10 Steps to Becoming a Self-Employed Parent (Or What to Expect When You Are Expecting to Work from Home)
Make a list of the things you need in order to offer your service- even just on a limited basis. Hold off on hiring that webdesigner for just a bit, and ordering those businesses cards. Start with the basic tools you need to be able to provide your service. You may find that you already have much of what you need. If not, then make a small investment in these basic tools. This is a lot more cost effective than purchasing a franchise, or renting an office space. You can always upgrade later, as your business grows. Once you become self-employed, you will be your own boss, and that means you will be able to create your own rules. You can charge less that your competitors, because you will be working out of your home, and your overhead will be absorbed into what you are already paying for rent. You can choose your own hours, and re-arrange your schedule around naps, playdates, or your spouses work schedule. Remember to get creative. You are the boss, so you call the shots. For example, if you are a hairstylist, you can offer to go to you clients home. This will circumvent paying rent at a salon so you will be able to charge less than your competitors (which your clients will appreciate). You may even be able to bring your kids with you to play with your client’s kids- a playdate while you work! It’s a win-win.
Self-employed Parent Enthusiast Ally Loprete is the Founder of OurMilkMoney.com, a nationwide online business directory of self-employed parents, and the host of This Little Parent Stayed Home, a live weekly radio show which is a part of the Her Insight Group on Toginet.com. Ally is on a mission to help others deal with the sometimes overwhelming prospect of leaving a full time job to start a new business, while running a full time household and raising kids. She is resolute about creating a haven in which parents across the nation will continue to thrive and obtain the support they need in their personal journeys.
10 Steps to Becoming a Self-Employed Parent (Or What to Expect When You Are Expecting to Work from Home)
This is a great way to minimize those start-up costs that you were worried about. It’s also a great way to network, and get testimonials, not to mention gain experience in your chosen field.
Make up the Difference with Barter
Yep, the old age method of bartering is making a comeback…and its hot! For families that are looking for an alternative lifestyle to what they have now, leaving a corporate salary behind may seem like an impossible thing to recover, but its not. After you have taken a look at your monthly expenses, made all the obvious cuts in over spending and subtracted your lost salary as well as the cost of daycare, if you can aim for a $200-$500 deficit, its a great spot to be in.
Making up the difference in that financial gap is completely attainable through swap and trade. Bartering, or the exchange of goods and services without money, has become a more common solution as family budgets tighten. In an economic turn down, more people are open to the idea and even more are becoming advanced in the art of bartering. Swap piano lessons for a gym membership, Babysitting for help moving, tutoring for hemming. You don’t have to run your own business to have something valuable to offer, and because we are all capable of something, there is no limit to how much of ourselves we can offer, making us worth more than what we have in our bank accounts, with no limit.
Self -employed Parent Enthusiast Ally Loprete is the Founder of OurMilkMoney.com, a nationwide online business directory of self-employed parents, and the host of This Little Parent Stayed Home, a live weekly radio show, which is part of the Her Insight Group on Toginet.com. Ally is on a mission to help other’s deal with the sometimes overwhelming prospect of leaving a full time job to start a new business, while running a full time household and raising kids. She is resolute about creating a haven in which parents across the nation will continue to thrive and obtain the support they need in their personal journeys.
![Is A Direct Sales Business Your Answer to Working from Home?]()
Direct Sales, Member Contributions
by Mona Colwell
These past few months we have worked to discover whether a direct sales business is your answer to working from home. If you have followed along this far, you probably ordered your starter set and maybe even had your first few sales. Congratulations!
You are now free from all the “what if’s” that could have held you back from giving an at-home business a try. Go ahead and dream about your future earnings potential, the prizes you will earn and the all expense paid trips that you will take as a top performer! Best yet, you ALREADY have everything that you need to be amazingly successful with your business!
You may be thinking, “What? How could that be?” The truth is that there is only one thing that sets successful consultants apart from those who are not successful. One simple word separates the ones who persist, stick it out through obstacles and keep their focus on the goal.
Two people may be from totally different backgrounds, live in entirely different locations, have different home situations and be equally successful with their businesses. Our environment only matters if we let it hold us back. For example, one parent may say that she can’t be successful because her kids are too small while another might say she is successful because her kids are small!
What makes the difference for the achievers? The ones who BELIEVE this business will work and BELIEVE that they can be successful will rise to the top! Our results in our business are the outward or physical results that come from the thoughts in our head – good or bad. If you think you can, you can!
Don’t you just love children’s books? They are filled with hope and words of encouragement. We honestly believe that our children can have anything that their heart desires. So how about us?
The best thing we can do for our business is to invest in ourselves and our positive thinking. This may sound easy enough but it takes hard work, persistence and commitment! It takes effort to be in a positive, believing state of mind every minute of every day.
However, the success of your business depends on it. If you know that your business depends on it and this area could literally make or break your business, would you find a way to make it a priority? I hope so… It starts with investing in listening, reading or watching something positive every day.
Start there and check back next time for 10 fabulous tips on creating powerful beliefs!
Mona Colwell is a work at home mom with 15 years direct sales experience. In addition to raising her three children, Mona has created a company for her almost famous husband, Emerson, and his children’s books, blogs for The Professional Women’s Network and recently transitioned to a brand new direct sales organization, Ava Anderson Non-Toxic.
![Is A Direct Sales Business Your Answer to Working from Home?]()
Direct Sales, Member Contributions
One of the benefits of a ‘business in a box’ is that part of your success will be based on your ability to duplicate certain skills that are common across many sales organizations. These include Network Marketing Skills, Communication Skills, Business Systems and Life Skills.
