I run my small business from home, and I love it, but it’s not the perfect fit for everyone. There are both advantages and disadvantages to running your small business from home. Today I’m going to focus on the advantages, but I’m also going to present the disadvantages for each.

1. One of the biggest advantages is working in your slippers if you want to. When you’re not meeting with clients or customers you can hang out in comfortable clothes and your slippers if you want to. I do always try to get dressed for the day when I get up in the morning. I think that sets the tone for the day. When I’m up and dressed I’m ready to get to work. The disadvantage: Sometimes it’s hard to get in a work mode with dishes to do, a pile of laundry staring at you, or your family has other plans for the day. It’s easy to get sidetracked and get nothing done!
2. You can set your own hours (sometimes). Setting your own hours is usually a benefit, as long as you make sure you set aside some time for work. Don’t just blow it off because you have flexibility. You’ve got to put the hours in if you want to build your business. The disadvantage is you never leave work! It can be tempting to work too much, and neglect your family if you’re not careful, or to let clients take over your down time.
3. You can decorate your office or work space however you want to. If you want to go all out for Christmas, there’s no one stopping you. If you want photos on your desk, or a coffee warmer, it’s all up to you. The disadvantage (for me at least), sometimes it’s easy to let my office space get cluttered with non office clutter, and to let my office expand into other rooms in the house. It can be difficult to keep things separated.
4. You don’t have to pay for a separate work space. If you set up an office or a storefront it’s an additional monthly cost to your business. Disadvantage, the same as number 3!
5. You’ll save big on commuting costs. With gas prices up you can save big dollars each month on gas, wear and tear on your car, and insurance by driving fewer miles and working from home. Disadvantage: Since you are at home it’s hard for others to believe you’re working, and easier for them to try to request things from you during your work time.

If you run your small business from home, what is your favorite advantage?

One thing that I love about blogging and creating Squidoo lenses is taking things I enjoy doing (my hobbies), and making money from those hobbies.

One of the most popular ways to start a small business is to take something you love and build a business around it. But is it feasible to create a business around your favorite things, or hobbies? It is if you think outside the box!

Sometimes you have to get creative to build a business around your hobby, but it can be done. You might not be able to create a business crafting or drawing because it’s too time consuming to make much money at it (although I’m sure there are those out there who do).

Think outside the box with your hobby, here are a few business ideas using the crafting and drawing examples I used above.

• Instead of actually selling hand crafted pieces maybe you could create patterns from what you make and sell the patterns.
• Create a blog about your craft or art work. Teach others to create.
• Make crafting or drawing how to instructional videos and sell them in an online store, or have others sell them for you through Clickbank.
• Create a website to sell your favorite art and craft supplies. You don’t even have to stock the supplies yourself just find a good affiliate program to promote.
• Don’t have money for your own website? Start with a couple Squidoo lenses about your hobby, and make money selling the supplies through Amazon, ebay, or your own affiliate links. Promote your Etsy, ebay, or Zazzle store.
• Sell your crafts through Etsy.
• Sell your artwork on t-shirts through Zazzle, or Cafe Press.
• Teach crafting or drawing classes locally
• Create a membership site with learning resources for people who would like to learn more about your hobby.

Just substitute your hobby in for the crafting and drawing, many of these will work for different hobbies. If you like to play music, collect antiques, take photographs, etc, just take a look at the list and decide what might work for you. If you’re good at what you do share it with others, you should be able to create a small business around it.

Many business ideas can be tested these days without a big dollar investment. You can create a video and upload it to Youtube, set up a free blog or Squidoo lens, or patterns to be downloaded by your customer, and it will cost you very little, but you can make money from it with a little promotional effort.

Think outside the box, what type of small business could you create around your hobby? How can you promote that small business?

Image: istockphoto.com

I work full time from home, some of the work I do is on my own blogs and websites, but I also have several clients to juggle into the mix. My work for clients usually has deadlines, but no one’s looking over my shoulder to make sure I get my work done.

