I have basically been my own boss of a home based business for the last 10 years. It has been a lifetime goal of mine to be able to become self-employed and to basically choose when I worked. Working from home seemed the perfect answer for me.

I run two small businesses, one selling composite doors and another offering stuttering advice. I have previously had a stuttering problem but have now been fluent for fourteen years. For the businesses to succeed, I need to work very hard and I need to keep coming up with new ideas to keep myself motivated and to keep the business alive.

I have been given some top advice from a good friend who works for a DVD replication company and here are some of the things that I have learned from him:

The first tip that I have is that you need to have self-discipline to make your home based business work. Each week set yourself business goals of what you want to achieve. Even though we are working from home we need to ensure that our home comforts do not take away our concentration and ability to succeed.

Part two of the advice concentrates on our eating habits. I fell into a trap of eating a lot of snack type foods, and did not ever feel that I had the time to cook myself a meal for lunch. I soon started to put on weight and this caused me to lose some of my self-confidence.

Thirdly you are likely to experience good months and bad months, financially. It is important therefore that you start saving so that when you are having a bad period, you have the cashflow to keep the business going. Also keep some money aside to pay the taxman. One of the main things that I liked about being self-employed was the fact that I only had to pay my income tax on a yearly basis. When I received my yearly tax bill it was quite a shock however and I have since started to put an amount aside each month to cover it.

 

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