Organize Your Way to Wealth—How to Make Money with a Barter Club

Is a barter club the right business for you? Well, are you good at organizing? Can you keep track of even small details? Do you enjoy playing matchmaker? Then you could be a very successful Barter Club owner. Humans have been bartering—or trading—since the beginning of time. It’s an inborn human activity. And you can make good money at it. This article will show you how.

How to Make Money with a Barter Club

Many people would love to trade skills or unwanted items for things they need. But someone has to organize a system to do so. Hardly anyone wants to do the work, so most barter clubs never get off the ground. That is where you come in. Charge each member a monthly or yearly fee for using the club. This money is your salary, minus any operating costs. The more members you have, the more money you make. It’s as simple as that.

How to Get Your Barter Club Started

If you don’t have members, you don’t make money. There are four main ways to get members. You should use at least two of them.

1. Put a small ad in your local paper advertising your barter club. It can look something like this:
   
   Need an Item or Service but Money is Too Tight?
   Trade your skills or unwanted items for what you need.
   We have merchandise and traders waiting for you.
   Call and register at (123) 456-7890
   Or www.nameofyourbusiness.com
   
2. Go online and set up a website. You don’t need to know html. A service like GoDaddy.com Hosting Plans can set you up with a website for as little as $50 for the year. On the website, state your terms and provide a place where clients can register for your service. Click here to Accept Payments Online with PayPal. Fast, Easy & Secure.
   
   
   
   You will want your website to look credible, so talk about the benefits of bartering. Either write or hire someone to write articles on the subject. Give these away for free. You can hire writers to write inexpensive articles at sites like Elance.com, iFreelance.com, and Guru.com. You can contact us too. We have people who can write articles for you. These articles will make you look like an expert, and attract the search engines to your pages.
   
    
   
3. Host a free seminar in your neighborhood. Talk about the benefits of your barter club and pass out literature that will “sell” your attendees when they leave. Get the names and addresses of each person that attends and send a follow up note.
   
4. Use salespeople to recruit new members. The salespeople should get 10-20% of the fee for each new member they sign up, plus credits that they can use to get services from your members.

What You Need to Know to Run a Successful Barter Club

You need to be a people person and be super organized. People will be calling (or emailing) you with their requests and items to trade. Your biggest value to your clients is your talent to arrange fair trades in a timely manner. You might do this by telephoning or emailing people personally, or by publishing a newsletter that lists items available to trade. You might also create a searchable database that keeps track of everything for you.

Check with your local Small Business Association (SBA) office to find out what you need to do to legally open for business in your area. For more information on how to successfully operate your barter club, check out ‘Bartering News’.

A barter club isn’t for everyone. But if you have good organization skills and enjoy playing matchmaker, then a bartering club can be the right business for you. It will take some time and a little bit of elbow grease, but after the initial work you can become quite wealthy in a short amount of time.