
Not every business has a physical brick and mortar store location. Not every business owner has an office. In today’s business world, many home-based businesses exist – and flourish! In some cases, working from home is a much more lucrative choice than opening up an office location. Firstly, you avoid having to pay a second rent for the work space. Secondly, you save tons of time and money on commuting. For many, working from home is the perfect work situation.
It’s important to point out, however, that working from home can have its downfalls. Many home-based entrepreneurs find it to be lonely. A type of cabin fever sets in and a preference for getting out of the house grows greater. This doesn’t make working from home a bad idea. It just means that a few steps need to be taken to ensure that it’s both an enjoyable and profitable experience.
Become a single-product expert.
Most people who work from home do so because they’re experts in particular fields that enable them to run their own businesses. They’re not worried about competing with other small businesses or even large corporations because they have loyal customer bases made up of people they’ve been given the opportunity to get to know personally. For home-based business owners, long-term success often depends on how you show your dominance in your particular field.
“Focus on a single product or service, and then market it, sell it, promote it-do everything you can to increase sales of that one product or service,” advises Rosalind Resnick on Entrepreneur.com, “While it\’s tempting to swing for the fences and try to be all things to all people, it\’s often less risky and more profitable to pick a product or two that you can execute really well and just try to get on base.”
Push your online store.
As mentioned, a brick and mortar store isn’t necessary for all businesses. But it would be hard to argue that a strong online presence isn’t necessary either. No matter your business, a good-looking, easy-to-navigate website is a must. But, for home-based businesses that sell products, it’s essential to have an online store. That way, you’re able to sell your products directly to your online visitors, no matter the time or where they’re located.
“Gone are the days when you needed a storefront to sell products,” affirms George Meszaros on SuccessHarbor.com, “A website lets you sell to anyone, anywhere. Websites these days are cheap to maintain, on the order of $30-$50 per month. They’re easy, too: the internet is full of do-it-yourself websites that don’t require programming knowledge to build. If you want a website that is really special, you might want to consider hiring a professional web designer.”
Accept payments with Converge.
Let’s say you’re a single-product expert who successfully sells his/her goods online. It doesn’t mean you can’t have customers visit you in person. And if/when they do, it’d be wise to have a payment processing solution that allows you to accept their payments directly. Converge – formerly known as VirtualMerchant – can do that for you!
Converge turns any web-enabled PC into a cost-effective payment terminal. With your home computer, you can take payments, quickly and securely, anywhere, any time and without a major investment of money or effort. For more information about Converge, call Canadian POS at 1-877-748-2884 or email us at info@localhost. Be sure to ask us about our e-commerce solution as well!