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Friends In Business is a place where anyone who owns a business or is thinking about starting one can find support and friendship, some great new ideas, plenty of old ideas.... and LOTS more advice than you ever wanted.

This site grew out of my Personal Passion.

Over a terrible three-year period, I fell for so many scams and just-plain-rotten "opportunities" that I nearly put my family in the poorhouse.

(What's that you say?  It could never happen to you?  BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!.... )

(sorry)

The turning point came when I discovered the Internet and fell face-first into The Information Age.  Until that day, I thought I was just stupid.

I had no idea I had been victimized.

And that's when I saw red.

I got busy and formed a "support group" of 600+ people all scammed by the same very nasty company we dubbed "The Scummit."  The FTC finally took over the fight (but not until The Scummit boarded up the place and ran away with our money).

After that, the drama died down, and....

well....

you guessed it.

I needed a place to play.

Friends In Business is a little different than the typical anti-scam site, in that we take more of an educational approach....

Our mission is to teach you what to look for so you can smell when something isn't quite right and save yourself from just about ANY "biz op" scam.... from chain letters to the dreaded "Opportunity Seminar."  (Once you can dodge the goons in the blue blazers and escape through the back door without even being TEMPTED to buy a "Business In A Box," you're ready to take on the world!)

My policy here is total honesty, so I'll start with introductions:

We're four generations of real people working together in the family business (I do it full time; the others dabble and help me when they can).  You'll find our address and contact information conveniently parked at the bottom of just about every page on the site (in the big white block with my picture in it... very hard to miss and, alas, very hard to avoid :-)

Before I go any farther, I probably should tell you, the "Scams Crusade" is my own thing....

My family thinks I'm obsessed (or possessed, I can't remember which but it's definitely one of those).

So as you might expect from one possessed, my favorite place (and the first "must see") is Scams 101.... a free (and comical) crash course in biz-op self-defense especially designed for anyone who's ever been tempted. 

Or you can skip right to the Gruesome Details of my escapades (or what less adventuresome web sites might refer to as "About Me").

And then there's the rest of the web site...

Don't even think of leaving 'til you pay a visit to The Message Board.... it's the friendliest entrepreneur's forum on the net and a great place to bounce around ideas, check out new opportunities, or just hang out with some really nice people.

And if you've tried it all and you're convinced making money in your jammies is just a myth.... I'm here to tell you it isn't.  My hand-picked Best Last-Chance Business Opportunities are 100% scam proof.  Don't misunderstand me.... I'm not promising you'll succeed, because no matter what anyone tells you, NO opportunity is for everyone, NO product sells itself, and there is NO SUCH THING as a "turnkey business."  What I am saying is that I've had personal experience with each one of these, and I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are legitimate.  Three out of the four, however, require some pretty heavy-duty face-to-face selling, and that gives me hives.

Which brings me to my next point . . .

After massive losses that even my own family didn't know about until I spilled my guts on the internet, I finally managed to get it right.  That means I found what works FOR ME.  I emphasize FOR ME because each of us has to find our own niche; it just so happens that I found mine on the internet.

If making money in cyberspace appeals to you but you don't have the slightest inkling where to start and you don't have a product and you don't even have any ideas for a product, take a look at Where Do I Start?  The "overnight millionaire" promises are just plain silly and they've landed a lot of trusting souls in bankruptcy court, but it's a fact that regular people just like you and me are making money on the net.  I'm doing it, and a lot of my Board Buddies have already been able to quit their full-time jobs.  (Leaving my transcription business behind is my goal.  I'm not there yet, but my family couldn't survive at this point without the money I make on the internet every month.)  It isn't easy, and it sure isn't "overnight."  It takes time and dedication (and loving it helps!) . . . but if we can do it, so can you.

Now back to my "little boo-boos" . . .

None of them did my credit rating any good.  But I recovered, and I did it on my own.  I mention this early on because so many people who find their way to Friends In Business and Scams 101 are already knee-deep in doo-doo, and I know first-hand that if I could Get Out of Credit Card Hell Without Declaring Bankruptcy.... you probably can too.

That's just a tiny sampling of what Friends In Business has to offer....

There are menus everywhere to help you navigate the other stuff.... and please don't forget to BOOKMARK our site so you can find your way back (right now would be good!).

(Speaking of menus, my other passion is transforming yo-yo dieters into thin people without exercise; without pills, potions, or other stupid stuff; and without hunger, deprivation, or celery sticks.  So if you dearly love your food but hate what it does to you, pay me a visit at Formerly Fat: Permanent Weight Loss for Wimps when you get a chance.) 

I hope you find something valuable here.

Lesley Fountain
aka MaaMaw

MaaMaw here!      For a year and a half, I tried everything I knew to make money on the internet.  Nice store, good products, great prices!  I worked my hiney off... and I could count my sales on one set of toes. In 1998, I stumbled on Corey Rudl's MAGNIFICENT internet marketing course, and I've made between $350 and $3,000 every single month since then.  Rich?  Nope... but I was able to dump the business that ruined my life for 25 years, and that's good enough for me.                                                                                         Here's how I turned things around . . . . .