Learn How To Start Making Money Online In 10 Steps

In this article I will describe the basic steps how to start your online business. First of all I would like to say that there are many ways to make money online but in order to be successful, you have to follow certain steps. So here we go.

Step 1.

In order to make money online, you have to sell or promote something. So the first thing to do is to decide what to promote or sell. Here you have two options.

a. Promote your own product

b. Promote an Affiliate product

If you don’t have your own product, you can create one, but it will take you some time and also an investment is involved to create the product. If you decide to promote an affiliate product, there is no investment involved and also you save a lot of time. After you decide what to promote, you can go to the next step.

Step 2.

If you have decided to promote your own product, you have two options.

a. Create your own website and promote the product exclusively from there

b. Open a ClickBank account and list your product there, so other internet marketers will promote it for you, and you will pay them commission for every piece sold.

If you have decided to promote an affiliate product, again you have to open a ClickBank account, but here you do not list a product but you have to choose from the market place other people’s products to sell and get commission.

Step 3.

If you are promoting your own product, start creating your website. It is better to hire a professional for this job, because you don’t want other people to think that you are not an expert. The website should look professional.

If you are promoting an affiliate product, now is the time to choose the right product that will make money for you.

Step 4.

This step may be skipped by those promoting their own products.

How to choose product to promote from ClickBank?

In order to choose the best and most profitable affiliate product for you, look for the following things:

a. Your affiliate product must be related to topic that you like or to your hobbies or passions

b. To offer high commission in matter of cash and not percentage from the price

c. To have high Gravity (gravity above 80 and bellow 200 is perfect for beginners)

d. To have high quality Sales Page

e. To have high conversion rate (anything above 2.5% is good)

f. To have support by the vendor

Step 5.

This step may be skipped by those promoting their own products.

After selecting your affiliate product, you have to generate your Hop Link from Click Bank and then purchase your first domain name. I personally recommend Go Daddy for your domain. After purchasing your domain name, set up the forwarding option so when somebody visits your domain name, will be forwarded to the sales page of the product.

Step 6.

Generate your keywords related to your product. Start with the single keywords and then go to the long tail keywords.

Example for keywords related to Money Making Products: money, money making, make money, win money, earn money, easy money, etc.

Example for long tail keywords related to Money Making Products: make money online, make money online from home, how to make money online, home based business making easy money, how to make my online business profitable, etc.

You have to make a list of at least 50 keywords related to your product. Try to find keywords that have big number of searches in the search engine, but relatively low results.

The best tool to start is Google Keyword Tool

Step 7.

Start You Promotion

Here you have many options to choose from.

No matter if you promote your own product & services or an affiliate product those methods will bring you customers.

In order to get customers, you need traffic to your website or your domain and then forwarded to the sales page.

More traffic means more money in your bank account.

There are two options.

Option 1 – pay to get traffic

Option 2 – get traffic for free

The first method will bring you traffic relatively fast, but if you are beginner there is a risk of losing money.

The second method may take some time to bring you traffic but it is free of any risk and it is also totally free of charge. You have to spend some time working however

Step 8

Free Methods of Getting Traffic

a. Article Writing – write different articles about your product and publish them to the net. The best article publishing website is Ezine Articles

b. Social Networking – create accounts in Facebook and Twitter and start making friends and then inform them about your product.

c. Video Posting – create You Tube account and upload funny videos, then include your website or domain name in the video.

d. Free Classified Ads – USFreeAds is the best to start

e. Create your own blog and invite people to visit and tell you their opinion

f. Yahoo Answers – create an account and start answering questions related to your product and send the people to your articles and from there to the product.

There are hundreds of free methods to generate traffic but those are the most popular and effective. It is better if you focus on one or two of those methods at a time and not get involved with all simultaneously.

Step 9

Paid Methods of Getting Traffic

a. Google Ad Words – open an account and start you first advertising campaign. Be very careful with the keywords you use because there is a possibility of losing money

b. Press Release – create an account with PR Web and start publishing your press release. It is an expensive and more advanced technique however the results are great.

c. Hire a professional from Elance to write articles for you and publish them to the different websites.

Step 10

Make your first Online Dollar

If you follow the previous steps one by one and be consistent with your work, definitely you will make money online

The foundation of being a successful internet marketer is the knowledge you have in order to be able to implement all those steps. If you don’t have the knowledge or someone to help you and teach you, unfortunately you may be trying to make money online for years without any success.

