Your Home Based Business Has NO Boss

Posted on January 8, 2012 by admin

Do you hate your job? It’s sad but a high percentage of employees are not happy with their job or their employer. Others simply don’t like the work or demands of the job. Sure, there are different reasons but the facts are the same. Most employees would leave their employer today if their dream of winning the lottery came true.

Second best choice is a home based business. Since winning the lottery is 100 million to 1 odds it seems prudent to focus on searching the Internet for your next income stream and start a home business sooner than later.

Walking down the hall and being in your office pronto is a nice change. Driving to work, fighting traffic along with road rage is nerves on edge. Finding a parking place, dressing up, eating out are all expenses you don’t have at your home office. You have to decide the pros and cons to make a personal decision.

However, a Plan B does not require quitting your employer. Maybe you’ll want to do both, have an employer as well as a second income stream from a home business. Much depends on your choices, your family, needs of your children or care taker issues.

Flexibility will be the most appealing benefit of your own home business. You’re not subject to pleasing a boss or supervisor’s demands when YOU are the boss.

There are no magic buttons to push for immediate income in a home business. If you find one please notify us immediately so we can join your team. Time and work are givens regardless of your choices.

You can do Networking, make personal contacts, hold home parties, etc. Others choose the Internet Marketing route but there are still demands on your time in the beginning unless you hire employees to do the work.

Virtual Assistants is another option to consider as your work increases. Talented and skilled workers are available through outsourcing your work without hiring employees directly. You can hire a Virtual Assistant for a few hours weekly or daily according to your business needs. Location of your VA is usually a non-issue for most jobs you want to outsource.

Business is all about managing the details. You’ll look like a huge enterprise to the world, no one has to know that you’re working from a bedroom or over top your garage. Your luxury convertible is idling below until you take a break for the mall, take a vacation or pick up the kids at school.

Automation, the Internet, Virtual Assistants have basically changed the opportunities of running your own business without employees. Working alone is not difficult when you can come and go as you please. Your hours are yours to manage. Not a bad choice if you are disciplined and focused on your goals.

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Home Based Business Marketer Explores Email Benefits

Posted on January 5, 2012 by admin

One of the huge benefits of email marketing is NO postage expense, no cost for paper or ink either. Add an autoresponder service to automate your mailing list, set up a series of letters and you’re ready to communicate with your customers, prospects too. How many letters? It’s unlimited, send out as many emails as you wish.

However, there are a few considerations you need to think about. Before sending out an avalanche of email letters, ask yourself and your leadership team about your frequency of contact by email. How many email messages can you send to your subscribers list before someone starts to complain, maybe some have lost interest in your club, gets fed up and unsubscribes from your list.

Let’s assume that you and your love [spouse] have recently joined a local garden club, you’ve started planting flowers, rose bushes, dwarf trees and learning all about how to aerate, cut and fertilize your lawn. Suddenly, you are spending your flexible hours with a different group with different interests.

You also enjoy riding a Harley Roadking motorcycle across America or you’re into Corvette cars and belong to the Corvette Car Club…. email mixing is NOT a good idea.   

You have two real interests [hobbies] Harley Davidson [motorcycles] and Flowers [Garden Club] which are at opposite ends of the favorites list. Our point about your email marketing system is the necessity of writing to each group according to their interests. I’m guessing that about 75% of your Harley Riders have no interests in hearing about your Garden Club.

You can add your jogging dancers, race cars, playing the piano, guitar, banjo and hundreds more. It’s not necessary for everyone you know or spend time with to have the same interests, jobs, careers or focus.

However, most of us do like to spend time with family and friends who like the same things and experiences we do.  As an email Marketer you have to focus your messages according to the interests of your buyers and subscribers.  Don’t mix then up.

As a home based business owner, you can build lists of people who show interests in a variety of categories, even sub-categories so you can write specifically focused on their choices. Mail-order has the same member characteristics of like-minded interests and focus.

Nothing seems to be slowing down the flow of email messages to hundreds of thousands of clients and prospects on huge systems of automation every day. Sign up on a mailing list one time and you can be overwhelmed with the messages that keep coming without letting up.  Either you enjoy the messages or it’s your choice to unsubscribe. 

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Home Based Business Uses PPC Advertising

Posted on January 4, 2012 by admin

Does PPC advertising make for good economics to the home based business owner? As you may guess, there are answers of yes, maybe and absolutely not. The obvious answer to me is bottom line. Can I make more money by spending money for advertising. Maybe “it depends” is our best response to the question.

