So I am going to meet a person next week to discuss about a potential business relationship and I knew right off the bat that this was a sole proprietor type of operation. The interesting thing was in virtually all of the correspondents the person appeared to be insistent in trying to make his business sound semi large. For example, in all of the communications there would be emphasizes on the office building and how it is located in the downtown core, there will be secretaries and assistants to guide me, etc.

Really, I already knew ahead of time that this was like a virtual office setup where people simply pay to say use the location for a mailing address while occasionally using the space. To me I personally wouldn’t care too much if the person flat out just said they are their own boss and run their business mainly at home. I would think nowadays it can be more impressive where you are able to sustain a viable business at the comfort of your own home.

Shouldn’t it all be about the numbers at the end anyways when it comes to a business? Example, one guy that makes a million a year in his living room versus a guy that makes fifty thousand while have a traditional office can be more impressive in terms of your image perception. To me that shows that the person knows how to be resourceful and can think out of the box.

Today I saw this company where its online business model was mainly to have people try out free offers from various vendors while doing surveys. Of course, the business gets like say $2 to $10 for every survey or offer that people try as a direct result of their referral. Their incentive to get people to do so is to reward them with these points of sort that can be used as a currency for their in-house products. Example, doing one survey can net them 100 points which can be used to play a game or 1000 to buy a cheap item.

It seems like it is doing well for them too. Compare that in contrast where if you went with the more traditional route where you say charged people $5 for like 1000 points or something like that and you probably won’t get as large of a response unless your product is truly in demand. There is a drawback to this though as many of these affiliate companies don’t allow you to offer incentives in order to get people to try the products.

For example, if one vendor offered me $5 to refer someone to try its product I can’t say that I will offer you $1 to do so. There are many that don’t mind though as long as it is qualified leads. Different ways of creating a business.

Usually it’s a fear of loss that gets you to take action on anything I’d say. With that in mind I was told of a person today that has it all set financially as a result of an inheritance. The problem now it seems is that since the person has more money than he knows what to do with he now goes through life in a very cautious way as the fear simply isn’t there when it comes to running out of money.

For example, we all know that that things like crime happen all the time. Now that he has the money he has hired a personal security guard. This is a simple residential home too. When he now gets sick for the slightest circumstance like a cold he now seems to neglect any kind of self assessment and would automatically assume that he is having say a heart attack. Therefore, he would always pay extraordinary fees to get a personal service to whiz him to the hospital for a check up.

To each his own I suppose. But one way I have personally avoided this type of mentality is to constantly get involved with activities or even work that puts you in the shoes of the everyday person. I find that this helps to keep you grounded in terms of fully appreciating what you currently have and therefore the money you get afterwards is just a bonus. You really do learn that so many things which you think you need you really don’t.

Eventually it becomes a situation like while you could hire someone to spoon feed and cut your meat it just seems silly that you need to spend money to do it I’d say.

Today I went to a restaurant for a family outing and as usual people fight over in wanting to try and pay for the bill. The bill was about $100 which wasn’t too bad considering the amount of people. The interesting thing was that the person that snagged the bill was not currently working as she was semi retired. A comment was then made that the bill is only not much if you had money coming in.

I tend to always look at bills that way too in determining if something is “not much” to buy something. Example, I know dining out is usually a major money killer for many people. So while say a $5 meal for lunch may not be “much” I would rather look at it from your entire income point of view. For example, some people only make say $12/hour. When you look at it from that perspective that $5 can seem a lot.

Examples like that is why I’d say it is better to always look at how much you actually have when you are spending versus price comparing the costs from different vendors.

I was reading a post about an item that seemed to be a price error where a product that could easily be in the $500 range was selling for $50. Basically, it’s like someone forgot to add an extra zero at the end of the price. Of course there were people that insisted in trying to buy say five quantities of it since it is such a good deal. This usually results in people getting blasted for trying to horde the items.

For me I would usually only buy multiple quantities if I know that I would be giving it to someone else that wants one too or if I can realistically sell the product to someone else to simply make my money back where it is as if I am getting the item for free. Example, if the item is normally $500 and is selling for $50 then I would simply buy two of them where it’s not farfetched to sell the extra one for $100.

I usually find that as a perfect balance where it’s not like you are trying to get everything for yourself but rather you are trying to be smart about saving and making money. I would personally only buy a ton and sell them for a high price if I was specifically in that type of business when it comes to earning an income. At the same time a habit of buying more than you need can usually end up as a waste.

To me it’s more of a habit development where you always want to think of ways to at least break even whenever money is going out of your account. Again, I personally see the real savings when it comes to shopping is how much money you have left in the savings account and not how much you necessarily saved on the item.