Archive for January, 2010

By Tammy Embrich

Typically a work at home professional uses a work schedule to get daily tasks completed. Are they really necessary? Does one make more money by checking off a to do list? It basically depends on lifestyle, your children and ages, your business needs, your family’s needs, and how much time you need to work.

Work at home schedules aren’t for everyone. Some people don’t even follow any set routine. They just get up each day knowing what needs to be done and gets working. And yet some desperately needs a daily routine to keep them on track and successfully checking things off as the day unfolds. I for one, fall in the latter category. I’m not naturally organized, so I significantly benefit from a work from home schedule.

Below is my typical work schedule for the week (updated for the new year)

Tasks I do daily… First thing in the morning and last thing I do before turning in for the night, I check all emails and website stats. I also do my job lead search and postings in the morning after emails. Twitter networking is also on my daily things to do (depending on how my day is going). Forum rounds, for the ones I help moderate and a few of my favorites.

Monday – Website updates and backups, article idea searches, writing (for my own submissions and sites, guest blogging, ghostwriting)

Tuesday – Blog updates and blog rounds, writing (for my own submissions and sites, guest blogging, ghostwriting)

Wednesday – I try to make it to most forums on my list, then if time allows, I do more writing.

Thursday – Article idea searches and writing.

Friday – I highlight the tasks that needs doing for the following week and check for any needed site updates. If time allows, more writing.

Evenings – Sometimes I work an hour or two, only if I feel like it or if needed. It’s usually just 1 or 2 nights during the week, give or take.

Weekends – I work on weekends ONLY if I absolutely need to. Otherwise my weekends are for family and me time.

I realize that the above type of schedule won’t work for everyone, as we are all unique and have various types of home businesses. For my business, I offer free work at home job leads and advice and this routine is ideal for me.

If you find yourself not getting things done (on time), you may benefit from a set schedule. Set one up that meets your individual needs. If you already have one and still find getting things done challenging, you may need to do some tweaking and also make a few lifestyle changes. I have a large desk calendar with ample space for listing tasks for each day of the week/month. It’s in front of me at all times and I try to plan out each week every Friday. This helps me out immensely and makes me feel more in control of my business.

Article Written By Tammy Embrich 

Tammy  is the founder of Work At Home Jobs, a free work at home resource website offering free job leads, work at home articles, home business ideas, and much more.

You can also visit Work At Home Articles for more work at home job leads, articles, and more.

By Tammy Embrich

Is it really that time of year again? Time goes by so fast, especially if you’ve been relatively busy with your home business within the past year.

There are so many things to remember when preparing your tax returns, as well as knowing exactly what is considered taxable. Let’s take a quick look at what may be taxable in your work at home situation.

Here are just a few that I’ve listed below:

1. Monthly Internet bill. I know this is the number one item on my list since I work at home and I have to use the Internet to make my income.

2. Monthly hosting bill if you own your own domain name. This is another important write off for your business, especially if you own several domains/websites and your hosting bill is considerably high.

3. Monthly phone bill. If you own a business and you use your phone to run your business, then yes, you need to write off your phone bill.

4. Business transportation mileage. If you use your automobile for business, such as home parties, this is another important taxable write off. Fuel prices has went up considerably. You need to keep careful track of all your transportation expenses (including gas receipts), and file anything and everything that you can.

5. Advertising expenses. Some people pay for advertising for promotion purposes and some do not. If you do pay for advertising, then you need to file these expenses on your taxes. Depending on the type of advertising, it may or may not be taxable, but it’s always safe to file all expenses.

6. Charitable contributions. Your contributions must meet specific criteria to be considered taxable. It’s still important to record all contributions for the year and your tax adviser will sort it out accordingly.

There are definitely more that need to be listed here. I just wanted to go over a few of the top ones to consider for your business. To do a more elaborate research on what is taxable, you can visit irs.gov.

Tips for organizing your tax documents

Don’t wait until the end of the year to start getting those important documents together. Start at the beginning of the year and place all relevant papers in their proper place. There are so many people (and I used to be one of them) that just shove these documents into hiding anywhere they can find, and not where they are supposed to be kept for fast reference.

For example: I have a file folder in my file cabinet that houses my office expense receipts, ink cartridges, paper, pens, pencils, software receipts, new computer/printer receipts, and the like. When you purchase something for your business, immediately when you return home, place those receipts in their proper folder.

