Teaching English online is a growing field.  Every day more and more students are studying English through out the world.

The number of people who are getting online and studying English is great news for English teachers.

The Internet makes it easy for English teachers to start a cheap at home business.  And making money every month is quite possible.

Here’s what you’ll need in order to get started as an online English teacher:

*  Computer with Internet
*  Skype or some other instant messaging program
*  Microphone
*  Web camera
*  PayPal account
*  Free website (but you don’t need it right away)

Those are the basic tools you’ll need to get started (but you’ll need to know your marketing strategy).  It’s quite possible that your computer has a built in microphone and web camera so you won’t need to buy anything else.  As you can see, your start-up costs are practically free.

How much can online English teachers make?

There are basically two type of sessions you’ll want to offer: just conversations and lessons.

Just Conversations: $15.00 to $25.00 an hour

These conversations are the easiest to conduct.  No experience, no degrees and no certifications are required.  Students from other countries have learned English, and they know if they don’t use it, they will lose it.

That is why they will pay to just have conversations with you, a native English speaker.

Lessons: $20.00 to $50.00 an hour

Again you don’t need any experience, degrees, or certifications, but it sure helps.  You can offer grammar, pronunciation, vocabulary, comprehension (listening), slang or any other specific topic you want to offer.

If you know a lot about art, medicine, business, movies or whatever, offer your skills and knowledge as a specific lesson that a student can buy from you.

Teach what you know and what you’re comfortable with and you’ll be a more successful online English teacher.

Once you get 5 to 15 repeat customers/students who pay you $100.00 to $250.00 a month, you can do the math and see you’ll make a nice sum every month.

So the more paying students you find, the more money you will make as an online English teacher.

As an online English teacher, you need to find ESL students who pay. Finding these students can be difficult, but my e-book (and 4 FREE bonus packages) will show you how to easily locate these foreign students through out the online world.

You’ll also discover everything you need to know in order to start and maintain your very own online English school.

Make money online by teaching English online today:  get exclusive access here – guaranteed success.

Get the e-book and the FREE stuff today…

Impress your students…

Most students will be satisfied with you if you educate them as well as entertain them. This doesn’t mean you have to put on a neon colored clown suit, dance a jig, and sing the list of coordinating conjunctions with a tambourine in hand.

Lots of foreign students are yearning to improve their already learned English. They want to practice what they’ve read in textbooks, and they continue to want new vocab words, cool questions, and interesting expressions.

ESL students from different countries want to have fun with you and the English language.

If you can teach them and entertain them at the same time with engaging conversations, you will not only be a successful teacher, but also a thriving entrepreneur. So how can you do this?

Ask questions!

People love it when others ask them questions. They feel like the center of attention. They feel important. They feel respected. As a result, students will feel satisfied with you if you shower them with questions, famous quotes, unusual proverbs, and practical vocabulary words.

Students want and need compelling conversations!

If you can deliver on this, they will reward you with money. It’s win-win!

This is the key to your success and happiness.

So check this out, awhile back I met the faculty advisor for the University of Southern California Conversation Partners Program, Eric Roth. We met online, and he’s a nice guy who co-authored, “Compelling Conversations” with Toni Aberson (his mother by the way).

They came up with a unique e-book that offers teachers and ESL learners a quick resource of over 1,350 questions, over 500 quotations, over 200 proverbs, and over 450 practical vocab words. It provides enough material for an estimated 180 hours of class time!

Wow!

If you need some easy lesson materials at your command, this download is for you. Eric gave me a copy, and I was so surprised by its elegant layout, it’s thoughtful usage of quotes and proverbs that introduce the vast lists of questions upon questions to ask students.

You’ll never run out of stuff to talk about during your Skype lessons:

If you download my e-book, “How To Teach English Online and Get Money,” you will also receive a free download of 152 conversational questions and 158 vocab words that I put together. But that’s just a fraction when compared to Eric’s e-book, “Compelling Conversations.”

I firmly believe that if you’re armed with my list of questions and vocab words as well as Eric’s questions of over 1,350, you will keep your students paying for more and more package deals. Sounds good, right?

Students will be so satisfied with you that they’ll recommend you to their family and friends.

If you educate and entertain them and make them feel special, you will make money online with Skype. It works.

This part is huge…so pay attention!

Eric told me that if you get “Compelling Conversations” today, you can give away chapters or sections of the e-book to your students by email. Let me say this in a different way:

You can copy and paste sections or chapters of “Compelling Conversations” and send them to your students by email. You can use this benefit to attract more and more paying Skype students.

He also said you can printout or photocopy “Compelling Conversations” and physically give them to your students (by snail mail or in person).

He simply asks that you not give away the whole PDF file to the student (besides, if you do, they are apt to be overwhelmed by the 45 chapters, so they need you to give it to them in bit-sized chunks via email and Skype).

So you can use “Compelling Conversations” as a free bonus, and we all know, everyone loves free things!

For example, you might set up one part of your sales page like this:

Buy 5 Skype conversations (50 minutes each)
…then get 1 additional conversation for free (50 minutes)
…and also receive free email lessons taken from the e-book, “Compelling Conversations”

This bargain ends next Saturday! Hurry, hurry, hurry!

Click the PayPal “Buy Now” button, order this package, and let’s start having some compelling conversations together on Skype by using a microphone, your computer’s speakers, and I will also use my web camera.

You will see my smiling face on your computer as I talk to you. How fun :)

Teachers! Are you ready?

Okay, once you get it, let me know what you think, okay?

You’re a smart person, and I’m sure you see the benefits in grabbing “Compelling Conversations” right now. Your students (and your bank account) will thank you for it.

