7 Simple Steps to Finding a Home Based Business that works for you
Everybody wants a piece of the action, their own little pie in the sky (or online) that will generate some serious revenue while they sit at the beach with a laptop. The reality is that real home based businesses that work are HARD TO FIND if you don’t know where to look. Sorting through the weeds can become a grueling task. The good thing is that no matter what your background, there are plenty of real opportunities out there for people serious about generating an income from home.
The key to finding the right home based business is to understand what works for you, and learn from others that are actually making money online.
These 10 steps will guide you on your search to finding your home based business.
What I'm going to do is show you the ten simple things I did to find the right home based business for myself!
1 - Decide how much you want to make.
Yes, it's true! Before you even go out there paddling the waters of thousands of business opportunities, the first thing you have to know is how much money you really want to make! You might be thinking "Well Roxy, of course I want to be a millionaire", and don't we all? Wouldn’t we all love to wake up in our PJ’s like the Heff, travel the continents via private jet, and use hundred dollar bills for toilet paper?
However, much like in the work force, you first decide how much money you want to make, you then decide how you will go about getting it. This is the first and most important step in deciding which route to take. The reality is, finding a home based business that works is EASY, the hard part is deciding how you are going to work it.
Some people have decided that they want to make an extra $1,000 a month online, others have decided they want to go full-blown and earn a multiple six-figure income.
The difference between these two will greatly determine which business you will choose.
Why is this step so important? Because it changes EVERYTHING.
Let's take an example from the real world versus the online world :
In the real world you decide what you are comfortable with, and you take a career path accordingly. Some people go to college, some get their masters, others get their Ph D's, and an even larger amount are convinced they will never be a part of the successful in society. The latter group will give up before they even try. We all know if you become a lawyer or a doctor you are guaranteed a certain amount of financial comfort. However, we all don't go out and get our J D's and our M D's.
Why? - Because we all don't want to put that amount of work into it, don't want to work those hours, maybe you have a learning disability, have trouble studying, or plain out hate books! If you're contemplating being a lawyer, you may decide you do not want to be the butt of societies jokes directed at the most vicious and evil people we know.
So, in life we make decisions and we either settle or move forward. Now you may be asking yourself what this has to do with Home Based Businesses, bare with me, it has EVERYTHING to do with it!
While I was in college I started playing an online game that had the potential to generate a few extra grand a month. I saw the potential, realized that the few extra grand was all I really wanted and needed, and so I worked that business and generated a solid 2-3k a month, sometimes peaking at 4-5k. This was ok for me at the time, because it was all I really wanted, and the amount of time I needed to invest in it was enough for me.
So, to the point – Before you pick a business, you must pick your income first. Ask yourself if the income you want to generate is proportionate to the amount of work or money you are willing to put into it.
2 - Know what floats your boat
The reality is that not everyone can do everything that the person next to them does. The fact that I made my first $10,000 in my first two weeks does not mean that you will. Why? Because what I do is not for everyone. On the flipside, the guy on Ebay making $3,000 a month selling motor parts will make those $3,000 a month on Ebay much better than I ever will! I could not tell you what goes on inside of an engine for the life of me! In fact, a few months ago, I almost poured coolant into my oil thingy. Thanks to the kind gentleman at the gas station who started yelling at me to stop..stop..stop.., I did not make that embarrassing mistake. I only almost made an embarrassing mistake.
Here is a great example: Before I started the business that I am currently working online, a friend offered to give me her husband’s home based business as a new baby on the way was taking their time away from the business. This business required me to drive 2 hours to L.A. to pick up wholesale priced products through connections her husband had made, and then I could re-sell them on Ebay to the tune of 200-300% profit. The potential for ROI was huge! There was a vast marketplace for these products, they were generously priced, and everything was in place for me to go.
So I drove 2 hours to Los Angeles, then about 2-3 hours back in traffic, and I had a car filled with… wait for it… airsoft bb guns. Not only had I never fired one before, I didn’t know one from the next. I tried shooting one in my backyard and the pellet actually hit my cheek as I was reminded of the infamous Christmas Story line, “You’ll shoot your eye out!”. Not only did I despise the idea of the traffic back and forth from L.A., but I had no concept of the product I was trying to sell. (There was also this unsettling fear of being pulled over by an L.A. cop with hundreds of black bb guns in the back of my car). I now have a closet filled with airsoft bb guns, one box opened, the rest all in tact sitting around collecting dust. This was clearly not the business for me.
So, a recurring theme I’m going to present in this article is “know what you want”. If you know what you can do, then you know what you want. Using your personal skills and knowledge will go much further than trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.
3 - Be willing to invest money
Just because it is the internet does not mean it is free. In fact, I actually would strongly warn anybody who thinks they found that perfect business opportunity that is advertised as free. Yes, there are many ways of advertising and marketing your business for free, but before the ad came, the business was there. You don’t see your local jeweler advertising jewelry without having anything in stock, no warehouse, no storefront and no employees … right? So stop kidding yourself! There is no such thing as free money, and as magical and genie-like as the internet can be at times, remember that a real business will require a real investment. So slap open that wallet and start believing in yourself.
