Does your business have a mission statement? A mission statement is a way to define your business. It is a statement of who your company is, what you do, and why you do it.

Some companies use their mission statement as an advertising slogan. But the real purpose is to clarify what your company is all about. Who are your clients, and what benefits do you offer them? What are your business goals? What problems are you solving for your clients?

In fact, the first step is an awareness of exactly who your target market is. You can’t be all things to all people. You need to narrow down your market to a target group, or “niche”. Once you know who you’re targeting and what their needs are, you can work to clarify how you can fill their needs.

Spend some time reading the mission statements of other companies. Then define what makes your company unique.

The mission statement should be short and to the point. It is usually three to four sentences long, and it should be broad enough to change as your company changes. The words and message should be simple and able to be understood by anyone that reads it. Fancy language won’t impress your potential clients. Instead it may cause some to be confused or unsure of what you are offering.

What is the purpose of your business? Are you trying to provide a unique service? Are you trying to fill a void in the market?

There are many reasons to write a mission statement. It can be used for fund raising, or if you have employees, it helps them to know what your company is all about.

Above all, it should be meaningful to you. It should be a constant reminder of why you’re doing what you’re doing. Keep reviewing it and updating it until it sounds perfect.  Once you have written the best mission statement you can, it will work like kind of a compass that keeps you moving in the right direction.

Technorati Tags: Home Business, Mission Statement, Own Business, work at home business

How do you define success? 

 The website http://dictionary.reference.com defines success as:

  the favorable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavors

1. the attainment of wealth, position, honors, or the like.

 Successful people don’t always “terminate” their attempts or endeavors, and success doesn’t always mean wealth or honors. How else could this word be defined?

 Your belief about whether or not you are successful may influence your future plans. For example, if you have been in business for yourself a couple of years and have not made as much money as you think you should have, it may make you want to give up. You may start to doubt yourself and question why you ever thought you could succeed. You may suddenly think you’re not going to be able to reach the goals you set for yourself.

 There are many levels of success. Those who start a home business while working full-time and are able to quit their jobs in six months can definitely be thought of as successful. Likewise, someone who makes six figures after a year or two in business could also be thought of as successful.

 But someone who put up a website with no knowledge of HTML is also a success. Someone who knocks on hundreds of doors and picks themselves up upon receiving one rejection after another is also successful. Someone who puts in an hour or two a day while working full-time is successful just because they are staying in the game.

 Success is about the journey, not the destination. It’s about hanging in there when you want to quit. It’s about believing in yourself when all those around you start telling you to go back to your day job. It’s giving yourself a pat on the back for each small accomplishment, and getting up the next day to try again.

Technorati Tags: telecommute, Work At Home, work at home business, work from home, working at home, working from home

Many people have the desire to start their own business, but become discouraged when faced with obstacles. The answer to discouragement is persistence.

 As Dale Carnegie said, “Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who kept trying when there was no hope at all.”

 Starting a home business requires determination to see your goals through. The first sign of trouble doesn’t mean you’ve been defeated. It means you have to try different tactics.

 Success doesn’t come overnight to most people. There is no such thing as getting rich quick. Starting your first business means you have to learn new skills. The learning curve always results in some mistakes, and mistakes are necessary to learn certain lessons. Mastering skills requires time and experience. There is no way around that.

 As a new business owner, when success doesn’t come as quickly as you think it should, you may begin to doubt yourself and your ability to make your dreams come true. When you’re in that frame of mind, listen to the words of Harriet Beecher Stowe:

 “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”

 If you believed in yourself enough to start your own business, don’t give up on yourself when you make mistakes while you are inexperienced. Remember that every successful person has a history of early failures. We aren’t born knowing how to run our own business, and chances are we didn’t learn what we need to know in school. We can only learn by trial and error, by jumping in and participating, and by trusting that with persistence, we will not only rise above our mistakes but benefit from them.

Technorati Tags: making money at home, telecommute, Work At Home, work at home business, work from home, working at home, working from home

One of the most important requirements to succeed in network marketing or any other type of entrepreneurship is a mentor. The word mentor is defined by http://dictionary.reference.com/ as “a wise and trusted counselor or teacher”.  One of the most significant words in that definition is trusted. When you are learning a new skill, whether it is network marketing or any form of home business marketing, it is important to put your trust in those who are already successful.

If you are starting an online business, it may be difficult to know who to trust. The nature of internet marketing is that everyone claims to have the answers that you are looking for – for a price.

