The Inland Revenue has begun a well-publicised crackdown on self-employed dentists, medics, builders and plumbers who it believes may be avoiding or failing fully to declare tax owed. As a consequence, tax experts say that their next target of HMRC is likely to be people who make money from online businesses like eBay and are failing to declare their earnings or pay tax on their profits.
“HMRC will go for the softest target because they need the money,” says tax expert Patrick Harrison, partner at accountant PFK. “They are trying to use their limited resources as best they can and use software to yield information about trading online. However, it is one thing to identify the tax due, and another to get someone to pay up, so they have to have a reasonable chance of collecting the money off the person they have identified for them to pursue a claim.”
So what is the tax position of selling new and second-hand goods online, and what tax will you have to pay if you sell on your second hand goods?
“Running an online business via a site like eBay is no different from self-employment,” says Harrison. You are required to keep records of income and expenditure and declare profits for tax. Your business could come in for VAT issues if it reaches the turnover registration threshold of £73,000 (in tax year 2011). “
If you are selling your own personal goods infrequently, then you do not need to declare profits or register your activities as a business – it is largely a question of scale. Harrison says: “Someone who is buying and selling regularly to make a profit would fall into the tax net, and you need to tell the Inland Revenue that you are running a business within three months of starting it. If you are selling your own personal goods then it does not qualify as a business.”
Article Source: http://www.money-marketuk.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1778:ebay-traders-come-under-scrutiny-from-the-tax-man&catid=72:consumer&Itemid=320
Wednesday, 31 August 2011
Monday, 29 August 2011
Can Broadcasters Make Money With Facebook?
It’s arguable whether we have seen any really meaningful examples of inventive, exploratory collaboration between broadcasters and web companies, but there were glimmers of hope in this afternoon’s panel exploring the state of convergence.
Beyond the obligatory clarification of what convergence actually means – presumably for the benefit of the audience – this was really an opportunity for Channel 4 chief executive David Abraham and ITV’s managing director of commercial and online Fru Hazlitt to flex their technical muscles, and prove that broadcasters really do get it. Both were fairly convincing, with a firm focus on the commercial potential of (finally) making money online.
Facebook’s deal with Endemol to host Big Brother voting across Europe is an example of a simple, first-step level of interaction between broadcasters and the web, Facebook’s director of platform partnerships Christian Hernandez explained.
In Germany, where the first partnership was rolled out last week, 10% of all votes are coming through Facebook and, he claimed, are supplemental to text and phone votes and so not cannibalising those revenues.
What’s in it for Facebook, asked panel chair Steve Hewlett? Hernandez explained that users pay to vote for Big Brother using the universal Facebook Credits system, with 30% of revenues going to Facebook and 70% to Endemol; at current euro rates that equates to €0.70 per vote.
Hernandez was explicit about Facebook’s objective: “We are an identity platform and want to make that pervasive through the web. Viewers can already log on to Channel4 with their Facebook identity … this kind of project is subsiding Facebook’s long-term vision for what it wants to be the underlying identity platform for the web.”
Abraham was emphatic in his response. “If you’re creating data sources that other people are exploiting commercially then you don’t have a business,” he said. The commercial future for broadcasters depends, then, on understanding, creating and managing the pools of insight and information about consumers are being able to commercialise that. Channel 4 already has pools of information on its users, grouped according to their activity on different specialist areas of the C4 web and mobile site. But those need to be joined up and contextualised.
Does it make sense for Channel 4 to try to develop its own infrastructure for managing user identity, preferences and behaviour? Facebook has an entire business built on that, so why not just partner with them? I posed that question on Twitter.
Former Channel 4 head of cross-platform Matt Locke responded: “Giving up auth to a 3rd party is suicide. Use other platforms for social ‘ripples’, but you need to see the data yourself. Putting all these eggs in one basket is too risky a strategy. C4 need to develop own tools plus use 3rd parties.”
“Her department will be one of the most interesting to watch in next few years…”
@paulblueeyedboy said the public value of Channel4 users’ data should not be transferred to an organisation like Facebook.
Tom Loosemore, who used to run Channel 4′s innovation investment fund 4ip, approved of Abraham’s comments: “C4 is now barking up the right tree. Could even do something really interesting in VRM space if bold enough.”
Locke pointed to Gill Pritchard, who was appointed director of audience technologies at Channel 4 earlier this year.
Article Source: http://www.psfk.com/2011/08/can-broadcasters-make-money-with-facebook.html
Beyond the obligatory clarification of what convergence actually means – presumably for the benefit of the audience – this was really an opportunity for Channel 4 chief executive David Abraham and ITV’s managing director of commercial and online Fru Hazlitt to flex their technical muscles, and prove that broadcasters really do get it. Both were fairly convincing, with a firm focus on the commercial potential of (finally) making money online.
Facebook’s deal with Endemol to host Big Brother voting across Europe is an example of a simple, first-step level of interaction between broadcasters and the web, Facebook’s director of platform partnerships Christian Hernandez explained.
