Please help...

I am going to apologize right from the start because I am sure that there have been many posts similar to this one.

I am a mom of three with a disabled husband who has retired from the Marines. With the busy schedule that my three children have and not really being able to rely on my husband because his pain differs from day to day I am not able to work out of the home. I can't find anything local with mother's hours. I have spent the last 12 years looking for a legit work from home job. I have (and still do, but nothing big) sold on ebay, done the survey's you get my email, I have applied for the work from home customer service jobs and I am currently in a company with direct sales. I was hoping for a lot more from this company but I have been doing it for about 9 months and I really have only been feeding my own habit, which I am ok with but was really hoping for more.

I have done the reserach, I have seen all the scams. I live in a wealthy town where the majority work for big businesses out of their homes. They all have degrees, unlike me. So my question is can anyone give me some honest feedback on what I should do? I am a high school graduate with little college experience. I would love to go back to school but the reality is I do not have that kind of time in my life right now. I have three kids one on the gymnastics team, the other about to be on the gymnastics team and the other a musician. The only day we are not in the gym is Sunday and my son practices everyday on guitar at home but he practices outside of the house 2 days a week 3 hours each practice.

I would love to be able to sell on ebay and make a living off that but I know that is very hard. I have been amazed at what I have got for my daughter's used leotards. I have paid $55 for some and have resold them for $65-$70 and she has got TONS of use out of them...so that makes me very happy because gymnastics is a VERY expensive sport once they make it on the team.

So I am hoping someone will read this and get an idea of who I am and can maybe direct me in the right direction. After 12 years of searching for something legit and steady I am getting sick of it. I do not want to have to work night shifts in some warehouse and never get sleep because I have to be here to help my husband and kids in the daytime.

Thank you!

Thank you Vishal for your reply. I keep leaning towards what I do should really be gymnastics related. I practically live in the gym so it would just make the most sense. But the problem is finding those used leotards. My daughter does not go through that many that it would help me start to build a business. I have go to tons of thrift shops looking for used leotards and I have never found one. Once a year our gym holds a leotard sale where everyone can bring in their used leotards and sell them for $15 each. I have been thinking if I wanted to start this business I would have to target places like this and maybe ask if I can start hanging ads in the gyms or dance studios. I would then buy the leotards off of people and hope that I can turn it around and make a profit off them.

As for the direct sales company that I am in, and I do love by the way, like I said I am feeding my own habit. I am a consultant for Scentsy. I LOVE them so this is something else that I would like to see take off. Do you, or anyone else have any suggestions? When I say I have done everything to try to make this work for me, I really have. People do not seem to want to have home parties. People are to busy to have and to attend. So I have been advertising that I now do basket parties which is giving the person a bunch of product in a basket and letting them keep it for a week or two and they take it with them. I just don't get how some people climb so high up the ladder!! I have try to reruit, I got one, but she ended up having a lot of health problems and I understood when she had to stop. I post my business on my own FB page and I also have a FB page that people can like. But it is all friends and family. So I feel like I am constantly feeding my friends and family, I have stopped nagging them, they know what I do and they know where to go when they need it. Should I start another FB page and add friends?? But how do I find the right people to add? How do I get out of my circle??

Hi maybe you could start a blog about gymnastics and post pictures of your son, use this blog to build awareness, and once you have enough traffic place adsense ads or amazon products that relate to gymnastics or possible blog about life of a marine wife to share with other military wives, Blog does not have to be fancy, in fact you would do better without fancy blog, just share your passion and experiences with other parents or wives who share your interest, I hope this has helped in some way, and I wish you much success, whatever you do don't give up, may god bless you and your family.

I agree with mydream2. If you really want to make it online gymnastmom,you should really start with a BLOG.
Focus on one subject that you are truly passionate about and blog about it daily. The more quality blog post you have
the more readers and possible customers you will attract. You can sprinkle affiliate products throughout your post and
earn a nice little commission everytime someone buys from your posts.Also if your blog becomes very popular you can rent out ad space on it for a nice fee as well. Just believe that you can achieve. Stay motivated and keep producing quality content and people will love you for it,and eventually you will see some type of cashflow.

Hope this helps you gymnastmom.

I agree creating a blog would be the best way to go.
Add affiliate links to eBay/Amazon gymnastics items.
You can post to a WP blog by email using Postie plug-in.
If you can send email and pictures you can write a blog.
Less than $100/yr to build your own internet business.
It's not hard to learn and free help is easy to find on-line.
Like on this work at home forum.

I also agree that creating a blog is a good idea. Attract viewers with your story which I'm sure many can relate too. To help build traffic you could have a personal facebook page and even a fan page (business side of Facebook). I think social media would be a great route for you to take. Being able to explain your struggles and how you combat these issues is something I think people will really be interested in. I believe you would also be able to help others while helping you and your family.

Affiliate marking is a great way to make money online and can be incorporated into this as well. Just remember one of the most important things to building a long lasting online business is to build your list. A list is exactly what it sounds like. It's a list of people who have opted In to your website. Usually they opt-in because you have offered something of value (free newsletter, ebook, video course, etc...) in exchange for their name and email. Once on your list you can send them great tips, advice, gifts, etc... but you can also send them out useful products that you are an affiliate for so when they buy you will make some sort of compensation. The larger the list means usually means the more money you make. You mange your list by something called an autoresponder.

