One of the problems facing network marketers trying to build their downline is the out of pocket expenses associated with advertising. Whether you’re buying leads for telephone and email contact, using PPC advertising, ad co-ops, solo ezine ads, or any other method of lead generation, the associated costs can quickly add up.

This can become a problem for many distributors who were attracted to the idea of setting up a home business with low costs. This is true of both multi-level affiliate programs and network marketing.

Both of these types of programs can create significant residual income, but they take time to develop and are certainly not a quick fix. But this dilemma, of finding a way to create income in the short to medium term, gave rise to the concept of the ‘funded proposal’.

Funded proposals essentially market industry-related information at a relatively low cost, which acts to both generate leads, and provide an income whilst doing so. The potential customer base is wider, as many people who won’t be interested in a given opportunity or business model might be interested in more generic information.

Funded proposals also act to ‘qualify’ people, by charging a small payment for services. This eliminates ‘freebie’ seekers, or those with insufficient funds who really aren’t in a position to set up a home business, even a low cost, internet-based one.

They typically lead with a sales style page aimed at generating opt-in email addresses. These are then marketed to with the use of an autoresponder sequence. Sometimes reports are actually mailed out in the post also. Those using the system are generally given a replicated website that they can use to drive traffic to. The list they develop is one they own.

These systems do have an advantage in that they are more easily duplicated by the downline. Special skills aren’t required to set up websites, autoresponders, write compelling sales letters, or persuasive autoresponder emails. The main thing the downline has to do is learn to drive traffic to their site.

Whilst these types of systems are very useful, there is an often overlooked method to fund prospecting – and that is through using contextual advertising like Adsense. A website is needed, but blogs are a perfectly legitimate and simple way to post optimized articles, with contextual ads on them. The blog could even link to a funded proposal page, acting as a traffic funnel to it, and monetizing the traffic that is just looking for information but doesn’t like the offer available.

Blogs are very easy to set up and are a great training ground for traffic generation. There are a lot of good blog directories that are a source of established backlinks. And blogs can be themed on a niche associated with your home business proposal. You can even use article marketing to promote your blog.

Any type of site that provides good information is a way to build trust and credibility with your visitors and prospects. That is the basis of any good relationship!