In Germany, where the first partnership was rolled out last week, 10% of all votes are coming through Facebook and, he claimed, are supplemental to text and phone votes and so not cannibalising those revenues.
What’s in it for Facebook, asked panel chair Steve Hewlett? Hernandez explained that users pay to vote for Big Brother using the universal Facebook Credits system, with 30% of revenues going to Facebook and 70% to Endemol; at current euro rates that equates to €0.70 per vote.
Hernandez was explicit about Facebook’s objective: “We are an identity platform and want to make that pervasive through the web. Viewers can already log on to Channel4 with their Facebook identity … this kind of project is subsiding Facebook’s long-term vision for what it wants to be the underlying identity platform for the web.”
Abraham was emphatic in his response. “If you’re creating data sources that other people are exploiting commercially then you don’t have a business,” he said. The commercial future for broadcasters depends, then, on understanding, creating and managing the pools of insight and information about consumers are being able to commercialise that. Channel 4 already has pools of information on its users, grouped according to their activity on different specialist areas of the C4 web and mobile site. But those need to be joined up and contextualised.
Does it make sense for Channel 4 to try to develop its own infrastructure for managing user identity, preferences and behaviour? Facebook has an entire business built on that, so why not just partner with them? I posed that question on Twitter.
Former Channel 4 head of cross-platform Matt Locke responded: “Giving up auth to a 3rd party is suicide. Use other platforms for social ‘ripples’, but you need to see the data yourself. Putting all these eggs in one basket is too risky a strategy. C4 need to develop own tools plus use 3rd parties.”
“Her department will be one of the most interesting to watch in next few years…”
@paulblueeyedboy said the public value of Channel4 users’ data should not be transferred to an organisation like Facebook.
Tom Loosemore, who used to run Channel 4′s innovation investment fund 4ip, approved of Abraham’s comments: “C4 is now barking up the right tree. Could even do something really interesting in VRM space if bold enough.”
Locke pointed to Gill Pritchard, who was appointed director of audience technologies at Channel 4 earlier this year.
Article Source: http://www.psfk.com/2011/08/can-broadcasters-make-money-with-facebook.html
Banks face rising online competition
First the retailers, now the banks?
The internet’s blowtorch that’s been searing retailers from book stores to electronics outlets is now turning the competitive heat up on the country’s biggest banks.
While customers have long had options to park their savings in online accounts - including those operated by the big four local banks - the offerings are now extending to mortgages, potentially cutting into some of the banks’ most lucrative profit streams.
Small online outfits like Loans.com.au, MyRate.com.au, emoney.net. au and StateCustodians.com.au are among those offering standard variable interest rates a full percentage point below those offered by so-called bricks-and-mortar bank rates.
The average of those mortgage loans offered by the big four banks on August 24 was 7.78 per cent, while an average of the four online-only lenders - unaffiliated with the established banks - was 6.77 per cent, 101 basis points less.
The upstarts remain market minnows compared with the banking behemoths, whose collective profit takings exceeded $22 billion over the past year. Even so, the banks are likely to keep a wary eye on the fast-growing competition in one of their most profitable sectors.
“We’re really surprised by how much the Australian consumers are willing to purchase a home loan online,” said Loans.com’s managing director Marie Mortimer. “We started with five staff three months ago, we’re up to 50 now. We’ve taken over a whole floor of office space.’’
The Australian Bankers’ Association said that although it doesn’t represent the online-online lenders, it welcomes the competition.
‘‘The housing finance market continues to be a very competitive sector and banks welcome competition from all players in that market - banks, building societies, credit unions and other lenders,’’ said ABA chief executive Steven Münchenberg.
Cost gap
Queanbeyan, NSW-based Phil Mandl said he began looking for a better interest rate two years ago, concerned about the Reserve Bank lifting the cash rate and becoming disenchanted with the service level at ME Bank, then the source of his home loan.
“I started to look around and got on the internet and I came across State Custodians,” he said. After refinancing his $330,000 home loan, Mr Mandl describes himself as ‘‘happy’’ and ‘‘very likely’’ to stay with the new lender.
The online pricing advantage for lenders has evident for years in retailing: potentially much lower costs of distribution, marketing and sales. Customers also have the ability to make snap comparisons of prices.
Loans.com’s Ms Mortimer said the company charges about 6 basis points on top of the credit cost to cover its expenses, which includes the lower expenses for staff, office space, and websites.
By comparison, Ms Mortimer estimates that traditional banks and networks of mortgage brokers face staffing, shop front and other costs totalling 45 basis points.
Online lender State Custodians managing director David Westerman said his company counts among its customers managers from ANZ Bank and Commonwealth Bank.
“We can offer one of the cheapest rates and make money and that’s all off the back of not having to pay a broker,” he said. State Custodians has seen ‘‘big spikes’’ in activity on the site recently, Mr Westerman said, without elaborating.
Comparisons
As with retail consumers using comparison websites before making purchases of electronics or cameras, Australian can look to a host of sites including RateCity.com.au,Mozo.com.au, Canstar Cannex (www.canstar.com.au), and InfoChoice (www.infochoice.com.au).
