost-effective, high-return marketing strategies. They may be as close as your wallet or the business next door. Below are seven easy to apply strategies for virtually any business.

1. Business cards

Business cards are often one of the most underutilized tools in marketing. Use the front and back of your business card to gain full benefit. You can put valuable information on the back such as a sports schedule, emergency numbers, or special dates people want to remember.

Creatively distribute your card. When you eat out, leave one with the tip. If you borrow a library book, use one as a bookmark. Hand them to clerks in stores who may know other people who could use your product or service.

2. Send a picture

A great way to keep your name fresh in a customer’s mind is to send them a picture of when they purchased a product or service from you.

Put a picture of a buyer’s auto purchase in a beautiful calendar. Likely, the proud owner of the vehicle will display the calendar for the next 365 days.

For specialty gift shops, when a customer makes a substantial purchase, have a picture taken with the shop owner. Frame the picture and send it to the customer. Chances are very good the picture will be displayed proudly for friends and family to see.

A dentist who specializes in smile makeovers can easily arrange to have a professional makeup artist and photographer capture the patient’s beautiful new smile. No doubt the patient will be more than happy to show others their new look.

3. Associations

Associations relevant to your market are a great resource for marketing. There are associations specific to virtually any industry, job type or business. A quick web search will show you how many associations exist in your market.

Most organizations have the following opportunities that can help you to gain visibility and do some very effective marketing:

-Newsletters
-Internet listings
-Links to your website
-Discounted advertising rates
-Networking opportunities
-Business referral services
-Special recognition events
-Educational seminars
-Business and membership directories

4. Committee involvement

Committee involvement is a great way to give back to an association or community while building visibility for you and your business. In some cases, you may want to get involved in a committee where you have little experience or knowledge. This will give you an opportunity to stretch yourself and meet and network with individuals you may not have otherwise had the chance to meet.

5. Contests and drawings

Contests are a favorite for many businesses with high foot traffic, such as a restaurant. Contests are a great way to build your database quickly. You will generate very hot leads when you have a contest with people who have already frequented your place of business. The key to making this work is to do follow up with back-end marketing. Far too many businesses hold contests, get lots of names and do nothing with them.

You can advertise a contest to gain new foot traffic in your place of business. Be sure to check local ordinances for any restrictions on holding a contest.

6. Cross-promoting

Join with other companies who have products or services that compliment yours and promote each other. A landscaping company can cross-promote with an outdoor spa company. A real estate company could easily cross-promote with a mortgage lender. A hair salon with a tanning salon.

Cross-promoting can considerably cut down the cost of business promotion and allow each business to use promotion techniques that might be too costly to implement alone.

7. Bonuses

Secure special offers from various businesses who share a similar market. When a customer buys a minimum amount they would receive a bonus packet with various offers from the other vendors. This creates a win/win situation all the way around. The other vendors gain visibility, you have something extra to offer your customers and the customers get an incredible value for their purchase.

Marketing does not have to be expensive nor does it have to be mundane. The possibilities are merely limited by imagination and your willingness to implement them.

The UK’s Records Management Society defines records management as, “the process by which a company manages all the elements of records whether externally or internally generated and in any format or media type, from their inception/receipt, all the way through to their disposal”. In this digital age many organisations have set up comprehensive systems to ensure that electronic records are safely stored and backed up, with a plan in place should an unexpected crisis occur. This makes a great deal of sense since some estimates suggest that over 90% of businesses that have had a major data processing disaster will go out of business within 5 years.

These days most employees rely on electronic systems to do their job and lost or damaged files can spell disaster. However while IT systems are often carefully considered and any perceived emergencies planned for, paper records can frequently be neglected. It’s difficult to pinpoint why this is except to say that perhaps manual records are considered unimportant when compared to expensive IT systems. Perhaps it is also the case that the sheer physicality of a paper record makes people (wrongly) believe it is not as important to safeguard as a computer file that could more easily be destroyed or corrupted. But to take this viewpoint is ill advised and short sighted.

Many organisations are under a legal obligation to keep certain records for a specified period of time. For example, financial institutions are now required to keep mortgage loan files for up to ten years after the loan has been repaid. Some medical records must be stored throughout the life of the patient and government institutions are now required to keep certain records for up to 50 years. Companies pay a high price for inadequate record keeping. In January 2003 The Bank of Scotland was fined £1.25m for breaching anti-money laundering rules on the identification of customers because it had failed to retain a copy of customer ID or a record of where it was kept. Often there is a legal requirement to keep the original paper document even when it exists electronically and in any action, the legal weight of records will be greater if the original version is produced. The Business Archives Council, which promotes the preservation of business records of historical importance, gives some other reasons why it can be prudent to save original documents.

