If your business is based out of your home you're doing more than reading about it, you're living it every day.
You probably love it and wouldn't have it any other way.
It has it's ups and downs but some days you wake up in the morning, put the coffee on to brew and with a smile on your face, realize why you chose to base your business at home.
Perhaps you're thinking of expanding your business online.
Maybe you already have and find it a bit overwhelming.
You can fill the pages of books with information on how to establish an online presence.
Advantage.
You already know how to run a business from home.
You're just ready to expand online.
The biggest mistake people make in the process when coming online, is to lose the wisdom of simplicity and question what they have already learned off line about running a home based business.
The Internet has opened amazing possibilities for growing a business.
The resources available online to help you do that increase with every passing day.
Learning to use them can catapult your business to another level in days.
Some of the best resources are free.
But before you decide on taking advantage of what is available you might want to take a lot more time deciding what you need to go to the next level.
With every resource you utilize there is time involved.
The old adage that time is money is still very relevant.
You don't want to waste either.
In fact, you can't afford to.
If you're new to the Internet it may seem fairly overwhelming to try and decide what you need for your business.
I advocate simple steps.
1.
Creating a Customer base? You need people to find you.
That means making sure major search engines can find you.
A simple blog is the fastest and most effective way to get this done.
Blogger.
com is a great blog service online for getting started and making sure traffic gets to your blog fast.
I would suggest creating a Google e-mail account first.
This will ensure you are able to access all of Google's services across the Internet which can benefit you in the short and long term.
You can create your blog using your Google account and make life easier all around.
Take time to add a few simple widgets to your blog once it's created such as Google Connect and an RSS Feed.
You can also add a blogger link list so other blogs can connect with you through updates.
This can all be done through the customize feature once your blog is created.
It is simple and easy.
Bloggers visit other blogs.
This is a fact and they link to other blogs.
Good for promotion, marketing and discovering new people, ideas and information.
2.
Since you already have a business you know it takes time to grow it and attention is not necessarily sales.
You don't want to tie up more time than you need to online so keep your blog simple until you learn your way around.
It's tempting to want to grab all the bells and whistles out there to make your blog stand out.
But remember with every thing you do online it will require maintenance and that means time.
On the Internet it's legend for something that should take a few minutes to do, easily turn into an hour.
Simplicity first.
3.
Focus on the necessities.
  Building your home based business using online resources is not very different from the traditional way of doing it.
  It takes time, sweat and tenacity.
On the other hand you can be overwhelmed with all that is available.
What you will have following the steps above is a foundation to network, find information you need and build online relationships that span the globe.
Take it one step at a time and never be intimidated to graduate to another level until you're ready.
  If traffic doesn't find you in the hundreds each day yet, don't despair.
Keep building your home based business and learning what works for you.
Keep it simple and you'll be able to keep enjoying that morning cup of coffee, instead of needing it.