After you go to his website, make sure to check out the bottom of the page to get a quick sample of some of the e-book’s questions, vocabulary words, proverbs, and famous quotes.

It’s compelling…

So to recap, you will get over 1,350 questions, over 500 quotations, over 200 proverbs, and over 450 practical vocab words. It provides enough material for an estimated 180 hours of class time!

	Download it today – click the book cover to the left…

Success.

What is success?  How can we define it?

Some people say it’s when you have a large bank account.  Others claim it comes around when we achieve true happiness.  And I’m sure some folks only think that when their boss tells them they did a good job, they are successful.

For me, success comes from my thinking and my continuing actions.

If you make any kind of upward progress toward a goal, you are immediately successful.  Creating some wish, some goal and then actively working to achieve, makes you a success.

Whether you get there or not, that’s not the ultimate definition.  The trip is more important than the destination.

And guess what?

You will find satisfying things to see along the journey.  So don’t worry.

Now…think about this:

ESL students are predominantly more successful than ESL teachers.

Why?

If you meet a student who has been studying English for many years, the fact they can talk and understand you is evidence they’ve been progressively working toward a goal for a long time.

Yet they don’t speak perfect English like the teacher, so the trip isn’t over yet.  They are still walking on their path.  And if they are seeking an ESL teacher LIKE YOU, this is further evidence that they are acting in a successful way.

Now when it comes to most online ESL teachers, how many are consistently working to improve themselves everyday or every week in the “English learning world” AND the business of it therein?

Is the ESL teacher learning more about their craft and/or their business of making money?

As a teacher, what are YOU doing everyday to make your online English school better?  How are you progressively working to find more students?  Are you learning how to sell more lessons?  Do you want to make yourself a better person so as to help your life and thus the student?

If you create an online English school and just sit and wait for the ESL student to arrive, you will fail.

Creating a website once and not touching it again will make you fail.

Giving a sales pitch on Skype without understanding the mechanics of what’s happening won’t allow growth.  YOU WON’T BE SUCCESSFUL.

I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again: you must be proactive.  Progress makes perfect.

Progress MAKES perfect!

The secret in creating a thriving online English school is movement.  Don’t sit and wait for students to come to you.  YOU must dance and jive to get noticed.

Do something everyday and the world will do something for you everyday as well.

If you read this post, please watch this video, understand it, set a goal, and then start walking toward it, and you will instantly be a success.  That’s all it takes.

If you aren’t familiar with Twitter, watch this quick video that explains it perfectly:

I just signed-up this morning after I woke up.  I’m under the user name, skypeteacher.Feel free to become one of my newest “followers.”  Discover my day-to-day inner thoughts, actions, and workings.  Be warned!

And for YOU…I’m really excited about the idea of online English teachers using Twitter to stay in better contact with current and prospective $tudents.

Imagine…here’s a situation on how Twitter might help:

1.  Your student Keiko is at home studying English, and she has a quick question about a vocab word.  So she Twitters you (in only 140 characters or less), you respond right away, and she is now happy.

2.  Other students start “following” you and discover just how great you are by answering Keiko and other students all the time. Remember, it’s like a blog, and all of your “followers” can read whatever you post to each student.

3.  So as a result of you and Keiko knowing each other, one of her friends discovers you, likes you as a teacher, starts “following” you, eventually meets you on Skype, and thus pays you for a lesson.

Here’s another scenario:

1.  You start developing many “followers.”

2.  You Tweet a mini quiz to them every day in 140 characters or less, “Pop quiz: Make a sentence using the words “travel” and “boat” and “crazy.”

3.  Students start responding.

4.  You fix the mistakes.

5.  They love it and tell their friends about you.

6.  New students are excited about you.

7.  They want to meet you on Skype.

8.  You find new paying online ESL students :)

Quick marketing idea:

1.  You Tweet a message, “I’m offering a 50 minute vocab lesson on Skype for the first student who buys it. Only $5.00 (normally $25) http://YourWebsite/vocab”

2.  A first time student clicks on the link.

3.  Student then buys it.

4.  You give a fantastic lesson.

5.  Student soon buys a package deal of 5 lessons for $125.  Done!

It’s hard to say if Twitter will work for online English teahers or not (I’m not psychic).  But I am optimistic and confident!

So today, jut go out and tell all of your students about Twitter, encourage them to “follow” you, and then see what happens.  And try to put some pictures up on your website that links to your Twitter profile page too.

Remember, the more you put into this experiment, the more you’ll get back.  So make a goal to send at least one post a day.  It can only be 140 characters or less, so it’s not a lot!  Half a minute a day :)

You can use Twitter from your cell phone or on the web.  It seems convenient!  And if you’re using FireFox as your browser, here are 8 cool plugins.

Last thought:

I believe it would be kind of cool if all of us online English teachers stayed connected and starting networking with each other.  So if you’re a little reluctant to try out Twitter with your online English students because you’ve never tried Twitter before, let’s all practice it together.

Sound good?  Click here to sign-up at Twitter, and don’t forget to join me at Twitter.com/skypeteacher

USA

Canada

UK

Australia

New Zealand

Were you born in one those 5 countries?

These countries are widely known across the world as English speaking countries where English is the dominant language.  Sure, there are many other countries that say English is part of their official language, but ESL students would never think of them that way.  Check out Wikipedia for the list of countries where English is an official language.

Anyway, if you were born in one of the Big 5 countries, all you need is your mother tongue to attract online ESL students.  How easy is that?  If you can speak…they will listen…and pay.

I’m not trying to dilute the importance of teaching English by saying anyone with a pulse can do it.  Everyone with a functioning arm can swing a hammer, but many will miss the nail.