If you want to be couched by the best internet marketer and have 24/7 live phone support and access to more than 450 hours of DVD quality tutorials, detailed blueprints how to use the hundreds of methods to make money online and more than 75 turnkey products for you to sell, and many more…

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Internet Secrets – Making Money Online

If your business is not offering its product/service online, then you are surly living in ancient times. Companies today have realized that in order to remain competitive, they have to reach today’s’ customers who do business mainly on the internet. Running a business online means that you have an international audience. And having a worldwide audience means that your business is up and running seven days a week twenty four hours a day. While your customers in United States are sleeping, those in Japan would defiantly be awake. An online business never goes to sleep; customers are always visiting night and day. Because of this, your online company must be staffed all the time in order to keep a close eye on potential sales and new customers.

When managing an online home business, communication is vital. Using instant messaging and email as a type of communication between your staff and yourself will surely have great benefits. There are also several different types of technologies available such as the VoIP which gives you the ability to communicate with your staff and business partners from any place on the planet. But since you and your business associates live in totally different time zones it is very important to set up certain times of the day when you can talk with them concerning different issues and updates that your company faces day after day and what they should to do deal with it. You should ensure that they follow your schedule and instruction.

Meetings are also very important for online home businesses. Having Meetings will inform you of the issues effecting your staff and issues that your company might be facing. To save effort and time, an internet businesses can meet online in conference rooms. This will get rid of the need for manual preparations and physical space.

One of the biggest secrets to making money online is brand promotion! Yes, brand awareness is very important even though you’re business is on the Internet. Brand building means providing fast services, great products and great experiences to your clients. Yes, you will surly want all your clients to have a good experience. Remember, news spreads quickly online. If you have just one visitor who has had a bad experience with your business and then spreads a bad rumor, chances are your companys’ name will be destroyed.

Remember that your site is the face of your online home business and should not be a secret. Making money online would mean that your business must keep up with current technological advances. In designing your sales page always remember to keep navigation at the top of your head. Potential customers will not want to visit a hundred different web pages simply to buy one item.

Surviving online is tough, Every single day there are millions of businesses going online and even more people setting up online businesses. Ultimately, the key to being successful in any endeavor is to totally love what you do. Remember, not everybody gets to affect lives every day on a global scale. If you would like to know more on this topic check out Dotcomology [http://MakingMoneyFromHomeOnTheInternet.com] the art of making money with your home business.

Making Money Online With CPA Affiliate Marketing

It’s a fact. Many thousands of people worldwide are being laid off by their employer owing to today’s global economic crisis. From big car manufacturers to small business, everyone is feeling the pinch. However there is one industry that’s still booming and offers regular people, with no qualification necessary, the chance to make money working from their own house.

Some people, the hard working ones, are earning the same income that they did working the 9-5 work day. These people are leaving their jobs behind in droves and working from the comfort of their own home, on a full time basis.

So what’s this industry called? Can it really be so? The industry is affiliate marketing, and yes, it can really be so.

Affiliate marketing is very simple. It rewards a marketer, commonly known as an affiliate, for promoting various products on the internet. Affiliates are paid a commission by the company whose product they are promoting, every time they refer customers to the company’s website and a sale is made, or a ‘lead’ is generated.

Becoming an affiliate is now one of the most profitable ways to make money on the internet. The sheer scope and amount of products that can be promoted is staggering. Marketing using affiliates is an extremely cost effective way for big and small business alike to expose their products to a massive audience of potential buyers.

The industry has the potential to provide a limitless source of income for affiliates who aggressively promote products and offers of such businesses. Such affiliates have been reaping the rewards of larger profits as the industry grows and becomes ever popular. As an affiliate you can expect to earn from 30% right up to 90% of the price per sale from customers whom you refer. Some programs even offer recurring monthly payouts for their products!

Cost Per Action, or CPA marketing as it’s commonly known, is a marketing system whereby affiliates earn money for simply referring visitors to a web page to fill out a short form or enter their zip code, without the necessity to make a purchase. This is fast becoming the hottest trend in affiliate marketing and sees some affiliates make $1000 plus in a single day. This new way of marketing promises to be exciting and highly profitable for years to come.

As mentioned earlier, there are no specific criteria or qualification for becoming an affiliate. You need to submit your resume. You do need to be committed and put in a good effort, and will at the same time develop skills in internet marketing, research and promoting offers.

Are Work From Home Jobs Real? Making Money Online is Possible!

Are work from home jobs real? They absolutely are. There are telemarketing jobs, internet marketing jobs and data entry jobs that people can do from home. There are some “scams” out there. However, many companies do want to provide you with the opportunity to market their product online.

