Starting Out

Work From Home? Key Personal Issues

Being your own boss and wouck stops with you. YOU are the marketing person, the bookkeeper, the doer of everything! All of these tasks are just as important as the others. Time must be regularly set aside for them all, or else things just won't happen (when they should). You will find yourself working late into the night catching up!

Your "normal" day should include regular time allocated for:

1. check incoming mail and respond.
   Don't put the piece of paper down to do later, because your "to-do" pile grows exponentially! Do it now!

2. chasing up new clients.
   You DO lose the old ones (often through no fault of yours) and they need to be replaced. Work out your figures and set realistic targets - e.g. "I need to get one new client every two weeks".

   If you don't achieve your target, allocate more time to this important activity. Initially, work out what it might be that you are doing wrong, and the nwork on correcting it.

3. keep in touch with existing clients.
   This puts you back "in their face" on a regular basis, reminding them of your importance to their business. Among other things, they're less likely to give you the "flick" because you're such a communicative person. At least you should be aware of any "problems" that might be brewing, and you can nip them in the bud.

4. do your accounting.
   Send out accounts when due, chase overdues, and pay the bills as you get them! Your business can't survive without money, so make sure you bill your clients and chase them when they don't pay. You can't survive without the people you buy from, so keep them happy too, or else your 30 day account privileges will be no more.

5. do the research you need to do to prepare submissions for your new and existing clients
   You won't generate new business, or expand on existing business, just because of your good looks. Interpret what your customers want (even when they might not know it yet) and then sell them the idea.

6. do the work your clients have commissioned you for
   Somehow, find the time after all of the above to carry out the job you promised to do, and do it on time! Not every job will be interesting, but to your client, it is more important than any thing else you're doing.

7. think... plan...
   Don't get snowed under with the day-to-day so much you lose sight of what your business is doing, and where it is going... If you do, it may be too late to rescue it if it needs it.