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There are lots of very good reasons for Moms to want to start a small home based business or to work at home. Taking care of family and small children, caring for their elderly parents or special-needs children, cutting commute costs and helping to earn extra are just some of the reasons.

Not surprisingly the first step to starting your own home business can also be one of the toughest to overcome - how to find the right niche or idea. Very often, successful work-at-home Moms start out with simple (even boring) ideas that slowly evolve into a full-fledged small business.

To help you decide what you can do at home to make money, here’s 5 tips you might want to consider :

Make use of your knowledge and experience

The most logical start to finding your small business niche is to use your knowledge and experience. If you’ve been an accountant for years, why not offer your services part-time to small companies, organizations or personal friends? Perhaps you’ve got a Degree in Creative Writing. Why not put those skills to good use by freelancing, being a ghost writer or starting your own blog? Or how about putting all those years of experience as an Administrator in government service to good use by being a part-time consultant on government application procedures to small companies?

Do something you’re passionate about

It’s not always possible to fall back on your working experience or educational qualifications. So what do you do then? Money is important, but if you work at something you love, chances are you will be in it for the long haul and you will enjoy building on your knowledge and expertise in that field. So think about what you’re passionate about and try and find ways to make money doing that. For example, if you love to bake, why not sell your cakes and cookies at your local marketplace? You can also supply to your local grocers. If you love to cook, why not start a small catering business for small parties and events over the weekend? How about making craft items, handbags, costume jewelry, hand painted t-shirt etc. if you are gifted in artistic skills?

Keep your eyes, ears, heart and mind open.

Ideas are floating around everywhere you look, everywhere you walk, even in your quiet time. Make it a habit to really open your eyes and ears the next time you’re out window shopping. Look at what people are selling, wearing, eating, drinking or enjoying and ask yourself “Can I provide that service too?” or “Can I make that and sell it?”.

The next step to this is to open your heart and mind. People tend to be too judgemental about themselves. Too often, just as soon as an idea comes into mind, they counter it with a negative “Naw… my family loves my pastries, but I don’t think other people will… “ or “It probably took years of hard work to learn that, I don’t think I’m good enough”. All these thoughts come from your mind – your first stumbling block. It’s just your imagination trying to keep you safely within your comfort zone. Don’t shut yourself out from your own limitless possibilities.

Talk and listen to people.

The best way to avoid learning anything is to avoid people. Don’t. The folks around you are a rich source of ideas and experience. You never know when idle banter can suddenly spark a bright idea. Our mind’s funny like that. Haven’t you ever enjoyed a good laugh with a friend over a drink and talk about (what seems like) nonsensical ideas when you suddenly think to yourself “Hey! That might just work!”.

My wife and I find some of the most interesting ideas spring up when we talk to our suppliers. Whenever we strike up a friendly conversation with them ( and with people in general), we always find that they often have inspirational nuggets that can be turned into money making ventures. So, don’t ignore that little old lady who cleans the toilet at your office or the elderly gentleman who stands guard at the office supplies storeroom. Talk to them and don’t forget to apply tip #3 by watching what they do. They might just have an idea or technique that can make you lots of money!

Make use of the Internet

You can find almost everything you need on the Internet these days - that includes money making ideas and home business opportunities. There are lots of websites that offer freelancing opportunities for people who want to make extra money or who are looking to work at home. If you have a web blog or a website, there are lots of ways to monetize the traffic to your website. If you don’t know how to set up a blog, there are also lots of ways to learn and set up blogs for free. You can sell stuff that you make yourself on the Internet or sell other people’s products. The latter is called “affiliate marketing”.

One very important thing to remember when looking to make money online is that there are just about as many scam sites as there are genuine home business opportunities, so you’ll want to make sure that you learn how to recognize and avoid scams.

Another important thing to remember is that contrary to what most Internet marketers would want you to believe, making money online does not happen overnight. It does to some – but as a general rule of thumb, like any other job, it takes hard work and perseverance to make money online. The difference is that you get to set your own work schedule and never have to leave the comfort of your own home. Using the Internet, the knowledge and opportunities of the entire world are open to you, so make sure the Internet becomes your friend.