And, it seems, more consumers are taking advantage of those offerings. InfoChoice, the largest rate comparison site by web traffic, said revenue for lead referral to lenders jumped 89 per cent in the six months to June 2011, helping lift its revenue 35 per cent to $2.7 million for the half.
Despite the rise in appetite for online loans, RBS Equities banks analyst John Buonaccorsi believes online lenders will only increase competition “at the margins” of the home loan market.
One reason is that smaller online lenders still face higher costs for wholesale funding, he said. In addition, the headline rates gap narrows when additional discounts are won by customers tapping loans from the major banks.
Back in the 1990s RAMS and Aussie Home Loans could access funding cheaply on global markets and offer loans 1.5 to 2 percentage points lower than the major banks, he said.
Those non-bank lenders, though, mostly disappeared in the global financial crisis as the cost of their funds made them uncompetitive with the major banks.
Online offerings
The major banks, meanwhile, are offering their own online offerings. For instance, National Australia Bank-owned UBank, launched in 2008, offers a standard variable rate at 6.79 per cent, well below the 7.67 per cent charged by NAB.
And many of the online lenders are in fact backed banks or non-bank lenders - MyRate.com is funded through ING Bank, while mortgage originator FirstMac provides loans for Loans.com.
The playing field is also becoming increasingly competitive with other entrants including Ratebusters.com.au, BetterOption.com.au, easystreet.com.au, Yellow Brick Road (www.ybr.com.au), headed by Wizard Home Loans founder Mark Bouris.
State Custodian’s Mr Westerman concedes there is a churn in the new players entering and exiting the business - visible in the mix of names offering the best deals on the comparison sites.
"A lot of people have tried this and have been seriously burnt and left the market," said State Custodian’s Mr Westerman. State Custodians - backed by non-bank lender Resimac - has been in business six years.
The challenge for the online lenders at this point, he said, is to get the right balance between low rates and remaining profitable.
"Anyone can offer a cheap rate with a low margin, but unless you can successfully convert that traffic you’re going to go broke.’’
Article Source: http://www.smh.com.au/business/banks-face-rising-online-competition-20110829-1jh83.html
The internet’s blowtorch that’s been searing retailers from book stores to electronics outlets is now turning the competitive heat up on the country’s biggest banks.
While customers have long had options to park their savings in online accounts - including those operated by the big four local banks - the offerings are now extending to mortgages, potentially cutting into some of the banks’ most lucrative profit streams.
Small online outfits like Loans.com.au, MyRate.com.au, emoney.net. au and StateCustodians.com.au are among those offering standard variable interest rates a full percentage point below those offered by so-called bricks-and-mortar bank rates.
The average of those mortgage loans offered by the big four banks on August 24 was 7.78 per cent, while an average of the four online-only lenders - unaffiliated with the established banks - was 6.77 per cent, 101 basis points less.
The upstarts remain market minnows compared with the banking behemoths, whose collective profit takings exceeded $22 billion over the past year. Even so, the banks are likely to keep a wary eye on the fast-growing competition in one of their most profitable sectors.
“We’re really surprised by how much the Australian consumers are willing to purchase a home loan online,” said Loans.com’s managing director Marie Mortimer. “We started with five staff three months ago, we’re up to 50 now. We’ve taken over a whole floor of office space.’’
The Australian Bankers’ Association said that although it doesn’t represent the online-online lenders, it welcomes the competition.
‘‘The housing finance market continues to be a very competitive sector and banks welcome competition from all players in that market - banks, building societies, credit unions and other lenders,’’ said ABA chief executive Steven Münchenberg.
Cost gap
Queanbeyan, NSW-based Phil Mandl said he began looking for a better interest rate two years ago, concerned about the Reserve Bank lifting the cash rate and becoming disenchanted with the service level at ME Bank, then the source of his home loan.
“I started to look around and got on the internet and I came across State Custodians,” he said. After refinancing his $330,000 home loan, Mr Mandl describes himself as ‘‘happy’’ and ‘‘very likely’’ to stay with the new lender.
The online pricing advantage for lenders has evident for years in retailing: potentially much lower costs of distribution, marketing and sales. Customers also have the ability to make snap comparisons of prices.
Loans.com’s Ms Mortimer said the company charges about 6 basis points on top of the credit cost to cover its expenses, which includes the lower expenses for staff, office space, and websites.
By comparison, Ms Mortimer estimates that traditional banks and networks of mortgage brokers face staffing, shop front and other costs totalling 45 basis points.
Online lender State Custodians managing director David Westerman said his company counts among its customers managers from ANZ Bank and Commonwealth Bank.
“We can offer one of the cheapest rates and make money and that’s all off the back of not having to pay a broker,” he said. State Custodians has seen ‘‘big spikes’’ in activity on the site recently, Mr Westerman said, without elaborating.
