5 Steps to Making Money in your Home Based Business

Fact: People start a home business to make money. If your business is consistently costing you money and not making you money you should evaluate every aspect of the business.

Evaluate the Product Line

Any business evaluation should start with the product line. Are you marketing a product that is affordable to the majority of your target market? If the product is only affordable to a few then you have a problem. In order for you to make a sale or secure a reliable customer base of repeat buyers you will have to reach more people to find the few who can actually afford your product. This is no easy task and could cost you more money in advertising than you have to spend.

Is the product line a one time shot or will it be repurchased once used? This is key to repeat sales which can be the lifeline of any business. Repeat sales will also keep your business on the plus side of profit with little effort on your part.

Evaluate your Product Knowledge

How much do you really know about your product as well as your competitions products. This is another key factor in your own success. Have you done your research or are you relying on what you were told by your sponsor, upline or company? Your ability to portray yourself as an expert in your business will give you an advantage over other marketers not only when it comes to marketing your product, but also if you are working on building a team to earn residual income.

Take the time to learn as much as you can about your own products as well as those product lines and companies that are your competitors.

Evaluate the Tools of your Trade

Look at the marketing material that you were provided. If you fall prey to the old school marketing techniques filled with hype and buzz words you may need to develop your own tools to market your product and build your business.

Another aspect of evaluating your tools is to look at the actual tools provided by your sponsor or company. Are you looking at paying additional monies each month for websites, autoresponders or landing pages? This will be additional money spent each month and possibly will keep your business in the red.

Evaluate the Focus of your Sponsor

This is another important key to your success. Is your sponsor only looking to pad their own pocket each month by encouraging you to buy additional product or sign up for their affiliate programs? Is your sponsor available to you when you need them to answer your questions or are they hard to reach or keeping business hours that don’t fit into your schedule? Do they provide additional support systems that provide you with answers to the common questions for the times that they are not available?

The most important factor for any business should be getting that business into profit as quickly as possible. This can’t be done if your sponsor’s only focus in on their own business.

Evaluate Yourself

We all need to evaluate ourselves from time to time and doing so when it comes to our home business is what allows us to grow not only our business but also to expand our own knowledge.
Look at yourself honestly and determine if you truly stand behind your products, tools and marketing methods. Do you believe that you can sell the products? Do you believe that you can learn what you need to know in order to portray yourself as an expert? Do you offer your business partners up to date tools and training or are you relying on old school marketing techniques that have been handed down for generations?

My own Road to Success

One of the biggest problems in todays MLM and Direct Marketing industry is the lack of common sense and integrity when applied to your business. It’s up to each and every marketer to apply the same common sense and integrity to our business as we would in our own personal lives.

When I started my home business in January of 2005, I made a commitment to myself and my sponsor to work my business for 2 years. I fulfilled that commitment and then evaluated my accomplishments over that 2 year period.

I did have a small level of success however I also believed that I could have achieved much more had I been provided with the proper training and tools.

I had very few months where my business was in profit, and also had to deal with my husband who financed my business each month. It’s hard to justify continuing anything that consistently sucks money and doesn’t make money.

Late in 2006 I evaluated what I had done as well as the tools I used and changed my business plan to incorporate two key factors. The first was listening to my own common sense and the second was to educate myself in my industry as well as marketing.

These two very simple factors are what brought my own home business from sucking money from our family budget into a business that has made money every single month of 2007.

I am thrilled to say that now my expenses are not paid for through the earnings generated from my home business and I am also able to contribute to our family finances as well.

I am also better able to help my growing team to get their business into profit quickly and provide them with the up to date tools they need to grow their business without draining their budgets. This is key because a business that is in profit rarely closes its doors and by supporting my team I am supporting my own business.

If you are interested in how to get your own business into profit using common sense marketing, visit my Website and request information.

Taking Control, My Three Step Business Evolution

My business came to a stalemate in January of 07. After two years of trying very hard to do what everyone else was doing I came to realization that my instincts (that small voice you hear in your head) about carving my own path to success was something I should have followed from the beginning.

