Monday, November 14, 2011

What is your busniess competition?

Discovering who your competition is is an important part of business success, and a good business plan can help you to stand out from those competitor and gain more customers.

As part of building a good business plan you will need to consider what you will offer your customers that your competitors can't. What will you do different from the businesses that are similar to your own?

Another question that working on a business plan will help you answer is if you are going to be the only one with your type of business in the area. If that is so, then that leads to a new question: Why are there no businesses like yours already in the area? Are you in a place where there is no demand for such a business?


While looking to see what your competition is, don't forget to look for any small home based businesses that might be similar to your business. Just because you do not see a similar business in any of the local shops does not mean there is not someone doing the same kind of business out of their home in a local subdivision. Local craft fairs are a good place to see if you already have any competitors if you have a product you want to make that might be sold at a craft fair.

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Sunday, November 13, 2011

Why Do You Need A Business Plan?

Whether you are a hobbyist who wants to turn their hobby into a second income, or a serious small business entrepreneur that wants to start a corner store, you need to consider what a business plan can do for your business.

When you write a business plan you are not simply writing a document that a bank or potential investors would look at, you are writing a plan for how you will conduct your business.

Business plans are fluid things that transform with your business. You will start out with a plan for what you will do to get your business up off the ground and moving. What is your marketing strategy? How much money will you spend on advertising, building and maintaining a website, or other business necessities for your business? Will you need to spend a certain amount on inventory?

By spending a little time working out a plan for your business before you begin you will have a much better way to keep on course as you move forward. Then get into the habit of reading over your business plan and adjusting it once a year to match what your new plan for your business is and what you want to accomplish over the next six months, three years and five years.

And don't forget to save copies of older versions, so you can see where your business came from and how it got to where it is in later years. Particularly if you might one day want to track your business growth for potential investors.

Saturday, November 05, 2011

Avoid the bad driving conditions - work at home!

Taking a drive a couple of days ago, I was reminded of something. I *really* want to work from home!

I went out during the first real snowstorm of the season and at two of the places that I had to go I ended up doing as much sliding as driving. I was going slow for the bad conditions too, and still ended up sliding along the road. If my parents had not done a good enough job teaching me to drive on slick snow covered roads, then I am certain I would have ended up in the ditch or worse.

I dislike driving, spent most of my life as a passenger in cars, so having to get out there and drive in the lousy winter weather is just not something I want to do if I can avoid it. So, enter the plan to stay home and work rather than have to go out and about in the icy cold of the Alaskan winter. I think it is about time I dove back into making my at home job pay the bills and stopped looking for a job that forces me to leave home when I would prefer not to be out there driving around.
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