Hello FreelanceMoms!

I have a lot of women contacting me each week asking for advice on how to start working from home. There are so many 'work at home schemes' out there and women wanting to work from home are particularly vulnerable.

My main advice always is to honestly assess what your skills are, what do you know how to do, and especially what do you love to do? How can you turn these skills into profit.

I was reading our local newspaper recently and was really heartened when I recognized just how many home businesses there really are out there. People are finding all sorts of ways to work from home. Some examples are kennel services, child care, errands businesses, bookkeeping, photography, website design... It's really quite impressive.

If you have a viable skill - really consider how you can make money with that skill. If you love being with children, consider offering childcare, or afterschool care. But offer the service with a pitch - a bang for the buck. What are your local childcare services lacking? There are a lot of Mother's who would love to send their children to preschool but can't afford to. They want to have structured days for the children with learning activities and outdoor time. Offer this. Let them know that their children will NOT be left in front of a television all day.

Or afterschool care with homework help and tutoring. Maybe simply offer tutoring sessions in a subject you excel with. Offer instrument lessons, art lessons, craft lessons...

You don't necessarily have to have administrative, computer or sales skills to work from home. You don't need to buy into a business opportunity. Just look at what you are good at, what makes you happy and envision yourself doing that and being paid! Then creatively market your services to the local community.

It's very possible to start your own home business. I promise!

P.S. Do you have a work at home success story you are willing to share? Please email it and we will include it on our website to inspire our visitors!

WAHM TIP
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Online Business: Work Smarter, not Harder
By, Keith Bryan
Online business is probably the fastest growing market on the planet. With over 34 million web pages out there and more being created every day it seems like an almost hopeless prospect for the solo home business owner to achieve any sort of success. Think of the competition.......right? Well, almost.

For those of us that have been raised in a world where a small business owner works like a dog to keep their creation from going bankrupt it seems almost unfathomable to even think of competing with the "big" companies. If you've ever known anyone that owns a business think back to the first few years of their entrepreneurial venture. You've probably never seen anyone so tired/overworked/stressed/worried in your life. This is what most people think of when someone mentions "starting your own business".

Starting Your First Home Based Business
By, Kirk Bannerman

Over the last few years I have helped thousands of people start their own home based businesses. Many of these folks have become quite successful and others, for various reasons, have failed to
achieve success.

People starting out in their first home based business adventure almost always suffer information overload in the early stages of trying to get their business up and running. I often refer to
this as the "taking a drink from a fire hose syndrome".

For the first time home business entrepreneur there will be a great deal of "newness" to virtually all aspects of getting their business started. When you combine all of this "newness" along with the natural sense of excitement and eagerness, it is easy to understand how people can easily fall prey to the feeling of being overwhelmed and lost.

To a degree, the confusion/frustration/overload situation frequently encountered in the initial startup phase is often similar to the old saying about trying to run before learning to
walk.