Teaching English online can be as simple as offering conversations.  Just conversations.  Only talking about anything and everything.

This might sound like a breeze to some, but if you can’t maintain a conversation, if you can’t think of what to say next, if you’re not a good listener because you’re mind wanders, then this gig probably isn’t for you.

• Have to seem fun
• Need to be quick on your feet
• Should ask interesting questions without missing a beat
• Should acknowledge the students’ feelings and needs
• Must listen for mistakes and correct them (but you don’t necessarily have to give grammatical reasons why they made a slip)

Many ESL students don’t have ANY opportunities to speak with anyone from the Big 5.  Their ultimate goal is to understand these Big 5 countries because it will grow their careers, help in their movie watching experiences, and if they ever meet a tourist in their country they will feel more comfortable to talk.

Students want to feel confident about their English
…want to improve their comprehension
…want to speak faster
…want to learn more vocab and slang
…and they want to have fun with you too!

If you can provide the above, you’ll do great!  So being on online English teacher (like with Skype) will make it possible for the student to speak with the folks they want…like you!

You can be quite successful if you only sell conversations for $20 or $25 per one hour session.  So for this…no experience is necessary.  BTW, if you need over 1,300 questions, 500 quotations, and 200 proverbs for your online ESL students that you teach on Skype, grab’em here.

So now what about offline teachers?  Can they start teaching online ASAP?

For those teachers who already have some offline teaching experience, you’ll do fantastic within the online world.

Think about what you want to specialize in.  Vocab?  Grammar?  Listening?  Slang?

Imagine this: you’re driving down a country road.  You’re sitting shotgun, and your friend driving suddenly slams on the breaks and points at a cow.  She screams, “Wow!  It’s a cow!  How interesting!”

You might look at the cow, see that it’s just a cow, look at your friend, look back at the cow, and them back again at your friend and say, “So what?  It’s just a cow.”

Cows are pretty ordinary.  They are not remarkable.  No one every stops the car to remark on a cow we’ve seen a million times.

But what if the cow were purple?

“Wow!  It’s a purple cow!  How interesting!”

My point is that you need to become the purple cow.  Be remarkable.  Be different.  Put a new and creative spin on whatever it is your offering to sell.

How can you stand out?  Try to make your vocab, grammar, listening and slang lessons unique.  Flip on the purple neon sign and grab their attention so they will buy big $500 package deals from you.

Teach what you know, but do it with a NEW style.

Check out this YouTube video.  Seth Godin is a marketing god.  If you like the video, consider his book.  He talks about YOU becoming the purple cow.

Hey everyone!

I’ve talked before in previous posts about giving something away for free to your online ESL students.

This is a good way to add more value to whatever it is you’re selling.

So in your case, an online English teacher, you’re selling English lessons to be conducted on Skype or Yahoo Messenger, or MSN Messenger or even Google Talk.

So now one great thing to give away for free so as to incentivize your first-time students to buy from you…

…is an e-book.

If you have something to teach them, you can write an e-book.  It doesn’t have to be very long.  It can be just a few pages to however big you want it to get.

You could write on one topic or a whole bunch of ‘em.

Or it could even be organized like a workbook too.

I use OpenOffice Writer to write all of my documents (it’s like MS Word but it’s free).  And it has a way to convert files into into a .PDF (thus your e-book is born).

In my case, I made one called, Learn American Slang that teaches all the “bad” words and expressions.  It’s 33 fun-filled pages of high-octane profanity and obscene thoughts.

It’s a lot of fun to use for Skype slang lessons with cool students.

Some of my most popular package deals were either conversation, or vocab or American slang.  So I know lots of people are interested in learning more of these crazy words and idioms.  It’s great to get paid to cuss people out!

Anyway…

Another idea for you is to offer the e-book to students who sign-up and take one of your free 15 minute conversations.  So you could say something like the following:

“Sign-up now for a free one-time 15 minute lesson on Skype.  If you sign-up before this Friday, you’ll also get my e-book for free.  Once our free 15 minute lesson is over, I’ll send you the e-book for free.”

Use you imagination and see what you can come up with.  If you want to bounce some ideas off of me on Skype, you know where to find me.

BTW, if you want to check out my e-book page on EnglishKitty.com, click here.  If you buy it, feel free to give it away to your students for free as motivation to buy from you.  I have no problem letting you do this…please just don’t sell it or change it.  Thanks!  And if you don’t want to give it away, you can use it for your Skype lessons.

BTW, if you make your own e-book, tell me about it!  Keep in touch!

In the article before last, I wrote about the importance of offering a free one-time trial lesson and how you should make it obvious on your website that you’re giving these away.

Check this out:

Here are the top 10 most important things you need to remember whenever you conduct your free trial lesson on Skype with a prospective ESL student:

1)  Be confident and use your web camera (they don’t need to use their web camera though).

2)  Smile non-stop.  Don’t ever let your facial expressions become too slack.

3)  Let the student do most of the talking (thus don’t you be too pushy or overly excited).

4)  Ask them questions in which you know the answers will be YES.  You’ll want them in a mindset of saying, “Yes!”

5)  Have a structured mini lesson ready.  You should have it on a Word or an Excel document so all you have to do is copy and paste the various things into the Skype chat box.

6)  Tell them the details about your great package deals and how they are better than the competition’s.  Practice what you’re going to say, and keep it as short as possible.

7)  Offer them a better deal if they say NO or just seem unsure.  For example, offer 2 free lessons when they buy 5 (normally it’s only 1 free lesson with this package of 5).