Are work from home jobs really providing an income to people. I can say that I definitely have made money from the internet. In fact, the blog that I set up earned me a commission within a week and that was with very little marketing knowledge. However, I did have some great marketing tools, a coach and tutorials to help me out. The reason many people don’t make money with internet marketing is because they do not put the time and effort in to make it work. Many of them buy products that are outdated and try those techniques which no longer work. For the best results, you should consider joining a forum that teaches how to make money online. That way the information and ideas being shared are current. You get the latest techniques as well as tips and tricks from seasoned marketers.

Are work from home jobs really helping people? Yes. As an online consumer, I purchase products and read reviews online. I realize that not everyone online is honest and not all information online is accurate. However, I try to inform myself before making a purchase online by reading reviews. Internet marketers do a lot of things, but the main thing that they do is help people identify products or services that could help others.

Are work from home jobs real? They are really helping some people make money online today. Many people are doing internet marketing full time. They realize the potential of creating a website and continually marketing products with the latest online techniques. A website can live online for a long time and continue to make you money for a long time. After you have created multiple webpages and articles, you will start seeing multiple streams of income. Are work from home jobs real? Without a doubt. Will a work from home job be right for you? Only if you have the motivation to produce content everyday without a boss.

Time Management Tips for Women – Making Time for Work, Family and Friends

Years ago when I worked for a technology consulting firm in the mid-80’s, I learned what would become of many hard earned lessons in time management. This was an exciting period me as well as the industry due to the lightning speed advances in technology. Our mid-sized firm was rapidly growing and I had recently taken on the role as Human Resources Director. This was a newly created role for the company and boy was I excited. However, my go-with-the-flow natural tendency would be challenged by the rigors and demands of my schedule.

I traveled extensively to top-tier universities scouting for super-smart talent, all the while, training all new hires, developing an HR system, raising two small children, and attending school at night. Yes, I was over my head. Well one day the owner sat down in my office, (as he could see my projects were piling up) and asked me to write down in 30 minutes increments what I was doing. Can you imagine that! I felt totally humiliated! That is a moment I will never forget, as then I realized I had never been taught to manage my time- effectively.

Flash forward to 2011, I’m now a work-from-home entrepreneur running an Internet Marketing firm and Style Coaching business. And things couldn’t be tougher to stay on task, and produce projects (such as this newsletter) on time.

When I see pictures of moms holding kids at a computer, I shake my head in sadness. That image has turned out more stressed out non-productive people you can imagine! There was a time I used to be one of them, but not anymore. Let me share with you the top time management tips of some of the most successful people I know.

1) Completely clear the clutter from your work space. Nothing creates more mental stress than to see piles and mounds of half completed projects. Immediately clear them away and notice the immediate peace that will overtake your spirit.

2) Work in solitude free from distractions. No TV, No music, No surfing the net, if your serious about working from home, achieving the success you desire you have to commit this no excuses. Now this was a tough one for me, because I love me some good music! Don’t get me wrong, I still crank up the music, but not while concentrating on completing a project.

3) Do not answer your phone. If your like me and have children, put the phone on silent and look at it every 15-30 minutes to see if you have missed THEIR call, no one else. Kids love to text- so use that tool to keep in touch. I’m baffled by parents who do not like to text, especially with their children. How on earth can they and you stay on task by engaging in distracting phone conversations throughout the day?

4) Choose a time of day to respond to email. We live in a society of email overload by stuff you’ve signed up to receive and loads of other mystery email that show up in your box. Whatever email account you use, most offer sophisticated tools to help sort and prioritize your emails. Don’t respond randomly throughout the day or you’ll lose precious moments staying focused and on task to complete what you really should be focused on.

5) Block out time in 30 minute increments for projects-then take a stretch. It’s important to know where your time is going and what you’re doing so you can adjust to stay on track. If your like me, your managing several blogs, writing newsletters, coaching clients, board responsibilities, all the while creating new and exciting projects. You cannot overemphasize the importance of time and energy control when you are trying to run your own business or simply be productive. You need to learn the value of time blocking, activity batching, and scripting your day. Stretching sends vital oxygen to your brain and energizes your cells. Try it, it really works!

6) Put your family and friends on notice about your schedule changes. This is a hard one for them to accept. Most people don’t believe you can make money from home, but oh are they dead wrong. By responding to their every request, you’re giving them permission to devalue what you do. What’s even worse is that you’re not getting the results your hoping for, and we all know what that leads to-frustration, fighting and non-productivity.