Earnings and expense records

I’ve learned over the years to keep a document for my earnings and also for my expenses in safe documents on my computer. I also actively backup all my files on a regular basis. You can of course figure out your earnings and expenses at the beginning of every year, but wouldn’t it make much more sense to do this as you go along with your business and record each transaction? It would definitely save you a considerable amount of time by doing this daily.

Basic office supplies for organizing your work at home office

calendar
file cabinets
interior or manila file folders
hanging file folders and labels
Microsoft Money or Quickbooks accounting software (if you choose), you can always keep active spreadsheets for business accounting purposes
sticky notes

With careful home business planning and organization skills, you will be more career productive.

Important: Also with precise organization, you will know at a moment’s notice where these documents are if you are ever audited.

Article Written By Tammy Embrich

Tammy offers work at home articles, free work at home job leads, and other business resources on her Work At Home Articles blog.

You can also visit Tammy at Work At Home Job Leads offering more free job leads, work at home articles, work at home tips, and more.

By Trent Brownrigg

Work at home ideas are obviously very important for anyone who wants to put the corporate world behind them to work from home for themselves. Without ideas and opportunities there’s not much for you to do unless you come up with a great idea for yourself. Being your own boss and making money with your own home based business is definitely the way to go, there’s little doubt about that, but without a home business idea your hopes of making money are severely hindered.

If you are going to start your own home business so you can work at home for yourself, you definitely need to make a plan because without a plan you will find it very difficult to succeed. In order to get that plan in place you need to first be sure you have the motivation, time and resources to fulfill it. Then you need to decide where you are going to start, and finally how you are going to manage everything. If, after all of this, you are sure you want to work at home and what you plan to do, you need to get started and make it happen.

Don’t worry if none of the following work at home ideas sound perfect for you at first glance. Use them as a starting point and think around them to come up with your own ideas. For example, think if there is something similar that you could do or something you could add to an existing idea then go for it. Brainstorm by writing down every home business idea that you think of even if it sounds stupid or weird. Sooner or later the perfect way to make money will come to you!

Here are three work from home ideas that you could get started on right now…

1. Freelance Work

If you have some sort of skill such as web design, writing, programming, proofreading, transcription, marketing, finance, or just about anything else, you can hire yourself out to do freelance work for other people. Go to a site like elance.com or guru.com and you can get setup pretty quickly. You won’t necessarily need a web site for this one but it will help to give some information about yourself and samples of your work.

2. Build Your Own Network of Sites/Blogs

Blogs are fairly easy and cheap or even free to build, and so are static websites for the most part. In fact, with resources like blogger.com it’s possible for a regular person without any special skills to get a blog online for free in a matter of minutes.

Getting a blog or website online isn’t a problem. The more important part is finding a niche that you can compete in where people have money and are prepared to spend it. A few examples would be weight loss, making money, debt, health issues, and certain hobbies. However, you can’t just jump into any of those broad niches because they are way too competitive. First you need to narrow it down to a few smaller niches within those topics.

Once you learn how to find good niches you will be able to crank out blogs in no time. Build an empire of blogs and monetize them with Adsense, affiliate links, paid advertising, etc… Then learn some internet marketing and SEO techniques to bring in quality traffic to them and soon enough the money will be rolling in.

3. Sell Content

There are many ways in which you can make money selling articles and other content that you have written. There are websites that will pay you for articles, such as associatedcontent.com and others. There are also a lot of internet marketers and bloggers who will gladly pay for well-written articles on almost any topic in tons of different niches. Just go the Warrior forum, Sitepoint forum, or Digitalpoint forum and you will find sections on all of them where you can sell your content.

Remember if you want to work from home, you will still need to work hard, have self-discipline, patience, and think creatively to come up with new ideas and make current ones work. Finding the right work at home business ideas is one part of being self-employed that cannot be ignored. The more innovative and creative you are the more money you can make. The best ideas are the ones that make other people wish they had thought of it themselves, so that’s your goal!

Article Written By Trent Brownrigg

Trent Brownrigg says that in order to work from home successfully, you must learn how to do it from people who have many years of home based business experience.
At http://work-at-home-based-business.com we have several experts giving you the best work at home information online.