Comparisons
As with retail consumers using comparison websites before making purchases of electronics or cameras, Australian can look to a host of sites including RateCity.com.au,Mozo.com.au, Canstar Cannex (www.canstar.com.au), and InfoChoice (www.infochoice.com.au).
And, it seems, more consumers are taking advantage of those offerings. InfoChoice, the largest rate comparison site by web traffic, said revenue for lead referral to lenders jumped 89 per cent in the six months to June 2011, helping lift its revenue 35 per cent to $2.7 million for the half.
Despite the rise in appetite for online loans, RBS Equities banks analyst John Buonaccorsi believes online lenders will only increase competition “at the margins” of the home loan market.
One reason is that smaller online lenders still face higher costs for wholesale funding, he said. In addition, the headline rates gap narrows when additional discounts are won by customers tapping loans from the major banks.
Back in the 1990s RAMS and Aussie Home Loans could access funding cheaply on global markets and offer loans 1.5 to 2 percentage points lower than the major banks, he said.
Those non-bank lenders, though, mostly disappeared in the global financial crisis as the cost of their funds made them uncompetitive with the major banks.
Online offerings
The major banks, meanwhile, are offering their own online offerings. For instance, National Australia Bank-owned UBank, launched in 2008, offers a standard variable rate at 6.79 per cent, well below the 7.67 per cent charged by NAB.
And many of the online lenders are in fact backed banks or non-bank lenders - MyRate.com is funded through ING Bank, while mortgage originator FirstMac provides loans for Loans.com.
The playing field is also becoming increasingly competitive with other entrants including Ratebusters.com.au, BetterOption.com.au, easystreet.com.au, Yellow Brick Road (www.ybr.com.au), headed by Wizard Home Loans founder Mark Bouris.
State Custodian’s Mr Westerman concedes there is a churn in the new players entering and exiting the business - visible in the mix of names offering the best deals on the comparison sites.
"A lot of people have tried this and have been seriously burnt and left the market," said State Custodian’s Mr Westerman. State Custodians - backed by non-bank lender Resimac - has been in business six years.
The challenge for the online lenders at this point, he said, is to get the right balance between low rates and remaining profitable.
"Anyone can offer a cheap rate with a low margin, but unless you can successfully convert that traffic you’re going to go broke.’’
Article Source: http://www.smh.com.au/business/banks-face-rising-online-competition-20110829-1jh83.html
Saturday, 27 August 2011
Facebook: can broadcasters really make money from the web?
Beyond the obligatory clarification of what convergence actually means – presumably for the benefit of the audience – this was really an opportunity for Channel 4 chief executive David Abraham and ITV's managing director of commercial and online Fru Hazlitt to flex their technical muscles, and prove that broadcasters really do get it. Both were fairly convincing, with a firm focus on the commercial potential of (finally) making money online.
Facebook's deal with Endemol to host Big Brother voting across Europe is an example of a simple, first-step level of interaction between broadcasters and the web, Facebook's director of platform partnerships Christian Hernandez explained.
In Germany, where the first partnership was rolled out last week, 10% of all votes are coming through Facebook and, he claimed, are supplemental to text and phone votes and so not cannibalising those revenues.
What's in it for Facebook, asked panel chair Steve Hewlett? Hernandez explained that users pay to vote for Big Brother using the universal Facebook Credits system, with 30% of revenues going to Facebook and 70% to Endemol; at current euro rates that equates to €0.70 per vote.
Hernandez was explicit about Facebook's objective: "We are an identity platform and want to make that pervasive through the web. Viewers can already log on to Channel4 with their Facebook identity … this kind of project is subsiding Facebook's long-term vision for what it wants to be the underlying identity platform for the web."
Abraham was emphatic in his response. "If you're creating data sources that other people are exploiting commercially then you don't have a business," he said. The commercial future for broadcasters depends, then, on understanding, creating and managing the pools of insight and information about consumers are being able to commercialise that. Channel 4 already has pools of information on its users, grouped according to their activity on different specialist areas of the C4 web and mobile site. But those need to be joined up and contextualised.
Does it make sense for Channel 4 to try to develop its own infrastructure for managing user identity, preferences and behaviour? Facebook has an entire business built on that, so why not just partner with them? I posed that question on Twitter.
Former Channel 4 head of cross-platform Matt Locke responded: "Giving up auth to a 3rd party is suicide. Use other platforms for social 'ripples', but you need to see the data yourself. Putting all these eggs in one basket is too risky a strategy. C4 need to develop own tools plus use 3rd parties."
"Her department will be one of the most interesting to watch in next few years…"
@paulblueeyedboy said the public value of Channel4 users' data should not be transferred to an organisation like Facebook.
Tom Loosemore, who used to run Channel 4's innovation investment fund 4ip, approved of Abraham's comments: "C4 is now barking up the right tree. Could even do something really interesting in VRM space if bold enough."
Locke pointed to Gill Pritchard, who was appointed director of audience technologies at Channel 4 earlier this year.
Article Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2011/aug/26/facebook-broadcasters-money-web
Tuesday, 23 August 2011
Looking to Turn a Profit— One Good Cause at a Time
A wave of entrepreneurs are trying to turn a profit by helping good causes find donors to back them.