7) I strongly recommend going to bed early. Even “cool and hip” New York Times best-selling author and celebrity Neil Strauss admitted that an early morning schedule allowed him to get more done. You’ll find that you’ll get “2 hours of afternoon work” done in 30 minutes of morning productivity. Again, I was sure success hinged on the idea of working myself to a pulp. Yep, that’s about what you will become. Pulp!

It is well to be up before daybreak, for such habits contribute to health, wealth, and wisdom. ~Aristotle

If working from home to you means relaxing with a laptop and coffee in hand at your local Starbucks or mentally fussing about things that need to get done at home, your aren’t going to create the life you’re hoping for. I’m sorry to tell that’s just not going to happen.

Here’s how to get MORE done. PERIOD.

You need to get serious about simple planning and a time management checklist.

The very last thing you should do each workday is to prepare a schedule/checklist for the next day’s work. Develop a template based on your current projects and literally block time for each task.

In order to “create” this schedule, you’ll need to use a journal to record how you are spending your time right now. Recall my opening story of having to “track my time?” Carry a notebook with you for a couple of days and write down exactly what you are doing every 15 minutes. Do this all day for three straight workdays. You will then identify the things that cause you to waste time, and you can work on eliminating those.

You may notice patterns of falling into the trap of checking emails that then taken you to far away places, like sports sites, fashion newsletters, twitter, etc. You see where this is going and so is your time. See that’s why having your schedule is so important. It will bring you right back to where you need to be.

Lastly identify the time of day when your most productive. What I’ve found is this may interfere with another family task. This is where family and friend support is so important to fill in those spaces of time so you can stat on task. Otherwise, you may find success eludes you for a long time, until you apply these time tested principles.

Top 5 Online Money Making Ideas

In today’s tough times, most are hard-pressed in making ends meet even if they’re currently employed with regular source of income. For some, a job is no longer an option and would rather venture into other money making ideas that can potentially replace their job income.

This article outlines the top 5 online money making ideas a lot of creative people use to earn extra (or full time) income that makes end meet or to actually put food on the table.

The internet has not only changed how we communicate and research for information but offered a lot of income opportunities to ones who are willing to grab it.

  1. Freelancing – One of the most common ways to make money aside from having a traditional job is to offer your services as a freelancer. If you’re an artist, you can position yourself as an artist for hire. Building an online portfolio is extremely pivotal to being an artist for hire. An illustrator needs to be able to show potential clients what they can offer them if they take them on as a client. Independent authors and web publishers are constantly looking for people to design book covers, websites, and logos for them. This is a great income source for someone who enjoys doing graphic design. My friend, does this quite successfully and by having his own website that attract organic traffic, he sets himself up above the many other freelance graphic artists around.Another popular way of making money as a freelancer is to become a freelance writer or editor. Self-publishing books has exploded in recent years. There are a lot of independent authors looking for editors who would like to have their work edited for a more affordable price than the norm in the publishing world. You can editing jobs or be a ghost writer to help the author craft the whole book if you know what you’re doing.

On the lower end of this scale, you can accept article writing gigs and help online publishers like niche website owners and bloggers continuously feed their sites with fresh quality content. The key here is quality content, to build ongoing relationships with your clients and build your reputation.

Freelance writing is a great money making idea because you can completely control how much work you take on. if you’re just getting started, websites like Odesk.com and Elance.com are great places to land your initial gigs. Pricing your service competitively will help you attract clients and build your reputation on these freelance job boards but if you’re considering to go this route on a long term basis, I suggest that you build your own website to build your reputation, attract more clients, and turn this into a real business that can potentially replace your day job.

There are a lot of services that you can offer as an online freelancer. If you’re a developer or a programmer, you’ll definitely make more money online by offering software development services.

  1. Become An Online Retailer – Ever bought something off Amazon and eBay? Most of these sellers are people just like you and me operating their own bookstores, gadget shops or computer retail stores off their homes. There are two ways you can start selling stuff as an online retailer.One is by buying stocks and keeping inventories to ship yourself or to become a dropshipper where you partner with a dropshipping supplier that will ship your inventories to your buyers from their warehouses. Option two takes a lot of work but it can be tricky when it comes to pricing, delivery and item quality as you don’t really get to see (or touch) your products before they are shipped to your customers.

The best way to get started with this money making idea is to start selling junk you can find inside your home (ladies, I’m not referring to your husbands!). The average person has a lot of things in their home that they never use. Items like old jewelry, unwatched DVDs and unused craft items are perfect. You can also buy things that are on bargain bins and sell them online for regular prices or get stuff from your local thrift stores or library sales.

The key is on being able to check the current prices of the items you’re looking to resell before you buy them to make sure you’re actually going to make a profit. This is where your smart phone will come handy, all you have to do is download price scanning/comparison apps like FOB Scan.

