For enterprising people like my readers, we're all looking for those opportunities that can enhance our wealth and income. However sad to say, there are many out there who prey on those with less information, those who trust too blindly.

So what are the "tell-tale" signs of a possible scam, and how do you avoid them? Let's mention a few:

1. They are independent and fly solo, without the quality stamp of a more respected organization. As such they do not offer any proper guarantee for their payment, nor money back guarantees. Paying them thus becomes a shot in the dark, you might get something of value, but often you do not.
2. They make vague claims that sound incredible, with little to back them up. Although it's common for online marketers to push their "best success" stories, and that there can be incredible opportunities, often if it looks too good to be true, it often is.
3. Do your research before accepting what is marketed. Try to understand what the basis for the opportunity is, and what the benefit to you, as well as the seller is. If the benefit to the seller is to simply sell to as many as possible, without offering a solid service, chances are the value to the buyer is not certain.
4. Often online scams use free services, such as free email, free websites, and to a critical eye is more vapor than solids. Even though not always true, a common scam tactic is to setup a site/service/product that people purchase, and by the time the buyers understand it's a scam, it has shut its door, the website and email have vanished and no trace is to be had.
5. Although it seems dangerous, one of the safer way of making payment to an online service is through using a credit card. Seems ripe for abuse correct? To the contrary, in a situation where you do not receive what was promised, you can dispute the claims. Banks and credit card companies deal with these scam businesses on a daily basis. Since the scam is often setup to run for a while then close and vanish, when you dispute charges on basis of non-delivery, you would normally win your money back.

I often run across services that advertise seemingly good deals, but scratching the surface it looks fishy. For instance recently I saw one service which allowed users to do work for them to fill out simple forms and type text. Basically a no-brainer job. But looking closer, they wished for payment of "training and teaching" material before new people would be able to work for them. And that is obviously counter intuitive. Why pay $ 40-50 USD in order to perform simple tasks? Although I can envision the service charging a flat weekly fee in order to give access to their work database (and thus be able to function as a business), it should not be as a training fee for what is touted as "simple tasks".