8)  Make sure to get their email address because you can send them personal lessons via email (you don’t want them to ever forget about you)

9)  Make them laugh and smile and feel relaxed.

10)  Sell them the benefits.  Talk about how they will feel more confident after practicing their English with you.  Talk about how their vocab and listening skills will increase which will help their job, their TV or movie watching experiences, or even help their personal life with native English speakers.

There you go!

These are the top 10 things you should remember every time you conduct a free trial lesson with a student on Skype.  Remember that you are also wearing the hat of a sales person, so stay positive that the student will buy a single lesson or a package deal.

You must be a salesperson more so than a teacher during your free trial lesson with a student.

If you would like to practice your free 15 minute trial lessons with me…no problem.  You can call me on Skype, and I can pretend to be a prospective student.  After your presentation, we’ll talk about the pros and cons.  You’ll get a nice critique about your free trial lesson.

Another reason you should practice with me is that it will make you more confident when you’re meeting a new prospective student.  You won’t want to be nervous with the students!

Enjoy your day!

Let’s get the Wikipedia definition out of the way first:

…the Law of Attraction says people’s thoughts (both conscious and unconscious) dictate the reality of their lives, whether or not they’re aware of it. Essentially “if you really want something and truly believe it’s possible, you’ll get it”, but putting a lot of attention and thought onto something you don’t want means you’ll probably get that too.

It all comes down to the power of positive thinking and the destructive potential of negative thoughts.

The Law of Attraction can be a good or bad source of energy in your life.

So can I ask you a question?

Are you…

…a positive or a negative person?

If you had to come up with a percentage for each, what would it be?  80% positive and 20% negative?  Something like that?  Really think about it and trust your intuition.  What were the first set of numbers to pop in your head?

Got it?

Unless that negative percentage is currently ZERO, then your future self deserves that you start considering the Law of Attraction in your life.

When I was in university, I watched TV news a lot.  I would start my day and finish it by checking out the latest scandals, robberies, murders, and financial meltdowns.

I would get so angry at the tube because of the craziness of the world, AND the news reporters would erk me too because I saw them ask loaded questions, give opinions, and try to sway my thoughts that in some way might benefit them or their friends or their philosophy.

To say the least, I no longer trust the mainstream media.  I don’t like how news stations are more concerned with profits and getting rich than presenting useful news in an unbiased way.

Also, I don’t like to hear about how awful the world is.  It’s just too much to listen to how everyone has no money, no jobs, no friends, no cats, no food, no sex, no, no, no.

So…I don’t watch the news.  Don’t get me wrong, I care about the problems of the world, but I need to focus my positive energy in a direction I’m most qualified in.  I can’t save the world (and really, I don’t think it’s going to go belly-up).

I have to trust that others will step up and do their part in their own unique ways.  And since we live in a society like workers bees, we will get the job done as a whole.

Things will work itself out.

And I know my life is going in the right direction because I can see the outcome of my labor.  No…I’m not psychic, nor do I chat with the dead.  What I see and hear are the images and thoughts phantasmagorically passing through my head.

Visualize your future and it will come.

If you see negative images (on TV or in your mind), your day struggles to achieve true happiness for you.  But if you surround yourself with positive messages be it from the TV, the radio, your friends, family and co-workers, your sense of wellbeing will easily plant a long lasting smile upon your face.

As I write this, I feel energized.

I love how thoughts create form.  My thoughts travel through my fingers, to my computer, to the Internet, to your eyes, to your mind, and I know you will act out in a more positive way.

That is the power of living in a constructive society.  We all “feed” each other good feelings.

And these feelings help manifest physical things in our lives if we want them.  Seek money, and it will come.  Seek ESL students for your online English school, and they will come.  Seek love and happiness and significance, and it will ALL come.

Patience.

Give it time.

Trust that the universe will spin in YOUR TRUE direction.

Visualize the outcome you desire, not the one you fear.

Here’s a trick: anytime you have a bad thought, replace it with the face of your favorite loved one.  Think of how cute your cat is as well.  Imagine buckets of cash at your feet as you eat sushi with your friends and burp out the alphabet after taking a swig of Sam Adams.

Be creative and try to imagine the most far-out scenarios of success.  So the next time you belittle yourself or have fear, think about a future filled will [insert your wildest fantasy here].

And remember to smile…even force yourself if you have to.

Anyway, today I can across some software in regard to the Law of Attraction, and it really got me inspired to share with you today.  I just found it a few hours ago, and it sounds interesting.  I’m going to try the 7 day trial for $5.00 and see how it goes.

So you can expect an update shortly after it’s been on my computer for a few days.  If I like it, I’ll buy it at its full price.  You are more than welcome to check it out before I’ve had time to review it.

So there we go.  Imagine a good day, avoid negative people and inner thoughts of pessimism, and I guarantee your day will be fantastic.

If you would like to talk more with me about the Law of Attraction, chat with me on Skype.  I’m such a happy workaholic that I’m usually at or near my computer.  I joyfully swear, I think Dell and Microsoft put some kind of glorious drug in their product!

I love it, and I can’t stop…nor do I want to!

Enjoy your day because you are unique on this planet.  Only you can see your thoughts.  Only you can decide to be happy or not.  Only you!

Peace be with you.

On the spine of your online marketing strategy, you’ll find many vertebrae.

In regard to the body, the Atlas Vertebrae is the most important vertebrae.  According to ConnollyChiropractic.com, “The brain is the light and the atlas is the dimmer switch.  Do you know what happens when a dimmer switch is low, the brightness of the light decreases. When the atlas is out of position the messages from the brain are not transmitted properly to every cell in your body.”