  1. Sell Fiverr Gigs – Yes, Fiverr gigs! It may not seem like much but Fiverr gigs are no longer limited to $5 per pop. You can offer your initial service or product on the standard $5 pricing but you can offer upgrades from $20 to $50 per pop. Some of the gigs you can offer are voice overs, small graphic jobs, short videos, SEO pushes, and other small and fast jobs that you can do for a few minutes of your time.
  1. Open Up A YouTube Channel – As mentioned in my previous article, YouTube users watch over 4 billion hours of video a month so there are always people willing to watch your videos. A person who plans to make money off of YouTube needs to decide on a niche or what they want to talk about in their videos. Do they want to teach a tutorial or give a commentary? If someone owns all of their material legally, than they’re eligible for the partner program.

With original ideas and constant promotions, an internet entrepreneur can set up shop on YouTube in a matter of minutes. Although it might take a lot of work, the payment after a while can be pretty big but just like any other content marketing businesses, 10 YouTube videos won’t make you a happy camper. It’s always a numbers game, think of it as having your own TV show where you’re the host, producer and channel owner. You can read this article for more on how to make money with YouTube.

  1. Create And Sell Your Own Products – A lot of online marketers found that they can make money faster with creating their own products than creating blogs or niche websites. This of course if beyond the realities of most beginning online marketers but if you have some time to spare, product creation isn’t really that difficult as you may think. Creating an infoproduct (eBook or membership site) on a subject that you know and love will reward you hundred times over. Come to think of it, if you have a product of your own, a lot of other affiliate marketers are willing to sell your products on their websites and email lists for a commission helping you reach a very wide audience that’s impossible for you to reach on your own.

There are a whole lot more money making ideas people use to make money online but these by far are the top ideas that you can put to work for you right away, specially the top 3. Building and publishing your own blog or website is the best way to build a business system that will build an awesome source of passive income in the near future but the top 3 ideas listed above will help you make money right away.

Offering freelance services on established freelance job boards helps you piggy back on their traffic being that they’re the “go to” places for people who are looking to outsource stuff they don’t like to do themselves.

Retailing on Amazon or eBay can also attract sales faster than if you’re going to build your own online store as they already have the traffic of shoppers whose mindset is to scout for products they want to buy online. It’s free to list products on Amazon and you only get charged when you actually sell something while eBay will charge you a few dime when you list a product for sale.

Fiverr on the other hand is the world’s “go to” place for small jobs people want outsourced. It may not be as promising as the first two money making ideas listed herein but they do pay for each gig you deliver.

Starting a Homemade Pasta Making Business

Starting a Homemade Pasta Making Business

The first thing that you should know if you are starting a homemade pasta making business is the basic process of making fresh pasta. This kind of pasta is made from fresh ingredients and has a shorter shelf life compared to the commercially made or dry pasta.

Manufacturing fresh pasta is better because the business owner can tailor fit it to the consumer’s needs and demands in terms of the shape, size, color and flavor of the finished product.

Below are some suggested steps in starting a homemade pasta making business, categorized into: Initial Stage, Regulatory Compliance and Marketing.

Initial Stage

• Create and perfect your own recipe that you think will sell and will come out the same way every time you prepare it. Have your family and friends taste them and ask for feedback.

• As in any business, when you are starting a homemade pasta making business, prepare a business plan which would contain the goals and business projections that you have set. This will guide you in the actual running of the business and to help you gauge if the business is doing good or not.

• Purchase your ingredients and supplies like bags and packaging supplies. Decide on how you intend to package your homemade pasta. You could pack it in a freezer-safe bag where the consumers can freeze it, refrigerate it or eat it immediately. It could also come in cellophane bags. You could search online for bulk suppliers for these items. You will be able to save money and will help create a professional and consistent look. Design your own labels on your computer and print them out or you could ask a professional designer to create them for you and order your labels in bulk. Make sure to include the cooking and serving instructions in the labels.

• Purchase equipments that you don’t already have to make the preparation of large batches of your recipes a lot faster and easier.

• Determine a wholesale price list for all your products. Factor in all the cost that you will be incurring in producing you homemade pasta like the ingredients, facility cost, packaging and labor cost. This should be drawn up in a spreadsheet form which would include the retail as well as bulk prices for each of your product. This information will be useful to your future retailers because it will show the proof of the profit they will be making if they sell your homemade pasta in their stores.

Regulatory Compliance

• Since you will be starting a homemade pasta making business and producing a food product, you need to get in touch with your local and state health departments to inquire about permit and licensing requirements.

