Archive for October, 2009

By Nicole Dean

Around the world, people everywhere are discovering that blogging is a great way to make money online. The reason? Blogs can usually be set up at a low cost and started with a minimum of experience. Two very popular tools for blogging are Google Blogger (blogger.com) or the easy to use WordPress (WordPress.org). Both make it easy to set up a blog. But what kind of blog should you start?

Recipes and cooking tips are two very popular topics on the internet. People who cook, love to share their stories, good or bad, with other people who love to cook. If you can tell someone else about a product that failed, a recipe that actually worked, or even a five-star restaurant quality meal that you stumbled upon, wouldn’t that be great fun? Now, what if your experiences in the kitchen could make you money as well? Blogging about regional dishes is especially interesting to folks who can’t travel to your area but would like to make something different. Have a little fun with it and include your own personal kitchen disasters like “the day the potato exploded”. People want to laugh along with you as well as learn something new.

If you’re questioning whether or not you have the skills needed to create a recipe blog, you probably aren’t giving yourself enough credit. You love to eat, right? Well, that’s one skill down. Can you write a recipe that’s easy to follow and accurate? There you go! You don’t have to be a trained chef or know all the fancy cooking terms, just enjoy what you do. You will probably want to have a digital camera so you can include pictures of the recipes you make, but it’s not necessary. You’ll find sites where you can download pictures that will suit you just fine. Most importantly, you’ll need to have patience. Your blog won’t get noticed as fast as you’d like, but before you know it you’ll be chatted-up all over the blogosphere.

Of course, you want to make money with your recipe blog. By using one or more of the following methods, you’ll have a real home-based business that will start producing income for you and your family.

Make Money by Selling Products: A recipe blog offers an opportunity for the entrepreneur to build a home based business by actually selling products online while blogging about them. By offering cooking products, cookware, cookbooks, and other tools that the budding chefs of the world would like, you are sharing your interests and your opinion while making money. If you are a retailer at heart, this method of earning income could be for you.

Make Money by Selling Advertising: Your blog may not be popular at first, but never fear. It won’t be long before readers start finding you and your traffic starts to increase. Once that happens, advertisers will be interested in promoting on your blog.

Make Money by Selling Your Blog: Successful bloggers, those whose readership has grown enough to be noticed by the search engines and/or media, can even sell their blogs to others and earn an income. Popular topics in high-traffic websites will get your name and your blog noticed, remembered, and visited. Some people create blogs just to sell them, in fact, so this is another idea to keep in mind.

Isn’t it incredible to think that by just sharing your love of food you can earn an income? With a bit of hard work and learning a few blogging tips, you will be able to create a one-of-a-kind blog that shares your stories, family recipes, favorite restaurant tips, cooking disasters, or whatever you want to share. Just be sure that you have your “stamp” on it, that it is uniquely yours, and the readers will follow! But, you can’t profit until your recipe blog is a reality. Get started today.

Article Source: http://www.wahm-articles.com

Setting up a Niche Recipe Blog is a fun and lucrative business to start with a minimum of money and equipment. Get step-by-step help by grabbing your JustAddSweat.com Guide to Making Money with a Recipe Blog. Need recipes for your new blog? Check out PLR Recipes.

By: Sheila Wray Gregoire

You’re home with your kids because you value mothering. You want to nurture them, care for them, and love them.

But you also need to work from home. Maybe you’re a writer, or an internet marketer, or a top eBay seller. How do you balance them both? With care, dedication, and discipline, you can thrive in both your business and your mothering! Here’s how:

1. Plan your Goals

One of the problems I ran in to was that, as an author, there were countless things I could have been doing to market my books. I’d think about them, dream about them, read books about them, but I didn’t have time to actually do them. Maybe I could accomplish one or two, but not nine or ten. And I needed to realize that and stop beating myself up over it.

When you are at home with your kids, you are at home with your kids. You will not be able to work eight hours a day productively. But you may be able to work two or three hours. So given that, what is reasonable to expect of yourself? How long will each thing take? And what can you put off until a different season in your life?

What is most important to build your career right now? Is it writing? Is it starting a blog? Is it starting articles, or researching money-making techniques on the internet? Make a list of everything you want to do, and prioritize it. Then only do your #1 or #2 priorities for a time. And forgive yourself if you don’t get everything on your list done! You’re doing what is possible, and that is enough.

2. Find Regular Hours

I know that sounds impossible with small kids, but it can be done. I used nap time for writing. Every day for two hours, even when I myself was tired, I would write. When the kids stopped napping, they still had downtime after lunch in their bedrooms. We instituted this early, and they stuck to it. That was their time to do puzzles, play in their beds, or look at books (and later, read).

Another time that works well is first thing in the morning, unless you have children who wake at 6:00. Try to stagger their bedtimes so that they do sleep until 7:30, and then you can start at 6:30 a.m. Or, if you’re more of a nighthawk, do the opposite, and work after they go to bed for an hour. Once children reach the age of 4 or 5 they can also get their own cereal in the morning, and then this can be their video time.

3. When You Do Work, Be Productive!

Don’t check emails (unless they’re business related). Don’t check Twitter, or blogs, or news (unless that’s part of your “job”). Only do what’s on your list!

If you are working at home to make money, then show up for work at your appointed time and WORK. Even if you’re tired, or grumpy, or have PMS. If an employer were paying you, you’d show up. So show up, even if you yourself are paying you!

4. Find Things the Children Can do on their Own

Keep certain toys, or the playpen, simply for Mommy’s work time. Don’t feel guilty if you’re not playing with them constantly. They can be on their own for 30 minutes, as long as you’re still supervising and know what they’re doing! You don’t have to interact with them constantly; kids do need some time to be on their own. This may only grab you 20 minutes to half an hour, but even that can be important.

5. When You’re With your Kids, Be With Your Kids

Finally, when you’re not working, be with your kids. Don’t run to the computer every moment they’re busy to see if you can “grab 5 minutes”. You’ll wear yourself out and you’ll feel like nothing is ever done correctly. The kids will get into trouble or call for you and then you’ll be annoyed.

Do something fun and active with them every day where they have your attention. Go to a playgroup. Take them to the library. Go for a walk, do a puzzle, or read some books. Have time where you really are with them, and not just supervising them in the same house, and you’ll likely find they don’t resent the time you take away from them quite as much.

If you’re a stay at home mom, you are never going to get as much done as someone who is not with her kids. You’re just not. But that doesn’t mean you can’t work. It just means you’ll do it differently. But you’re still being a great mom to your kids, and that’s irreplaceable.

Article Source: http://www.wahm-articles.com

And now I’d like to invite you to download my FREE planning charts, including personal planners, organization checklists, daytimers, chore charts, and more, so that you can organize your work and your outings! Sheila Wray Gregoire is a syndicated columnist, and the author of four books, including To Love, Honor and Vacuum: When You feel more like a maid than a wife and a mother. She blogs at tolovehonorandvacuum.blogspot.com.