Testing your advertising methods is the key to knowing. None of us have a magic wand to prove that we’re on the right track with our advertising budget. You can throw your dollars out there and hope for good results. However, you’ll find out quickly that opinions are good but provide our business with no validity or confirmation of the results.

Google is not your only option so be open to learning about yahoo, bing and other resources for PPC advertising of your personal product or an affiliate product through clickbank. If all of this is foreign to you then we’ll tell you about the online university style training that we use.

Search the forums like “warrior” and others where lots of internet marketers share their experiences. Don’t rush to begin your IM journey without first learning from the best trainers. Some services and most forums are free to join by simply signing up. If you have a little cash, it may be worth spending a few bucks to connect with those guru types who charge a monthly fee.

Your education online is the quickest and most valuable investment you’ll ever make. Think about what you would ask in $$ for your training or to share your experiences if you were making lots of money every month as an Internet Marketer. My guess is we all would expect to be paid for our time and expertise. You are the only person who can make that decision about spending money to learn IM, buy a franchise, start a business, etc.

Our best advice and suggestion is that you build multiple streams of income with a Plan B. Don’t expect something for nothing or you’ll be disappointed. A home based business and Internet Marketing is a great combination if you’re willing to invest some time. As the PotPieGirl says, do for a year what others won’t do……. and you can do forever what others can’t do….. set realistic goals and stick to the challenge for 12 months makes sense.

Lots of TOOLS are available at nominal cost for the home business entrepreneur. If you have a job, keep it until your Plan B is working for you. Never give up a paycheck without replacing it with a bigger one.

Be sure to check out the RESOURCES listed above on this page.

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Discover the Future of a Home Based Business

Posted on January 1, 2012 by admin

Where has the morning traffic gone? Ask a home based business owner and you’ll be amazed. As we all know, jobs and new careers have vanished before our eyes. Employees are discovering a new path to financial security for their family and taking action as new entrepreneurs in a home based business.

Caution is important for all of us. When opportunities move in a new direction there are always the scam artists in front of the pack. It reminds us of the hawkers standing on the street corners trying to lure the unsuspecting into buying their fake watches. Separating the real thing from the fake copies is not easy to do.

Honesty and integrity are still working in the marketplace. However, the “bad” boys may have the “look” but their actions are coming out of the devils workshops, especially on the Internet. Easy money is always your money going into the pockets of the crooks as they ply their cunning persuasive tactics.

Experience in the school of hard-knocks is my middle name. Most of us live with a two-sided coin which has “sucker” on one side and “honest Abe” on the other. You probably know people in your circle of friends who don’t trust anybody and other friends who trust everyone. I’m not sure which is the best side but even when you open the door and get burned by a dishonest merchant, it still has it’s value.

You read about it in the newspapers or it’s touted on TV that somebody found a pocketbook or billfold with a couple $100 bills inside. An adult or a child picks it up and hands it to a security guard with all the money still inside the billfold. Is that a big deal in your eyes? It should be…. standard-operating-procedure rather than something out of the ordinary.

Why is honesty so rare today across America and the world? Is it all about easy money, believing in the possibility of winning the lottery? What can the Government do for us, we’re entitled? Maybe the old saying, “finders keepers, tough luck for the loser” or something close to that is how people think.

If you ever read in somebody’s sales page on the Internet that “we’ll do it for you” and believe those words just beware that it may not be exactly what you think it means to the promoter. I’m not sure what it means but you can get badly burned [lose a lot of money] as it’s often a slick promise [a lie!]

You’ll discover there are lots of training sites on the Internet but just be careful which ones you choose. Some can be free and others may have an investment required to use them. Thousands of Internet Marketers share experiences and knowledge in forums and at other locations. You still have to invest time in the learning process but lots of help is available for the asking when you are serious about building your own home based business.

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Home Business Owners Mastermind Teams

Posted on December 30, 2011 by admin

Have you heard the word “mastermind” team lately? Sometimes the word gets bounced around with sometimes negative responses. Truth is…. it can prove to be your greatest business asset or a waste of time. Not much in between to consider.

Home based business owners can benefit from a well thought out mastermind team. Doing your “own” thing is great but input from other business executives can be extremely valuable when making important decisions.

Unfortunately, there are very few Mastermind groups. I’m not sure of the reason but there is a time commitment from everyone. You might agree to meet weekly or every two weeks. You have to decide about what makes sense for you.

Careful selection of your team members is critical to your success. Internal executives should be involved in most of your meetings with the firm’s mastermind team. Don’t leave your executives on the outside when they are important to your growth and future success in the marketplace.

