Home Business Information

Remember always operate your business like any other business (online or offline). You must ensure that certain systems and checks and balances are in-place.

When you start your business, you may not know what your doing. You may do what I and countless others have done. When I first started, I was joining everyone's newsletters, trying to learn something for nothing. Then, I progressed to learning more by purchasing products, subscriptions, and memberships. Some were good. Some were worthless. Some were terrible rip offs. In any event, I had all these items to keep track off, even if I to want cancel or return the bad items. Paypal saved me for many of my purchases but not all of them. All this information was contained in at least six email accounts. No lie!! SO, you need to be able to keep track of all this stuff including receipt numbers, passwords, usernames, account numbers, and expiration dates.. You needs to systematize your business.

First things first, I highly recommend using an inexpensive tool like roboform at www.roboform.com. This will automatically keep track of your passwords and form information. It prompts you anytime you enter a logon and password. If it is already in Roboform's database, you can retrieve the information and automatically submit it. This saves tons of time and keeps you organized.

Next, keep a database that lists all those items I mentioned before: company names, dates joined, invoice numbers, logons, passwords, websites, email addresses, whether a once-off or monthly fee, and any additional notes. You can use a formal program or keep track of it with Microsoft Access or Excel, or consider OpenOffice, a free alternative to Microsoft Office, at www.openoffice.org.

Next, you need to keep track of your income and expenses. A simple way is to use a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. You can also use Quicken, Quickbooks, or more formal software. What should you be looking for besides just the figures? You need to use the data to identify trends in profits and losses. Look at your product or services in relation to seasonality. If you sold this item last year, how did it fare this year? Obviously, you need the figures for tax accounting. Just make sure you have a system in place to ensure you are always on-track . How will you know what is working and what needs changing? You need to see if you are getting a good return based on the money you are spending in your business.

The last system you need is something to keep track of your advertising expenditures and results. It is most effective if broken down by ad campaign. Without the ability to test and measure all of your advertising, you might as well just wear a blindfold. You absolutely MUST KNOW what is working and what is not working . They always say test small at first to minimize your advertising dollars. Keeping track of your advertising allows you to add more monies to the good campaigns and minimize or shut down the other campaigns.

A spreadsheet can include ad cost, number of subscribers (in an ezine), number of clicks, number of sales, cost per sale and ROI (return on investment).

# posted by Medical Information : 3:25 AM