The Pros & Cons of a Work at Home Business

Some will say working at home is the best thing they've ever done. Some will say that they would rather go out of the home to work. Everyone has their own preference. Some can tolerate commuting back and forth to their job, but others cannot bear the thought of it.

I've only been working at home since October '06 and I can tell you some of the pros and cons that I've experienced so far. I've been a stay at home mom for 11.5 years now so I'm used to being home with my children. I know there are some that need that little break from home and the kids when they go to work. I know I sometimes wonder if I should go out to work when I get overwhelmed at home. I know I would not be happy though. I want to see my kids grow and see every one of their milestones.

When my second son was 3 months old I went to work. After a few weeks my son preferred my mom over me. That killed me. I did not want that. I had others taking MY children to the doctor because I was working. I hated it. Needless to say, a few weeks later I quit. Now that I have four children, I wouldn't be able to keep up on the house and the kids if I was out working so a work at home business is perfect for me.

There are some things I've discovered over the last few months. The pros to working at home are being home with my children/family and being there when they get home from school. I don't have to commute back and forth in busy traffic. Not unless you count 6 people in a house with only one bathroom. That is the extent of my commute. I save money and wear and tear on my vehicle. I save money on food. I don't have to report to a boss and have deadlines to meet. I can work at my own pace and make my own hours. I have more free time since I don't have to come home and do housework and laundry.

Some of the cons include difficulty in concentrating when everyone is around. I am easily distracted and frequently interrupted. This is understandable though, if I'm the only parent home. The kids need things and my one year old requires more from me obviously. Because of this I find myself up way too late doing the things that require my full attention. It can be easy to say "oh I'll do that later" since there are no deadlines. You have to keep motivated because not having a boss to report to can make it easy to slack. Since I don't have an official office I don't have the quiet that I need during the day. I do as much as I can during the day that doesn't require a lot of thinking or concentration. I save the other stuff for when the kids go to sleep. When I do go to my bedroom/office one or more of the kids are banging on the door. I tend to not even bother.

Some people require adult conversation. Not being around other people besides kids can really cause a person to go stir crazy. That's why it's important to get out sometimes. Go to dinner and a movie with your spouse, lunch with friends or even just a walk to clear your head of all the demands of the kids. Me personally would rather quiet and to be by myself sometimes. At the end of the day I'm tired of talking and I'm tired of noise. That's probably why I'm up too late.

Ok, so now you know some of my pros and cons of working at home. Some may agree with these and some may not. Everyone has there own tolerance and preference. Weigh these and make the decision that's right for you.

To Your Success,

Tara Martindale
Work at Home Business Opportunities

Frustration

Frustration is a normal part of starting a work at home business. There is so much information to read, learn and soak up that it can get a little overwhelming. I have e-books and learning material stored on my computer that I haven't even gotten to yet. It's a big world out there on the net, you can get lost. If you try to consentrate on one or two things at a time it is much easier to focus and limit frustration.

Another frustrating factor is the time it takes for a business to take off. When not using paid advertising it takes longer to get yourself out there and noticed. I'm trying to relax and not get too impatient. I'm in this for the long haul so I'm willing to wait for my business to take off. I know it's coming....one day soon!

I'm submitting articles and clicking like crazy. I try to post in the forum. I'm kind of shy so it's sometimes hard for me to get involved. I feel like I don't know enough to give opinions on some things. There are lots of people that know so much that I feel like an idiot compared to them lol. I'm learning though and I hope one day I can give great advice and opinions like the others. Posting ads is another thing I've been doing. Not much success with this as very few actually click on the link. I get the most views from Craigslist.

Well that's it for me today.

To Your Success

Tara Martindale
Work at Home Business Opportunities

Warrior Forum-Plug-In Profit Support

If you've never heard of this forum you need to go there and check it out. If you become a PIPS owner this forum has the most supportive members. They give honest, helpful advice that can be used to better yourself and/or business. I've learned a lot reading the posts there. I check in everyday to see if there is anything new that I can learn and usually there is. If it isn't something to learn, it is seeing how supportive everyone is.

I urge any new Pipsters to post there and read everything you can. You'll learn a great deal.

To Your Success,

Tara Martindale
Work at Home Business Opportunities

I Love This Business

Working at home is the best! I get to stay home and take care of my kids, keep up on housework and laundry (not that it's fun or anything), work only when I want to, there are no deadlines to meet or bosses to report to or impress. This is the ideal business for me since I have 4 kids and I want to see them grow and be here at all times for them.

Sometimes it is difficult to get work done when the kids are asking for this or that or just being loud. It's hard to concentrate. I do most of my work on the couch so I call that my office lol. I usually wait until the kids are in bed before I do anything that requires concentration. I click away when they are up.

