Offering Pay For Phone Support

A friend asked me this a while back. They wanted to offer phone support for customers who pay a subscription fee. As a small business they of course don’t have the kind of budget for the big expensive solutions.

She wanted to go easy and low tech. Basically, if someone is a paying subscribers, they will receive a phone number for support after they subscribe. Low tech is good. But I pointed out this may not work so well in her case because, if the phone number is a static one, there’s nothing stopping a past subscriber from calling the number after they cancel their subscription. And it becomes so awkward after they call you, you tell them you can’t answer them because they haven’t paid.

Not sure about you, but I personally like to limit as many potential bombs as possible. So, I helped her figure out a better, more cost effective and yet simple way. The suggestion, use a program like aMember to create and manage their membership.

Then, get themselves an account at a company like thinkingVOICE. thinkingVOICE is a click to call service. You place a button or a form on your site, people fill in their information including their phone number and click call me. Their system will call you, when you answer, it will connect the customer and you together. Your phone numbers are not revealed to the customer.

The cost? A queen’s ransom of $6.95 a month + $0.15 per minute. Back to my friend’s case. She would only have to put this form or button inside the membership area so it’s only accessible to active subscribers and eliminate the problem of being able to call after the subscription is canceled.

Lynette Chandler helps entrepreneurs leverage readily available technology and trends for their marketing. Learn how technology affects your business today. 

Work at Home Tips from a Desperate Working Momma

Do work at home moms get distracted? You bet they do! Watch this video for a few laughs.

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Setting Up Membership Sites

With residual income all the rage these days, people always ask me how to set one up and what they can use. There are many systems available. Some come complete with the content management system built in, some are 100% hosted meaning you don’t have to worry about software upgrades or keeping the technical parts well oiled and greased, and some simply manages the access to your content.

I’ve managed several membership sites, took a few different system for a spin but ultimately, I still come back to aMember. It’s highly configurable, you can build your member’s area using any system you are most comfortable with including FrontPage or Dreamweaver and it’s got lots of different payment system plugins. It also comes with free setup and the good thing is, it’s been around for a long time so the user community is fairly large, which in turn means it’s easier to find answers if you hit a snag.

Technorati Tags: ecommerce, technology

Lynette Chandler helps entrepreneurs leverage readily available technology and trends for their marketing. Learn how technology affects your business today. 

February’s Affiliate Classroom Magazine

This month’s Affiliate Classroom magazine is now available and you can download it for free here.

 This month topics include:

Adding Revenue Streams: How to revive a site with less than stellar conversions.

Conversion Fundamentals that are often overlooked during site development.

Merchant Tips: Six application process tips

and much more.

Grab your free copy!

WHAM? Wasn’t that an 80’s band?

The other day I was doing some instant messaging with a man and in our conversation I mentioned that I am a WAHM. I nearly fell out of my chair laughing with his response.

WHAM? Wasn’t that an 80’s band with George Michael?

Why yes it was, but I am not a former member of the band - believe me NO one wants to hear me sing.
I then had to tell him that WAHM stands for Work At Home Mom.

I learned that not everyone in the world knows what the heck WAHM stands for so from now on I think I’ll just take the time to write it out instead of being confused with an 80’s band.

Could Your J-O-B Turn Into A WAHM Opportunity?

I have a friend who is a wahm and she doesn’t even know it! All she knows is that she enjoys the luxury of doing her job from the comfort of her own home. This is the same job that she performed in the traditional sense for many years. She got up early, put on heels, hose, and make-up and drove the 20-minute commute to her workplace.

When I say she doesn’t know that she is a wahm, I mean that she has no knowledge of the wahm community as we know it at all. Actually, I think she is what we refer to as a telecommuter, but I need to check with Nell T. on that to make sure!

Through a series of events, some of which were health related, this lady is now able to work from home performing all the same job duties as when she was reporting to the workplace every day. She still enjoys all the same company benefits such as health and dental insurance, 401K plan, employee stock ownership plan, etc.

Now I don’t understand enough about her work to be very specific, but I know that she reviews and analyzes new software used by the company, provides training via teleconference and online computer information sharing capabilities (and occasionally onsite in the classroom) on how to use the software, writes documentation and implementation procedures, and provides technical support for the company’s divisions worldwide. She is required to travel to the company headquarters out of state for about a week maybe once every six months or so, but other than that she works entirely from her home office, equipped with company computer, phone, printer, fax, etc..