Among their points are:

* Transparent corporate governance

Good record-keeping is an integral part of transparent corporate governance. The implementation of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in the US has brought heightened scrutiny of an organisation's internal controls and practices. Trustworthy and accurate records serve as a bedrock for a company's reporting systems and ensure that they comply with best practice

* A key part of Corporate Social Responsibility

Caring for your heritage can be a key part of a Corporate Social Responsibility policy. Businesses have impacted on the lives of their staff, customers, shareholders and on the communities in which they operate. Business archives record how lives have been affected and changed. Some companies have publicly acknowledged that their own histories are an important piece in the jigsaw of the past and that they have a duty of care to their own archives. Making business archives accessible to the public is a real contribution to the community.

* Brand Building

The past can be used to support present performance. Archives add detail and depth to the public image of a company, differentiating it from the competition. Celebrating significant anniversaries or birthdays brings the long-standing nature and the achievements of the company to the fore. Historic information and images can also be used to support particular brands emphasising their position in the market place.

* A market for nostalgia

Exploiting your heritage can bring in revenue. Companies with well known advertising and packaging logos and images can licence their reproductions in all kinds of ways: the Guinness Toucan, Colman's mustard and Pears soap are just a few examples of well known images that bring in money for their owners.

* Education

Archives can be used within a business to inform and educate new recruits about a company's history and successes and pass on company values and principles. Archives can also be used as an educational resource by learners of all ages - some companies have produced very popular and highly regarded educational resources aimed at schoolchildren.

Clearly some of these points would not be put under the heading of ‘Business Critical’ but they do give further background as to why paper records can be so important.

The first rule of thumb for any organisation should be to asses their records according to the following criteria: business value, legal value, administrative value, historical value. The records can then be classed as vital, important, useful or non-essential. For those records deemed vital, the next step is to ensure that the storage of those records is an integral part of your business continuity plan and this means considering how and where they are stored. In exactly the same way as you would safeguard your IT systems and electronic records, consideration should be given to the possible disaster scenarios and how you can guard against loss or damage of those records.

For many companies the first obvious factor to think about is physical location. A Morgan Stanley Brokers note in June 2003 estimated that 70% of businesses are storing records on their own premises. Clearly this has huge implications should that office be subject to any kind of negative event. The horrific and devastating events of 9/11 showed all too clearly the potential risks of storing vital business records on site with many thousands of important documents destroyed. But if not on site then where is the best place? Some companies discount off site storage for those records that are deemed ‘active’ since they can be concerned that, should they need them, it will be a difficult process to retrieve them but any professional records management company should be able to deliver a document back to you within 24 hours and/or a scanned electronic version within a few hours.

If that is not acceptable then consideration should be given to copying the record and placing the original off site. The same factors apply to long term or ‘inactive’ storage. When deciding on an off site storage provider another important point to consider includes the environmental conditions of the site. Paper needs to be stored in cool consistent temperatures with a tight humidity band. It is worth reading through BS5454 since this sets the environmental standard for the storage of archival documents. Other points to assess include the risk of flood, fire or terrorist attack and, should any of these occur, how does the records management company in question plan ahead to handle it.

The National Archives previously known as the Public Records Office, has some of the country’s most important records. Acting as the UK government’s official archive, The National Archives looks after many thousands of documents containing 900 years of history from the Domesday Book to the present. The National Archives keep the majority of their material at their headquarters in Kew but they also keep a portion of their archive off site at DeepStore. They suggest that, in order to minimise damage to paper records, organisations should consider the following when planning for disaster.

* The best way to deal with potential disasters is to stop them happening. A first step is to identify and assess sources of potential risk in terms of the probability of an incident occurring, and likely impact if it does, including the costs of recovery.

* The process should include a detailed inspection of the premises and operational activities on site, and consultation with staff in each work area, particularly those such as caretakers or cleaners who have day to day responsibility for the building. It may also be necessary to consult specialist external sources of advice from individuals such as fire prevention offices, security advisers, insurance providers and a qualified conservator.

* Risk assessments should be reviewed at least annually to take account of changed circumstances and a systematic logging of any previous incidents will help to refine those assessments.

