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Start a Home Based Business in Retirement? Part 1 – Will a Home Based Business Solve Your Problem?

Congratulations. You’re retired and you thinking about starting a home based business.You’ve probably heard that at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting each person gets up and starts his talk by saying, “Hello, I’m __________ and I’m an alcoholic.”What they’re doing is admitting they have a problem, and they want help and support in solving it.Well, now that you’re retired, you’re reading this because you have a problem, so say aloud “I’m retired, and I have a problem.” That’s right; the first step in solving your problem is to admit that you have a problem.Perhaps your problem is:

Your retirement nest egg has been severely hurt by the drop in the stock market, or You can’t afford to take the vacations you want to take, or You have trouble paying your bills, or You’re just bored.

 
Whatever your problem, you’re wondering whether starting a home based business is a solution for you, and if it is, which business opportunity should you select, and what do you have to do to make it successful enough that it solves your problem.I started a home based business because my wife had a serious accident, and I needed to spend more time with her at home. I solved my problem by starting a home based business. Before making a decision, I thoroughly researched all the data available, so I could make an informed decision.I spent months collecting data. Hopefully, by giving you the results of my search, you will find your answers in a much shorter time.Briefly, what I found out is that a home based business can be a way to solve your problem. A great many people are making a very good living from their home based business, but many, many more are not only not making money, they are losing money.People lose money because they believe the hype that it is possible to make a lot of money in your spare time without any expertise and with very little expenditure of time and money. When they find out that this hype is a lie, they give up.A home based business is like any other business. You can make a lot of money in a home based business, but like any other business, it takes hard work, marketing skills, and an investment of time and money.Also, you can run a home based business part time, but you can’t run it in your spare time. You have to dedicate a specific amount of time to your business, and allocate that time to the various tasks that you must do to have a successful home based business.The key to a successful home based business is (1) using modern marketing methods and (2) finding a mentor who will help you get started. If you do these two things, you can succeed in any opportunity you choose. However, for a retired person, some opportunities are better than others.In succeeding articles, I will discuss these points in more detail.As I said at the beginning, you probably are looking for help and support to solve your problem. If you want help in solving your problem, don’t hesitate to email me, and I will do my best to help you.

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Plan To Succeed With Information Product Creation: Why You Need To Split Your Process Up

One of the keys to succeeding in information product creation is to break the process up into discrete steps. This frequently isn’t an instinctive reaction for the typical information marketer. Especially on the internet where small sized learning products are the norm.

However, it is extremely important to your ultimate success. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if you don’t do this you probably won’t succeed… even when you are starting out let alone as you move forward.

Your product creation system should do this for you if only to help you to understand the overall task.

But why?

In this article, I’m going to ignore chunking and focus on the practical aspects. That’s not to say that chunking isn’t important. It is. It’s important to understanding and to learning the process. But while you can use the same chunks as you move forward, long term your focus needs to be on the operation of the system not the understanding of it. Unless of course you are constantly training new people!

So why is chunking important to long term use of the product creation process? (Yes, I know systems design uses a different term for this process but I’m not teaching you systems design. So I’m going to use the word learning content designers use.)

The first reason that having individual discrete tasks is important is one of schedule estimation. Frequently it is very difficult to estimate how long the total task of creating a product will take. After all, the size and type of the products matters as does the number of products in your product funnel. And those are just the most obvious elements. However, estimating a discrete task is often much easier. The total can then be estimated as the total of the discrete tasks.

Secondly, scheduling a large task can be problematic. However, by segmenting the task into a number of discrete tasks, you gain a much greater flexibility in scheduling. Not only that but as your business begins to add people you are able to schedule multiple people to the product creation.

Finally, segmenting a large task into smaller discrete tasks allows you to have much better control over the product creation. This affects two different areas — status and quality.

By segmenting your process into discrete tasks you are able to schedule and record the progress at much more detailed level. As a result you are more in control of the status of the product creation. You know what everyone is doing. When they should complete it. And how much it should cost. You also know exactly what has been done.