Research what others are doing with their mastermind team. How do you begin the process? Is there a particular background or expertise required? Maybe 5 or 6 is a good number to consider inviting from the business community as potential mastermind team members.

Another option to consider is the local university, to inquire if they have a formal system to be involved with the local business community. At the University of NC Charlotte there is the Ben Craig Center [BCC] which provides lots of expertise through their connection with the university.

How do they evaluate their successes? Their failures? Whom at the university oversees the incubator system at the BCC. Are university students or graduate students involved?

If you have deep pockets then you can hire the necessary legal counsel and accounting expertise but every new business does not start off with excess cash. There are services and valuable guidance available through the Small Business Administration for both financial and advisory guidance. Usually, a large number of the SBA counselors are retired business executives in a group known as SCORE. Worth checking out!

As you know, our focus remains on the home based business owner. Our goal is to encourage everyone to build a Plan B for financial security. It takes little money to learn the insiders track to Internet Marketing and training from the experts. Remember, YOU are your own security, not your boss or employer. Join us in our effort to put America and the World workforce back on the right track for success.

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Home Business Owners Discover Social Media

Posted on December 25, 2011 by admin

Social media seems to have arrived for the Internet Marketer. Home based business owners have many avenues to promote their blog or website in every direction across the web. Some sources are better than others but it makes sense to discover what social media can do for your business.

Whether you’re in a brick and mortar business or strictly an Internet Marketer, there’s advertising and promotion resources widely available. It’s more a challenge to discover what will work for your business rather than where are the sources that drive social media. Some social media resources are well known while others are obscure with little value. Maybe some will grow over time and be worthwhile as a business resource.

You may be asking what is so important about using social media. Communications, interactive dialogue is our goal as Internet Marketers. In many areas we find that communication between organizations, individuals and communities have turned into social media connectors. It’s hot, used by many, worth knowing how to use it in your business as a valuable tool for interaction with your contacts list of friends, neighbors, business associates, customers and prospective customers, too.

However, don’t discount all the other means of contact with your customers and prospects. You can write articles like we do, email on a regular basis, use direct mail, follow-up with thank you phone calls. Think about what your customer needs, wants, that you can provide. Can you offer discounts like some are doing everyday through email contact? Discounts, special services are low balled daily to beat the competition.

In your marketplace today you have to be alert to challenges offered by your competitors or get left in the draft of a new player, suddenly trying to take your business. Sometimes you’ll see loss leaders or something free to get the attention of your customer. Everyone wants what they don’t have, your customer.

Never say “I’m not going to do that” or you may discover your business has moved on to a competitor willing to meet the competition or offer their own enticing bonus. Customer loyalty is awesome but tight money has brought out many bargain hunters who’ll switch to a new vendor of services.

Ask yourself if your customer service is exceptional. Are you staying in regular contact with prospects as well as your regular customer? Do you call and make sure your personnel are meeting customer expectations? It’s one thing to think “all is well” but another to call and make sure your customer is pleased with your service.

Don’t get comfortable believing your customer will always be. Everyday there are defections, jumping from one service to another, often for minimal reason or no reason at all. Usually, the reason you lose customers is because you failed to stay in contact, lack of focus, interactions that should be a given. Never believe that your business is guaranteed, your customers will never change vendors is only a dream, not reality for any of us.

As usual, we encourage business owners to have a Plan B as a good business decision. Multiple streams of income should be the dream of everyone. Learn how and enjoy the benefit of real security with us.

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A Home Based Business with Tax Savings

Posted on December 23, 2011 by admin
  • Your home based business gives you the benefit of flexibility and making your own decisions. However, it is an imperative that you focus and stay on target or expect little success from your work. Don’t even begin to think about your own business without a commitment of time, study and learning the business.

Just like the BIG companies downtown, you get the same tax benefits they do based on the profits you generate as an entrepreneur.Working from home you can write off part of the cost for the office space, office equipment that’s used for your busiiness. Ask your tax advisor for details and how you can profit best.

Fear of failure causes many people to never begin their own business. Sure, you will likely fail in many areas that you begin and sometimes give up on. All of us have been down that road as entrepreneurs learning the business in the S-H-K {School-of-Hard-Knocks].

JOY comes in the morning because you made the effort, began the journey. You’ve joined the rest of us as we struggle with new challenges along the path to success. A big problem for us and others is often lack of focus. We begin then try something else because it sounds so much easier, faster and profitable. A word of advice is to make a decision and stick with it. Obviously, we just startedpreaching to the choir, ourselves.