For your online English school, your Atlas Vertebrae is the free trial lesson you should offer first-time students.  You need to give these lessons away if you want to shine the light on your message, your teaching ability.

I can’t stress it enough: you need to make it obvious that the student can meet you for a one-time trial lesson on Skype.  Make this offer known on every single page of your website or blog.

Here’s what you can say:

“Get your FREE one-time trial lesson with me on Skype for 15 minutes.”

“Do you want to talk with me for 15 minutes on Skype with your microphone?  You can do this one time…and it’s FREE.”

“FREE trial lesson!  Only 15 minutes!  FREE VIDEOCHAT with an English teacher!  One time only!”

Obviously since you’re students aren’t perfect at English, they might get confused and think your volunteering your time to teach for free…every time.

I try to make it obvious that I’m not a 100% free teacher (yet some still think I’m always free anytime).

So to help clarify what you’re about, put pictures of credit cards and PayPal logos on all of your pages.  Make statements like, “Get a free trial lesson and then decide to buy some of my cheap lessons.”

Giving away a free trial lesson is so important.  It’s the #1 reason why students will contact you!

If you’re making them pay you in order to meet you for the first time, they will be highly reluctant.  There are too many Internet scams out there, so by meeting them on Skype for free (with your web camera) will increase your sales exponentially.

Always use your web camera and smile a lot!  Smile non-stop!  Laugh and have fun too!

If you want to practice your free trial lesson with me on Skype by using a microphone and a web camera, let’s meet.

Practice makes perfect.  We’ll role play.  I’m be the student with intermediate skills, and you’ll be the teachers/sales person.  After 15 minutes, we’ll stop and discuss what’s working and what needs to be tweaked.

I’ll offer you a free 15 minute meeting so you can see I’m a real person too, and if you so desire, we can meet for longer to practice your free trial lesson/sales pitch (for a fee).

I’ll charge you about the same prices that you’ll charge your students.

Of course, like you, I’ll only give so much away for free since I need to eat and travel (my two favorite things besides my fiancée, Yuka).

Click here to check out the prices.  If you’re on a fixed income or have a strict budget, I’m happy to work out a fair deal.

I like to stay flexible.  And so remember, I’m always just an email or Skype chat away :)

Here are some links to pictures you can right click and then save to your computer.  I have no idea if the following are copyright protected or not.  If Google can have them on their site without prior permission, why not you too?  Check’em out:

Credit card pictures
PayPal pictures
Skype pictures

If you’re not familiar with this section of Google, make sure to play around with the different sizes.  You can adjust the sizes with the drop down menu at the top.

There you go!  I hope this article helps.  Have a great day!

My high school education really let me down.  Sure, they taught me reading, writing, and arithmetic, but what did they forget to include?  What’s more important AND more practical?

Well…it’s money!  Learning how to make, save, and spend money was never a topic.

I’m not a big conspiracy nut, but don’t you find it highly suspicious that most high schools across America (and I’m guessing the world too) avoid specific courses that teach this valuable knowledge semester after semester?

This should be required study starting in elementary school!  REQUIRED…NOT OPTIONAL!

Think about it: why would the rich and powerful want you and I to compete with their rich children?  If you know anything about Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki, you’ll know that rich dads teach their children about the money world, and poor dads do not.

But the burden of financial education shouldn’t completely rest on the parents’ shoulders.  Public and private schools need to step up since most parents don’t have the proper knowledge anymore.

It’s no wonder that almost everyone I know is in debt.  Credit cards are dangerous in the ignorant minds of consumers (especially the young).  And most people are grossly incompetent when it comes to responsible spending.  I learned this lesson the hard way!

But why did I have to?

No one taught me the wise ways of Wall Street, buying a house, taking out a business loan, dealing with credit card finance charges, investing in a money market account, getting business licenses, creating a simple budget, filling out different tax forms, marketing strategies, writing a simple business plan, customer service, saving for retirement, and as you can see, the list can keep going on and on.

What the hell!

This is America!  The land of opportunity that implies anyone can start a business and get rich.  What are your thoughts?  Do you feel like they (I’m not exactly sure who “they” are) pulled a fast one?  What’s the situation like in other countries?

Any way, I want to talk about diversifying your income:

Since you might not have a 100% understanding of what I’m talking about, this simply means to create more than a single stream of income.  Having 2 or more ways to make money from different sources at the same time is safer because if one of those dries up, you still have other streams to protect you.

You need to have money coming in from multiple angles.

This is pretty important in these crazy economic times.  So many people have been conditioned (brainwashed?) to have ONE job.  Having only one job, one stream of income is so dangerous considering the rise of outsourcing and CEO’s laying people off left and right.

So, here are some of my ideas on diversifying your income as an online English teacher in an ESL world:

Idea One:  Sell English lessons online by using Skype as a way to connect you with the student wherever he or she might live.  My e-book will give you on a step-by-step plan on how to start, operate, find students, and keep them paying again and again.  Sorry for the shameless self-promotion, but this site was created to make me money in a rewarding way that I could be proud of :-)

Idea Two:  Write an e-book.  Create an e-book that teaches them something.  Make your own creative and exciting lessons and throw it all together in the form of a .PDF file (and there’s your e-book). Make another website (or blog) just for your e-book, and market it the same way you would as your Skype lessons.

After you make a sale to a student, you’re in a better position to sell them more products.  Your student trusts you, they were satisfied with one buying experience, so logic dictates you can repeat this with other products.