Sometimes it can be easy to say I’ll do it later, and do something else instead. My motivation is, I LOVE doing what I do. I love working from home, and I love writing and creating. I don’t want to do anything else, period!

So yes, I keep regular business hours, and I treat everything just like a business. I make a daily schedule and I try to stick with it. If I didn’t I’d be out of a job and back to work someplace with someone watching over my shoulder.

Do you keep regular business hours for your small business? There are many reasons why you should keep regular business hours, even when your small business is just starting out.

• If you set up regular business hours you will be more motivated to sit down and work. If you sit down and get sidetracked make a schedule and set a timer. Then you’ll know it’s work time and time to get focused, that you shouldn’t be folding laundry, or mowing the lawn. You should be working on something to move your business forward.
• Your customers and other contacts will know when to contact you. Whether your contacts are hundreds of miles away, or right down the street, it’s good for them to know when your business hours are so they know when they can do business with you. I do regular phone interviews, and I usually schedule them for about the same time of the day, it helps to build a routine in my day.
• Set rules with your family for your work hours. If you have older children you will be able to let them know when it’s OK to interrupt your work time, and when they need to be able to take car of themselves for short bursts of time. For younger children you’ll need to decide if someone else will need to care for them during your work time, or if you can pull double duty. It’s tough to balance work and children. Even if you schedule your work for short bursts with plenty of family time in between make sure you schedule that work time.
• You’re better able to schedule your work day. If you have set work hours for your small business you’ll be able to make a list of what you need to get done, then set up a schedule during your business hours to get the tasks on your business to do list accomplished.

Even if your business hours can only be a few hours per week, it’s still a good thing to set aside that time to work on your business. The more time you can devote, the more you’ll have a chance to grow your business.

Image (c) L Gerlach

Have you heard the buzz on Google Wave yet? I’ve been reading everything I can, trying to wrap my brain around exactly what Google Wave will do for my online business.

Google Wave will bring a new way to communicate with your clients, followers, coworkers, customers, and anyone else you come in contact with on a regular basis.

If you check out the video below you’ll learn what Google Wave will do for communication. It will be a new way to IM, blog, email, share ideas and documentation, and waayyyy more!

Check out a demonstration from the developers on how Google Wave will work:

I’m still trying to wrap my brain around Google Wave, but here are some of the applications I think will be useful (I’m sure there are a ton more).

1. I love the idea that it will be open source. That means there will be tons of applications developed to interact with Google Wave. Oh, and it’s free!
2. Which leads me to the possibility of extensions and applications built by others to improve Google Wave’s function, and custom tailor it to your business needs
3. The communication possibilities are huge. The conversation can be edited by anyone involved, and everything happens in real time. No more waiting while someone is typing. You can see what they’re typing while they’re typing it.
4. Drag and drop file uploads makes content sharing easier.

What I can’t wait to check out is how developers will use this platform to develop even bigger and better applications. I think it’s going to be a huge boost to online communications.

What do you think of Google Wave?

I was hopping around on Youtube today and I found this interview with Seth Godin talking about his book The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick). I enjoyed the video, so I thought I’d share it here.

It’s definitely something you can apply to your online business. I think back to when I first started, and wonder what would have happened if I would have quit during those first few months when I made zero dollars online. Where would I be now?

Definitely not where I am today! The first three or four months I tried to make money online were a ton of work but no return. Then I made my first sale. I think I made less than $1 on that sale, but it was enough to get me pumped up about this internet marketing thing.

So I read more, studied what others were doing, and kept on plugging. Pretty soon I was making regular sales, and a regular income. I’ll still always remember that first sale, and wonder what would have happened if I would have quit before then.

If you make a brand new TwttrList Squidoo lens and you could win a Kindle reading system.

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Visit Make a TwttrList. Win a Kindle for all the details!

Are you hard at work on those summer lenses and blog posts yet? If not you should be, or even getting a head start on those fall ideas.