Don’t begin a new program and give it up too soon for something else. Give your decisions a chance to prove themselves before throwing in the towel, quitting too early in the game. If you do get on the wrong track and find you’re off base, drop it quickly and move on. You never fail until you refuse to try again.

It may take several tries in a variety of venues before you hit a “homerun” in your business. That’s OK, all of us have been there. If you like to write articles, do it. You can be a copywriter, website builder or help others in your neighborhood use the Internet for their retail business.

You can have Plan A [work for corporate America] and Plan B, too. Our goal is to build a second source of income should Plan A go away and eliminate your income.Usually change happens when you least expect it to come down your street, then it’s announced thatyour company has been sold or merged with another.

Our Plan B begins and ends with education in the basics of “how to” make it happen for you

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Do YOU Need a Home Based Business?

Posted on November 28, 2011 by admin

A home based business idea can come to you at anytime.  In my early life, about thirty years ago, I got fired [downsized, layed off, screwed] but it’s all the same thing meaning my weekly paycheck suddenly stopped coming.

For almost 5 years I gave my employer the best I had to give and still got kicked out the door with little thought or appreciation.  That was before employers hired security guards to escort terminated employees out the door for fear of going postal.

How could this happen? Our local region was awesome, great profits were delivered every month to the home office. It’s never enough for the big guys and bean counters at the home office in New York.  Good employees were everywhere doing a superb job. Committed, loyal, the best group of people we could muster for our employer.

I’m guessing that’s how you feel about your job, your team of associates. Probably thinking your position is secure, no way your boss could do without you, right? I’m with you and thought the same way until change happened on my watch without any severance pay, immediate loss of insurance benefits, no vacation either because the company was going in a new direction immediately.  Nice surprise!

As you might guess, I went home with my confidence and spirits shot.  My thoughts went to having a bride, 3 young children under 10 years old, 2 car payments monthly and a mortgage on our home.  Looking out into the carport did not send excitement, only dispare looming in our future.  Did anybody care?  No need to mention that we buy groceries weekly and our usual consumption is a given.

Truth is…. your position may be secure, I hope so. However, nothing will feel better than having another stream of income “just in case” the boot comes and you’re not expecting it.

Your Plan B is the key to financial security for your family. That’s our goal for the American workforce so none of us end up in the unemployment lines looking for another job.

For many years our business was helping people find employment on a temporary basis as well as full-time employment. Searching for employment, taking tests, interviewing for a new position is one of the toughest challenges any of us face, all on our own dime, no pay.

One thought to keep in mind is that something better is coming your way. Believe it and you’ll see it when it arrives. As told above, I got fired because the company wanted to eliminate my salary and keep the business we had built for them over a 5 year period. Another thought for you is to know that your security belongs to you, not your employer.

You’re asking, who won and I delight in sharing the details. We started a new company to serve our same clientele and the business stayed with us for the next 25 years until we sold to a national firm willing to pay for our assets at a fair value.

Even if you own the company, have an excellent income, don’t put “all your eggs” in one basket, i.e. tie up all your assets with one or just a few clients. Diversity is your key to long-term success and financial security.

If you do find yourself searching for an employer in your future, make an appointment with a staffing service and get an update on your skills and learn what employers are looking for in new employees.  Be sure you and the assigned recruiter “connect” with each other.  Listen and learn what’s going on in the marketplace where you seek employment.  Lots more but this gives you a start.

Let us hear from you.  It will help us reach out and touch more people in a positive way.  What are you experiencing as you seek a new career?  Are salaries high?  Low?  Fair?  Are interviewers giving you the facts about their firm?  Job security?  We invite you to share your experiences with us.

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Home Based Business and Ecommerce Success

Posted on November 16, 2011 by admin

You may wonder why we put the home based business and the best ecommerce sites together and we’ll try to sort it out for the Internet community.

We understand the challenge of putting it together.  Maybe you can help us sort it out for all to see.  Everything we suggest is not necessarily ready for an exceptional joint venture, so we do take seriously the process of verification under all circumstances.

Much thought and evaluation goes into every decision we make. We’re not inclined to assume that our suggestions or recommendations are the law or that everyone is going to make a mint, lots of new cash. However, that is our goal every time!

All of our decisions involve many value factors including WHO and WHY before finalizing a JV project for others. An easy way to begin every project is to introduce the details to
your Mastermind group and get feedback from your members starting the very first day of your new project.