Idea Three:  Suggest Amazon.com products that the student might like.  Sign-up for Amazon’s affiliate program, find some good English learning products, and do the following:

• Create a separate website/blog that focuses primarily on these Amazon products.
• Add a shop (an extra page) to your website (the one that sells your Skype lessons).
• After everyone of your student’s paid lessons, suggest a new product to them.  Or bring up the product during the lesson at some point in which it smoothly fits and then send them the Amazon affiliate link in the Skype chat box.

Idea Four:  Create a membership site that students only pay a few bucks a month to join.  Once in the membership site, the students will have access to special text, audio, and video lessons that you’ve created or acquired.  You could have a forum and a live chat page for students to interact together and thus increase the site’s sense of community.  I’ve never done this, but I really want to.  Does anyone know the best way to create a membership site that could do this?  I’m not a big programmer, but if there’s an workable solution, let me know!

Idea Five:  Write a paperback book and sell it through Lulu.com.  This site is a publishing-on-demand company.  All you do is upload your correctly formatted file to the site, and anytime someone buys it, Lulu will print off the book and mail it to the customer, and you’ll get a commission.  They take care of all the sales and customer service!  And you don’t have to pay any upfront costs!

Idea Six:  Sell your own created t-shirts or other merchandise with catchy expressions.  Gear them towards the love of English learning.  Check out CafePress.com or Zazzle.com to get started (it’s free).  One cool thing about Zazzle is that you can promote products that other people have made and get at least 15% commission.

Idea Seven:  Create a blog just for English learners and put Google Adsense ads on them.  And if you include Google Adsense to any of your other sites (like the one selling your Skype lessons), be careful.  You don’t want a prospective student to click on the Google link thus only making you a few cents when the student might have bought a big package deal of lessons from you otherwise (you could miss out on $100 to $500 if they never come back to you).  I would only put these ads on your site if you’re getting over 1,000 unique visitors a day.

Idea Eight:  Make DVD video lessons.  Sell these DVD or CD’s through Lulu.com or just CD’s through Zazzle.com.

Idea Nine:  Create an affiliate account at ClickBank.com and refer English learning related e-products that other authors have created.  You can always try to suggest other products to non-ESL people in the same way.  If you’ve never heard of affiliate marketing, discover more at Wikipedia.

Idea Ten:  Create interesting podcasts and give away half of each podcast for free.  And if the student wants to hear the rest, they should pay you a few bucks or so.  Here’s some free software to create nice podcasts.

Time to get serious!

Some of these ideas I’ve never experimented with, but I assure you, I will!  We all need to buckle down and create multiple streams of income in this day and age!

If you’re ready to buy a domain name or two for your various websites and get some hosting for it, use the same guys that I currently use.

I’ve been happy with them and have been using them since 2003, and their prices are right, and their customer service is outstanding…no complaints!  See what you think of the hosting plans.  At least secure a domain name before someone else gets it first!  Go here to buy your next domain name.

And yes, the above links are my affiliate links, but I really do use this company, and I’m proud to be their customer.  I’m confident you’ll like their services too for your URL and website hosting needs.

Another good reason to go with them is that I can help you if you have trouble publishing your site.  I’m familiar with their control panel that customers get.

I can easily walk you through any problems.  I’ve used the control panel so much, it’s like riding a bike for me.

I could really help lower your learving curve.  Time is money!

Contact me on Skype, and I will do my best to assist you with your newest website.  If you have Skype, click here to chat with me, or click here to call me (if you have a microphone) or click here to add me to your list of Skype contacts.

And if anyone has any more ideas on creating multiple streams of income for online English teachers, please let us know!  We’re all in this together, and we will be more successful if we share.  The universe will reward us because of our good karma :)

1.  WORKING ANYPLACE YOU WANT IS SOOOO LIBERATING!

True freedom is when you can get up and travel without having to worry about your job.  Becoming a self-employed online English teacher will allow you to go, go, go anyplace you want and still have the ability to work.

We live in exciting times.  Internet is KING!

You can literally teach from a Starbucks.  Teach from a relative’s home if it has a decent connection.  Teach from the beach if you know how to use your cell phone to give your laptop an Internet connection.  Imagine the possible places you can teach English.

What freedom!

2.  MEETING INTERESTING PEOPLE FROM AROUND THE WORLD

Even before I started teaching English online, I loved to travel the world and meet new people.  It’s so amazing how people are so different yet so similar from one country to the next.  The world is huge, but it’s “small” at the same time.

Do you know what I mean?

Teaching online with Skype really allowed me to meet people from countries I’ve never stepped foot on.  I was able to form new, exciting relationships with people from Poland, Switzerland, Turkey, and Russia to name a few.

Thank you everyone!

3.  A GOOD CHALLENGE IS EXCITING AND ENHANCES PERSONAL GROWTH

I’ll be honest, it wasn’t easy for me to start my own online English school.  Check out how I felt when I first started out.  But this challenge only made me stronger.

What doesn’t kill us only makes us grow if we allow it to.

I thrive on solving problems.  Being creative is one of my defining characteristics.  I love applying logic, intuition, skill, luck, and optimism toward a mystery that needs a fixin’.

You will honestly feel like a bigger, stronger person once you make your fist sale…and that leads us to the next one:

4.  MAKING MONTHLY SALES AGAIN AND AGAIN FEELS SA-WEET

With any product or service, the first sale is always the hardest, but it’s the sweetest.  My first sale was to a student in Korea, and I will never forget her.

The feeling of her saying, yes and then getting that email from PayPal stating, “Payment received” was great.  I did it!

And soon thereafter more and more students starting saying…YES.

Getting over the initial hurdle took some time, but it got a lot easier after that.  Using momentum is a great thing…never forget that!

