As you begin the process of starting an online business you will be faced with information overload as you sort through the myriad of available products, software and services for the Internet entrepreneur. In this video I recommend several “must-have” products that you will need to start your online business and get up and running.

So you want to start an online business and your asking yourself, “How much can I REALLY make online?” Am I going to make $1,257 a day like that ad I saw pop-up on my screen or am I just going to make an easy $10K a month working 4 hours a week. Does any of this sound familiar? Get some real advice on how much you can expect to make as you go down the path of investigating the facts around how to start an internet business.

If you are starting an online business you need to find a product that you can get excited about! Who wants to sell something they would never use themselves? In this video I provide ideas on how to select a product and where to find stuff you can sell for your new home based online business.

1. Jack Humphrey - Blogger and social media expert.  Owner of several websites including The Friday Traffic Report and a membership site called BlogSuccess.
2. Mike Dillard - Network Marketer, Affiliate Marketer and overall online success.  Mike creates excellent content, training materials and offers high quality products for re-sale as an affiliate.  If you are considering building a Network Marketing business online or offline then you should definitely consider some of Mike’s products.
3. Frank Kern - Internet Marketing guru and product launch expert.  Frank is responsible for some of the largest product launches in the make money online crowd.  He’s associated with all of the major players and has knack for developing interest and desire in a market and then turning that into cold hard cash.

These are just a couple of names to get you started.  Pick one that you like, read some of there material, learn and enjoy!

There are literally hundreds of Web2.0 and Social Media sites out there and more are being developed every day. These sites are interactive and let the users and the communities within in them contribute and publish content for the world to see.  Most of the sites offer you the ability to rate, share and discuss the content with other users giving it the ability to make content “go viral” across the web when you have tons of people all raving about a particular piece of content at the same time and sharing it with others.  And with all of these sites content is grouped and categorized by popular interests such as “health & fitness” or “finance” allowing users to easily find content that is specific to their search. Why is this important…well if you are trying to drive traffic around a specific group of keywords, these social media sites are highly regarded and have the “google juice” necessary to get you some high quality backlinks and push you further up in the search rankings.

The list is subjective and based on research from a number of sources including: stompernet, quantcast and alexa ratings. So here we go….

Social Media Sites

#1 YouTube -  www.youtube.com

Nothing beats video.  I recently saw a statistic that boasted that over 50% of all the content on the web is now video.  That is an amazing statistic.  There are a lot of people that shy away from video as part of their marketing and SEO efforts.  So that means its an opportunity and something you can use to your advantage.  So get out there and make a short video of whatever it is you are doing and get it online.  Stats: 72M visitors per month. Page Rank: 6.

#2 Blogger - www.blogger.com

Blogger.com has quickly become the free blogging platform of choice.  Google owns it (no surprise there).  Its free to sign up and start creating content that quickly gets indexed and viewed on the web. Want to be seen…put your content on blogger.  Stats: 20.1M people per month. Page Rank: 32

#3 Twitter - www.twitter.com

If you haven’t heard of twitter then please continue to stay under that rock that you’ve been living under.  Yes, everyone uses twitter from politicians to pop stars and athletes.  For a low-cal diet of micro blogging and pointing people to more substantial content this is the place to be.  Stats: 26.5M people per month.  Page Rank 25.

#4 Wordpress.com - www.wordpress.com

This is a free blogging platform that is a favorite amongst the people.  Made for the people, by the people.  This opensource platform has tons of great functionality and content from the wordpress network of blogs is picked up all over the web from other sites such as google and facebook.  Stats: 188.6M people per month (across all published blogs). Page Rank 11.

#5 DIGG - www.digg.com

Digg is the social media and bookmarking site on the web. Its a great place to be seen and heard.  The site lets users share and promote content from anywhere on the web and google loves it…need I say more.  Stats: 28.2M people per month.  Page Rank: 53.

#6 Hubpages - www.hubpages.com

Hubpages is a leading online publishing platform with an active community and easy to use tools for content creation.  With an engaged and active community you have the opportunity to leverage this social media site to drive traffic and rank in search engines.  They also like to make it easy for you to monetize your content.  Stats: 13M people per month.  Page Rank 125.

