The following article is one of a series of articles which focus on Affiliate, Article and Internet Marketing. All of the articles are based on real experiences and research done over twenty years as a personal and business coach. They are also written in response to questions which I have been asked as well as address common challenges that people have with affiliate marketing, article marketing, internet marketing or running an online business in general. I sincerely hope that you find the following information of value. One idea, one tip, one clue can make all the difference.

There have always been opportunities to work at home and run a home business. Sadly, there have also been scams set up to take people’s hard earned money. There are, however, plenty of real and legitimate opportunities for those with the desire to run a home business and earn additional income working from home.

With a ‘bricks and mortar’ home business, one significant problem can be raising working capital if we can’t fund it ourselves. This may be for premises, equipment, inventory, advertising, marketing and other start-up costs.

Without these necessary basics, I think it would extremely difficult if not impossible to succeed. However, over the past few years, the internet has helped to overcome almost all of these issues and has opened its doors to literally millions of budding entrepreneurs who wish to make a success of running a home business.

Why Is The Internet Great For Starting A Home Business?

The Internet is the ideal vehicle for starting a home business because it provides the opportunity for us to get started in a real business from home with very little start-up costs. Not only does this put the opportunity in front of a lot more people, part time or full time, it has made it possible for a home business to compete on a world wide scale with much larger enterprises.

With nothing much more than a website with a targeted product and / or service to sell, someone can be at home running their business which can be visible to the world wide web. If the website is professionally designed and hosted, it can even create the impression that the enterprise is a lot larger than it actually is.

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Internet Marketing and running an online home business isn’t as easy as many would have us believe. This article shows that running a home business on the internet is certainly a lot more easy, especially at start-up, than many ‘bricks and mortar’ home businesses. However, you are here, right now, because you have a desire to start a home business, improve your business, and be more successful. If your desire is strong, may I recommend that you read some of the other internet marketing and home business articles that are here with the sole intention of helping you to make the whole process a lot easier.

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Let’s look at why the Internet has become so popular, and why so many people have embraced it
for starting a home business.

Home business entrepreneurs do not have many overheads. The Internet home business does not have the expenses often associated with a traditional brick and mortar business.

Typically, most people who have the desire to start an Internet home business already have a computer and have access to the Internet. So, they already own two of the most important assets. The third one, of course, being themselves.

When I look back a few years and recall that it was not that easy and not cheap to design and host a website, ease of use and affordability of a website is certainly the order of the day now. For all of us, this is the benefit of competition online. A website domain can be registered and hosted for a few dollars a month. Moreover, many hosting companies also provide website development software.

Alternatively, there is a continuing growth in the development of ‘ready-made’ websites and hosting packages. They are worth checking out but it is going to depend on the longer term plans you have for your online home business what is going to be the right choice for you.

As always, do your research, search online and do cost / benefit checks before making your final decisions.

Actual physical storage space and Inventory is usually not needed. If your desire is to run a retail home business, it is usually not necessary to invest at start-up. ‘Drop shipping’ is very common among online retail businesses. This basically means that you, the seller, wouldn’t need to have actual inventory or have to worry about stock control. The products you would promote would not be ordered until one of your customers has bought the product and then it would be shipped directly to the customer by the distributor – a seamless process allowing you to concentrate on developing your online retail business with few of the headaches associated with retail.

Methods of advertising and marketing are also plentiful. Depending on start-up budget, you can choose from a number of free resources (some being better than others) to paid advertising such as pay per click, pay per lead, pay per sale.

Again, I cannot stress enough, do your research. Take the time to read up on both the free and paid methods of advertising. There is a wealth of articles here as well as detailed explanations and instructions provided by the major search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN.

If you decide to use pay per click which is certainly one of the most powerful methods of getting traffic to your site, learn first. There is no excuse not to find out how it works and how to use it effectively. Yes it is powerful but people have spent large amounts of their advertising budget with little return for their investment. Don’t make this mistake, learn first.

There are many good opportunities to make money online with a variety of businesses and those who are focusing on tight niche markets are making a very healthy income for their endeavors. Research and evaluate the business idea or opportunity that interests you before jumping in head first. Once you find the right opportunity, appreciate that it will take time and hard work. If you do, you will be well on your way to running you own successful home business.

Andrew provides a focused problem solving approach and his overriding goal is to provide you with the right solutions to meet your needs. Andrew’s website is content rich with value-added information, articles and resources.

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