• Make sure that you could sell the products that are produced from your home kitchen because different states have different laws regarding homemade food products. These information are available online from your state’s Department of Health website or you can ask for a copy. Try to check on local zoning laws if operating a business from your home is allowed. As of 2010, only 13 states allow the operation of home-based cooking business and they are: Alabama, Iowa, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia and Utah. So it is important that you check into these before starting your business.

• Most states allow the sale of homemade food products at farmers’ markets and flea markets without the necessary state licensing and inspection. They allow the sale of these products at these places only. Before starting a homemade pasta making business and deciding to sell your products in these venues, make sure that your state does not have any label requirements, like this label for example, “Made in a home kitchen and not inspected by the (insert state) Department of Agriculture.” The label should indicate the product name and the ingredients that you used and check the cottage laws of your state about the requirements of home labeling.

• Most of the home based cooking operations are either sole proprietorship or partnerships. If you plan to make your business as a source of livelihood, a DBA (Doing Business As) license would be the best route if you will name your business. As of 2011, the registration fee is between $25 and $35. The DBA registration is not required though if your business name contains your legal name. Your state may also have other food processing licensing regulations which are peculiar to your homemade pasta making business.

Marketing

• Your main competitor in the homemade pasta business is the commercial pasta. Therefore, it is not a good idea to compete with these manufacturers in the supermarkets and groceries because this is not the right avenue to sell your products. You must do the traditional and tried and tested marketing strategies to attract your customers like posters and handing out flyers. Make your business be known in your community by giving out samples of pasta dishes with your fresh pasta or give them for free at community gatherings or meetings. It is also good to custom-made your fresh pasta during these events in order to cater to the individual needs of the customers. If you are into making healthy pasta, you can try selling your products at your local health stores.

• Other possible places to sell your products are the local farmers’ markets, craft fairs and flea markets. A lot of people like the taste of homemade goods like fresh pasta but just doesn’t have the time to prepare them themselves. You can give them that homemade taste that they are looking for. During holidays and special occasions, many people love give local and homemade food products as gifts.

• You can also market your food products by creating your own brochures, catalogs and price lists and offering your products at retail outlets that sell local products. Draw up a list of your target retailers in your community with the name and contact information of the person who is in charge of purchasing.

• Try to ask if your local Italian restaurants purchase pre-made pastas because this could be a possible joint venture between your business and their restaurants.

• The internet is also a good venue to feature your products on a national scale. If possible, you could build your own website to help your business grow.

Hope these steps will help you in starting a homemade pasta making business.

Making Way for Community Entrepreneurs

Community entrepreneurs are typically groups or organisations that seek out and act upon opportunities to transform communities and create a positive impact on community values.

Why this is different to social entrepreneurship is that many social entrepreneurship models focus on individuals and disadvantage.

Community entrepreneurship focuses on the community as a whole and creates a sense of abundance for all.

Examples of activities can include:

• A new indoor-outdoor community facility in a built up neighbourhood

• A community focus on activities that reduce the carbon footprint

• Business attraction in rural communities

• Making strategic use of IT to connect communities

• Creating community identities through music and the arts

What does a Community Entrepreneur look like?

They’re in your community. They have a story to tell – a story that has transformed your community. Or they probably haven’t stepped forward to make their mark yet? Maybe it’s you. Here are some ways to spot your local community entrepreneur or even one in the making.

The anatomy of a Community Entrepreneur

1. Laser sharp vision

Community entrepreneurs have a clear idea of what they want to achieve – both physically and in terms of impact on the community. Their vision is ambitious and ground breaking by anybody’s standard. Their challenge is not just to get the interest and support of the community, but to keep the community patient as all good things take time to build.

2. Mind over matter

Bringing a new idea to fruition requires strategic thinking. People can be suspicious of anything new. New ideas challenge those who are slower to accept change. From the start community entrepreneurs think and plan above the fray.

Conserving energy to focus on achieving results, community entrepreneurs focus on big picture thinking. Don’t try to bog them down, they will find a way to move ahead no matter what the obstacle.

3. The language of change

To be effective, they must be able to understand and communicate well to influence change. These groups operate within the community so the change they are influencing impacts on them as well. They are already talking the language of the community.

Their role is to motivate and lead through dialogue within the community and get the support of stakeholders and other agents of change to achieve the desired results. Failure is not in their vocabulary.

4. Shouldering responsibility

Leadership is a responsibility not to be taken lightly. Along the way others may want more control or will fade into the background when things are not going to plan. Individual personalities can make or break a community venture. At some point the group leading the project must step forward and own its responsibility, especially when it comes to finances, resources and process.