NETWORK MARKETING SKILLS: These are some ‘founding’ principles that are important to follow because they are already proven to work well within a direct sales organization. Successful business owners develop prospect lists, use scripts (for generating interest in their business, scheduling appointments, closing sales and following up with customers) and follow a specific presentation format for both the products and business opportunity.
COMMUNICATION SKILLS: The best communicators are the best listeners. They are able to uncover prospect’s needs and provide solutions. It’s important to ask questions and hear the answers before offering products that can potentially help your audience. Honing these skills will grow your business with lasting clients.
SUCCESS SYSTEMS: These are systems that are put in place to help run your business smoothly such as a website where your customers can order products, reports for tracking your personal team production, customer sales reports or inventory management. Today, many corporations offer these systems as part of their ‘back office’, freeing your time up so that you can be in the most important place which is in front of people presenting the products and the opportunity.
LIFE SKILLS: Successful entrepreneurs often demonstrate high ‘life’ skills which encompass:
- People skills – how you relate to others, attract customers and provide exceptional service
- Time management skills – creating and working by a schedule and focusing on income producing activities
- Emotional management – keeping your feelings in check and looking at every experience as an opportunity for growth
Many direct sales organizations will provide educational websites, CDs, podcasts and events to help you gain and improve these skills. A direct sales business is just like every other business, and not necessarily a ‘get rich scheme’. Rather, it is an opportunity for you to have easy entry into the marketplace where you can take advantage of an already established business model. By taking the time to learn these proven skills and then putting them into practice in the field, your results will be a fast growing, lucrative home based business.
Mona Colwell is a work at home mom with 15 years direct sales experience. In addition to raising her three children, Mona has created a company for her almost famous husband, Emerson, and his children’s books, blogs for The Professional Women’s Network and recently transitioned to a brand new direct sales organization, Ava Anderson Non-Toxic.
Chris Loprete, daddysden, Dads, Family
Written by Chris Loprete
I hope you and your loved ones had a wonderful Thanksgiving and are gearing up for a safe and happy holiday season. We parents really are very lucky because seeing the joy and excitement in our children at this time of year makes us feel like kids again. It’s so much fun to be a part of isn’t it? There is one little warning I’d like to give to all of the new parents out there however. While you’re dolling yourself up to head to the office holiday party or the gift and cookie exchange party down the block or the New Year’s Eve extravaganza you’ve been waiting for all year; while you’re leaving instructions for the sitter and kissing your kids goodnight and saying, “Be good for (insert sitter’s name here), go to bed when she tells you and we’ll see you in the morning”; while you’re doing all of that remember one thing: KIDS DON’T KNOW WHAT A HANGOVER IS.
Date nights and adult gatherings are a rarity now for us ‘rents aren’t they? When one comes around and we actually envision an evening of adult conversation that doesn’t involve our child’s bathroom habits we jump at the chance faster than lions jump on a gazelle that tweaks a hamstring. Even though babysitter quotes have become outrageous (what are they, unionizing?) we’re willing to spare the extra sheckels to get an evening away. We may even have a drink or two. Even for those parents who don’t drink, that doesn’t stop you from taking full advantage of the night off and staying out a little longer than usual, right? And then after “making rather merry” we come home in the early morning hours, stumble into bed and sleep the sleep of the dead knowing that the hours we lost in the beginning of the night, we’ll make up for by sleeping all morning. And then (seemingly 5 minutes later) at 7 AM we feel a tap on our forehead and a small voice pierces our throbbing skulls saying, ”I want cereal and cartoons!” What the…? Now? Why? Don’t they know that mommy and daddy had several spirits last night and have only been asleep for 5 hours? Don’t they feel those jackhammers pounding into our cerebral cortex? Answer: no they don’t. And if they did…they probably wouldn’t care. And if you think you can just croak, “later” and turn and go back to sleep, I got news for you. Those jackhammers will increase by one. And it will get louder and louder and more and more powerful. And this one doesn’t have an off switch.
It’s not just hangovers either. You could be sober as a judge and go to bed Friday night thinking the weekend has started which means sleeping in for the next two days. And you’d be right…if “sleeping in” means getting up even earlier than your alarm usually goes off. My alarm clock is smarter than my 3 year old son. It realizes that Saturday and Sunday are non working days for me so it automatically shuts off and lets me sleep. My son saves the day though and makes sure I’m up at the EXACT time my alarm usually goes off during the week. My alarm almost shrugs and says, “Sorry, guy. I tried” My 3 year old knows the days of the week.: ”Monday, Toosday, Wenday, Fursday,…”,and he knows Daddy doesn’t work on “Satday” and “Sunday”…but hasn’t quite learned the concept of “sleeping in”. Or else he has and chooses to ignore it.
Another concept they don’t get is the two times a year when most of the country changes their clock forward or back an hour. For those in Arizona and parts of Indiana you can stop reading because you don’t change your clocks and therefore don’t have to deal with this phenomenon (freaks). The rest of the country just recently “fell back”. Now that gives us cause to rejoice because it’s an extra hour of sleep, right? Right…if you don’t have small children. Our little ones have not fallen back one minute and continue their clockwork ritual of waking us up bright and early. The difference? Instead of 7 AM it’s now 6 AM! Somehow they get themselves on track eventually, but just know that ”fall back” now refers to sleep time as in “Tonight we fall back on an hour of sleep.”
So take heed new parents. Enjoy the holidays as much as you can. Go out, see friends, and party like the old days. Just know that there will be a price to pay. Eat, drink and be merry…for tomorrow you’re up early.
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