If you are too afraid to invest in a business than you shouldn’t even be looking to start one. The fact is that if you are so afraid you are going to fail, investment or not, you will most likely fail. I never met a millionaire who said “I did it for free!”. Everybody invests something at some point or another. When I came across my income opportunity I was so convinced I’d be successful at it I sold my car to invest the money into it. If you want the comfort of a base salary or an hourly wage, then this is not the route for you. Stop reading now, go to hotjobs.com, and keep your average life. No.. really, get outta here.
4 - You have to love it or else you’ll leave it
Some of you reading right now may be thinking, “I don’t care if I love it, I just want the cash!”. However here is a very simple law of human nature; You will be most successful at the thing that you love doing. If you haven’t found that “perfect 10” opportunity yet, then begin by weeding out the things you don’t like. I don’t like bb guns, I don’t like traffic, I don’t like generating only 5-7k a month, I don’t like MLM, and I definitely don’t like selling people on things they don’t want. Make a list of some of the things you are NOT willing to do, and you’ll find the things you are willing to do will become more and more clear.
Some of you may be in debt right now and will be willing to walk over hot coals as long as it means paying the bills, but what I want you to wake up and realize is that MONEY IS EVERYWHERE. You may not see how or where right now, maybe you’ve been burned by MLM schemes or failed home businesses, and I’ll get into that later in point number 6, but for now focus on this… The more you love your business, the more successful you’ll be at it.
If you come across an opportunity to make 100k a year, but hate what you do, never have time to spend your money, and dread waking up in the morning, then you are probably in the wrong business. In fact, I’ll go as far as to say that you are failing right now.
The main point here is that if you don’t love it then you probably will leave it eventually, and who likes to go around in life thinking of their current job as the “transition” to what they really want?
Now that we’ve cleared the main principles out of the way, let’s get down to strategy shall we?
“Business, more than any other occupation, is a continual dealing with the future; it is a continual calculation, an instinctive exercise in foresight.”
- Henry R. Luce
So now that you know (or at least have some idea) of how much money you want to make, what you are willing to do to get it, you are certain that failure is not option and you are willing to invest money into your new home based business, where do you go now?
5 - Follow someone who has ALREADY succeeded
"Mentor: Someone whose hindsight can become your foresight"
- Anonymous
“The only safe ship in a storm is leadership.”
-Faye Wattleton
“If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulder of giants.”
-Isaac Newton
I think you get the point… Starting a new business can be taxing, and for many people it seems impossible because it can be such a lonely road. Mistakes can be averted by simply finding somebody who is willing to lead you into the success they have achieved.
When I came across my home based business opportunity I found a mentor who was already successful and spoke to him hours a day on the phone the first few weeks of my business. I am completely convinced that I would not have seen the success I have seen now were it not for those crucial first few weeks! Seek out the help you need from people who are already where you want to be, even if it costs you money!
If you want to start a home based widget business, find yourself the guy who specializes in mentoring widget salesmen. This is really not that hard to do, if you look hard enough, you’ll find one.
Aside from Step One, in my opinion, this next step is the single most important step in this guide.
6 - FIND A SYSTEM THAT WORKS AND USE IT
"If you and I would go and start our mom-and-pop operation, the national statistics say we
have a 15 percent chance of succeeding. By success, let's say surviving. We would have an
85 percent chance of failure," said Eric Reiss, who specializes in franchising law at St. Louis-
based Greensfelder, Hemker & Gale.
"With franchising, the statistics are exactly reversed," he said. "If you have a good franchise
system, all you have to do is follow the system. It's like a recipe. It's kind of a no-brainer. It
doesn't mean you won't work hard, but you know what business plan to follow."
Let’s face the music here. The world is not friendly to the rookie, the start-up, the inventor, or even mom or pop… Mom and Pop will most likely get squashed within their first year to four years, while Walmarts, Starbucks, McDonalds, and Subways keep popping up all over the place. So how can you apply this to your home based business search?
Find an established business opportunity that allows you to plug in, do the work, and reap the benefits.
You CAN have the best of both worlds, I do it right now! Much like in the real world, you can find business franchising online. The problem with people looking to start up businesses over the internet is that they have somehow fooled themselves into thinking that an online business is not a real business. IT IS. However, thankfully, just like in the real world, there are plenty of investment opportunities for you to plug into a system that is already working. You simply invest, do a little sowing, and then begin to reap the benefits of becoming an extension of a well established business.
7 - DON’T WASTE TIME KICKING TIRES
Have you ever met an indecisive person that has so much trouble figuring out which way to go that they never do ANYTHING? I coach people everyday into starting their own successful online business, and the one thing I find myself telling people way too often is “Stop what you’re doing right now and start acting”. Take Action.
Here is the deal guys, there ARE a lot of opportunities out there, and you could spend a year looking over each one, scrutinizing, analyzing, comparing, and contrasting. You know what happens to those people? THEY GET LEFT BEHIND. If you find something that fits into your paradigm, into your list (like the one we created in the first four steps), then just ACT.
If you find something that works, you find yourself a coach or a mentor that has been successful, if it’s something you like doing, and it is going to generate the income you are looking for, then stop dawdling and start taking action.
The reason I put together this guide was to assist people in taking action, finding, and participating in home based business opportunities. You can be successful at home with a few defined goals, a target income, an understanding of what you are capable of, a coach, and a business system. The last thing you need to do is just act. Stop kicking the tires, just find the right vehicle, get in it, and drive!
Roxanne Gibert
http://www.topdailysales.com
Business 