#7 Squidoo - www.squidoo.com

Basically the same as Hubpages.  If your an expert then you can place your content HERE.  Squidoo lets you create a “lens” (there term for an article of piece of content) for the world to see.  They have a user friendly format for building a lens using different types of content such as text, video and graphics and pulling it all together.  And of course the more positive reviews you get the higher your rankings.  Stats: 10.2M people per month. Page Rank: 166.

#8 Zimbio - www.zimbio.com

Zimbio is one of the fastest growing online magazines and social media sites.  They boast over 18M readers per month.  The site tends to focus on the hyper-active pop culture segment which includes entertainment, style and current events.  However they do not limit their content to these categories and as a marketer you can submit your blog relative to your niche and they will include your content on their site, as long as it is good Stats: 18M people per month. Page Rank: 107.

#9 Wetpaint - www.wetpaint.com

Wetpaint is a fast growing social media site that promotes users, companies or anyone for that matter promote their brand by building community sites that are engaging and interactive.  You can set up a community and let the users post content to keep them coming back for more.  Stats: 6.4M people per month.  Page Rank: 1,329

#10 Propeller - www.propeller.com

Propeller is AOL’s social media/news and bookmarking site.  Its very easy to submit your site or article and content ranks well in the search engines. Unfortunately their traffic has been declining.  Keep an eye on this one.  But for now it’s a “must” use social media site for creating backlinks and SEM.  Stats: 500K people per month.  Page Rank: 3,533

The key to effectively leveraging these sites is to post consistently and cross reference all of your posts and articles to create a matrix of inter-connected content all pointing back to your main site.  If you can do this on a regular basis you will increase back links and see your page rank steadily improve over time.

I hope you like this list of sites to use as part of your online advertising strategy.  Now I have a special bonus for those of you that read this entire article.  You can get a FREE report on how to MONETIZE SOCIAL MEDIA .  This report was created by Perry Belcher who has been killing it in the social media space.  Enjoy….Ray

For the past 11 years I have been able to work from home in some capacity.  That’s not to say that I don’t leave my home to work but my main office is my home office and I’d like to keep it that way.  There is a steady trend towards working from home and it’s evident by the sheer numbers.  In 1997 the U. S. Census Bureau estimated approximately 11 million people worked from home in some capacity.  Let’s fast forward to the 2004 U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistic Work At Home Summary.  It reports that some 20.7 million people did some work at home as part of their job or own home based business.  Here are my top 7 reasons for working at home:
1.    You are more productive and get more done (if you have the discipline).
2.    You don’t waste time commuting to the office.
3.    You spend less time at the “water cooler” and office socializing.
4.    It’s the “green” thing to do.  You consume less fuel and energy needed for commuting thus less carbon emissions.
5.    Flexibility.  You get to work your own hours and from your location of choice.
6.    Work / Life Balance….this is an important one.  We all need time to take care of our own business and family.   Working from home lets you take care of a lot of those little things that can slip if your office day is 12 hours long including commute time.
7.    And most of all Happiness….I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that people that work from home are generally 100 times happier about their work situation than those people that absolutely cannot work from home
Now, don’t get me wrong.   There is significant value in going into the office.  Out of site, out of mind is a real thing and in most situations face to face communications is the most effective way to get your point across.  But you’ve got to balance this out across the benefits of having the option to work from home.  Ideally you have a situation where your employer offers you the flexibility to work from home 1-2 days a week while also putting in some office time to make sure they don’t forget who you are.  That’s all for now…I’m gonna grab my surfboard and head out to “lunch.”

For more information on home based business opportunities click here.

The work at home industry has seen a dramatic increase over the past decade.  Based on information from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2004 poll over 20.5 million people reported working from their homes.  A total of 6.9 million or about 5.1% of the total working population indicated they own their own home based business.  This trend continues to grow as more and more people are looking for new ways to earn and income and start their own business.  For more information on work at home opportunities you can go to www.rayforrest.com/work-from-home.