If money is no object, you may want to hire a paid mentor, but this really isn’t necessary. Although paid coaching and mentorship programs may be helpful, the best mentors are people who are willing to pass on what they know for free.

The best place to find this type of person is by spending time in forum. Whatever your niche, there is a forum where people are discussing it. Within every forum, it is possible to find experts. Not only that, in forums people openly discuss who they look up to, who they have learned the most from. By listening to and participating in these discussions, you will most likely find someone you admire and that you want to emulate and learn from.

Having a mentor may eliminate years of trial and error. There is no wiser person than one who can learn from mistakes others have already made. You may be able to save yourself both time and money by listening to one or two people with more experience than you have.

Truthfully, there is a very fine line between success and failure. Finding a trusted mentor may make all the difference.

Technorati Tags: mentor, telecommute, Work At Home, work at home business, work from home, working at home, working from home

The desire to work from home usually goes hand in hand with the desire not to have to report to anyone else. People envision a life free of alarm clocks and rush hour traffic, free of pointless meetings and time cards.

 Still, many people begin their work at home careers with a telecommute job. They may get started by talking their current boss into allowing them to work from home, or they may secure a telecommute job such as customer service rep or telemarketing job that entails putting in a certain number of hours, possibly at specific times.

 There is nothing wrong with that if that is really what you want.  But a telecommute job is just that – a job. You still have a boss, you still have to put in a certain number of hours and your worth is often perceived based on how many hours you put in, not the quality of your work or how productive you can be.

 A home business on the other hand is a way for you to really be the boss. This can have both good and bad aspects to it. You are in charge of what hours you work. If you don’t work, you don’t make money. At least, that’s how it is in the early months of your business.

 The ultimate goal for a home business owner is to create an environment in which you are making money whether you are working or not. You may have employees that are able to carry the ball for you. Or you may be able to set up a business that brings in money on auto-pilot, such as a website that sells high demand items.

 The choice of a home business or a work at home job is up to you. Consider what is most important to you, and then decide which path is the right one for you to take.

Technorati Tags: telecommute, Work At Home, work at home business, work from home, working at home, working from home

One of the advantages of working at home is the freedom to work with your own body clock. In the corporate world, you have very little control over your day. If you are a morning person, or a person who is most energetic earlier in the day, you will find yourself sluggish and unproductive when difficult tasks or meetings are scheduled for late in the day. If you are a night person, you may struggle to be alert for tasks that are scheduled for the morning.

 As a home business owner, you have the freedom to plan around your own biological fluctuations. If you are most energetic in the morning, you can plan your most difficult or challenging tasks for first thing in the morning. If you are a night owl, you have the freedom to sleep late and tackle challenging projects after dinner, or even in the middle of the night.

 The key to working with your own body clock starts with recognizing when your highest energy level is. Some people are always energetic at a certain time of day and you can almost set the clock by the time when their energy wanes and their alertness fades. Other people are less predictable, and their energy level may depend on family demands or other stressors, or may even be affected by fluctuations in their diet.

 Working with your own body clock also means that you have to take responsibility for planning your day. It’s very important for a home business owner to plan ahead. The most productive days are usually days that are planned the night before. Obviously, unplanned events sometimes come up and not everything can be predetermined. But if you at least sketch out your day and plan ahead to the best of your ability, you will likely find your productivity will skyrocket.

Technorati Tags: Time Management, Work At Home, working from home

The biggest challenge most people who work from home face is distraction. You may picture working at home as a stress-free life, but you may find that being able to stay disciplined and focused in the middle of constant distraction is a lot more difficult than you anticipate.

 In an office environment, workers are often placed inside cubicles, probably to reduce noise and other distractions. The decision to work from home is usually at least partly motivated by wanting to get away from living inside a cubicle. You are looking for freedom:  flexible hours, even a flexible location. You may imagine sitting on a beach with your laptop.

 In an at-home work environment, dealing with distraction is a daily challenge. For one thing, other people tend to view a person who works from home as not really working. They will be quick to call you on the phone, or show up on your doorstep, expecting you not to be busy. And if you’re not battling other people, you may find sometimes you are battling yourself.  Self-discipline and motivation take constant practice.

 The belief that you can create a life free of distractions is unrealistic.  Life is full of ringing phones, crying babies, and needy spouses. And if you’re able to get away from all that, you will still have to contend with noise in your head. Your mind may start running away with planning dinner or next week’s schedule. You’re curious what emails you have received in the last hour or two. Ultimately you are distracting yourself even when others aren’t distracting you.