If you’re stumped for ideas here are 20 lens ideas to get you started. You could write about…

1. 4th of July games and activities
2. Your favorite pool games and activities
3. Your favorite local amusement park
4. Your local county fair (fair food yum!)
5. Summer shoe styles
6. Summer swimwear for toddlers
7. The best summer vacation spot
8. Your favorite childhood summer memory
9. Your favorite summer foods
10. Strawberry recipes
11. Your favorite watermelon recipes
12. What’s growing in your garden?
13. The best places in your neighborhood to visit during summer break.
14. Outdoor summer activity ideas for children
15. Anything baseball
16. Your favorite summer blockbuster movie
17. Your favorite herbs to grow
18. How to stay cool when it’s hot outside
19. Your favorite flower
20. Your turn… you tell me what number 20 should be.

There are tons of great stock images out there for low or no cost, but creating your own image gives your work a personal touch. I love to use my own images whenever possible.

You don’t have to spend a fortune on a camera, or equipment to get great images. I have a Canon PowerShot Digital Camera and it takes fabulous photos.

I have an SLR camera with fancy lenses, but my point and shoot fits in my purse or pocket and is ready to go in seconds. It’s the camera I use to get most of my images, including all of the images I’ve posted below.

I take photos of my garden and flowers.

Capture food images…

Crafts…

And anything else I feel like capturing in pictures.

Sometimes the image itself can inspire an entire blog post or Squidoo lens. I take pictures of everything! Even if I’m not sure at the time what I’ll use the image for.

Many times I’ll write a post, and remember that I have the perfect image for it in my collection… then comes the fun part… finding it.

You don’t have to spend a ton of money on photo editing software either. A couple of my favorite photo editors are free downloads. Number one on my list is Photoscape, and I also use Gimp from time to time for putting together banners and headers.

I’ll be back with a few more tips on capturing great food images.

I’m excited that Squidoo is taking the effort to change their groups and make them better. Here’s Kimberly’s original post with the new group guidelines: Making Groups Great Do You Have What It Takes?

I posted this in the Squidoo Forums, but I wanted to reprint it here:

I’ll be glad to answer any questions I can (from anyone), and any questions I can’t I’ll direct to Kimberly. I don’t think Squidoo HQ is interested in closing down everyone’s group, I think they just want to clean up the spammy groups that don’t really serve a purpose except to spam their own spammy links out there in one more way (groups with only their own lenses on the group page, groups that don’t even have a group page set up, groups that are set to let everyone in and never update their group page, abandoned groups) .

I would say most lensmasters who are visiting here care enough about their groups, and take care of them enough that they don’t need to worry about their groups disappearing.

Making the cut for the top 100 and the extra prize may take a little extra effort…but I love a challenge, and I think most lensmasters here do too:-) I need to work on my own groups to get them up to snuff.

I’m working on a new lens to help lensmasters work on their group. It’s not done yet (I don’t even think it’s ranked yet, but you’re more than welcome to stop by and let me know if it helps, and give me some feedback on anything else you’d like to see there:-)

Taking Squidoo Groups From Good to Great

If you have questions, feel free to leave a comment here, contact me through the contact form at Squidoo, or leave a comment on one of my groups mentor lenses. I’ll get back to you with an answer, and if I can’t answer I’ll direct you to Kimberly.

I got a new toy yesterday. An HP Pavilion DV5-1160US Laptop , and I am loving it. I said in a previous post that I had money set aside for this from my online business. Well, I finally found the laptop I wanted.

I’ve been busy “mucking it up” as my son says with all the Internet tools and programs that make my life easier. Most are free downloads, so I’ll be back on another day to let you in on some of my favorite tools to help make working online a little easier.

It’s a totally sleek machine with Windows Vista Premium, 4GB RAM, and a 320 GB hard drive. And I’m now in the new century with a wide screen. Woot! Way faster than my old laptop!

Now I have both laptops (old and new) connected to the router, and I’m switching from one to the other. Yeah I’m addicted.

For now I have to get back to playing working. I just had to tell someone about my new toy.