The tool they use is called niche crowd-funding. Entrepreneurs set up websites for very specific types of charitable projects, like supporting small farmers in developing nations or helping victims of natural disasters. People who need backers can put fund-raising pitches on the site—and the entrepreneurs take a cut of whatever money they raise.
The sums involved are usually modest. Users generally donate about $20 to $100, and most projects don't have big funding goals. Still, many of the site owners aren't looking for a big payoff—they see themselves as social entrepreneurs whose first priority is helping others.
And some site owners say that over time their efforts can bring reasonable returns. "The social-business model isn't meant to make a lot of money," says Michael J. Greene, founder of WorldPennyJar.com, which focuses on natural-disaster relief. "But it all adds up."
Every Little Bit
For instance, visitors to GreenFunder.com, a Venice, Calif., site that launched in March, recently gave more than $5,000 to Forè Bamboo—a group of Haitian farmers who want to help their countrymen grow bamboo as an earthquake-resistant building material. The site collected a 5% service fee.
"We're already really close to recouping our start-up costs, which were very low," says Molly Rasmussen, who pooled her savings with a partner to get the site up and running. As with other entrepreneurs in the field, she says, their goal was to do some good, and make money at the same time.
Helping people raise funds for relatively small projects isn't an entirely new idea. A number of popular sites—such as Kickstarter and IndieGoGo—already let people in need of money connect with potential backers.
But those sites aren't devoted to single themes; people with all sorts of projects in need of backers can put up requests for money. The owners of the niche sites are betting that people want smaller, more focused venues where they don't have to compete for attention with thousands of unrelated projects.
Crowdsourcing.org, a Dallas-based site that tracks the crowd-funding industry, has identified more than 400 websites around the world geared toward raising cash for a variety of needs and causes—up from just a handful of sites a decade ago.
The sites are relatively cheap to set up; some established crowd-funding operations have started licensing their online platforms for as little as $17,500, says Carl Esposti, founder of Crowdsourcing.org.
Where Is Everybody?
But, he cautions, niche sites require tons of legwork to grow. For one thing, he says, entrepreneurs must develop a critical mass of fund raisers and potential donors to give the site value.
One way to do that is to tap into an existing network. Patrick Donohue, co-founder of Hoopfund.com, says the San Francisco-based site has grown to more than 4,000 members in less than a year. The strategy, he says, is to give donors another way to support people whose goods they already buy in stores.
Launched in August 2010, the site lets users make interest-free loans of $25 at a time to help suppliers in developing countries who produce everything from chocolate to vodka. Donors usually know the products from chains like Whole Foods or smaller markets. "Each brand we bring on board brings along their own social network," says Mr. Donohue. "Since these networks tend to have an affinity for one another, we're creating a large community out of all these smaller networks."
Once their money is returned, lenders typically use it to buy the borrowers' products (which are for sale on the site), or lend it to another project or both. The site takes a 15% to 25% share of all sales.
Hitting Home
Mr. Esposti says crowd-funding sites can also help themselves by giving funders a personal connection to projects. For instance, he says that donors are more likely to support a project when they can interact with fund raisers in venues like online forums or video chats.
Some sites specialize in making causes personal. FitFunder.com, which is based in Thousand Oaks, Calif., lets users connect their fitness goals with charitable causes. People who want to run a marathon for charity, for instance, can use the site to link up with a cause in need—and then solicit donations. The site charges 5% of funds raised.
The site, launched last month by the broad-based crowd-funding site Invested.in, appeals to people who support the charities as well as people who support the user with a fitness goal, says co-founder Alon Goren.
"It's a win-win situation," Mr. Goren says.
Article Source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903341404576482531281540132.html
The tool they use is called niche crowd-funding. Entrepreneurs set up websites for very specific types of charitable projects, like supporting small farmers in developing nations or helping victims of natural disasters. People who need backers can put fund-raising pitches on the site—and the entrepreneurs take a cut of whatever money they raise.
The sums involved are usually modest. Users generally donate about $20 to $100, and most projects don't have big funding goals. Still, many of the site owners aren't looking for a big payoff—they see themselves as social entrepreneurs whose first priority is helping others.
And some site owners say that over time their efforts can bring reasonable returns. "The social-business model isn't meant to make a lot of money," says Michael J. Greene, founder of WorldPennyJar.com, which focuses on natural-disaster relief. "But it all adds up."
Every Little Bit
For instance, visitors to GreenFunder.com, a Venice, Calif., site that launched in March, recently gave more than $5,000 to Forè Bamboo—a group of Haitian farmers who want to help their countrymen grow bamboo as an earthquake-resistant building material. The site collected a 5% service fee.
"We're already really close to recouping our start-up costs, which were very low," says Molly Rasmussen, who pooled her savings with a partner to get the site up and running. As with other entrepreneurs in the field, she says, their goal was to do some good, and make money at the same time.
