How to start a house clearance business

A household clearance business can be a huge help to a whole variety of people. The house clearers enter the homes of those who have deceased or vacated and essentially clean them out top to bottom. They get rid of everything inside from garbage to collectibles and everything in between.

How Does a Household Clearance Business Make Money?

A household clearance business generally makes money by selling the items they find inside the home. A home that’s been foreclosed on is often left full of furniture, appliances and equipment that the previous owners just couldn’t take with them. A clearance business can sell all of these items for a profit. In the case of foreclosure or a death, that’s generally how they profit. However, a clearance business can also charge by the hour or by the home or project.

What Do You Need to Start a Household Clearance Business?

If you’re going to be removing and transporting garbage, you’ll want to look into your local licensing regulations. Many communities require a special license for transporting waste. Additionally, you will likely want to make sure your business is insured.

You’ll need vehicles to transport all of the waste and items found inside the home. Storage for the items you find inside the home and intend to sell is also helpful. You may also need a few employees unless you are content to work long and laborious days on your own.

You’ll want to have some basic cleaning equipment as well. These might include gloves, shovels, and containers for waste and items to be removed. While no formal training or education is required, if you’re looking to sell collectibles then knowledge of antiques and collectibles will help.  

Marketing Your Household Clearance Business

In this business it pays to have connections. You will want to connect with funeral homes that can pass out your card when a client asks for guidance. You can also connect with real estate agents who will be aware of foreclosed homes. You can also market your business online and in local business directories. Think about where someone would look for your service and then make sure you’re represented there.

Owning a household clearance business can be a lot of work but it can also be a lot of fun. You’re able to see real progress as you clear out a home. You might find rare and valuable items inside a home and you’re providing a service. If you don’t mind working the occasional long day and you do enjoy clearing, cleaning and selling items, then a household clearance business may be your dream opportunity.

How To Break into Ghostwriting

So you want to be a ghostwriter?

Congratulations. It can be a rewarding lifestyle. You have the freedom to work when it suits you. You get to work with wonderful clients. Additionally, you're able to learn new things each and every day and focus on a skill you enjoy. However, as a ghostwriter, competition can be difficult. And breaking into ghostwriting provides some challenges.

Here are the top five tips to break into ghostwriting:


Tip #1 - Focus on a niche. A niche is a specialty. As a ghostwriter, a niche can help you establish credibility and authority. Your niche can be a topic, for example “parenting”, or your niche can be a format like articles or blog posts. A niche will also help clients find you. They may search online for “parenting blog writers” - if you’ve established yourself and created a website around that niche, they’ll find you.

Tip #2 - Remember customer service. One of the most important aspects of being a ghostwriter doesn’t have anything to do with writing. It’s your customer service. This means professional communication, reliability, timeliness and, of course, a professional approach to requests, revisions and feedback. You’re providing a service to a customer – if they have a good experience they’ll recommend you to others.

Tip #3 - Network. Breaking into ghostwriting can be simply a matter of being in the right place at the right time. In order to create more opportunities, you may want to network online and off. The more people who know about your service, the more opportunities you’ll come across.

Tip #4 - Price competitively. There are a number of ghostwriters who seem to write for next to nothing. And there are those who charge ten times what the market demands. Your job is to price yourself competitively. You want people to be willing to pay to try out your services and sometimes that means working for a little less than you’d like - especially in the beginning. Know that you can raise your rates once you’re established. You might even consider doing some work on spec. It can pay off handsomely.

Tip #5 - Brag. Often writers are introverts. They also struggle with confidence. Half the time they think they’re an amazing writer and the other half of the time they think everything they write is the worst ever. However, in order to instill confidence in your clients you’re going to need to, at least, fake it. Don’t hesitate to list your writing accomplishments, credentials and experience.

Breaking into ghostwriting isn’t difficult. It takes a plan, a commitment to succeed and the willingness to go out and market yourself. Trust that you’ll soon have a full schedule, wonderful clients and you’ll be living the writer’s life. The life you’ve always dreamed of.

How to Avoid Getting Scammed as You Learn

There are a few scammers on the Internet who prey on seniors attempting to learn how to build an online business. They may promise immediate success (there’s no such thing) and charge you an astronomical amount of money for their courses or sure-fired methods of making money online.

It’s like purchasing a frozen pizza in a box with a picture that looks like the most delectable pizza you’ve ever seen. Then, when you open the box to heat and eat it, it looks like someone played a joke on you. There may be a few sprinkles of cheese and a teaspoon of sauce – nothing like the picture on the box.

That’s what scammers do to would-be online senior entrepreneurs. They paint a pretty and exciting picture of making a fortune in no time at all. Unfortunately, there's rarely a quick way to make an immediate fortune online.

That doesn’t mean that everyone offering courses or charging you for advice is a scammer, but if you come into contact with a marketer who doesn’t respond to your emails asking for information or who tries to push you into a multi-level marketing situation – beware.

Check out the reputation of the people who are offering the once-in-a-lifetime deals where you have to buy it now or the price goes up astronomically. Also, promising that you’ll make money on the first day if you just plug in and then sit back and watch the pounds/dollars roll in is just not true.

Fortunately, there are great marketers who offer real time help that will get your business up and running. They’ll walk with you along the way and take you under their wings when you’re having doubts or problems.

Forums are excellent places to sort out who’s who in the Internet marketing world. Get to know the marketer before you do business with him or her and don’t shell out your hard-earned money until you know it’s legit.

The truth about making money on the Internet is that you have to know how to use a computer (many scammers claim you don’t) and you have to know your way around the Internet. If anyone tells you different, beware.