Self-discipline and focus won’t come easily, but they will get better with time and practice. As long as you are truly committed to your goals, you will be able to deal with the distractions both inside and outside yourself. 

Technorati Tags: dealing with distractions, Time Management, Work At Home

As a home business owner, you have to invest in your business. Many people interested in starting a home business have very limited funds. One possibility to solve this problem is to borrow.  But if you don’t have money to invest and either can’t get a loan or don’t wish to get a loan, what is the solution?

If you want to start a business with little or no money, you still have to make an investment. With little or no financial investment, you have to invest time. What this means is if you quit your day job, don’t expect to work less hours than you worked in the corporate world. In fact, you probably will have to invest long hours to get your business up and running.

For example, if you start an online business or blog, your initial task is to choose a niche that has a reasonably high demand and not a lot of supply. Once you’ve done that, you need to choose your monetization method. How will you make money? Whether you are planning to make money from affiliate marketing, Adsense revenue, or selling physical items, you will need to make an investment of either time or money to drive traffic to your site or blog.

 For most new online business owners, time is all they have to give. If you still have a day job, you may not have a great deal of that either, but if you’re serious about your business, you have to find time to invest somewhere. Give up an hour of sleep or an hour of television or both. Time has to be spent on article marketing, free advertising, social bookmarking, and getting to know other marketers in forums.

 The more focused time you invest in your business, the more chance it has of being a business that survives and prospers.

Alternatively, you can invest money. Traffic can be drawn to websites using pay per click advertising. Learn more about this in my next post.

Technorati Tags: investing time in your business, Work At Home, work from home

The importance of daily planning for a home business owner can’t be overemphasized. In the corporate world, days are very structured. You may need to complete certain projects by certain dates, attend meetings or training programs at certain times. You probably have coffee break at a certain time, lunch at a certain time, and you go home at a certain time.

 But in planning your day for your home business, you are faced with a blank calendar. No one is going to make you do anything. No one is going to notice if you fritter your day away with web surfing or checking emails, or if you chat on the phone or watch soap operas or talk shows.

 Of course, you will notice if time passes and you’re not making money. As a home business owner, you are responsible for planning your day and sticking to your plan. No one is going to make you do it but you.

The most important part of daily planning is to write down the tasks you expect to accomplish each day. It’s easy to tell yourself that today you will work on certain things, but if you don’t have a written plan, chances are you’ll succumb to distractions.  They best way to write out a plan is in the evening. Clearly state what you will work on the next day. Plan your hardest tasks for the hours you are most alert, and the hours you are least likely to be interrupted by children and family.

 You may have to dedicate a certain part of your day to marketing or business record keeping. Keep track of the hours you are actually working, not web surfing or chatting on the telephone with friends. Strive to better your best by knowing where you are now and what you’re actually doing with your time.

 Some business owners prefer to use software to plan their day.

Technorati Tags: Work At Home, work at home business

For a lot of new business owners, their biggest mistake is lack of focus. Getting started isn’t the problem. Staying on one path is. They are constantly starting multiple projects, purchasing the newest ebooks or joining new membership sites. They work on one project for 20-30 minutes, only to abandon it to check emails or run off in a different direction.

I’ve known people that have purchased web hosting and spent two years not even coming up with a niche or a domain name. They’re constantly researching and planning, but never actually committing to anything. Their train of thought seems to be always interrupted by the newest kid on the block offering the product that will turn their lives around.

 Having too many ideas and goals at the same time is kind of like being on the freeway chasing multiple cars. First there is a Mercedes that you think is going where you want to go, so you follow it a while. Then you spot a Porsche, so you change lanes to follow it instead. But wait! There’s a Lamborghini – and off you go chasing it instead.

 All you’ve accomplished is a lot of lane changing, but not getting anywhere near where you want to be. Just think, if you’d stayed behind the Mercedes, you’d probably be at your goal by now.

 The point is, choose one goal and stick to it. Make a list of the steps you need to take to achieve that one goal. Don’t allow yourself to be distracted by anything else. Above all, don’t let yourself start a new project until you’ve really given the one you’re working on an honest effort.

 The way to stay focused is to plan ahead. Know exactly what you’re going to do each day before you get started. Next time: Daily Planning.

Technorati Tags: staying focused, Work At Home, work at home business