Scams on the Internet

Avoiding Internet Scams

Scams on the Internet seem to be everywhere these days. I suppose as soon as genuine honest people start to look to anything as an opportunity to make money, there are unscrupulous people that will try to take advantage of those who are starting out.

Many people thinking about starting their own online home business are therefore apprehensive because they are afraid of Internet scams.

Everything is written in such a way that it looks too good to be true and if you are just starting out online, it is easy to get sucked in and spend money on things that just do not work! So you need to be on the look out for specific tactics.

Many work at home opportunities are honest genuine business opportunities and will not rip you off, unfortunately, there are still some Internet scams around.

Firstly, let's be clear. There is a difference between someone running off with your hard earned cash with no intention of giving you any goods and something being not what you thought it was or don't actually need.

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Be Careful with your Money

Purchasing things on the Internet is not as scary as you think and if you are careful you should not experience someone running off with your money. Whilst I know of lots of people who have had their cards cloned at the petrol station (including my husband recently), I don't know of anyone personally that has had the same problems online.

Make sure you pay for anything online using methods that will protect you should something go wrong. A credit card will usually protect you, whereas a debit card will not.

My biggest rule of thumb is not to spend any money before you know that this will be right for you. Many reputable companies offer free trials, taster courses or free consultations that will help you to make your decision about whether or not this is the right thing for you.

My favourite network marketing training programme is free, and others have free tasters of information to enable you to make a buying decision. In my opinion, anyone who wants you to rush into a decision before you are ready is relying on the panic factor to force you into a buying decision.

Site Build It! the programme that I use to build and host this website has a number of Free Trial Downloads that enable you to check out its value before you buy. You are also able to speak to a site owner to answer any questions and they have a money back guarantee. Now that is the kind of service that allows you to make a buying decision with confidence!

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Be Aware of Clever Marketing

In my time working on the Internet I have come across many things that seem the "perfect solution" only to find that they are not right for me. In my opinion, this is not actually a scam but very clever copywriting and advertising techniques. The offer is written in such a way that it sucks you in and makes you think that it is the perfect solution for your problem.

Sometimes termed Butterfly Marketing techniques, they will start off with a very low price or free offer and then just as you click to leave you are faced with a one time only offer that seems too good to be true. The price is hugely discounted to a never seen again offer, and you are left battling with yourself over whether to purchase the product.

If this happens, beware! I'm not saying that everyone that uses this technique is selling something that is worthless but if you are aware of the tactics then you are less likely to purchase something that you don't need or won't be able to make sense of.

More importantly, take a look at the methods that they use to promote their offer and try to identify what it is that drew you towards making a purchase. If you can educate yourself as to what copywriting techniques made you take the bait, you will have learned a lesson that you can put into your own writing.

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Do Your Anti-Scam Research

Researching an opportunity and the company thoroughly will also protect you from the scammers.

Ultimately you need to trust your judgement and if there is a human being at the end of an email or phone you will have to decide whether or not you trust and can work with them.

A good rule of thumb is that if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is!

There are a few places that you can go to check how reliable your opportunity is. Google and Yahoo Groups will normally have news pretty quickly of the latest scams. I have listed a couple of sites that deal with this specifically.

• Google Groups
• Yahoo Groups
• www.scambusters.com
• www.worldwidescam.com

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Ease Yourself in Gently

Another trick to ensure that you don’t fall hook, line and sinker into a scam is to ease your way in gently. Keep your regular job if you have one and don’t give it up until it has built to the level that you can afford to quit altogether. That way you minimise the risk of losing everything!

Be careful not to put all your eggs in one basket and try to make sure that you have multiple income streams so that if any one fails you still have other income to fall back on.

Another good approach is not to invest all your hard earned savings into one opportunity. There are many relatively low cost start-up businesses. Some of the most successful businesses were started on a shoe-string, or thereabouts…

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