Internet Business Or Continue Your Day Job?

I have always had an itch to start my own business but I’ve always held a 9-5 and did my very best at them. After during a five year miltary career I decided to get serious about school and attend community college. I did the best I could in community college while working a 9-5 and supporting myself. Although I enjoyed my 20's I was begining to realize time was passing me by and I wasn’t as wealthy as I'd like to be. Even more so, I noticed that the business structure at most jobs I held didn’t lend to making me rich (why would they I was making them rich(er).

Last year I purchased a Real-Estate course online, studied it night and day, took out equity in our town home, and purchased a house that fit the criteria outlined in the Real-Estate course, fixed the property and sold it for a profit. Whew, that was a mouth full. While doing the aforementioned I held a 9-5, took online courses to get my Bachelors in eCommerce, and did most of the work on the house myself. I worked my 9-5 Monday - Friday, was at the investment property from 5am - 12pm Saturday and Sunday (so I could spend time with my family the rest of the day). It took me 4 weeks to finish work on the property. After closing on the house and receiving the check everyone seemed to be happy but me. I didn’t feel satisfied. Although I made a nice profit I felt like I had worked too damn hard for it. With house flipping there is a lot of competition so you spend a bunch of time:

1. Finding a property. If you don't have a qualified Real-Estate agent this step will be long.
2. Time ensuring it meets your criteria (Comparative Market Analysis, etc).
3. Time quantifying costs to fix it up.
4. Finding qualified contractors for work you can't or won't do.
5. Finding the best price possible for work and supplies.
6. Doing the work or ensuring Contractors are doing the work right.
7. Cleaning the house to prepare it to be shown for sale.
8. Keeping the property up while its on the market.

After refurbishing the property I didn't want to see it again. Lucky for me I had an awesome agent who let me know although I had just done a ton of work there were little things that could be changed to give the house more appeal. The house sold in two weeks. The neighbors couldn't believe how the place looked after it was finished and really couldn't believe it had sold so fast. My wife was very skeptical at first but couldn't believe how it looked either. Shortly after, I tried to obtain another property but by the time I got to any of the properties someone had an offer on it. It seemed that the competition had gotten more fierce. This, combined with the fact that I was less driven than before made me take a step back to evaluate how I could streamline the process. With my limited resources, Real-Estate wasn’t the right business for me at that time but I will revisit it in the future with a network of qualified partners. Plus, Real-Estate isn't really an "At Home Business". If your considering Real-Estate investment please learn from what I have just mentioned.

After completing my B.S. in eCommerce I conveyed to my wife how nervous I was about putting my new talent to work. The first thing I did was a SWOT analysis. Then I jumped on the Internet and researched how people were making loads of cash via the Internet. I knew a little about PPC, PPL, PPS but didn’t know how to find the companies that paid per lead, click and sale. I ended up falling prey to some excellent Adcopy by some of the industries best Affiliate eBook gurus (prey may be the wrong word but that’s what I felt like). After learning a bunch about Google Adwords, spending $500 on PPC advertising and not making a dime I decided to take a step back and continue my research. Although I had an awesome work ethic my work at home mentality was infected by the “get rich quick” virus. For the record by no means were the Adwords courses I purchased scams. It was almost like I scammed myself, I approached my work at home venture like I was trying to win a race and I was in last place. I constantly dreamed about Ad Campaigns, Keywords, Niches and so on. The other night I dreamt I was conversing with someone who asked “who are you competing with” and I replied “myself”. The next morning, I really didn’t know how to feel about the dream but I decided to take it as if I was beating myself up for my Adwords failure.

I subscribed to a couple of forums and newsletters of like minded Internet entrepreneurs and discovered that there are less expensive ways to make money online. One thing I neglected to understand was that if you offer people something of value you may be able to get them to purchase (PPS), click on a link (PPC), or fill out a survey (PPL) on your website, blog, email, etc. Since I had been writing multiple papers for the last couple of years in school I figured what the heck. This is when I made it my goal to master SEO (search engine optimization).

Finding those interested in your website content/product/service is one step in the puzzle of making money online, keeping them there is the next, and last is getting them to purchase. I ask new customers or leads how do they plan to promote their website and most of them aren’t concerned with it. I tell them they are throwing money away if they don’t learn SEO for their website (or pay a professional).

Starting a home based business can be challenging but if you are armed with the right information and the right network of people you can devote the necessary amount of time to grow your business. If you are going to work at home get online and do your research then once you have decided on what you want to do, find all the information you can on the subject via forms, ezines, ebooks, etc.

Regards, K.M.