5.  HELPING FOLKS IMPROVE THEIR ALREADY LEARNED ENGLISH IS REWARDING

The reason I like teaching is because it’s like giving people little nuggets of gold.  They are always so excited to get something new and shiny.  It puts a smile on their face to learn, and in-turn it does the same for me.

One of the secrets to happiness that I’ve learned is to make others happy because it’s reciprocal.

I love this truth.

6.  DEVELOPING PERSONAL CONNECTIONS WITH STUDENTS IS NICE

Spending week after week with a student is interesting.  You’re bound to discover new bits of their history.  It’s nice to share similarities and differences.

Ask your students lots of questions, and you’ll not only discover things about them, but yourself as well.  A good conversation is a process of discovery that benefits both parties.

7.  LEARNING ABOUT DIFFERENT CULTURES OPENS THE MIND EVEN MORE

The only way the world will end prejudice and craziness is to know how others are different and accept it as normal.

“Normal” is relative though.  Nothing is really distinct.  Embrace people who are “other” than you.

I like being different…yet the same!

8.  SPENDING MORE TIME WITH LOVED ONES IS PERFECT

Being able to work at home gives me more time with loved ones.  Whether I’m working in the same room as my fiancée or in the next room, just being “near by” is enough to make me feel more comfortable.

And since I can travel and visit family and work at the same time, it’s a perfect situation to be with everyone and not lose out on making money.

Doing all of this at the same time is ideal!  Who wants to spend half of their waking life away from the ones who matter?

9.  NOT RELYING ON A CORPORATION TO FEED US IS ESSENTIAL

When I worked in Japan, I thought I had job security because I was working for the largest English conversation school in the country.  But in the end, the ship sank, and I didn’t get paid.  I missed out on around $5,000 worth of earned wages.

And in this new world economy, working for a corporation is no guarantee of lifelong job security.  CEO’s are only concerned with increasing profits for the next quarter, and if that means that have to outsource and lay people off, they will do it.

They will do whatever it takes to make the shareholders happy…NOT the employees who got them there (just look at Wal-Mart).

So it’s best to work for yourself.  If you can trust yourself to work hard and put you as #1 then you’ll do fine.  And if you can figure out other ways to diversify your income, you’ll be even more secure.

Teaching online can free you up to find other online gigs or other business opportunities to find in your community to make money.  Throw enough stuff up on the wall and eventually something will stick!

10.  FEELING SIGNIFICANT TO THE WORLD COMMUNITY ROCKS

Feeling wanted and important is essential  to our well-being.  When students come to you and ask for help feels great when we can give them what they want.

You have English as your mother-tongue.  This is a gift to the world.  We are lucky.  Let’s not waste it.  Share what you know.  Teach.  Get respect.  Help others grow and you will grow too.

You are significant.  We all are when we work together.

Thank you Internet!

Thank you Skype!

Thank you World!

Here are 3 websites you might consider signing-up for (assuming you don’t want to create a real marketing strategy):

CafeTalk.jp
BuddySchool.com
LingWorld.com

I’ve used the first one, but I only found 2 students, and that was when the site was just starting out and didn’t have a lot of English teachers yet.

So my answer to the previous questions is…NO.

Don’t be passive!

The reason these sites are attractive to teachers is that it’s all so easy: “Wow!  I can create a profile and students will come to me, ask me for a lesson, pay me, and then we conduct an English lesson on Skype.  Hot dog!”

It’s so easy!

WRONG!  THIS IS NOT A GOOD MARKETING STRATEGY!

Sorry…I didn’t mean to raise my voice…but…UGGG…these sites erk me.

Any way, these sites just don’t work well enough.  It’s time to take matters in your own hands.  Proactive.  That’s the way to go my friends!  Be creative!  Don’t let others create if for you.

Besides, do you really want the first impression to students being dictated by how other sites present you to them?

What if you want to include more information?
What if you don’t want to include something?
What if you don’t like the color scheme of the site?
What if…

Wouldn’t you rather have full control?  Having 100% control on how students first “see” you is all important.  First impressions matter!

So here’s my two cents:

If you want to work hard and make some serious money online by teaching English online to ESL  (English as a Second Language) students, don’t sign up for these sites.  You need to control your image and your online English school’s image 100%, and the only way to do that is to create 100% of your school/biz yourself.

I was able to successfully create my own online presence and marketing strategy that attracted ESL students from countries like Japan, Korea, and many places within Europe as well.  It works…and I’ve helped many English teachers find out how to start this at-home business/school and how to get paying online English students.

It took me a long time to figure out the subtleties and nuances, but I did it because I was proactive, creative, and persistent.

Let me save you truck loads of time (and frustration).

Like 99% of the people I know, those who happen to ask themselves and think about the following questions will see things in the whole new light.  This illumination requires prescription grade sunglasses my friend…I hope you don’t do blind :)

WARNING: the following requires an SPF of 30 or higher!

The truth is always good, but many don’t welcome it.  Read as much as your comfort level can handle.

MAIN Question Number One:

Imagine your perfect life and how it would be, so how would it look and feel and taste?

Close your eyes for a second after each question and think about where you ultimately want your future self to go…and the great outcome that you most desire!  Reward yourself now with “happy thoughts.”

• Would you have a job or not in your desired future?
• If so, what kind of job would it take to make you feel fulfilled?
• Who are your friends?
• How would you spend the time with your family?
• What kind of restaurants would you frequent?
• Where would you fly to most often?
• Would your overall eating habits change?
• Would you get a new cell phone or a new dog?
• Would you sleep more or less?
• How would people see you differently?
• Would you contribute more to your community?

Really try to feel this future possibility…

Imagine the new gizmos and gadgets you would hold.