Is this situation possible for almost anyone in the corporate world? Probably not. But I wanted to share the story because I know there are many part time wahms out there still working regular jobs who would love to be home full time. You just never know what might be possible.

I do know that this friend’s work arrangement probably would never have happened had she not had a history with the company of being hard-working, dedicated, and productive. If you have that kind of reputation with your employer and feel that you could perform your job from home while maintaining the same level of productivity, you might consider making a proposal to that effect. You just never know!

Posted by Linda Hinkle of High School Stuff 

What Does Your Office Sound Like?

My office sounds too much like home. It is because of that, I’m deathly afraid of getting on the phone many times because there is no place I can ’send’ my kids to. I’m quite sure most of you at one point or another feel the same way.

Here’s something interesting. Recently, I someone commented on one of my blogs about Thriving Office. Checking it out, I found what a brilliant idea it is! Thriving Office is a CD of typical office sounds. So if you’re on the phone, it kinda sounds like you have people working in the background.

They also claim that people use it even when not on the phone. It seems, some people find it helps them concentrate and feel like their at work.

Technorati Tags: business, entrepreneur, wahm

Lynette Chandler helps entrepreneurs leverage readily available technology and trends for their marketing. Learn how technology affects your business today. 

Staying Organized…the Key to Sanity

Sometimes being a WAHM can be really crazy with trying to keep up with your work schedule, kids’ school schedules and extra-curricular activities. One way that I have found that helps keep me sane with scheduling is maintaining two calendars.

I have an organizer that has a page for each day of the week. It’s in a zippered leather binder and I love it. I have all my contact phone numbers in there and I use that to track my daily tasks and time spent on each project. I only put my work-related tasks and goals on the pages of that calendar.

The other calendar I have is a wire bound monthly planner. It is about 9×13 and has a month spread across two pages. It’s just a monthly calendar. I use that to track other daily events. School holidays, sporting events, birthdays, conferences, etc. Having 4 kids in 3 different schools, I assign each child a color of ink and their events get calendared with thier own color. It saves space and really helps with keeping me on track and I am far less likely to miss events if I can look at the month in a glance.

Lauren is the owner of Boomerang Admin and North Country Esscentuals. She loves being able to work at home, doing what she wants and having the extra time with her children.
http://boomerangadmin.com

Online Idea Making Moms Money

When it comes to exploring the online idea making moms money, you will find that there is more than one attracting the masses of at-home workers. As you sit at the computer and type away a multitude of Internet searches, you will find a particular online idea making moms money that really catches your eye. Keep that in the forefront, but also consider additional options, including lesser-known online ideas making moms money.
[Read more]

Time to unWAHM

Time to unWAHM is my play on words for time to unwind! I’ve got the kids bathed, clothed, fed, and now they are headed off to the Grandparents for the day!

I love my kids dearly and love my life as a WAHM, but it is nice to have those days where you do unWAHM and just relax by yourself.

So, today I’m going to come home out of the cold – get in my sweats – curl up on the couch – and watch some lifetime movies or something really girly! Heck, I might even catch a quick nap.

I’ll be totally refreshed and ready to hug my little peanuts when my unWAHM time is over.

Do you ever unWAHM?

Post by Nell Taliercio of TelecommutingAnswerLady.com

This WAHM is staying warm today….

Today when I woke up to -25 degree temperature it made me realize again how fortunate I am that I don’t have to commute to work. I can stay in my fuzzy jammies and bunny slippers all day if I want. I can stay nice and warm all day!

That is one of the many reasons that I love being able to work from home. My children are in middle school now. It’s such a great thing to be able to fit their activities into “MY” work schedule instead of my “employer’s” work schedule.

As posted earlier by Nell T., sometimes its just nice when you have one of those moments where you just realize how blessed you are to be able to work from home and today I had one of those moments.

Lauren is the owner of Boomerang Admin and North Country Esscentuals. She loves being able to work at home, doing what she wants and having the extra time with her children.
http://boomerangadmin.com