* In addition, it is important to be aware of temporary increases in risk, e.g. due to the presence of contractors on-site, extreme weather conditions, unusual activity in adjacent premises. Common sources of risk to paper records (of varying degrees of seriousness) include extreme weather, leaking roofs, plumbing problems, smoking, poor storage of inflammable materials, malfunctioning electrical wiring, lighting, arson or vandalism (up to half of UK fire are started deliberately), gas leaks, industrial accidents in nearby premises and terrorism.

Anna Buelow, Head of Preservation, at The National Archives gives some advice as to how a company should tackle a problem if, despite planning to avoid it, the worst occurs and paper records are damaged by water. She explains, “The prime concern in a disaster situation is to take what measures are necessary to salvage or limit the damage to as many of the records as possible. Ideally, the recovery process should start with a preliminary assessment of those documents in the affected area, designated as being the most valuable or important, identified by the first senior member of staff to come on site. “For slightly damaged material it may be possible to air dry the items. This should be done in a large, well ventilated area and supervised by an experienced professional if possible. Anything that is saturated should be removed from boxes, packed in polythene bags and labeled. They should then be frozen and dealt with by a specialist agency.”

And what about fire damage? Specialist company Harwell Restoration Services offer the following advice, “Depending on the design of a given building during a fire the smoke residues can travel great distances from the source of the actual fire, potentially creating widespread damage, even if the fire itself only affected one room. Within an office or library, this smoke can present an immense problem, as without restoration, the damaged paper will not safe or practical to use. Fire damage is restorable in the vast majority of cases. Tightly packed paper will not necessarily burn and damage, chiefly caused by smoke residue, is usually restricted to the outer edges, leaving the information inside the book block, archive box or file in tact.”

So when considering off site records management companies it is important to make sure that they have first rate storage facilities. Look carefully at all their systems and ask lots of questions. It’s also worth thinking about where they are sited since even if their building or unit seems safe, a fire or flood in a neighbouring unit could cause real problems.

Despite the emergence of the so-called ‘electronic age, it is clear that there will be a need to store paper records for many years to come. In the light of this is it vital that they are treated as a key part of the business and every company’s business continuity plan should take this into account.

Is the staff that is keeping your business where it is now, the same staff that will take you where you want to be?

If you are not reaching your productivity, sales and revenue goals, it is time to figure out exactly why.

What Have You Done to Grow Your Business this Year?

If you are like most business owners and managers, you have tried just about everything; from new technology and software, to modifying your marketing message and efforts, to hiring teamwork consultants, to reorganization.

There are three things all of these techniques have in common. One, they cost you a lot of money. Two, they eat up a good amount of your time. And three, they rarely (if ever) work. To grow your business, it is imperative to improve the productivity of your employees. That is the reason organizations spend their time, energy and revenues on the products and services that are written about in articles, advertised in the media and introduced at seminars.

However, the typical outcome is "business as usual." Those employees who naturally performed before the costly modifications, still naturally perform. Those who failed to meet your sales, teamwork, motivation and productivity expectations, still fail and cost you time, energy and money.

Why You Need to Hire ONLY TOP Performers

Your TOP Performers produce month in and month out. So no matter how ineffective your technology, processes or managers may be, your best employees continually make you money without external support, motivation or incentive.

Studies have shown, the top performers in a position are five to eight times more productive (and profitable) than average employees. Organizations that have created recruiting and hiring standards, and more importantly follow them, have doubled or tripled their productivity, sales and revenues by doing nothing more than hiring more top performers.

At the same time, their industry counterparts have either failed to grow or gone out of business. Most of these organizations have spent a good amount of time, energy and revenues on reorganizing their marketing, sales, technology and leadership processes also.

Adding another top performing employee to your team is the only way to guarantee your success. Whether that means adding a new position to payroll or replacing a non-performer, it is an important decision that must be made if you want to grow your business.

How to Attract & Hire TOP Performers

Because it is not a matter of if, but when you come to the realization that your current staff is holding you back from your important goals, here are five ways to insure every future hire can, and will, become a top performer:

1. Don't Expect Candidates to Find You

If you are only recruiting "passively" with classified ads, general web boards and employment agencies, you are only going to find "passive" job seekers. You need to do everything in your power (network, referrals, educational partnerships, etc.) to "actively" recruit motivated top performers.

2. Believe Only 50% of the Resume

Studies have shown 95% of resumes contain exaggerations. The best thing about a resume is it tells you if the candidate (or their professional resume writer) can use grammar properly, can last more than a few months at a job and has the basic education or training required.

3. Believe Only 50% of the Interview

Your reason for having the interview is to make sure the candidate will fit your culture, team and the job you are hiring them to do. Now think about it, their reason for accepting the interview is to be who they need to be and to say what they need to say to "sell you" on hiring them.