5. Maintaining a steady balance

They leave the knee jerk reactions to others. Negotiations require a steady nerve as they walk the tightrope of change. Navigating obstacles, ducking the slings and arrows of opposition, community entrepreneurs harness their vision and start with a goal and use a plan to get there.

6. Forward momentum

Community entrepreneurs are going places. No looking backwards for them. Propelled by positive energy that permeates throughout the community, they will succeed.

The only thing holding you back is your own self-doubt. Group think can get bogged down in dogma. Smash the chains once and for all and bring the dream to life.

Is your group the next generation community entrepreneur? Congratulations. There’s no better time to start than now. Don’t let self-doubt win before you begin.

How to Be a Successful Entrepreneur – Making Decisions, Part 4 of 6

Placed Successfully!

Congratulations! You are really doing well with your deep dive into planning, making conscious choices, sorting through a number of decisions, and crafting your strategy for starting a business. It might feel a little overwhelming – or maybe it feels a bit tedious and slow – but hopefully it is bringing you clarity and narrowing your focus! What you are doing now is ensuring your success and the ability to sustain your venture. You’re not leaping without thinking. Being actively engaged in creating a process is a lot of work and it will really help keep you moving in a common sense, organized fashion!

One of the things to consider is where do you want to do business. What are some of your options?

WHERE, personally, would you like to do business?

  • from your home with unrestricted hours (to meet a variety of time zones or because your life and work are intertwined by choice)
  • from your home, knowing that you are a part-time resident of several locations rather than of one year-round residence
  • from your home with standard business hours
  • from an office but with trips to clients, for instance, as a consultant or insurance broker or financial adviser
  • from a retail environment – your store or restaurant, for example)
  • from out in the field (think about drilling wells or training horses)
  • from a warehouse or manufacturing environment

WHERE would you like to your customers to be?

  • in cyberspace, shopping online from you
  • In your local market only (ie, someone who comes directly to your store for purchases)
  • In regional markets
  • In domestic only markets
  • In a combination of domestic and international markets
  • Only in one foreign country – or anywhere overseas

WHERE would you like your customers to work?

  • Are you selling directly to individual consumers (B2C)
  • Are you selling only to other businesses (B2B)
  • Are you selling to companies in a certain revenue category – only Fortune 500 companies, for example
  • Are you selling only to non-profits
  • Are you selling only to schools or to government entities or to religious organizations

WHERE can you access things important to small business start-ups – and what things are important to new business?

  • How many patents are issued per 10,000 people (the national average is 1.8)
  • What is the cost of living and can you find access to affordable and/or flexible lease space (the Council for Community and Economic Research calculates cost of living indexes specifically for the self-employed)
  • Can you find creative talent and/or a skilled work-force (what is the density of universities and/or tech schools and community colleges with job-training programs)
  • Is there a density of small businesses and/or incubators with a track record of creating start-ups
  • Is there access to private seed capital and/or a track record of such monies being available to start-ups
  • Is there a state income tax
  • What is the franchise tax cap
  • What are the local zoning laws (including parking regulations) and do they allow for or promote co-working space
  • Are there regular gatherings or networking events for start-up minded folks?
  • Are there financial incentives and are there mentoring opportunities, some of which are often provided by business incubators or business accelerator programs
  • Is there access to low-interest business loans
  • Is there access to government contracts
  • What is the corporate tax rate
  • Are there tax credits available promoting certain industries or certain geographic locations

The fact is new businesses start everyday and they start even in places that can’t claim to have everything on the list above. If you are willing to move and interested in moving, you might increase your odds of success by making a decision to move to a location that meets the majority of the considerations listed above. I happen to be quite fond of Beaufort and believe there are many attributes here that will contribute to your success, not the least of which is quality of place. My personal bias says that living in Beaufort, SC – a community where people you don’t know wave when they drive by or say hello when they walk by, with people who slow down to let you walk your dog across the street or who stop to chat in the grocery line even if it slows things down, a place that celebrates our Gullah influences, our French beginnings, our military presence and sacrifice, and a place that provides beautiful flowers and bench swings so that living here is calming and visually pleasant – means living in a place where you are reminded that being an entrepreneur is just one component of your life, a life that is interconnected with family, friends, and community. And besides, the more of us who commit to being part of job creation and the entrepreneurial scene here in Beaufort, the more vibrant our town will become!