Helping people raise funds for relatively small projects isn't an entirely new idea. A number of popular sites—such as Kickstarter and IndieGoGo—already let people in need of money connect with potential backers.
But those sites aren't devoted to single themes; people with all sorts of projects in need of backers can put up requests for money. The owners of the niche sites are betting that people want smaller, more focused venues where they don't have to compete for attention with thousands of unrelated projects.
Crowdsourcing.org, a Dallas-based site that tracks the crowd-funding industry, has identified more than 400 websites around the world geared toward raising cash for a variety of needs and causes—up from just a handful of sites a decade ago.
The sites are relatively cheap to set up; some established crowd-funding operations have started licensing their online platforms for as little as $17,500, says Carl Esposti, founder of Crowdsourcing.org.
Where Is Everybody?
But, he cautions, niche sites require tons of legwork to grow. For one thing, he says, entrepreneurs must develop a critical mass of fund raisers and potential donors to give the site value.
One way to do that is to tap into an existing network. Patrick Donohue, co-founder of Hoopfund.com, says the San Francisco-based site has grown to more than 4,000 members in less than a year. The strategy, he says, is to give donors another way to support people whose goods they already buy in stores.
Launched in August 2010, the site lets users make interest-free loans of $25 at a time to help suppliers in developing countries who produce everything from chocolate to vodka. Donors usually know the products from chains like Whole Foods or smaller markets. "Each brand we bring on board brings along their own social network," says Mr. Donohue. "Since these networks tend to have an affinity for one another, we're creating a large community out of all these smaller networks."
Once their money is returned, lenders typically use it to buy the borrowers' products (which are for sale on the site), or lend it to another project or both. The site takes a 15% to 25% share of all sales.
Hitting Home
Mr. Esposti says crowd-funding sites can also help themselves by giving funders a personal connection to projects. For instance, he says that donors are more likely to support a project when they can interact with fund raisers in venues like online forums or video chats.
Some sites specialize in making causes personal. FitFunder.com, which is based in Thousand Oaks, Calif., lets users connect their fitness goals with charitable causes. People who want to run a marathon for charity, for instance, can use the site to link up with a cause in need—and then solicit donations. The site charges 5% of funds raised.
The site, launched last month by the broad-based crowd-funding site Invested.in, appeals to people who support the charities as well as people who support the user with a fitness goal, says co-founder Alon Goren.
"It's a win-win situation," Mr. Goren says.
Article Source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903341404576482531281540132.html
Tuesday, 16 August 2011
Stay-at-home mom with a blog? How you can make money blogging
For most bloggers, writing and posting regularly is a labor of love. You spend countless hours writing about the things you love with the hope that a few like-minded people appreciate your unique perspective on things. But what if you could make money doing what you've been doing all this time for free?
You might not be able to quit your day job and live lavishly off your earnings, but there are financial rewards out there that can put a little extra cash in your pocket. And while it's more likely that you'll earn a modest paycheck blogging, there's always the chance that you'll strike it big if your blog becomes a hit.
Article Source: http://www.pressregister.com/online_features/hot_topics/article_633bbe41-8da3-5e11-8abc-a57c98b9131c.html
You might not be able to quit your day job and live lavishly off your earnings, but there are financial rewards out there that can put a little extra cash in your pocket. And while it's more likely that you'll earn a modest paycheck blogging, there's always the chance that you'll strike it big if your blog becomes a hit.
Article Source: http://www.pressregister.com/online_features/hot_topics/article_633bbe41-8da3-5e11-8abc-a57c98b9131c.html
Saturday, 13 August 2011
Money | The make-a-stash philosphy
In the 1990s, as the era of the licence permit raj began to fade, so did the moral odour around the concept of money. Money became not only a legitimate aspiration, but for the first time in independent India, making money or openly aspiring to make money became morally acceptable.
The khadi-clad freedom fighters of the 1940s marched for the tricolour and shunned foreign-made riches. The “bush shirt”-wearing Nehruvians of the 1950s and 1960s, busy with nation-building, scorned money-making as infra-dig. The kurta and chappal-clad Naxals and Angry Young Men of the 1970s and 1980s roared against an unfair establishment which monopolized immoral wealth. Money was still a dirty word then. But in the 1990s was born the materialist Indian, for whom the only revolutions were the revolution of expectation and the revolution of money-making.
Lakshmi had been a shy goddess in the post- independence period. Khadi, charkha and satyagraha were the foundations of our newly acquired freedom. Socialist austerity and an elaborate hypocrisy about wealth underpinned an economy whose “commanding heights” were held firmly in the hands of the leviathan state. Bollywood traditionally depicted business and enterprise as sinister machinations of quasi- criminals. Businessmen were invariably hairy medallion men in white shoes quaffing illicit bottles of Vat 69.
But in the 1990s, Lakshmi leapt out of hiding and took centre stage as society’s new muse. As finance minister Manmohan Singh slashed at the tentacles of the licence raj, the shackles of the mind broke apart too. A study commissioned by Ogilvy and Mather (O&M) in 1997 discovered what O&M called the “Genie” generation or a generation who independently engaged in society. In the survey, 70% of metropolitan youth in the age group 18-28 said making money and being materialistic (not making revolutions or changing society) was their goal in life. In a 1998 Outlook-Mode survey of youth across major metros, a majority said their role model was Microsoft’s Bill Gates.