You also improve your overall quality. Instead of waiting until everything is done you can check quality as you go. This allows you to immediate react to low quality products without absorbing their costs. This means that you have less rework and your rework costs less. And if the product is not going to meet its quality requirement you will know about it in time to stop the development, change the requirement or fix the product.

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Home-Based-Business: How to Be First and Get Deals With No Competition At Every Garage Sale!

How can you be the first one to every garage sale, every time? How can you get their first, and still get the absolute best prices? How can you just flat wipe out any competition? How can you make a big business out of buying garage sales? Find out right now!I cleaned out my shop last month – it made me think about garage sales. We (my wife and I) have also been business partners for 30 years. We have always been fascinated by business and business marketing, even on the micro start-up level. As I cleaned out my shop, I had the following thoughts a home-based-business based on garage sales.Thought #1: Make an offer they can’t refuse. If you have just one or two thousand dollars in capital to start your home-based-business, you can go to almost any garage sale, survey everything there and make an offer on all of it.This is true today, but it would have been risky home-based-business not that long ago. Simply scan the stuff for the most valuable items. Write down what they are. Walk town the block and get on the internet and check eBay’s Completed Items category to check the actual value – this will show you what actually sold.Garage Sale Home-Based-Business Thought #2: Make the offer for everything. Make your offer is based on the value of the key items, but take everything. You may not want to take everything, but by offering to take everything, you’ll get all the small stuff for free or nearly free because you are taking the problem away for the seller.In other words, do what others won’t and you’ll win. No other buyer is going to mess with the small stuff, so their offers on the good stuff will not have as much value as your offer.You may be saying to yourself as you read this that you don’t want to deal with the little junk – I understand that. However, if you just set up a simple sorting system and donate what you don’t want to resell, you’ll get great deals from the sellers who REALLY don’t want to deal with the small stuff. Dealing with things fast and right is what being in a real home-based-business all about.Garage Sale Home-Based-Business Thought #3: How can you eliminate the competition?How can you always be first to a garage sale without competition? Run Craig’s List ads that say, “I’LL BUY YOUR ENTIRE GARAGE SALE NOW!” Place it in the “wanted” category. In the body of the ad, tell them you’ll pay a price that will make them happy and you’ll take everything to save them the trouble of having a garage sale – you can even offer to sweep the garage out in the bargain. Why? The more you make it a “service” the more seriously your offer will be considered. In fact, it would be good to use the word “service” in everything you do with your new home-based-business.Why? It’s because we are all human. If someone wants to help you, even if they are buying everything you have at a bargain, you’ll be more inclined to think kindly of them and accept their offer. Contrast with the hard and crusty professional buyers you see at garage sales who are simply trying to make low ball offers on only the items they want. You want to be providing a service – the service eliminating all of the hassle for your customer.What are you risking by softening the blow of your offer by offering to sweep the garage? The vast majority will appreciate the offer but won’t have you sweep. Why? It’s because most of them are neat freaks – that’s why they are selling everything at a bargain! They just want to get to the good part, the part they like, cleaning up.This is important: Please understand this – you are advertising to people who are thinking about having a garage sale. You are offering to save them time because they won’t need to have a garage sale at all, because you’ll take all of it. Can you see how you won’t have any competition? You’ll be the only buyer there because you’re there when they are just in the thinking stage – just thinking about having a garage sale!WARNING:Always think in terms of massive action when it comes to business. Advertise on CL and your local throw-away paper like The Penny Saver. Also, make up a flyer and make 5,000 copies for very little money by finding a printer online. Put out 1,000 at a time and see what you get. Be sure to use the same language – you want to buy their entire garage sale of items.Buying at garage sales and reselling on eBay and CL always sounds like a tiny business. STOP thinking small. You could get rich fast doing this home-based-business.What should you do next?

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