Accounting Home Business
Start an Accounting Business and work for businesses & individuals preparing their financial reports, accounts receivable/payable, payroll, tax planning and preparing financial forms.
If you are a Certified Public Accountant, you can charge more for your work, as your level of education and expertise are higher.
You should be very comfortable working with numbers, and be detail-oriented. Organization is a must.You'll need a fax machine, copier and computer with spreadsheet, word processing and database software. An adding machine is also useful for tallying up receipts.
Additional software and reference books, such as the yearly tax guide, will also be needed depending on the range of services you will provide.
Auctions: Sell on eBay and Other Online Auctions
If you like garage sales, resell shops, flea markets, or estate sales, chances are that you will LOVE shopping on eBay! So if you've never spent any time on eBay, do it now! (Might want to pour yourself a cup of coffee and relax, it's addictive!)
eBay selling can be done at any time, place, or on any day of the week. All it takes is an internet connection to your PC, and the desire to work from home (and who wouldn't want to work at home?)Selling on eBay and other online auctions has become a hugely popular way for stay at home moms to earn a little extra income, and many moms earn a substantial income from their auction sales.You can start by just looking around your house at items you don't want or need anymore (my favorite items to sell are infant/children clothing, and they sell *very* well!)
Think in terms of having a garage sale. Items that you might consider selling in a garage sale may be just the things to get started with on eBay.
Home-based Professional Alterations and Seamstress Service
If you know how to, and enjoy sewing, put your talent to work sewing items or offer repair and alteration services.Often, cheer leading squads and drill teams will use an alteration service to make small changes to the girls' uniforms.You could even sew draperies, curtains, tablecloths, quilts, pillowcases and sheets, costumes, doll clothes, or make cloth labels for children's clothing. You might want to design and sew original items such as tote bags for the beach, diaper bags, overnight duffle bags, or infant and kid's clothing.
Word of mouth will get you a ton of business!
Professional Pet Grooming Service
Pet Grooming can be a very profitable business, because most people are willing to pay well for someone to groom their pet while being sensitive to the pet's behavior and needs.You'll need to have a love of taking care of the grooming needs of pets, as well as a lot of patience, and practical knowledge about the animal's anatomy, depending upon what type of animal you choose to provide services for.You will need to be experienced or willing to take courses to learn proper pet grooming techniques, and how to use the equipment.Other areas you'll need to think about will be purchasing equipment, having the proper space for a grooming service, and cleanliness and hygiene issues.
Start a Home-Based
Answering Service
As small business owners are quickly learning, outsourcing their answering service needs to a home-based answering service provider can really make things easier for them, and save a lot of money.Clients who call a business and reach an answering machine or voicemail are less likely to leave a message. People prefer to talk to a "live" person, and that's a fact!
This virtual service has relatively low overhead, and is easy to run. And depending upon your quality of service and professionalism, you can earn a very healthy income doing this from your home office.You will need to decide what level of service you wish to offer, whether it will be part time, full time, 24 hours or only during normal business hours, whether you will open on weekends or during the week. It is vital that you decide what hours and days you will be working before you take on your first clients.Next, you should decide how many clients you want to take on, because that will dictate your equipment needs.
Fewer than about 10 clients would allow you to install a separate phone and phone line from the phone company for each client, which is the most cost effective way to provide this service to this number of clients. You will need to check with your phone company and find out if any limits to the number of phone lines you can have installed in your home exist in your area.
If you are considering more clients, then you would need to have a switchboard to make it more cost effective for you. Again, check with your phone company about leasing a switchboard.
Providing excellent customer service and a friendly phone manner is critical to your business. You should have excellent grammar and diction.You clients could consist of anything from sole proprietors to small and medium businesses. Anyone who has to leave their business location (if they even have one) to do their job has a need for someone to take business calls.
Start a Bridal and Wedding Consulting Service
A Bridal and Wedding Consultant performs services from arranging meetings with vendors, planning the wedding schedule, planning the rehearsal dinner, creating a budget, bridal registry, and much more...but the main thing to remember is that the bride is the client. It is the consultant's job to make the bride's wedding dreams a reality, make her happy, save her time, and save her money.As a Bridal Consultant, you would need superior time and people management skills. Diplomacy and negotiating skills are a must, as you will frequently be dealing with one bride, as well as other family members who all will have strong opinions about what they want to see happen at the wedding.You will need a strong arsenal of vendor relationships such as florists, caterers, photographers, hair salons, bridal shops, travel agencies, and limousine rental services.Certification is not required, but it is suggested that you do take some courses to make certain you possess good skills, and generally can make things easier for you. There are some distance learning (courses and classes online) that are available, just do a search on the Internet for "Bridal Consultant Courses".
Some Suggested Courses and Skills:
Hospitality
Event Planning
Decorating
Diplomacy
Bookkeeping
Marketing
Negotiating
Planning ceremonies
One of your best methods of advertising will be your clients, so do your best and the word will get out that you can put together a drop-dead fabulous wedding!