Understanding how things work online will help you reach success faster than any scheme from a scamming marketer could. The reputable marketers are out there and ready and willing to help you learn all you need to know about becoming an Internet entrepreneur.  Do your due diligence first and keep your wits about you.

Finding Your Niche as a Senior Entrepreneur

By the time you retire, you probably know what you enjoy doing. In fact, you may have become quite an expert at a particular topic such as golf, fishing, cooking, travel or some form of craft.

You may have also had job experience that you can turn into a money-making opportunity on the Internet. Imagine, then, turning either your lifelong passion or your former occupation into a profit-churning business.

There are so many online options for you to choose from when you're considering the possibility of become a senior entrepreneur. Blogging, affiliate marketing, creating digital courses and many more ideas are available for you to showcase your expertise and help others learn what you already know.

Exploring further, you may see a way to turn that knowledge into a business that you can profit from and enjoy. Whether you’re looking for a niche that you’ll have fun dabbling in or one that will fill a need and make money – you can find success by following your passion.

There are different ways to go about picking a niche. Aside from profits and passions, make sure you either know enough about the concept to share it, or you’re willing to learn more before you begin to share.

Alternatively, there’s nothing wrong with starting your business as a bona fide newbie, and saying so – because people love to watch the journey unfold as someone absorbs information that’s new to them, and shares how they implement the knowledge until they achieve success.

Make sure that you can enjoy – or at least stomach – writing about your chosen topic on a regular basis. Don’t pick something that will make you dread working on it because blogs and online businesses require your attention.

Go into a bookstore, into the non-fiction section, or look online, and see what kinds of topics there are. These are generally topics people will pay money for – such as relationship help, cooking advice, and pet care.

Think about whether you want to be in a broad niche, such as anti aging or survival – or if you prefer to narrow it down to something like skincare or food prepping for an emergency situation. Sometimes a broad niche gives you more opportunities for sales, but the narrow niche enables you to position yourself as the 'go to' expert a little more easily.

Don’t pick a niche that you’ll be unhappy in. Even a niche like depression may seem rewarding because you get to help people, but keep in mind that your audience may also make you feel sad if you’re the type of person to let other peoples’ problems weigh on you heavily.

Retirement Doesn't Have to Mean the End of Your Career

How to Get More From Old Content on Your Blog

If you’ve read around and you know your stuff when it comes to creating and running a blog, then no doubt you should know by now the value of sharing your new content as you upload it. Create a post, share said post on Reddit, Google+, Twitter, Facebook… rinse and repeat. Simple!

But what if you don’t have time to update your blog with new content every day? Does that mean you can’t do any promotion that day?

Of course not! It simply means that you should look for ways to promote your old content to get repeat traffic from old posts.

Lightning Can Strike Twice

Say you created a post on Bruce Lee, uploaded it to your site and then shared it on social media and it went somewhat viral. Maybe it got you thousands and thousands of hits on that day alone and then trailed off for the next few days.

Does that mean that you’re done with that post just because you already shared it once?

Of course not! An article on Bruce Lee is what you would call ‘evergreen’. That means that it will remain relevant no matter how old it becomes because it isn’t based on current trends or on topical news items. Which, in turn, means you could promote it again ten years from now and have the same exact amount of success.

In fact, you could actually post the content to the very same place and probably still get a big response. Why? Because there are billions of people online – if the community is a big one then chances are your post will be seen by mostly new people the second time around.

But better yet, why not look for new places to share it? Other social networks, forums or social bookmarking sites?

If you consider that each of your blog posts has the potential to rake in thousands of views, that means you’re probably sitting on a veritable goldmine if you have a website packed with old content!

Want to get even more use out of your old posts? Then consider updating them from time to time. This way you have a legitimate reason to post them in the same place you’ve had success before and Google will also see the content as being relevant and up-to-date. This is a big help for your SEO!

How to Minimize Distractions and Get More Writing Done

Every time you lose your train of thought, it takes time before you can regain your focus and carry on. The more derailments you have, the longer it’ll take to get anywhere. A recent study from King’s College, London showed that constant interruption lowers one’s IQ by an average of about 10 points, and interferes with productivity. If you want to get that novel of yours written or finish writing assignments on time, minimizing other demands on your attention is a good idea.

Here are a few ways to avoid losing focus to distractions:

1) Go Incommunicado: A ringing phone or e-mail and message alerts can distract you even if you don’t respond, so close your e-mail program, shut down instant messaging, and turn off your phone. The world can get by just fine without you for a couple of hours. If you can’t resist the urge to peek at your e-mail, try unplugging the modem, or even using a computer without internet access when you’re writing.

2) Dedicate Specific Chunks Of Time To Writing: Let the people you live with know that this time is writing time, and see if you can get them to act as though you are not at home. A spouse who wants to complain about his or her day at the office and discuss the grocery list can be at least as distracting as text messages and phone calls. Of course you need to have those conversations, but you probably don’t need to have them right when your heroes are in the middle of trying to hotwire a space ship.

3) Turn Off The Chatter: Some people can write with music, radio, and television in the background. Some highly successful novelists are among them. The rest of us, though, usually end up listening to a television program or singing along with a song in our heads, instead of concentrating on our own words. Which type are you? Be honest with yourself. If chatter distracts you but silence bugs you, try listening to instrumental music. If you really want human voices for company, try listening to music in a language that you don’t understand.

4) Block Off Visual Distractions: Sounds aren’t the only things that can take your attention away from the work at hand. A flickering television screen, the scene outside your window or even curtains fluttering in the breeze can tug at your brain. Turn the TV all the way off, and close the blinds if you find yourself wondering what’s going on across the street.