There is a lot more to all this and I could go on forever but I just wanted to offer some help.

Hope everything works out great for you and your family,

If you have any questions about this please let me know.

Kevin

Thank you everyone for your advice. Sorry it took awhile to reply I was lucky enough to get hit with a nasty virus and I am just starting to feel a little better.

Just a few questions. What site would you recommend using to start my blog? I know that there are several out there. I am also wondering how much is to much on my blog? I would like to work my direct sales business in there as well. So I am thinking writing about the life of a gymnasts and parents (dealing with our day to day life in the gym), my direct sales business and maybe some product reviews that I do from sites that I belong to that send me products to test. Is this to much? Should I just stick to one or two? I am also wondering how do I get my blog to get traffic? I know that some blog sites you can build it up before you actually publish it, how much content should I have before publishing?

I also just noticed the ads about this post about gymnastics. How did that get there?

There are different ways to go about this and it's up to you on how much you can handle. Personally, I don't like to spread myself too thin when learning new things. It's easier for me to focus on one task at a time but everyone is different. You need to do what works best for you and what you can handle. There are also many ways to get traffic. I think social media would be good for what your trying to do. You could create a Facebook personal and fan page. You could try Pinterest and twitter which might be good as well. You could even write articles and submit them to some directories. There are many ways to go about getting traffic. If you have something that people find interesting and valuable people will share your stuff and really help get you traffic much quicker. It's also good to know how to do keyword research. This will help your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) results.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

It is best to have your own domain name using a WordPress install. (not a WordPress.com blog)
They are two different things, you can post anything your heart desires on your own domain.
No censors or having to worry about losing your work to the whims of someone else.
WP has a huge community providing free instructions and plug-ins for everything.

I just created a website for a client using WP in under 24 hours start to finish (well, almost).
That's not 24 working hours either, I hiked and slept half of that, plus corrected mistakes.
Don't be afraid to fail and you will find all the help you need here on the world wide web.

Creating a website using wordpress is a very straight forward and easy job. Just find any web hosting company, register a domain of your choice and get webspace and its all done.
Install wordpress, choose a theme and you are ready.
It is as simple as 123.
**Create a website using wordpress does not take more than 5 mins. Believe me, its real. And don't pay anyone for this easy job.**
If you need any help in doing that job, please let us know.

Have you ever considered photography? You could get a great start by just photographing your girls Gymnastics and taking images of the team mates as well and then allowing the other parents to purchase them from you. You may even be asked to start photographing their team photos and before you know it, with access to all those kids and being in a wealthy area you could be booking family sessions and senior pics in no time flat. The greatest part about doing this kind of work is you can do it around your kids schedules and it is flexible enough to allow you to go down to part time when your schedule gets super busy and or to full time when things slow down again and you more available. It doesn't take a ton of work to get started and it can be very lucrative. I have been doing this for 7 years and have been very successful at it as well as successful at being a stay at home mom too If you have any interest I would love tot chat!

If you need help with a Wordpress website. Amazon Kindle has an eBook from Dr. Andy Williams called, "Wordpress for Beginners - A Visual Step-by-Step Guide to Creating your Own Wordpress site in Record Time, Starting from Zero!"
It's not free but inexpensive. I believe you can get it for $3.99 U.S Dollars but don't quote me on that. Amazon has other eBooks as well but I like Dr. Andy Williams. He gives quality content. This should at least help get you in the right direction.

Wordpress is great. I currently use Wordpress.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

It is very hard to imagine a site without wordpress.....

I agree with the blog part.

You could go with a self-hosted word-press blog. Many people like HostGator, I prefer JustHost though. I got an affiliate-link that'll save you a little bit money. Hit me up if you want to use JustHost. I'm new to this forum and don't want to start out here by posting affiliate-links.

If you want to promote your direct sales company however, I'd go with Empower Network as it's related and you'll get a lot more traction with it to rank easier on google and other search engines. Here as well, I'm an affiliate, so please come to me, once you did your research.

I have to disagree with Google AdSense. It might make you some money over time (Google still owns me a hundred bucks), but you're missing out on a lot more money through affiliate programs.

Vishal made a good point with the Newsletter. E-Mail Marketing is still a huge money maker!
The methods he mentioned (Article Posting/Social Bookmarking etc.) are very good. I like to use semi-automated tools for that.

Wordpress is the way to go for a blog.

A blog is a great idea and incorporating affiliate links in the white space. And I would recommend making the blog about your whole story. I know there are probably a lot of military family members out there that can relate, as well as parents of gymnasts.

Don't rely on just SEO with your keywords for people to find it through. Distribution is the key. There are many ways to distribute your blog. The use of social media is very effective for distribution. You can tweet your posts. You can join FB groups, related to your topics, gymnastics, military life... than distribute your posts accordingly.

Being active in the social media will make more better so that your blog updates can be made as your status

hetherz20

Being active in social media gives you a powerful avenue to distribute your blogs. The Facebook groups give you power of communication beyond what an update to your status delivers.