Cake Decorator and
Custom Cake Designs
If you have taken classes in cake decorating and design, and you have a talent for your creations, you might start offering your cake decorating and design service to your friends and neighbors.
Word of mouth will travel quickly, so make sure you know your stuff before taking any paying jobs! Much of your business will come from past customer referrals, and people who were at the event and saw your beautiful and original creation there.
You'll need adequate space in your home, along with the equipment you'll need.
It's a good idea to take photos of your finished designs in case a potential client wants to see your work.
Start a Cleaning Service
Most cleaning services start as home-based businesses. A cleaning service, or maid service, can be either residential or commercial cleaning services, or both. They can have one employee, or several cleaners while the owner takes care of the business administration duties.
Advertising can be done by running ads in your local paper, business cards, printing flyers, posting on the bulletin boards of various businesses, and websites that provide local information and classifieds.But by far, your best advertising will be from past and present customers who are very happy with your excellent customer service and the job you've done well.
Dance Instructor
If you are a trained dance instructor, or have a lot of dance experience, you can start your own dance instruction service.Ballet, Jazz, Tap, Hip-Hop, Tumbling, Twirling are all "dance" styles that are taught at dance studios.If you have solid experience in any or several dance styles, you can give private lessons in your home, providing you have adequate space.
Start a Home Based
Child Day Care Service
Because more parents must work outside the home, there will always be a demand for child care.
But with the concerns about quality child care, more people are moving away from the large day care schools, and turning to friends, neighbors, people they know from school functions and PTA meetings, and finding child care providers by word of mouth.
This creates a huge opportunity for someone who loves children, and wants to create a business dedicated to taking care of them.One attractive benefit for the stay at home mom is that starting a day care from home enables you to work at home, and take care of your own child at the same time.Before you do anything, check on any zoning laws and be sure to know the regulations in your area. The regulations that apply to your area will be your guide as to how many children you can have enrolled, and you can write your business plan from there.
You would want to take a CPR course, as well as other related courses that would help you know what to do in case of an emergency such as a serious injury or sudden illness.
It is important to set your policies and rules, and enforce them. Even if you are babysitting for a friend, you will be well served by having something in writing in place. The last thing you want to have to deal with is resenting a friendship because there wasn't any type of contract in place, and you end up being taken advantage of.Forms and contracts for day care providers can be downloaded from the Internet. You can certainly edit them and print out your own as needed.
Purchasing supplies and running your Child Care Service on a budget will always be your goal, and there are many tips and tricks for accomplishing this.Purchase used and pre-owned items that are in very good condition. These items include furnishings, toys, books, games, videos, dvd movies, children's music tapes and CD's from resale shops, garage sales, thrift stores, classified ads, and even on eBay (good for small items such as books because you'll want to watch the shipping charges).Buying used toys and videos can save a ton of money (and it's something most of us budget-conscious Moms are already doing!) Buying supplies in bulk from places such as Sam's Warehouse. These would include items such as non-perishable foods (cereal, ), and cleaning and hygiene supplies (bleach, disinfectant spray, dish detergent, toilet paper, hand soap, etc).You'll want to plan age-appropriate activities for the children in your care, and try to schedule a daily routine. This will help you more than anyone, and keep you from losing track of time.
Desktop Publishing Service
Desktop publishing is very well suited to telecommuting, and with low overhead and start-up costs, it can be developed into a home business very easily. Desktop publishing provides services that all businesses need at some point in time, as well as nearly all individuals.Desktop publishing is really a wide category, and you can choose to specialize in any one of a number of niche areas. It is also possible to combine closely related services without stretching yourself too thin, because so many areas overlap.My degree is in Graphic Imaging and Desktop Publishing, and my services and consultations have included all of the following at one time or another:
Create Letterheads and Business Cards
Fliers, Posters
Brochures
Invitations
Greeting Cards
Advertising Banners
Newsletters
Catalogues
Menus
Product Lists
Presentations
Scrapbooking
Calendars
Logos
Spreadsheets
You'll need a good computer with desktop publishing and graphics software, and a fully equipped home office to properly work this job or business at home.You can develop an entire website community that provides information to visitors on various topics such as:
The basics of desktop publishing
Training on-site
Training online
Courses online
Free tutorials online
Desktop publishing software
Graphic design applications and elements
Industry related definitions
Tips and tools
Articles and Commentaries
Message Board or Forum
Desktop Publishing eNewsletter
Posting Telecommute Jobs
Offer your own Desktop Publishing Services and consultations
You can sell advertising space on your website, and join an affiliate program as well to increase your revenue. To begin, simply register for a free account, choose the products, services, or companies that are relevant to your website's theme, or might be useful to your visitors, and you can then sell advertising space and generate income from your website.
If you are experienced, you can register and apply for verified work-at-home jobs & freelance projects in your field.
