Archive for the ‘Home Business’ Category

Although it is perfectly possible to start a home based business with very little money as you (hopefully) begin to expand your company an injection of cash may be the extra boost you need to take it to the next level.

Obtaining financing for a home business is never the easiest thing in the world. Many banks will indeed turn your application down, but there are programs now offered by the SBA (Small Business Association) that make it far easier for a home business owner to obtain the financing that they need.

The SBA offers three different loan programs for small business loans, but only two of them are really within the reach of the average home business owner.  Which one suits you depends very much upon the size and nature of your company but there are consultants that will help you decide which product is better suited to your business needs before you begin an application.

SBA Loan Products at a glance:

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Most home based business owners will have at least read about the great marketing potential of online videos to promote their product or service. The problem that many fledging entrepreneurs run into, which holds them back from entering this potentially lucrative field is exactly how to make a successful video to post on YouTube, Google Video and other online video sites.

Creating a video to post online that will successfully draw users to your business website should not be an obvious blatant advertisement. Rather an entertaining snippet that contains a subtle hint that will gently lure users to your business.

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Though the leaves have only just started to fall in many places you can be sure that those ads for holiday shopping will start appearing everywhere in just a few short weeks. Most retailers don’t even wait for Halloween to go by anymore before they start stocking their shelves for Christmas.

The holidays can provide great opportunities for the creative home based entrepreneur. Even in a recession most people loathe to cut back too far when it comes to holiday spending so the market really is always there at this time of year, as long as you know where to find it.

One way a home based entrepreneur with an artistic side can cash in on Christmas (and Hanukkah, Kwanza and New Years too) is by creating and selling their own greeting cards. Not the kind you make with construction paper, glue and a little glitter like you did when you were a kid, but by signing up with sites like Cafepress.com , Zazzle.com and Greetingcarduniverse.com. These sites allow artists to upload their greeting card art to their site and make money off of a portion of the sales.

The sites themselves do all the leg work, the printing and shipping and so forth, so obviously they take a cut of the profits. But a clever design (you don’t need to be Picasso) can end up be a nice little money maker, and if you have a number of them all the better.

Of course, these sites do not just limit the greetings card designs you can submit to holiday themes. Any and all occasions are acceptable. The only limitation is that of course, you cannot use copyrighted material that does not belong to you.

Whatever line of business you are pursuing at home there are software products available that can make every aspect of running your concern a little bit easier and far more efficient. Here are a few that you should definitely consider purchasing;

Microsoft Office: Almost an essential for any home based business. If you do not own it yet, or are considering an upgrade Office 2007 is well worth the investment. In addition to the standard offerings of the 2003 version – Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook – the 2007 version adds Publisher, which is an incredible desk top and web page publishing tool and Access, a powerful database application.

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Working from home sounds great, but if you are not really interested in the business or project you undertake the chances are that you will fail very quickly. Working from home takes a lot of time, effort and discipline and if you do not like what you are trying to do you will inevitably find it impossible to stick with.

The key to a successful work at home career is finding something you are truly passionate about, whether it is a product that you sell, a service you provide or a combination of the two.

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