Training courses on the way!

It’s nice that since I started trying to re-invigorate this website by writing more often and such, the number of people coming and visiting here has skyrocketed!   Let me thank you for coming by and visiting.

As part of my effort to show people how to make money online, I will continue blogging about it here, but I also have something else that I will be offering in coming months.  I am coming out with a series of courses to teach you how to make money online!  The courses, as I am planning them now, will include written instruction, videos to show you how to do things and such.  Plans can change, but this is what I am envisioning.

You know, honestly, there are thousands of people teaching stuff like this online.  Problem is, most of the people who are trying to sell you something have never successfully made a living online themselves!  Well, I have honestly, made 100% of my income online for over 6 years now.  I have no other source of income, other than what I earn online!  As you already know, I have a number of different ways that I make money online:  blogs with advertising, e-commerce stores and other ways.  I used to really be into selling on eBay, and made a lot of money doing it.  I quit doing that because I had other ways of making money online that were easier for me, but I still know how to earn money on eBay, and it is not that hard, if you know a few of the secrets!

I want to show you those secrets and help you start making a living online.  Watch here, as those courses become available, I will announce them on this site!  Perhaps I’ll even have some contests or something where the winner will get a free course, or something like that!

Yes, the courses will be for sale, but don’t worry, I will continue to share tips on this site for free too!  I am a big believer that we can all make money online, if we want to!  Want to join me in doing so?

A site killer - online fraud!

As with any business, it is important that you protect yourself from thieves.  In a brick and mortar business, people can come in and shoplift your goods.  They might break in the window in front of your store and clean out your expensive goods in the middle of the night.  Maybe you will have an employee who dips into the cash register.  There are so many ways that people can steal from you in the world of a physical store.

Did you know that they can steal from you over the Internet too?  Believe me, I have been there, and I’ve learned many lessons because of thieves taking advantage of me.  I hope that I can teach you how to avoid being the victim of Internet Fraud.

Over the past years, I have learned a lot about how to protect my business from being victimized.  For the items that I sell, there are basically only two categories of products in my selection that are targeted by fraudsters.  First, and the number one most targeted product is cellphone load.  Here in the Philippines, cellular phones work a little different than in the USA, where I come from.  You don’t have a phone bill that you pay each month, in most cases here.  Instead, you purchase prepaid credits for your phone and you “load” them to your account.  Generally, you purchase prepaid cards and you enter the PIN number into your phone, thus transferring the value of the prepaid card onto your cellular phone account.  This is the most high fraud item that I sell on my sites.  Hardly a week goes by without having multiple attempts to steal load from me.  But, in recent years, I have not been successfully stolen from by the fraudsters out to get load.  Instead, I have caught them, and have protected myself.  I’ll teach you how to do it shortly.  The other item that a lot of people try to steal is cellular phones themselves.  Cell phones are high value items, and if a fraudster can steal one from you, he is getting a really large theft.  Using the same methods, I have been able to prevent fraudulent thefts on cellphones as well.  Other than these two classes of items, it seems that all of my items are fraud free.  Nobody ever tries to steal my other items that I am selling.

How do I stop them?  Well, I have a few methods:

1. If the purchase for these high theft items is by a regular customer, we go ahead and fill the order immediately.
2. If the purchase is by a new customer, we make a few checks:

• We check the IP address of the customer.  Every computer on the Internet has an IP (Internet Protocol) address, which identifies where that computer is located.  If the customer address is in Chicago, and his IP address says that he is in Nigeria, you can bet that he is trying to steal from you.
• We call all new customers on the telephone if they are purchasing one of these high theft items.  In most cases, if somebody is trying to steal from you, they enter a fake telephone number.  If you call and ask for the customer by name, you will either get an indication that the number is not in use, or the person answering the phone never heard of the person you ask for.  This is a sign of fraud.
• If the customer fails any of the above checks, we do not accept the order.

It’s that simple.  If you are worried about the cost of calling overseas, do like I did, get some kind of VOIP solution.  I use Vonage, and I can call anywhere in the world for free or close to free, after paying my monthly charge of $25 or so.  In the years that I have used the above procedures to check for fraud, I have never lost a single cent to fraudulent orders, except for a few times when my employees did not follow the exact procedure that I laid out for them.  You can bet, when they got hit with a fraudulent order and they did not follow the correct procedure, it was the last time that they did it!  Because they got additional training, and they were told what would happen to their jobs the next time that they did not follow the procedure.

When I first got into the business that I am in now, only a week or so after I started, I got over $1,000 orders for load in a single day.  I was ecstatic, I thought that  business was going gangbusters.  I thought that until I found out that people were stealing from me!  You can bet that I fixed that problem quickly, because I can’t afford to lose $1,000 every day.  I doubt that you can either.

Keep in mind that after you get your e-Commerce site up and running, looking out for fraud is probably the most important job that you have.

Remain vigilant!

Choosing a payment processor for your e-commerce site

Choosing a company to process payments on your e-Commerce site is one of the most important decisions that you will make in setting up the venture.  You have to choose a company that is right for you, but more importantly one that is good for your customers.

You don’t want to start accepting payments through a company that has questionable business practices.  Certainly, you don’t want your customers to get double billed, or experience other problems with their credit card transactions.  Something like this could kill off your site quickly!  So, you need to choose somebody that is reliable, both for you and for your customers.

If you are located in the USA or in Europe, you can most likely set up a real merchant account for accepting credit card payments on your site.  You can shop around and find the best merchant account for you.  Check with your bank and with others offering the service.  Costco stores in the USA offer merchant accounts that are very competitive, and probably among the cheapest such accounts that you will find.  In addition to that, they are honest and reliable.  Really, no matter who you choose to handle your merchant account, just do some research by Googling the name of the company to see if any horror stories about their service can be found online.  Keep in mind that just because you find negative things online, that doesn’t mean it’s a bad company.  Even good companies can get a bad writeup from time time.  I know that I have some companies that you can find people saying bad things about on the net.  I know that the statements are not true, but everybody is entitled to their own opinion, just keep that in mind.

For people like me who live in the Philippines, your choices are more limited.  I have been using two different payment processing companies over the years.  At first, I was using Paypal, and I still use them from time to time.  They have been reliable for my customers, although I have experienced a few problems with them.  Until a year or so ago, they did not officially do business in the Philippines, which is what lead to the problems that I experienced.  When they found out that I was in the Philippines, they would freeze my account, and I basically lost access to my money.  Those issues are all resolved now, because Paypal is now doing business with people in the Philippines.  One thing, though… when I used Paypal as one of my payment methods on my site, a lot of people who chose the Paypal Payment option would end up abandoning their shopping carts and not complete the purchase.  I don’t know for sure why, but for some reason my customers disliked something about Paypal.

The company that I use most is called 2Checkout.com.  2Checkout has been very good in my experience.  This is another case where you can find a lot of negative things on the net about 2Checkout, but I have been using them for about  years now, and have never experienced any problems with their service.  I recommend 2Checkout highly.  One drawback on 2Checkout is that their fees are rather high, 5.5% per transaction.  I don’t mind that, though, as they have been quite reliable, and as I said earlier, the choices for payment processors here in the Philippines is quite limited.

So, while I do recommend 2Checkout quite highly, I also feel that you should shop around and see what options are available in your area.  Also, don’t forget that  you are not just looking for the company that is best for you - it is most important that they are a good fit for your clients!

Tomorrow we will conclude our series on e-Commerce sites by looking at an issue that could put you out of business in an instant - online fraud!