Five Top Tips For Running A Home Business
Although losing your job can seem like the end of the world many people have been turning it to their advantage, it’s given them the perfect excuse to start again. Some have taken this opportunity to try a new career, maybe go back to education; many have decided to start their own businesses and work from home.
Who hasn’t sat in the office on Friday afternoon, spending more time dreaming about working for themselves rather than actually concentrating on what they were meant to be doing? If you’ve recently found yourself out of work, have spotted a genuine gap in the market you know you can fill, or you’ve just had enough of your boss, starting up your own business from home and being self employed doesn’t have to be as difficult as it may first seem.
If you’re starting your own business, it makes a lot of sense to run it from your home, you have no (additional) rent to pay, you don’t have the expense of traveling (which in itself can amount up to a whole extra day per week) and you could find it easier to be on hand if needed by friends and family
You’ve decided you want to work from home, what are you going to do all day? You’ll need an idea; there are a few ways to come up with one, have you spotted a gap in the market you know you could fill? Do you have a hobby or something you normally do for fun you could actually get paid for? Maybe someone’s already offering something you know you could do better? There are loads of ways you could start up a home business
Once you’ve got an idea for your home business, go and sell it. Make a list of all the people/organisations that might be interested in you and approach them, try to speak to them in person or at least over the phone (emails get ignored very easily and buried even easier). You can’t afford to burn any bridges so try not to let any discouragement show, they may not be interested in your product or service at the moment but that might change next month or they may know someone else who could be interested. (for loads of great advice on sales and selling techniques, check out Richard Denny’s exclusive set). Be friendly, polite and positive and you’ll be surprised by how far you get.
You’ll also need to consider the more mundane tasks of running your own business from home, if you thought it would mean an end to all that admin and paper work you’d be wrong. You will need to notify your insurance company (especially if you’re going to have additional equipment like computers around). Unless your new business is going to be particularly noisy, or involve large lorries rumbling down your road at unsocial hours, going to be producing strange smells, or have large amounts of people rolling through your front door all the time you shouldn’t need to inform your local authority if you become self employed. All local authority websites will give you an exact list of criteria you’ll need to check though and this will tell you if you need to notify them. Whilst you’re doing all your setup admin, don’t forget to let the tax man know you’re trading from home, as soon as you’re incurring any business expense or making any money he’ll need to know.
Now you need to get some good exposure for your home business, the easiest step to get your business in the media is to write a press release, and send in a good image. A good press release has a good headline, includes facts and figures and preferably a quote, if you can get endorsement from a celebrity that would be even better. Send it to someone who writes about the kind of things your business is involved in and again follow up with them just to make sure it’s a story they would be interested in and the kind of story they’ll print
One last bit of advice when starting your own business, follow the golden triangle, this is spending a third of your time on three things, one is business development (going out and generating new clients), the second is taking care of your existing customer, and the third part is admin, making sure you’re registering the vat, keeping the books in order etc. that way you’re business stays in order. If you are able to spend roughly a third of your time on each of these areas, you’ll find your home business runs as smoothly as possible.
All that’s left to do now is enjoy being your own boss!
There are so many of places offering you help you may not know where to start (well, GuruOnline would be a good place!), Emma Jones started Enterprise Nation for this very reason. If you are serious about starting your own business from home, this site should definitely be on your ‘must check out’ list, it’s a great free resource that can help you start and grow your business from home, check out Emma’s sets on GuruOnline to hear her great advice on starting a home business