Do you want a work from home

Business Opportunity and Franchise
and earn extra monthly income part time?

Business Builders: Finding a viable and
Unique Home Based Business Opportunity

Amongst all the offerings how do you decide which one to go for?

The first thing that you need to determine is your objective. Do you want to earn just a
few extra pounds a month to supplement your income or do you want to build a
long term future? The type of activity you choose should always have this in mind. The
second part of the question is whether you might want to change your mind and develop
what you start into a long term business at some later date? If this is the case it would
make sense to start a business that could be developed at some time in the future.

If you only want to earn some extra money in the short term there are many options such
as envelope stuffing, typing from home, processing claims from home and so on. These
are all forms of selling time for money but you do not build any equity in the activity.

What does that mean? If you stop the activity there is no income. It is just the same as a
job but you do it from home and gain the benefits such as flexibility and no commuting but
you will not be paid very much and your income cannot grow. You also rely on someone
else providing you with work and you have no guarantee of this happening, so the income
is not guaranteed.

The purpose of this article is to look at those home based business opportunities where
you can build a substantial long term income, in other words, it is for business builders.
These can also be started part time with a view of just earning a few hundred pounds but
give the flexibilty of being grown into larger businesses where you obtain a residual income.
Residual income is the key point here and it is the income your earn from your past efforts
and which continue after you have stopped working yourself. These I will term home
businesses rather than just working from home.

What to consider when looking for a Home Business

Vision:

First of all you need to have some vision of where you want to be in 10 or 15 years time.
These are not get rich quick schemes but a deliberate process of building a business over
time. The rewards come after the hard work and sustained effort of many years so you
need to come into the business with this consideration in mind. Many people start a home
business and give up just before it starts to pay dividends. This is the first trap to avoid.

Time and money:

The next consideration is to decide how much time and money you can invest in the short
term. For most people starting a home business they are already doing a job or are at
home looking after children. A home business will take time to become established before
it can be relied on to provide a constant or growing income. For this reason it is best to
have another source of income to cover your household bills and expenses without having
to rely on your new business to cover your day to day expenses. So either you or your
partner, if you have one, should have another source of income. In the event that you do not
have any other income you will be putting pressure on yourself to get sales and the be
using the money from the business to cover your living costs rather than reinvesting into
the home business. This will slow down your growth but this may be offset by your drive
and need to be successful. There is nothing like having your back to the wall to make you
focus and really work at your new enterprise.

Characteristics of a Home Based Business:

There are a great variety of home based businesses opportunity's out there and one cannot
say that this one is the best or that one is as it depends on many factors such as your
personality and your objectives. I will give you my views and how I set out to choose
between the different options. This does not mean that I came up with necessarily the
best solution, although I believe I did for me, but one which satisfied the criteria that I was
using to decide between the alternatives.

These were the criteria I considered when evaluating alternatives:

1. Consumable product or service so that I could get repeat business:

2. Mass market appeal so that it could become a big business:

3. High growth industry with predictable growth for a long period of time:

4. High quality products (I want to be proud of the products or service):

5. Strong management which acts with integrity. What were the values of the company
and it's reputation? Is it a member of the DSA (see below):

6. Established for at least 5 years and preferably 10 with a strong financial postion
(I want some confidence it will be around in 15 years time):

7. The compensation plan. Was it clear and easy to understand? Was it sustainable?
Would it provide the residual income I was looking for?;

8. Training and support. What was available and would it be ongoing?

9. Infrastructure. Was there an infrastructure in place or would I have to create it: and

10. Could it leverage the power of the internet without being an internet business
i.e. the internet is a tool rather than the business.

These criteria, or those which are important to you, need to be established before you
start deciding on your business so that you do not get deflected by a glitzy presentation
or a smooth operator. You are looking to start a business and you can choose which
industry or business sector you enter so choose wisely and with objectivity.

Not suprisingly it took me a long time to find a busines which passed all or most of my
criteria. I am glad I waited because once I had found the right one I was confident about the
company and opportunity and so I was prepared to commit to the enterprise from day one.

Value Added:

The next factor to consider is what you bring to the table. Do you have any skills that are
relevant to running a business? Your work ethic. Unless you are prepared to put the work
in nothing will come out. Are you teachable? In all likelihood you will be entering into an
area where you know little. This should not worry you if you are teachable and the
business does not require some detailed experience before you start. Are you prepared
to do whatever it takes to learn about your new business? Will you go to company
meetings and do the training necessary to be successful?

You need to realise that to be successful in business you have to add value to the
marketplace. If you are not adding any value in what you do why should you expect to
be well paid for doing it?
Value added content or lack of it is what often distinguishes a scam or poor opportunity
from a genuine proposition. Get rich quick schemes seem to promise that you become
rich just by doing X. If it was that simple everyone would be rich. I have met many people
who have dreamed of being rich by buying some website or some special business offer
only to find that there was nothing behind it. A website is of no value unless you can drive
traffic to it. Driving the traffic is the difficult part and once the trafic arrives you need to be
sure that you have something which the public perceives is of value or nothing will happen.

In all walks of life you are compensated because of the perceived value you bring to the
market place. You will need to increase your skills and become knowledgeable about
your business whatever it is. If you are not prepared to do this you are unlikely to succeed.
That is why it does not matter too much if you know nothing about the industry you are
entering as long as you are prepared and capable of mastering it. It may take a bit longer
in the beginning but if you have chosen wisely it will pay off massively in the future.

Technology and Commodities:

Be careful of being seduced by technology and be aware of the risk of commoditising.
The latest and greatest new product can soon become obsolete. The accelerating rate
of change in technology can mean that today's great product is on the scrapheap
tomorrow. Look at fax machines; they were everywhere but now scanning and email
have more or less made them redundant. In the US, long distance phonecards provided
a fantastic opportunity to grow a business until they became so successful the major
outlets started to sell them. They had become a commodity and the opportunity had
then disappeared. Why? Because the resellers of the cards added little value added
so buying one in a store was just as good. Always look at your industry and offering
and question whether, if it becomes large and successful, the major outlets will take
over the marketplace.

This does not mean that some of the offerings are not good ways to make money in
the short term. That may be enough for you if you can make enough in that timeframe.
Just be cognisant of the probability that the residual income criteria may well not be met.
You could always then adopt a newer technology and build a new business. This does
appeal to some people and many have had great results. These are opportunistic
approaches to making money which bears some similarity to traders.

DSA:

Many of the lhe largest multi level marketing companies are members of the Direct Sales
Association (DSA). The DSA is the industry's trade association. Members have to qualify
by adhering to the DSA's Code of Values. One of these is that the company offers to
buy back products purchased at 90% of their original cost within 12 months of purchase
by a distributor. This factor is important for a new distributor because it limits the risk of
the investment that they may make. There are no guarantees but membership of the DSA
should provide some comfort to a new person that they are dealing with a reputable company.

The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) in the UK recognizes the DSA which, in essence, means
that the public can deal with the company in the knowledge that their interests are safeguarded.

Summary

Take the time to check out the company with whom you will be dealing. If you are to follow
a 10 or 15 year plan you want to be sure that your are getting involved with the right sort of
company and one in which you can believe. The choice is up to you and I recommend that
you make some objective assessments before commiting yourself. Once you have made your
decision, move forward with confidence and conviction and establish a long term strategy to
reach your goals and dreams.

To find out more about the Business opportunity that we chose please go to our website by clicking here

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