See the smiling faces in your new life.

Taste the exotic foods you would eat on the beach.

Focus in on the best possible vacation of your life.

Don’t underestimate the power of imagination.  Take a moment…stop reading, go get a drink, and while you’re walking away from your computer, think about the above questions.

Okay?

Did you get a drink?  I hope so, because you’ll want to feel refreshed in order to read on…

MAIN Question Number Two:

How much money would you need to generate each month to achieve your dreams?

Try to be realistic.  Keep in mind that things usually cost more than we can predict.  I like to add at least 20% to any logical budget I create.  There are always unforeseen expenses that’ll pop up.

Got the figure?

Try not to read on until you’ve thought of that minimum monthly income that you’ll need to maintain that dream lifestyle.

Okay…now here’s the big one…here we go!

MAIN Question Number Three:

If you’re doing what you’re doing right now during these current days, will you EVER achieve enough money to grant you YOUR future?

To rephrase it, if you’re going as you are now, will you EVER achieve ALL those goals?

Now if you’re like most, the answer is NO.

Reason?

Most folks are caught up in the day-to-day grind.  “Please let me just finish this day!”  Most don’t have the energy to imagine a better future AND to fully construct a plan.

Lots of worker bees can only see a few weeks ahead AT MOST.  “I can’t wait until this month is over!  Next month will be better…I HOPE.”

So 99% of people are so caught up in the moment and the very near future that they unconsciously block out the potentially bright and shinny future.  And when they do dream a little dream it’s fleeting and put together in bits and pieces along the way.  Most thoughts of a better life only come when life is going badly RIGHT NOW.  And then the future quickly fades and is forgotten for the time-being because the desire to just get through the present is too much of a dominant force.

The NOW is too dark that it eclipses the light of next year, next decade.

It’s time to focus with the light of imagination and planning.

Having a crystal clear image of what you want and how you’re going to get there is KEY.  It’s the most important group of thoughts you can have to secure a future YOU TRULY NEED.

You must, must, must write down your plan of action.  AND remind yourself WHY, WHY, WHY you want those goals.

Light brings clarity.  And your imagination and you physically recording your plan on paper or your computer is crucial to bring your future into focus and ultimately into your NEW present reality.

Make sure to review your plan often to keep the energy flowing.

Ponder this: how can you get anywhere without directions, a map, and a destination?  Please don’t aimlessly drive the dark alleys with broken headlights.

Watch this YouTube video of Tony Robbins who helped shine some rays my way:

As some of you might know, I lived in Osaka, Japan from early 2005 to late 2007.  I was employed with Japan’s largest conversational school, Nova.  At the time, they had over 4,000 teachers and over half a million students!

They were huge!  They had lots of money!  And they were on the cutting edge of technology.

I worked in the multimedia department.  So I taught English lessons from a computer in Osaka to students scattered all through out Japan via the Internet, a web camera, a microphone, and a cool software program.

Since I love computers, this was great.

After several months of working, I discovered that Yahoo Messenger was offering video chat similar to Nova’s.  This was the first time that I heard about the ability to call other peoples’ instant messaging accounts and speak with live video using a web camera…and it was free.

My first thought was, “Wow!  I could do the same job I was doing at Nova, but I could do it myself at home!  I could teach Japanese folks English with Yahoo Messenger.”

Since I knew a little bit about website design and Internet marketing, I felt like this was a perfect fit for me (but later I realized these skills weren’t crucial for starting up).

Any way, I bought the domain EnglishKitty.com and started contributing to various forums and whatnot.

Eventually I discovered Skype and quickly realized it was better than Yahoo.  I had only used Yahoo’s video chat once with my brother, and I didn’t like the quality.

Any way, about a month after launching my site and doing various things to get the word out, I got an email from a gal in Korea.

Korea!  I thought I was trying to attract Japanese, but no problem.  It was a happy surprise.

And then the time came for our free trial lesson, and I was scared out of my mind.

Not because I wasn’t prepared.  Not because I didn’t have the experience behind a web camera.

I was scared with sweaty palms because this was my first real business-like experience.  This was my first time at trying to achieve my own self-employed business that could actually bring me money very soon.

Would I fail?

Would she like me enough to become my paying student?

And what would happen if I actually succeeded?  Was I even ready for that?!

I also kind of felt like I didn’t know what I was doing to make this business work.  And she would see it!

To make a long story short, my anxiety quickly subsided after we connected together on Skype.  I was calm, relaxed, and charming.

I smiled a lot too.  I believe this was the main thing that quieted my nerves.

And so thankfully at the closing of our free trial lesson, she was ready to buy.

She bought one English conversation with me for $20.00.  And for several weeks after that, she would dutifully pay $20.00 before each 60 minute conversation.

I learned a lot about her and her culture, and she was able to practice her already learned English with me.  It was win-win.

Soon after, I started meeting more and more prospective students from other countries.  Some would buy, some only wanted the free one-time meeting, but in the end, I was making money.

And I continued to smile!

My fear of failure and warped fear of success was unfounded.

I’ve heard that about 80% of the things we worry about don’t even come close to coming true.  So why is it we as humans waste so much time and energy worrying about unrealistic things?

I believe it’s because most of us never think about this psychological phenomenon.  But once we have clarity.  Once we understand how things actually work, we can slowly change our thoughts that ultimately benefit our actions.

Positive actions lead toward success.

Positive thoughts lead toward success too!

What do you think?  Do you agree that almost 80% of the things we worry about never come to pass?  Do you have any specific examples from your life?

Please leave a comment and share your thoughts with the rest of us.  Thanks!