In a prior post I was complaining about google only giving me one back link. Just today I checked and I have 7 now.

Ok, that's it for today.

To Your Success,

Tara Martindale
Work at Home Business Opportunities

Addicted

I'm telling you, I'm addicted to this business. I can't wait to get on the computer. I'm on and off all day in between taking care of the kids and the house. It's actually fun for me. I never thought I'd say that about any kind of work! This is something I can do for a very long time because it's never boring. I find something new everyday, whether it's a new article directory or some kind of software to play around with.

I was thinking about making a totally new website so it's different than all the other PIPS sites. I don't want to ruin any progress I'm making with my current site though so that's something for the future when I'm more established in my business.

Today I submitted more articles, clicked as usual (I can't wait 'til I can buy credits), posted some ads and blogged. Tomorrow will be more of the same. Ok I think that's it for today. See it's midnight here and I can't shut off my computer. I have to force myself! Must get to bed, kids have school in the morning. Seriously, I'm done for the day.

To Your Success,

Tara Martindale
Work at Home Business Opportunities
PIPS

Another Day Working the Business

I've been submitting articles and building up links to my site. My site went from a position in the 150's to the 4oo's using my main keywords. It's at #11 with other keywords. Google is confusing! I have 1 measly backlink to my site according to Google. Total backlinks, using Link Popularity Check, I'm at about 380. I have a long way to go in order to get my site higher up on Google and start getting traffic. I really don't get any traffic right now. I have my Plug-In Profit Site sales page on 8 different traffic exchanges. I will list them below. All the advertising I do is free so it takes a while longer to start seeing the traffic roll in.

I'm still waiting to get my first sale in PIPS, but I know it'll happen soon and I can't wait. I've gotten some sign ups in SFI and I have spillover in Empowerism and Success University. I make a little cash from SFI and Empowerism.

I promote a couple other programs also that I make a little money off of. They are GDI and NPN. I have faith that everything will work out and I will start making good money in my business. I'm sticking to this and I will make it successful for my family! They deserve it.

Ok, here are the names of those traffic exchanges:

Traffic Swarm

Hits2U

Hit Safari

TS25

Hits 24/7

I Love Hits

URHits

Traffic Pods

To Your Success,

Tara Martindale

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To find the best Work at Home Business Opportunities so you can stay at home visit:
Work at Home Business Opportunities

Click, Click, Click

Traffic Exchanges! All this clicking has my wrist hurting. I'm not paying for any credits right now so I have to click a lot to keep my credits up. When I start making some cash I'll pay for credits. Anything's better than clicking all day. I have 7 or 8 traffic exchanges going at once so you can imagine how many times I click!!

Today was spent clicking, of course, submitting articles, updating some classifieds, blogging, gave my link to someone on myspace and exchanged links with another site. More of my articles have been accepted into article directories. I'm building up my links, slowly but surely.

To Your Success

Tara Martindale
Work at Home Business Opportunities

Squidoo

Well, I just made a Lens at Squidoo. Never heard of them until about a month ago. I didn't get into it though, until I read a discussion about it on the forum I post at. I decided to see what it was all about. I made a very simple one since I'm new to all this. I'm going to look at some of the other lens' to get some ideas. I'll update it every so often so don't forget to come back to see any changes.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To find the best Work at Home Business Opportunities so you can stay at home visit:
Work at Home Business Opportunities

The Beginning

This is the journey of a complete newbie, Tara (that's me), building a successful home business. It all started early October. My sister had been doing online marketing for about 8 months and she was making some cash. That's when I decided to give it whirl. I signed up with a program called SFI. I got some pointers from my sister about advertising. I signed up for Traffic Swarm and started submitting to directories.

In the meantime I was doing searches to see what kind of other programs were out there. About 3 weeks later I found a program called Plug-In Profit Site. I was signed up with a few of the programs that PIPS requires. SFI, Traffic Swarm and Internet Marketing Center so I thought "why not".

PIPS has definately been a learning experience. The training alone is worth every penny. I've even learned some HTML. A lot of it actually makes sense to me now. It all looked like mumbo jumbo to me before. Well, it still does, but not as much!

I have been busy submitting articles, submitting to link directories, traffic exchanges, placing classified ads, blogging and posting in a forum. I did some SEO (I think) on my website. I'm not sure if I did it properly. My keywords are starting to show up in the search engines but I have a long way to go in order to get regular traffic to my site. I think this is the most difficult part of this whole journey.

Well, that's it for this post. I'll keep updating on this blog every other day or so.

To Your Success,

Tara Martindale
Work at Home Business Opportunities