None of us are so “smart” that we have all the answers and always make the right business
decisions. At least from our vantage point it makes sense to do our research before taking
any actions in either direction.

Your Mastermind group expects you to divulge all of your research before asking each of them to give an opinion about your new project.  Business expertise and experience should dominate your Mastermind Group.

Every suggestion you get from the members of your Mastermind team has to be evaluated carefully.  Even the best ideas that come from your “smartest” team members have to be scrutinized, researched and evaluated carefully.

You’ve heard lots of ideas in business that turned out to be flawed in one way or another.  Too many ideas can turn out to be illegal or simply wrong.  None of us needs or wants an unexpected surprise with any of our websites, articles, links, etc.

Listen to what your legal counsel has to say, involve your accountant or CPA when it involves a lot of financial considerations. You don’t want to make a huge investment of funds and find yourself losing money.

Remember, there may be certification requirements, licenses, educational minimums or relearning details spelled out for us. You’ve heard it before, “haste makes waste” so be careful in the decision making process “with” whom and why. Does a joint venture make good sense? Will a JV cut into your profits? Why involve JV partners except to make more money with your project?

Some people get a piece of paper and do the “Franklin” test or the “Pro-Con” evaluation. You should be sure that it’s a YES or NO go with your proposed project. Financial gain is an obvious consideration to you and for all JV partners you try to recruit.

Our decisions may cause second guessing, a little anxiety, even the sweats for many of us. Did we do the right thing? Are we on the right track? Will all of us make money? How much is enough?

Did we give up too big a piece of the pie, the cash, before carefully evaluating the system that we developed? Nothing is more disconcerting than “what could have been” with good guidance.

Where can you get some real advice worth taking to the bank? In most cases it’s about finding the person or persons who have “done it” before.

Where can we find a successful Internet Marketer willing to share his/her expertise with us?  There are many IM working everyday to drive traffic to their web site, getting a huge number of visitors, some buyers, a few “tire” kickers but still making money.

Nothing beats knowing the leaders in your field of expertise. The more you’re willing to share your personal experiences with others it will come right back to your web site at the fastest boomerang speed ever experienced.

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“Due Diligence” is KEY to YOUR Success in Business

Posted on November 1, 2011 by admin

Sometimes we think there’s NO urgency in the beginning.  Starting a new business means getting a license or licenses required by the county, city, state, etc.  You may even need a certification of your skills or special training before you can open for business.

All those things are necessary and must be done if you want to avoid trouble with the authorities.  You may even get by without anyone noticing that you’re in business but be sure that you are asking for trouble in the future.

Our focus is about “buying” a business or a franchise.  Just because the seller claims everything is in great shape does not mean it is ready for you to purchase.  You’ve heard it said that “buyer” beware is good advice.  Due Diligence is your way of confirming there are no skeletons in the back office.

You’ve also heard that it “takes money” to make money in business. Your first expense is hiring your team of experts extraordinary to begin the “due diligence” process of verification, verification, verification.

Business owners are often anxious to sell their business as quickly as possible.  Obviously, a franchisor is excited about your interest in their francise and getting your investment dollars as soon as possible so you can get started immediately.

You may be excited and anxious too, BUT….. it’s imperative that you control the process under the guidance of your team of advisors.  Usually, you will need expert legal counsel, accounting and insurance professionals on your team.

A word of caution here…. do not be rushed through the process or it may just bite you in the backend.  Sellers are known to use tactics of fear.  You may hear comments like we have 2 more interested buyers or franchise prospects ”ready” to buy NOW and can make their decision today or next week.  Sign the contract!!

After your “due diligence” you may decide NOT to sign the contract.  “ProForma” is another big word with lots of hype or confusion for the business buyer.  The word actually means a “WAG” or in layman terms it’s a “Wild Ass Guess” projection of truth.

History of the business is what you want vs the proforma or “wag” of what the business might be under prestine conditions or best management practices.  Sure, you “think” under your leadership and management the business will do great and we understand.

Maybe a restaurant is a good example to consider.  Great franchisor and profits look good in California but we’re in NC.  Beautiful building design, good signage, enough parking, excellent menu.  What’s the problem?  Even with great “everything” you canot make any profits because of the fixed overhead expenses.  Franchise fees, building costs, etc. and the franchise name is NOT McD, it’s unknown in this marketplace.

Your team of advisors should provide you with the facts and their expert advice to help you make the right decision about buying or not.  Your advisors are not cheap but it can prove to be your wisest investment before…. rather than after a bad decision.

 

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