There are lots of ways for moms to work from home and spending time with their families and still be financially independent. It might just be about making extra money to buy nice stuff for your kids or to help out in the family finance or about living your dream of running your own home based business, but the best part about being able to work from home is the freedom to call the shots – and be your own boss!

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The real world of working at home is literally a mixed up jungle of unexpected distractions, mismanaged time management, lack of routine and sporadic loss of distinction between your personal and professional identities.

You start off working at home with lots of well thought out plans and good intentions. Pretty soon though, you find that your boss’ constant interruptions are replaced with your kids constant need for attention. The time you once wasted cleaning up other people’s messes in the office are now spent cleaning up after a messy brood. You ask questions like “Should I organize my appointment book or wash the dishes?” and “Do I have time to whip up lunch before that appointment?”

It’s natural that personal and family commitments get mixed up with your professional responsibililties. After all, one of the reasons you opted to work from home was the flexible schedule right? You never thought that working from home could be a possible cause for losing your mind!

But after years of working at home and talking about these experiences with other work at home parents, here are 10 simple ways to help you keep your sanity working from home :

1. Keep Your Space Separate
   You need to make sure that there is a separate, distinct area in your home that you call your “office”. Even if home is a small, cramped apartment, designating your desk and the immediate area around it as “office” can help to put you into “work” mode. We have two offices in my home. My first “office” is my workstation in the family room. It’s prone to lots of family disruptions, but I’ve learnt to work when it’s time to work and play when it’s time to play. My other office is the kitchen, where my wife and I run our home based food delivery business.
2. Plan Your Time
   When your business and personal time overlap, you need to learn to plan your day. Keeping to a routine helps you stay focussed and on track. NOT keeping to a routine opens you up to endless distractions because you don’t have any goals set for the day. Remember that your personal time - even if it is time for not doing anything - is as important as any other appointment. Personally, I’ve come to the point where almost everything from Monday to Friday is planned - from lunch with my kids to lazing with them to time for “spontaneous” horsing around and kiddie foolery. Okay, so even though planning is important, flexibility is still should still factor in your daily plans. A completely rigid schedule sucks the life and joy out of working from home and it can really start to feel like (or worse than) a full-time job.
3. Pass The Buck. Outsource If You Can
   When you start out working from home things get done quickly because YOU call the shots and YOU do everything yourself. But as your business grows, you can’t be expected to do everything. Your time is precious and if you’re going to spend it stuck in a 2 hour traffic jam sending a document across town, you’re not working smart. You’re the boss and it’s time you learnt to outsouce your assignments whenever you can. Sure, keep and eye on your budget, but don’t be a scrooge. Outsourcing can help you stay focussed on “real work”. You can’t be expected to come up with the next great marketing plan if you’re too pooped to think.
4. Get Tech Savvy
   Meeting people can be very rewarding when appropriate but not all meetings have to be in-person. With all the advances in technology, you can save lots of time doing business via telephone, fax and email. You can even have face-to-face teleconferencing using web cams without leaving your desk. Just think about all the time and money you save not having to sit in traffic jams and burning up gas while in your car. There are lots of other ways that technology can save you huge amounts of time and money. All it takes is a little bit of fact-finding to locate the equipment and software that best suits your needs based on your budget.
5. Plan Your Errand Route
   Try to group your errands or meetings on a specific day, within a specific location or along a route. For example, instead of making 3 separate trips, drop off your laundry at a store located along the way to your client’s office and shop for groceries on the way back. You’ve heard it lots of times before because it’s true - plan your route and you’ll save time and money.
6. Say No To Distractions
   It’s not always possible to keep your workspace off limits to your friends and family, but it IS possible to say NO to distractions. I’ve learnt to say NO to my kids when they want me to have a go at Guitar Hero on their Playstation even though I’d really love to, and they’ve learnt that a NO from Dad doesn’t mean NEVER - it just means “not now”. This can be a challenge if you have small children, but with practice, it can be done. My kids have learnt that responsibilities come first, but every now and then, it’s okay to throw the rules out the window now and then. After all, what’s the saying you’d like to work at home so you can spend more time with your family you DON’T?
7. Focus On Your Goals
   When you work at home alone it’s easy to feel lonely and discouraged. Running a home business is never going to be easy-peasy all the time. You ARE going to face lots of challenges. When these challenges pop up, it’s important to stay focussed on what you need to do and just do it. Don’t lose sight of your goals. The good thing about working from home though, is that you get to adjust your goals according to your needs without having to answer to a boss or committee.
8. Go With Your Mood
   What’s the point of working from home, running your own home based business and being your own boss if you work as if you’re at a regular day job? We all have personal work “moods”. Some of us are early birds and some of us are night owls. Some just have to sneak a 30 minute snooze after lunch and they’re pumped up with energy. Me? I like to work late into the night when the kids are asleep and there are no distractions. You yourself know when you work best, so take advantage of your own natural cycles and go with the flow.
9. Suit Yourself.
   Hey, this is YOUR office, YOUR workspace, YOUR business. Paint and decorate your workspace however you like it - unless your workspace is where you also meet clients, in which case, you should find some sort of compromise. If soft classical music is what you dig, then have it playing in the background. You’re going to spend lots and lots of time at your workspace, so make your work environment as comfy and cushy as you like. And there’s nothing wrong with brining your laptop to the park, beach or in your backyard to enjoy a change of scenery while you work.
10. Make Time For People
    Life can be really lonely when you work from home. In fact, one of the first things work-at-homer miss is the comraderie of fellow workers, so it’s always a good thing to schedule meetings with clients, prospects and suppliers. They don’t have to be work related. If you need to, then take a break and have lunch with a friend. It’s important not to lose touch with what’s happening in the world and with people in general.