Bollywood mirrored the change. The 1994 smash hit Hum Aapke Hain Koun..! was set against the backdrop of an extravagant, flamboyantly wealthy family wedding. Glittering saris and flashy jewellery, fabulously ornate interiors combined with the devotional rituals of a Hindu wedding to consolidate the image of money as aesthetic as well as moral.
The 1995 hit Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (DDLJ) was similarly set in an ostentatiously affluent yet traditional Indian household where characters were no longer middle class or rural but unapologetically and unabashedly wealthy. DDLJ marked the beginning of films that were no longer shot in the modest hills of Shimla but in flashy locales across Europe. On ski slopes, in tulip gardens and on fashionable high streets. Rich people were now good people. The hero was no longer a dock worker or coolie but a scion of a wealthy family. The heroine was often the daughter of an equally wealthy clan. Role models transformed completely. For the first time the Hindi film hero openly made money, often lived overseas and had a globalized lifestyle.
The Wall Street dream had already gripped the Indian elite in the 1980s, but in 1994 when Kolkata boy and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) graduate Rajat Gupta was elected the first managing director of McKinsey born outside the US, he became the poster boy of the new culture of “honest” money-making. Gupta came from a middle-class Bengali background, his father was a freedom fighter and his mother a schoolteacher.
His anointing as head honcho at McKinsey signalled a powerful change in the mentality of the Indian middle class. The open pursuit of wealth was no longer considered sinful. Instead it was a duty, almost a new phase of nation-building, to take the India story to newer heights and to shed past hypocrisy about wanting to be rich but keeping it a secret.
For the first time, Indian millionaires began to feature in Forbes lists. The takeover of Silicon Valley by IIT-trained engineers continued apace and the setting up of the business process outsourcing (BPO) and software industry meant that being rich, middle class and Indian were no longer a contradiction in terms.
The pursuit of wealth and success also brought a transformation in how Indians perceived their career goals. Cyrus Broacha went to acting school in New York, studied law for a year, worked in an ad agency before getting his big break as an MTV veejay. Becoming a VJ or RJ would have been unthinkable to professionals of the 1960s and 1970s. But in the 1990s they became legitimate and highly aspirational. The money they offered after all was the sole determinant of success.
The 1990s was also the decade of the big advances in publishing. Vikram Seth received a whopping £250,000 (around Rs. 1.8 crore now) for his book A Suitable Boy and Arundhati Roy sold the UK rights of The God Of Small Things for £150,000. The hype and glamour around these books was due in large part to the money they received and wannabe novelists across India dreamt of similar get-rich-quick novels. Roy quickly became a role model for aspiring writers, not just for the book she wrote, but primarily because of the money she earned.
In the media too, the 1990s saw the advent of sales and marketing departments play an increasingly dominant role in journalism. Newspapers, pioneered by TheTimes of India, became money-making ventures, determined to boost profits and profitability. The circulation of The Times of India is reported to have touched 1.6 million copies nationwide after it launched its colour supplements like Delhi Times. The circulation of Hindustan Times (published by HT Media Ltd, that also publishes Mint) grew by 50,000 copies in Delhi after the launch of HT City.
“Page 3” was born. Rich, glamorous celebrities whose wedding anniversaries and parties were celebrated through glossy pictures in colour supplements were ambassadors of the new culture of money. After decades of dreary socialist tea parties, conspicuous consumption, lavish parties and beautiful clothes exploded on to our senses with neon-lit force, creating an alliance of beauty, success and power with unembarrassed display of wealth.
In the electronic media, the monopoly of Doordarshan faded and there was the rise of private satellite television. The money revolution on TV would reach its pinnacle in Kaun Banega Crorepati, launched at the end of the decade in 2000. The show became the culmination of the Indian middle-class’ forthright, publicly expressed aspiration for big money.
“I believe in money,” said a character in the 1940s play The Queen and the Rebels by Ugo Betti. It was only in the 1990s that for the first time since independence, the Indian could say the same thing, without guilt or hypocrisy.
Article Source: http://www.livemint.com/2011/08/12203425/Money--The-makeastash-philo.html?h=B
The khadi-clad freedom fighters of the 1940s marched for the tricolour and shunned foreign-made riches. The “bush shirt”-wearing Nehruvians of the 1950s and 1960s, busy with nation-building, scorned money-making as infra-dig. The kurta and chappal-clad Naxals and Angry Young Men of the 1970s and 1980s roared against an unfair establishment which monopolized immoral wealth. Money was still a dirty word then. But in the 1990s was born the materialist Indian, for whom the only revolutions were the revolution of expectation and the revolution of money-making.