4. Don't Always Rely on Your Instincts

Your "gut" has been proven wrong before and it will be proven wrong again. And this works both ways. You have surely passed on someone who made a bad first impression that later became a top performer for a competitor. You have also hired the energetic, friendly, punctual candidate that eventually became a drain on your time, energy and cost you a lot of money.

5. Use All of the Available Resources

According to studies, using a resume, interview, background and reference checks, employment agency recommendations and your instincts only provide you about a one in four chance of hiring a top performer. For over 15 years, most of the Fortune 500 and almost every Market Leader has kept their use of "Job Match" Assessments a secret from their competitors. The secret is now out that you can improve your Hiring Success Rate of top performers to about 75% with these tools.

AuctionTip #1: Howto Put an Atractive Background in Your OnlineAuction AdPage 1 of 9

AuctionTip #1: How to Put an Attractive Background in Your Online Auction Ad

Have you ever visited an auction and noticed a peculiar and catchy background?

Here's how to do it. First of, go background texture hunting at this site: http:/www.grsites.com/textures/ Once you find one- upload it to a free image host like: htp:/www.honesty.com

Now, for the moment you're been waiting for. This requires HTML so don't faint on me. Make sure this is the first thing that appears in your ad html:

That's the code you'l need.

AuctionTip #2: The BEST Types of Products to Sell

Without a doubt, there are a few types of products you'll need to sel in order to become realy successful on eBay…

Here are the 3 types of products you should try to sel if possible:

Consumable

Example would be anything a person would buy and use up and buy again. To say there is staggering potential for backend sales would be an understatement.

Any product you would download or receive by floppy or CD is considered to be an info-product. Though it takes some study and patience to reap the rewards of seling information efectively, in the long run it wil be worth the efort.

Collectibles

EBay is famous for its rare items. Stamps, beanies, antique whatnots, you name it, and it's there.

Sentimental items carry with them the largest profit margins. When you're puling in $100-200 profit margins or more, your volume doesn’t have to be heavy to get where you need.

If you want a brainstorm with a list of al the various products categories, visit the link below:

htp:/listings.ebay.com/

11 Time Tested Principles For eBay Seling Success

Without a doubt, something separates good selers from the not-so-hot ones. It has nothing to do with magic either- it has everything to do with sound practice.

Here are 11 principles to live by when you start your auction business. They wil work wonders for you.

1. Pick Your Niche and Define Your Market

This is ground zero for your success strategy. Find your own niche. Define your market. Then you can know the type of person you’re going to be seling to and the types of product you want to sel.

You're auction sales leters wil be a hundred times beter if you know the person who you are writing for.

Credit cards are available from more banks than ever before. There are a huge amount of different varieties of credit cards available online as well. Of course they are all cleared through Visa, MasterCard, or American Express and Discovery. So the variety is in the realm of similarity. Also, certain states have more favorable laws for the establishment of large credit card issuing units, especially the states of Nevada and Delaware and a couple of others.

Basic attractions of credit cards come in a fairly limited series of features. The first is low interest rates. Many cards today give you an up to 12-month introductory rates of zero-interest rates. Thereafter, the APR is several points above the prime rate. Rates vary from a low of 11.5-percent to 14-percent or more. Another incentive is to give customer rebates, and points accumulated as discounts on certain attractive problems. The most familiar discounts are on gas and the accumulation of airline “frequent flyer” points.

For example, on a card issued by Chase Banking Corp the APR is 14.24-percent, which is a variable rate. With this card you can earn rebates on all of your gasoline purchase, not only one brand, with the maximum gasoline rebate per month being $15. These days it has become increasingly easy to be approved for credit cards. It’s mostly based on your credit score, and your current income, but often, there will be no verification of your income.

You can see there is quite a variation of the interest rates paid on cards. Looking at a Discovery Platinum card, it’s amazing to see an APR of only 10.99-percent and also a 12-month period of zero-interest on balances. The actual interest charge will be based on the customer’s credit history and income. This card has a credit limit of $50,000. Due to the low interest rate and the high credit limit, presumably the verification of credit and income would be more rigorous than for any old card.

There is also an up to 2-percent cash back bonus award, when the customer receives certificates towards products and services that are partners with the issuers of this credit card. Other stores and warehouse clubs pay 0.25-percent cash back when you use this credit card. These cards are issued by the Discovery Bank, which is a branch of Morgan Stanley (investment bank). When you apply for the card, the pop-up says you get up to five-percent back on some products, so I wish they would make up their mind.