There are numerous reasons people choose to work at home or from their home, but whether you use your home as a base for your operation or never leave the house, the simple fact is you will have to present a professional appearance about you home office. There are a few simple “rules” you will need to follow in order to make that appearance obvious to you customers or clients and without presenting the proper appearance, chances are good your business will not last long.
One of the first mistakes people make when starting a home business is their telephone. In order to save on their initial investment, they tend to use their home phone number as their business number. That’s OK if you are the only one that ever answers the phone, but if there are other family members in the home, there is always the chance for you to look like a small business.
You probably love your six-year-old child but prospective customers don’t want to wade through a dozen questions from a child about why they want to talk to their mommy or daddy before they can talk to an adult. One of the fastest ways to lose a customer is to have them realize your office is not really an office. A second phone line can be costly, but it is worth the extra money if customers look at your business as being viable.
You can also sign up for a second line in the home, www.vonage.com for example, not only offers a flat rate phone service for local and long-distance calls using your high-speed Internet, but also offers a second number, which can also be toll-free for about $5 a month.
One of the best means of marketing your home business is by being part of your local community. Sponsoring a local youth league sports team allows you to put your company’s name on the players’ shirts and if your local paper publishes the scores, your name will be in the paper along with the scores. Baseball, football, soccer and bowling all have sponsorships available to help the teams offset the cost of uniforms and association membership fees. While many sponsorships can be costly, the payback can be worth the money spent from your advertising budget.
Writing a local column for your local paper can also be beneficial to you business. Regardless of the business you operate, as the business owner you are considered an expert in the field. Offer your local paper a recurring column about timely information for their readers. Most newspapers have a strict budget on how much they can pay for content and are willing to take your information, if it helps their readers to help fill the pages with local content. The time you spend writing these articles can be considered as cheap advertising while getting your name in print.
