Kanaka, a recently married Indian housewife from Hyderabad, said to me, "I am not a creative writer, nor a software developer. I am neither a trained professional nor an experienced business person. I don't have money to invest in any self-employment project. I have a computer and an Internet connection. I am willing to work hard from home for an hour or two a day. Do you think there is a drop of hope in my case? Please do not give me some inspiring stories and ask me to do everything on my own. I pray (?) for your guidance in some specific project."
"How much do you think you can earn with your present skills?" I asked her. "I have no idea. I will be happy if I can make a few thousands a month," she replied.
"Can you be more specific?" I asked her with a smile. She replied after a moment of silence, "Two thousand a month will be great for 50 hours of work."
I told her, "That's a humble expectation. I am sure anyone can achieve it. You are setting a goal of Rs.40 an hour. May I take the liberty of telling you something personal? When you find time, please think about your skills and needs and place a higher value on yourself. It's a shame to think of earning such a low amount an hour."
"When I don't earn even a cent a year, is not a dollar an hour a fortune?" she asked. I did not respond to her question.
"I'll tell you about a project that you can do without any investment or experience. I believe you know something about blogs and contextual advertisements. If you don't know what they mean, please go to my website to read about them. I don't want to repeat the ideas here. Blogs are a type of easy-to-create websites where you can write whatever you want to and publish your writings in the World Wide Web, without learning how to create a website. There are many excellent free blog hosting services and you can use one of them. Contextual advertisers display ads on your websites based on the theme and words on your web pages and pay you money for allowing them to advertise on your website," I told her.
"I know about them very well. But I don't know how to write well. I can't create quality content. That's my problem," said Kanaka. "You can build a blog of high quality content without writing a word on your own and still attract hundreds of visitors every day. I am sure you know that people love discount offers and are ready to give an arm and a leg for free offers!" I told her.
"Yes. On New Year eves, thousands of visitors wait for hours in front of the household goods shops just to save a few hundred rupees. I too never miss such offers," said Kanaka.
"That's human nature and all intelligent business persons appeal to it to promote their business. Thousands of online businesses make steep discount and free offers every day. If you help the Internet users by providing them information on new offers every day, they will read your web pages every morning just as they read morning newspapers," I said and continued, "I will give you an example so that you can get started tonight. Every day the website Giveawayoftheday.com offers licensed software you'd have to buy otherwise, for free! Basically, every day they nominate one software title that will be the Giveaway title of that day. The software will be available for download for 24 hours and that software will be absolutely free. That means - not a trial, not a limited version - but a registered and legal version of the software will be free for their visitors. Last week I downloaded two excellent, useful, licensed programs worth Rs.5,000 for free. Every day you can collect information about the Giveaway title of that day and publish it on your blog. You can also search for free, legal version of useful programs such as free RoboForm and publish the carefully written content provided by the software company on your blog. When people start visiting your website in hundreds, you will start making money in thousands."
I received an email from Kanaka after a month. "I am thrilled to see the results of the project. Without writing a word on my own, and investing any money, I have earned Rs.1,000 in a matter of a few days. At this rate, I will be able to make Rs,5,000 a month, more than double of my original expectation. Thank you."