DO’s

  • DO keep constantly in mind that planning to start a business is a process that requires you to lay a foundation. Keep deliberately slogging through this decision making process in order to create a business that meets your needs and lifestyle
  • DO consider your flexibility, or lack of it, in considering where you want to live when you start your business and as you grow your business. If you start a business with a physical location you have committed yourself to staying put. That is neither negative nor positive – just make sure you have decided in advance you are content with that outcome.
  • DO consider whether traveling is something you want or can accommodate. A good friend recently advised me he logged over 200,000 flying miles last year – and he has twin 9-yr-olds at home. He loves his work and is very successful – and he loves his family. But it takes a lot of energy to travel that much and there are very real sacrifices made by all because of the type of business he does. I also know of people who limit their travel by limiting the frequency and destination of their trips. But they go on buying trips to places they would have traveled even wthout a business. Having a business purpose to visit their favorite places is a real bonus for them on a number of levels!

DON’Ts

  • Don’t choose a new location for starting a business based on the false pretense that the grass is always greener somewhere else. If moving makes sense after doing your research and laying your foundation, then go. But don’t go TO somewhere new just to get away FROM your current dissatisfaction. Problems have a bad habit of traveling with you so it’s best to fix things right here first.
  • Don’t minimize the impact of a move on your family members. If you aren’t single, consider the issue of ‘the trailing spouse’ – will there be things your ‘significant other’ can do for work and recreation that they will enjoy enough to make the move satisfactory to both of you? These days we often spread out pretty far geographically but it does create considerations when there is a need to be close to aging parents or a desire to be close to young grandchildren. Don’t forget to consider the whole big picture when deciding on the best location for your new business and it’s success.

ACTION ITEMS:

  1. Sit down and review this article. Write down where you want to work from ideally, where you anticipate your customers will come from, where you anticipate the bulk of your sales to come from, and where there are resources that your business will need for its success.
  2. Think about where you spend the majority of your time now and where you’d like to spend your time – in one place year-round, in one location for the summer and a different one for the winter, not currently tied anywhere and interested in visiting or living briefly in as many places as possible? Also think about where your family members are now and determine if their circumstances will affect yours in the next 1-2 years and the next 5-10 years, and think about how this might affect your choice of where (and how) you want your business to operate. Depending on the type of business you choose and its success, you may create greater freedom through increased flexibility and finances. If these are your goals be sure you are clear on the outcome you want and in understanding if the business you propose to start will indeed land you this outcome.

Effective Lesson Plan Making Strategies

Planning is an integral part of any activity that you do as it is the only thing that can ensure the smooth completion of your activity. An effective plan can let you work in a proper way and also lets you analyze your path, your growth and your progress towards your aim. The same principles are applicable to the field of education. This makes Lesson Plans an essential part of the teaching and learning process. A lesson plan is a blueprint for a teacher on his/her course of teaching or conducting a class. While this takes care of the different styles in which a subject can be taught to the students, it also takes care of the various understanding levels different children may have.

An effective lesson plan helps you in finding the right way to guide the students. A teacher gets to know how to handle a topic in an effective manner and how to go about it so that the concept or the learning outcome is absolutely clear to the students. While the plan lets you to strategize your teaching course it also helps you in effectively managing assessment.

An effective Lesson Plan should broadly be based on the following elements:

• Direct Instructions: this is where a teacher makes a formal introduction to the topic that has to be taught. Reading and explanation can be included under this.

• Guided Discovery: Also known as ‘learning by doing’, this should include activities where students gather information about the topic and learn by way of researching or doing. A plan should include the kind of activities that can be conducted for this purpose.

• Assessment & Review: this should include the way in which the teacher plans to assess the understanding of the students and the way actionable feedback can be given in a well-structured format.

Steps in making an effective Lesson Plan:

• Share clear learning outcomes – the principles or concepts you expect children to learn and understand by the end of the class

• Make a strategy to have an instruction process that ensures that the whole idea is made clear to the students.

• Find out different methods that can be used by students to investigate the topic and research it which in turn will facilitate learning.

• Chalk out activities that would make students learn in groups and develop learning partnerships.

• Develop and design activities that generate interest in the subject and make students learn through discussions, reflection and investigation.

• Find and develop activities that will help in assessment of students’ learning

•Find out ways to recognize and review understanding and grasp of core concepts.

A major challenge here is to have a right plan in place and most teachers struggle in making a perfect plan without wasting much of their time that is needed in teaching. Here educational experts can help out. They have the professional skills and the qualifications to chalk out the best plans and help teachers manage their time effectively. Since they are experts in subject matter as well as educational planning they know how best to strategize and plan to get the desired results. One can go for some well known Educational Service Provider for getting a good lesson plan prepared for effective teaching delivery.

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