So there you have it folks, my 10 tips to help increase your productivity when you work at home. It’s not an exhaustive list by any means because we’re all unique and we have our own quirky needs and wants. The good thing about beinig your own boss is you can do what you want, when you want and where you want!

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If you’re a web publisher and you monetize your traffice with Google products, it may be time to update your privacy policy.

Wikipedia describes a privacy policy like this :

… a legal notice on a website providing information about the use of personal information - particularly personal information collected via the website - by the website owner. Privacy policies usually contain details of what personal information is collected, how the personal information may be used, the persons to whom the personal information may be disclosed, the security measures taken to protect the personal information, and whether the website uses cookies and/or web bugs.

Read the full description here

As a web publisher, Google requires you to have a Privacy Policy published on your website :

AdSense publishers must have and abide by a privacy policy that discloses that third parties may be placing and reading cookies on your users’ browser, or using web beacons to collect information as a result of ad serving on your website.

With their recent purchase of DoubleClick, Google will be using their technology - which includes the use of the DoubleClick cookie - to enhance ad serving on your website, so they’ve updated their TOS to include the following phrase :

Google uses the DoubleClick DART cookie (English only) on publisher websites displaying AdSense for content ads. Subject to any applicable laws, rules and regulations, you will have the sole and exclusive right to use all data derived from your use of the DoubleClick DART cookie for any purpose related to your business, provided that Google may use and disclose this data subject to the terms of Google’s advertising privacy policies (English only), and any applicable laws, rules and regulations.

A member of WebmasterWorld Forum recently started a thread on this. As web publishers, we need to keep up with changes to the Terms of Service for any ad provider we are affiliated with. This help to keep our website compliant so we don’t get booted out and possibly lose a lucrative revenue stream.

So take a minute to read the updated Adsense Terms Of Service and update your Privacy Policy on all your sites. For many thousands of publishers around the world, there is just one simple reason to do so - Adsense is a really fat cash cow!

