Home Based Business Opportunity or a Bunch of Hype?
A Home Business Article Contributed by Alina Sandor
Home Based Business Opportunity Internet Overload
If you enter the keywords "business" "home based business" or "business opportunity" looking for genuine information you're not likely to find any. What you are likely to find is mountains of scams and get rich quick schemes.
For instance, one search of home based business opportunities on Google came up with 3, 600, 000 results. Only a small handful were actually help for the owner of a home based business. The sites with the highest ranking were, yep, you guessed it, scams and get rich quick schemes. What is interesting, though, is that almost none one of these schemes actually told what kind of business they were trying to sell.
Where do Home Based Business Opportunity Scams Come From?
Most home based business online scams have origins in the real world and have been brought on the net by con artists and frauds. Running a con on the internet is much easier on the internet because it is harder to track down a person you've met on the net. It is also easier to snag more suspecting victims on the net then in real life.
Everyone wants to make a quick buck and scammers have realized that the net is the best place to go fishing for people who are in such a hurry to get rich they don't check the facts about a business opportunity before they jump in with both feet.
How do You Know it is a Home Based Business Opportunity Scam?
These scammers and con artists don't list a phone number, so that can be your first clue to their real identity, and if they do list a phone number, the "company phone" is never answered.So, if you do see a phone number listed, call it to talk to a representative from the company. If you get a voice mail message, be sure to leave your name and number and don't do business with the website until you get a call back. If they do call back you should ask them some questions, such as:
How many years have you been in business?
Who have been some of your past customers and can I contact them?
Do you have a refund policy?
What actually kind of opportunity are you offering?
Can I have a physical address?
Scammers usually don't use real addresses, if they use one at all. Be sure the business has a truthful physical address on their website or that they can provide you one over the phone.
What do You do If You Find a Home Based Business Opportunity Scam?
The first thing you should do if you run into a scam is to report it to the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The FTC is the best place to go to get help and answers if you have been a victim of fraud.
You can also report it to websites such as OnlyReviews.com that has Scam Alerts to warn other people of con artists.