I have always worked on personal growth, it has been something consistent throughout my life. What I do and how I do it has never been something that I shared openly with others. I have always believed this is something very personal, and I still believe this.


I have made many mistakes throughout the course of building a home business. One of the biggest mistakes was sharing my "Why". What drives a person to achieve is so personal and if shared can show vunerablities that you would never show strangers. Its important to note that everyone in business needs to understand their why, I just don't think its anyone else's business what your why is.


My ability to always find something good in every experience is one of my strongest assets in my personal life, and now in my business life.


In early 2007, I was unceremoniously removed from a leaders board and had my moderator privileges taken away from a team board. Both of these events occurred without explanation and to this day I don’t know the reason why these decisions were made.


My attempts to find out why failed as the person who made the decision refused to tell me via email and I was not going to be manipulated into a phone conversation. In the end it didn't matter why because I realized that my knowing why was not going to change what had been done. This was the beginning of my taking control of my business.


I decided to evaluate the course of my business over the previous two years and this opened up a Pandora’s box that I was ill equipped to handle on my own. I credit the friendship of a single person with guiding me and helping me to keep my focus where it belonged as I evolved.


The first thing I realized while doing my business evaluation was that I had fallen into the herd. This was a shocking realization because I had always prided myself on not being a “follower”. Step One of my evolution was to stand up and take responsibility for my business as an individual.


Step one was huge because it meant that I couldn’t assign blame to anyone but had to hold myself responsible for straying from my own personal belief’s and making poor choices in regard to my business.


This is not to say that I did anything wrong only that I should have listened to my little voice who kept telling me that there was a better way. I also firmly believe that the people guiding me the first two years really belive that what they are doing is the correct path to follow. Ignorance can be bliss.


Step Two was the realization that the foundation of my business was not built on what I wanted or believed in. I kept a positive attitude as I tore down everything I had built the two years before by constantly telling myself that a successful business had to have a firm foundation.


As I rebuilt my business foundation, it was difficult for me not to be angry at what had led me to this point. This is where my friend played a key role in teaching me how to turn those bad feelings into something good.


Up until January, the foundation of my business had been built on old school methods of marketing like the three foot rule, working your warm market and some very long and boring training documents that were just tired and lacked any real substance. These were the tools I was given and I was told if I used these tools and didn't try to reinvent the wheel I too would be successful. Hogwash!


My process of rebuilding my foundation meant that I needed to learn how to market not only my product, but myself. It was silly of me to think that people with no formal training in marketing could ever teach me how to be a successful marketer. And it was stupid of me to not use my own common sense when making decisions about my business and business tools.


Step Three was a grueling process. It wasn’t enough to take responsibility and rebuild my foundation, the tools I had been given and in turn provided my team members simply did not work for the majority of people in our company. This conclusion is based on the number of people who actually promote to the higher levels within the company structure.


I had to look at what I had, and evaluate what really would be beneficial for my team members based on what worked for me and what my team members asked for. The actual process of building usable tools and putting training programs in place for my team was exhausting, frustrating but one of the most rewarding things I have done in my business.


I put my new marketing education to work and kept my focus where it needed to be and started working with my partner to produce quality tools that were simple and filled the need of my team.


In the beginning of the tool development, I struggled with each and every aspect of what I was doing. After the first tools were complete, things just started to flow like honey. I went against the old school rule and I reinvented the wheel.


My evolution is not yet complete. It will be an ongoing process as I learn more not only about myself, but about business and marketing. I am no longer angry or bitter over the culmination of events (not just the two I mentioned) that led me to this evolution, but look at them as part of my growth process.


I've learned that my responsibility as a Team Leader means that I lead my team and support my team. It is not my responsibility to lead and support someone else's team which is what I was doing prior to being tossed out of those two groups.


I have a firm grasp of why I got into this business and what I want to achieve within my business. I have also drawn my line in the sand and will continue to trust myself and believe in my own ability to be a leader and a moral and ethical business person.