1.
Choose a company or product that matches your interests. Where
is Success
2.
Look for a company
or product that you can be behind 100%. Make sure you agree with their
values and policies and their products. You can not sell products that you
do not like yourself.
Choosing a Company
3.
Come up with a product made from your own need or passion. My
homeschool book came from sharing my resources with many homeschool
families. It started as a notebook. My ID cards came from my homeschool
kids needing school ID’s.
Do What You Do Best!
4.
Choose a name with meaning for you. Register your domain name (only
$8.50 a http://www.godaddy.com )
5.
Get a web site with e-store capabilities. I like http://www.wahmshoppes.com
for $6 a month and he registers your domain name for free for you.
6.
Get set up to take credit cards. 2CheckOut
is great. Propay only
allows $1000 a month in transactions. Your local bank may be able to help
you. US Bank does them for $25 a month. Join Paypal
too.
7.
Get a DBA business license through your state. It is you “Doing
Business As” business name registration. I got my form at the bank. It
was $18 a year. Register your business name and your domain name if
different.
8.
Open a separate checking account just for your business. Make sure
every order/income and every expense go thru it. Get a separate business
credit card for online/phone orders of supplies. I write next to every
deposit what it was for and which client.
9.
Get free
business cards with your new name for FREE. Give them out everywhere.
Put them in when you pay bills. Put them down at doctor’s offices,
stores, and bulletin boards.
10.
Get a PO Box for all your business mail. This is especially true if
you are online. It protects your family. I never post my home address
online.
11.
Get a toll free 800 number for business calls.
12.
Send an email out to all your friends and family telling them about
your new business and offering them a discount to help you get started.
Do You Have Enough
Business
13.
Join several WAHM groups at http://www.yahoogroups.com
to get support from other WAHM’s too. I really like 1ChristianWAHM-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
and wahmhits-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
, WomansNetworkingCommunity-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
commonconnections-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
There are MANY!
14.
Check with an accountant and a lawyer to see if you need to do
anything special in your state.
Find your states sales tax at http://www.taxadmin.org/fta/rate/sales.html
You will be required to collect sales tax from customers in your state.
Get your sales tax forms at http://www.taxadmin.org/fta/link/FORMS.html
15.
Come up with a flier, brochure, and postcard to have printed and
send out to others. Mail Box Etc offers 1000 black copies for $35. You can
take your own paper if you want color or card stock.
ABC's to Your Business
16.
Swap fliers/coupons with others in like businesses. Join
www.wwwpacks.com or www.mommymailers.com
to find others to swap with.
17.
Make or have made a banner, button, and logo for your web page and
all printing. There are many other WAHM’s that offer this service for
inexpensively. You can find them on your yahoogroups.
18.
Put up a banner page on your site so you can swap banner links with
others. This is a great way to increase your search engine ratings.
19.
Submit your web page to all the search engines. http://www.Google.com
has done well for me.
Here are my search engine helps. http://www.mypreciouskid.com/searchengines.html
20.
When you get a request for information on your product or company be sure
to respond immediately. That will bring customers back. I print the
request and wrote on it the date I mailed the info and file it in a SENT
folder so I can look back at it if needed.
21.
Give more than expected. Pack a little surprise in each order. Go
the extra mile.
Give Rather Than Get
22.
Support other Work at Home businesses. It helps your reputation.
http://www.123HomeBusinessGuide.com
will help you.
23.
Barter your products with other work at home businesses. It gets your
product out there to be seen.
24.
Offer your products for contest prizes. It gives you added exposure.
See our contest http://www.mypreciouskid.com/contest.html
25.
Figure out a budget of how much you can afford to spend on advertising,
barters, free products, printing, etc. Stay with in that.
26.
If you make you own product be sure to find out exactly how much it costs
you make that product. Rule of thumb is cost times 2 is wholesale price
you would charge others. Wholesale times 2 is retail. Some do cost times 3
for retail.
27.
Be sure to realize you will need to set aside a portion of your profits
for taxes.
Read about your taxes How
Do I Pay Taxes on My Business
28.
Keep a log of every mile you drive to do anything with your business. Many
of us can write off that mileage on our taxes. Last year was 34 cents a
mile. This adds up fast.
29.
Get receipts for every expense you pay for.
30.
Do a search on http://www.google.com
for your supplies wholesale. I found several good sources for mine, and
the companies had very low minimums. With a business license you can
usually buy wholesale.
31.
Have a contest on your site. It brings visitors. Be sure to submit
your contest to ezines, contest boards, and search engine.
32.
Have a mailing list or yahoogroups list. It can be announcement only for
your ads and specials. Or it can be an email loop where others can chat
with each other. Or it can be an ezine format daily or weekly or monthly.
It brings others to your site over and over again. Have a sign up form on
your site.
33.
If you have a product you can wholesale to others, search the search
engines for those kinds of businesses. Then email them and ask them if
they want to have a FREE sample/wholesale pack. I have had good results
from this.
34.
Offer a FREE product on your site to increase visitors. It can be a
printable that others can print right from your site. It can be a freebie
thru an affiliate program that you can earn money on.
35.
Join one of the many affiliate programs.
36.
Offer your product through an affiliate
program to other sites. You can do it for free through http://www.mals-e.com
They also have a free shopping cart program. Swap affiliate links with
other WAHM businesses.
37.
Find your niche. A type of customer or business that can use your product.
Do a google search or a local yellow pages search and offer your
services/products. Do contacts for one type of customer at a time until
you have exhausted it.
Making Contacts
& Selling!
38.
Get “What Others are saying about” statements from others who have
bought or gotten your product through barter. Add those to your site.
39.
Decide what your typical customer is like. Income, location, needs??? Then
work at getting your product into those locations. I know my typical
customer is a working mom with kids in daycare or preschool. So I am
contacting them offering them a fundraiser program with my products. The
school/organization gets a portion of the sales.
Recruit Lead Tip
Sheet
40.
Become an expert in your field. Write articles with your web address and
email in the byline. Offer to speak on your subject for seminars both
online and off. I am offering to do child safety talks at preschools along
with offering my ID cards and giving the school a portion of the profits.
41.
Schedule regular working hours for your business.
Have a Party!
42.
Write a business plan. http://home3.americanexpress.com/smallbusiness/
has a free outline.
43. Check out the free getting started in business seminars
44.
Use your domain name email for all email. It puts your domain name in
front of people.
Kay@mypreciouskid.com tells
everyone I email where my web site is :)
45.
Make sure you have an email link on every page of your web site. Make it
easy for clients to get a hold of you.
Do You Look
Like a Business-
46.
Use the first page of your site to tell customers why to order from you,
the benefits, and features, and guide them to ordering. Do not have too
many other links there to distract them. Make it easy for them to order
from you. Tell them how and give them a reason too.
47.
Give every customer you get a reason or need to order from you again.
Offer a discount coupon or incentive to bring them back and tell their
friends.
What Kind of
Marketing Do you Do
48.
Put your web site description and URL under your name in your signature
line of all emails. Using
Your Email Signature
49.
Price check the competition to be sure you are in the market range. Know
what they are offering. Never talk down the competition. Talk up your
benefits/features.
50.
Drop off coupons for your product to local doctor office staff, resale
stores, preschools, day care centers, and other places you do business
with.
Building a Sales
Team
Thanks
to the many WAHM’s (Work at Home Mom’s) who helped add to this list!
More Articles by Kay Green at
http://www.123homebusinessguide.com/articles.html
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