Lakshmi had been a shy goddess in the post- independence period. Khadi, charkha and satyagraha were the foundations of our newly acquired freedom. Socialist austerity and an elaborate hypocrisy about wealth underpinned an economy whose “commanding heights” were held firmly in the hands of the leviathan state. Bollywood traditionally depicted business and enterprise as sinister machinations of quasi- criminals. Businessmen were invariably hairy medallion men in white shoes quaffing illicit bottles of Vat 69.
But in the 1990s, Lakshmi leapt out of hiding and took centre stage as society’s new muse. As finance minister Manmohan Singh slashed at the tentacles of the licence raj, the shackles of the mind broke apart too. A study commissioned by Ogilvy and Mather (O&M) in 1997 discovered what O&M called the “Genie” generation or a generation who independently engaged in society. In the survey, 70% of metropolitan youth in the age group 18-28 said making money and being materialistic (not making revolutions or changing society) was their goal in life. In a 1998 Outlook-Mode survey of youth across major metros, a majority said their role model was Microsoft’s Bill Gates.
Bollywood mirrored the change. The 1994 smash hit Hum Aapke Hain Koun..! was set against the backdrop of an extravagant, flamboyantly wealthy family wedding. Glittering saris and flashy jewellery, fabulously ornate interiors combined with the devotional rituals of a Hindu wedding to consolidate the image of money as aesthetic as well as moral.
The 1995 hit Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (DDLJ) was similarly set in an ostentatiously affluent yet traditional Indian household where characters were no longer middle class or rural but unapologetically and unabashedly wealthy. DDLJ marked the beginning of films that were no longer shot in the modest hills of Shimla but in flashy locales across Europe. On ski slopes, in tulip gardens and on fashionable high streets. Rich people were now good people. The hero was no longer a dock worker or coolie but a scion of a wealthy family. The heroine was often the daughter of an equally wealthy clan. Role models transformed completely. For the first time the Hindi film hero openly made money, often lived overseas and had a globalized lifestyle.
The Wall Street dream had already gripped the Indian elite in the 1980s, but in 1994 when Kolkata boy and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) graduate Rajat Gupta was elected the first managing director of McKinsey born outside the US, he became the poster boy of the new culture of “honest” money-making. Gupta came from a middle-class Bengali background, his father was a freedom fighter and his mother a schoolteacher.
His anointing as head honcho at McKinsey signalled a powerful change in the mentality of the Indian middle class. The open pursuit of wealth was no longer considered sinful. Instead it was a duty, almost a new phase of nation-building, to take the India story to newer heights and to shed past hypocrisy about wanting to be rich but keeping it a secret.
For the first time, Indian millionaires began to feature in Forbes lists. The takeover of Silicon Valley by IIT-trained engineers continued apace and the setting up of the business process outsourcing (BPO) and software industry meant that being rich, middle class and Indian were no longer a contradiction in terms.
The pursuit of wealth and success also brought a transformation in how Indians perceived their career goals. Cyrus Broacha went to acting school in New York, studied law for a year, worked in an ad agency before getting his big break as an MTV veejay. Becoming a VJ or RJ would have been unthinkable to professionals of the 1960s and 1970s. But in the 1990s they became legitimate and highly aspirational. The money they offered after all was the sole determinant of success.
The 1990s was also the decade of the big advances in publishing. Vikram Seth received a whopping £250,000 (around Rs. 1.8 crore now) for his book A Suitable Boy and Arundhati Roy sold the UK rights of The God Of Small Things for £150,000. The hype and glamour around these books was due in large part to the money they received and wannabe novelists across India dreamt of similar get-rich-quick novels. Roy quickly became a role model for aspiring writers, not just for the book she wrote, but primarily because of the money she earned.
In the media too, the 1990s saw the advent of sales and marketing departments play an increasingly dominant role in journalism. Newspapers, pioneered by TheTimes of India, became money-making ventures, determined to boost profits and profitability. The circulation of The Times of India is reported to have touched 1.6 million copies nationwide after it launched its colour supplements like Delhi Times. The circulation of Hindustan Times (published by HT Media Ltd, that also publishes Mint) grew by 50,000 copies in Delhi after the launch of HT City.
“Page 3” was born. Rich, glamorous celebrities whose wedding anniversaries and parties were celebrated through glossy pictures in colour supplements were ambassadors of the new culture of money. After decades of dreary socialist tea parties, conspicuous consumption, lavish parties and beautiful clothes exploded on to our senses with neon-lit force, creating an alliance of beauty, success and power with unembarrassed display of wealth.
In the electronic media, the monopoly of Doordarshan faded and there was the rise of private satellite television. The money revolution on TV would reach its pinnacle in Kaun Banega Crorepati, launched at the end of the decade in 2000. The show became the culmination of the Indian middle-class’ forthright, publicly expressed aspiration for big money.
“I believe in money,” said a character in the 1940s play The Queen and the Rebels by Ugo Betti. It was only in the 1990s that for the first time since independence, the Indian could say the same thing, without guilt or hypocrisy.
Article Source: http://www.livemint.com/2011/08/12203425/Money--The-makeastash-philo.html?h=B
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