You can find more information here :
DoubleClick Cookie and Privacy Policy
How Internet Cookies Work

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Quote source :
Entrepreneur.com
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The Mooncake Box

It’s an age-old conundrum that faces every entrepreneur planning their business: What do I pay myself? There are a lot of different theories when it comes to this issue, but the two most common for startups are:

When you first start out, you tend to think that you are lowering your expenses if you don’t pay yourself a salary at all. However there are lots of drawbacks to doing that :

• Your profit looks more than it actually is (since you haven’t factored in your salary).
• It’s a psychological thing. When you think we’re already making money, there’s a tendency to relax. However, since your profit hasn’t taken into account, you might begin to think that you’re already in a “safe zone” when you may actually may be operating at a loss.
• You’re not working to create a business that can sustain your financial needs. In other words, you may have to depend on your family or personal saving longer than you actually need to. Remember that psychological thing?
• You are not giving a true representation of what your business is worth if you decide to sell it.
• Your may not be providing enough for your tax and retirement funds. Eventually this will catch up to you and you will have a bigger mess to handle.

The quoted article from Entrepreneur.com goes on to provide a detailed method to determine your actual worth so you can arrive at a salary that is both realistic and correctly reflects market value.

So remember, you NEED to pay yourself a salary - even if it is just to cover you basic needs - right from the start.

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Dr Foster Smith

Dog and cat lovers have it easy all the time. They have portable carriers in all shapes and sizes to transport their furry friends whenever they need to go anywhere - until now that is.

Dr. Foster and Smith have come up with a sling bag that is actually a portable bird cage to easily transport your bird - to the veterinarian or the park - and keep him close, safe, and secure. It’s a hands-free, vest-style bird carrier with padded shoulder straps and quick-clip waist strap for comfort. So you little birdie gets to enjoy the ride as well, the carrier has a durable mesh fabric front that allows good airflow and visibility for your bird. Zippered opening at top and bottom allows access. I’m sure you’re wondering what happens when your little feathered friend decides to go right? Well there’s a nifty removable bottom tray that catches messes and wipes clean easily. There’re even a 1/2″ diameter beveled perch and two toy hanging loops for those long trips when birdie can get bored and need some recreation! But before your start thinking is this is just the thing to show off your pet eagle or vulture, Dr Foster and Smith Travel and Outdoor Bird Carrier is designed only for small and medium size birds, such as parakeets, conures, canaries, finches, budgies, and lovebirds.

After reading about this product, I wonder when someone else is going to come up with a sling bag carrier to lug their pet boa constrictor or creepy crawly tarantulas around to show off to the world!

If anything at all, this bird carrier should appeal to every bird lover simply as a great conversation starter! There are more ways to make money than you think.

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• Air Cond Pet House

Quote source : Ananova
Image source : Ananova

The owner of a flooded restaurant in China scrapped plans to close it down - after business picked up.

“It’s very cool. Not only in temperature, but also for a fun new way of having a meal,” said one diner.

Very often, things just happen out of the blue and you have to be quick to grab the opportunity. This restaurant owner saw the opportunity flooding in (pun intended) and capitalized on it.

But think about it - doesn’t this just give you ideas for a novel business? I can think of a couple already :

- floating restaurant (I know - already done)
- floating diner - where diners sit in sampans or rubber dingys (anchored of course) and the waiters bring your food via sampans too.
- how about a direct copy of this flooded restaurant - where diners sit in a hall with water flowing around their ankles or even waves generated by a wave machine? Would take some investment in pumps and water outlets though.
- or how about a in-the-pool diner where your customers actually sit in swimsuits and dine at tables (bolted down to the floor of course) in 2 feet of water with a backdrop of palm trees and blue skies?

I hear a few chuckles already and some of you are wondering if I’ve gone mad. I must be honest though and say that in the midst of that flood of ideas, I wondered if it was BAD Feng Shui to sit and eat in the middle of water!

But the one thing I know is that ANY idea can be turned into a money making business if you follow it through. In this crazy world, everyone’s game for anything.

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