Motivations.
What are you motivations to launch a home based business? You should sincerely ask yourself if you can make the long-term and thankless commitment to building your presence on the global internet. There are no shortcuts to your ultimate goal of being “found” by your desired customers, readers or viewers. I hope that part of your motivation is a passion for the product or service you are soon to provide to a mass audience. Having a passive interest or knowledge of the product or service you have decided to market is a sure fire recipe for failure.
If you are not motivated to succeed as a business person and treat your internet endeavors as real business activity then you will be unable to accept the small and large failures along the path to success, and there will be many failures along your learning curve to profitable decision making.
A key to determining your motivation is to review your past entrepreneurial projects; did you have enough patience to mature through your miscalculations that led to failure or dissolution of your project? Did you have a learning experience and not make the same mistake twice? Another point to consider is if you sought help and consultation from another successful entrepreneur or entrepreneur group dedicated to your chosen business niche. You can find such support groups at your local chamber of commerce.
If you join a local chapter of SCORE—which most Chambers have as a free outreach program, you can connect with former CEOs and business executives that can give you deep knowledge on how to successfully launch your own business and protect you from the most common pitfalls.
Having enough motivation will enable you to connect with more successful business persons in your own niche, and they should not be viewed as competitors. I have found that my competitors more often then anticipated were my greatest allies for success. Because when I am successful our entire niche is successful and the internet will not be cluttered with yet another useless website with no substantial content and thus weakening the value of other successful websites in my own niche. For example if you are an affiliate marketer and you have a new website selling replica high-end watches and jewelry.
You must study the sites that are located on the first 2 pages of your search results for the search term “replica watches”. How many unique pages do these sites have? How many one way back links do they have, how many visitors and followers do they have? Are they socially bookmarked in client made fan-pages in MySpace , Facebook and Twitter? Do they have a blog connected with their website? Are you motivated to also create a separate blog for your affiliate website, or even a unique podcast that you will update weekly? Are you willing to contact the CEO of the website for advice—and sometimes they are willing to help you IF..IF you are willing to do something beneficial for them, perhaps, create a link to their site and also promote some of their non-competitive products that you don’t offer.
You see, there are many ways to grow your motivation support group. Your family and friends are the primary source of motivational support. However, the secondary level of motivational support will come from your peers in the same industry, they are not necessarily competitors. Many of my clients have been underemployed for many months, some even a year or more working only a part-time job or no job at all. I have countless stories of stay-at-home dads, and where the wife is bringing in the income and in the greatest paradox, these once career men desire to remain at home with the kids and dog and start their own businesses. They have the motivation but the need to recognize it and focus and connect this contagious motivation with like minded entrepreneurs.
Such is the state of jobs in Ohio, and I can write volumes of books on the theme of employment in Ohio . The uncertainty of new high paying jobs in Ohio for college graduates and experienced professionals has instilled a survivalist mentality in many Ohio job seekers. The idea that one job is never enough, or secure enough for any long-term future has permeated the state such that more educated people in-the-know are motivated to opt for second careers, what are called “micro-careers”. These micro-careers are derivatives of their actual main job. Since there are no longer now hiring sings in every business window as was the case in 2005 when Ohio experienced a job growth boom, many Ohio job seekers are motivated enough to add more work hours to their demanding work week by working at home; either as some form of internet marketer, or free-lance consultant.
An internet business has been the most popular micro-career to grow simply because there is usually a lack of “conflict of interest” that would be found if you were consulting in the same field you maintained your current job. For example , you would have a conflict of interest if you were a corporate employed civil engineer and you decided to launch an engineering consultancy on the side that offered lower rates than your present employer when biding on public projects—sure there is a conflict of interest and your employer may sue or terminate your employment. Whereas if you had an online site selling engineering manuals, books and software you might fare much better legally and financially since you are selling globally and not consulting locally.
Let’s talk about money motivations. If you are motivated to make a quick fortune your first year you might be on the path for failure. My personal example, I only made a few hundred dollars the first six moths after I had tweaked my advertising campaign for my first affiliate site. Then a year later I was making $1200 a month off the site which to me was a fortune, considering that I already had 4 other sites only making a few hundred bucks a month. Your reality is until you have mastered marketing for your niche product or service you will not make any significant money for up to a year. There are some successful marketers I know that within two months are making hundred of dollars a day from just one website. There isn’t a cookie-cutter formula for advertising success and driving willing to buy website visitors to your website or blog.
We will talk about marketing in my future articles. Today , I want to focus on your motivations, and one aspect is your expectation for quick profits which has motivated you to enter the internet realm must be put in-check. I want you to be motivated to make a better website than your competitors, provide better content, a better sales pitch and price closing offer than your competitors, and I want you to connect with ready buyers more effectively than your competitors. If you can do these things repeatedly, especially the creation of better website content you have won half the battle. Lower your expectations BUT do not lower your motivation to learn, improve and eventually make money.
Do not quit your day job once you get your first wave of sales or big commission check. My first Google Adsense check paid off my rent, after that I was so thoroughly convinced that the next month’s check would be three times as much simply because my website made it to the second page in 2 different the search engine results for my chosen key words, so I went out and bought new clothes, CD’s with half of next months rent money and a wide screen television and a Bose theater surround-sound system on Lay-away. ..boy was I wrong ,the very next Google check was enough for just a six pack of beer and a Dominos pizza ( actually I got two pizzas for the price of one).
Huh?!? Lesson here my friends; don’t quit your day job, lower your expectations of instant wealth and stay motivated on creating a content rich site that is updated often and presents a better offer than your competitors. In my next article I am going to talk about creating content; from what you know and from what you research. All the search engines are addicted to fresh and relevant content. Your blog or affiliate websites will survive on fresh content, quality one-way backlinks and visitors who return to your site to be informed or make a purchase. Please stay motivated and keep your expectations in-check, and eventually you will achieve the marketing and business decision skills to be a full time internet entrepreneur. Be Motivated to learn and then your correctly place motivation will allow you to EARN.
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