For most of us starting the new venture on a part-time basis is the answer. You can test your ideas out, maybe build a simple website rather than the flashy one you plan on for later etc. Now this part-time approach requires just as much commitment as the other way and thats where the approach sometimes falls over. We find ourselves juggling family commitments as well as work commitments, friends, activities and the rest all tend to soak up our time and energy. Here are a few pointers that might help you do it part-time:

Firstly make sure your family is onboard with the idea. You’re going to be spending many hours working on it. Best they understand what you are up to and some hours are set aside for it.

Are there aspects of your existing employment that could be useful to your plan? Maybe you can even spend some of your down time like lunch periods researching your ideas online? Understand I’m not suggesting you steal from the company, just be smart about the knowledge you have gained and your use of time. You will need to be aware of your own employment conditions on the subject of other interests.

Share the load with someone. Find someone to partner with and you’ll have not just a way to spread the work load but a sounding board for ideas. Two heads are invariably better than one so you’ll have someone to talk about your ideas with and agree on a consensus. Talk about it and inevitably one of you will think of something the other did not.

Set definite times for yourself and your partner to work together in one spot. It might be just one weekend day spent together while the other hours are worked alone on weekday evenings. Having that little bit of added pressure to live up to the others expectations provides motivation to perform as none of us likes letting others down.

Start small. If your great business idea has come about through a hobby interest then use your leisure time to test your idea in a small way. If the idea works and a profit is produced at the small part-time level then it will almost certainly scale up to larger profit at the full time level.

Use the findings of your small scale tests to set your targets as to what level is required in order to support you and your partner in a full time venture. Is it a certain number of website visitors? A weekly number of sales leads? Ensure the triggers for jumping in full time are agreed by you and your partner. Then when you know you can or will hit those trigger points you know its time to go full time.

Good Luck with it.

Is the product something not easily and cheaply purchased in a local store? The more commonplace the item the less your chances of selling yours at a good profit margin. Some of the best selling items on eBay are collectibles and antiques for this very reason.

Is your product in demand enough to start at a low price and allow competition between bidders to rise the eventual selling price for you? There is a lot of evidence that low starting prices attract more interest and therefore higher winning bids.

Is the likely profit margin enough to allow for the occasional poor auction result? You don’t want to sweat on the results of every auction. The cheaper you source your items the greater your chance of profits. Source collectibles and antiques at deceased estate sales and even garage sales for next to nothing and make excellent returns on eBay.

Is it easy to handle and ship the goods to the auction winner? The more time and effort you have to put into this element the less time and motivation you’ll have for repeating the success of the first sale. Try to stick to easily handled items that you can use pre-paid mailing for if possible.

Check out my Squidoo Lens on this for more on making money on eBay

Unrealistic Expectations
Think you’re going to make millions quickly? Think its going to be easy? Get real, building a business requires hard work and it can take a long time to get ahead of the breakeven point. Unfortunately the notion of getting rich quickly is promoted in the many home business scams out there which does not exactly help matters.

Lack of Planning and Preparation
You can’t just dive in and start a business without a proper plan. Planning and preparation are absolutely essential if you are to have any hope of beating the competition. If you don’t have a business plan for your home business and have some milestones to mark out the little successes along the way, then how are you going to make it?

Lack of Discipline
Have you got what it takes to work hard and to do so consistently? Will you make time to keep the paperwork in order and to ensure you keep learning about your business? Funnily enough, if you can get into an organised and disciplined mindset then the very business of being in business will become easier.

Lack of Marketing
“Build it and they will come” is nonsense. You have to advertise and get on to your markets radar screen in one way or another. Do you know how to get visitors to your website or callers on your phone? Have you factored the cost of placing ads and distributing your advertising material? Having a marketing plan of some description is essential even if it is just an outline one.

Quitting too Soon
Very much related to the above comments, too many business owners quit just before they are about to see the success. Sometimes they even try another business idea from scratch and end up failing again. Again a proper plan and the discipline to see the work through is essential.

This is hardly an exhaustive list but these are perhaps the reasons most business fail – is your’s going to be the next failure or are you going to ensure you don’t fall in to these traps?

Developing your business plan will force you to think through issues of time and resources among other issues, it will also lead you to setting some targets so that you can gauge whether your plan is working to the timetable or not. Start by thinking about why you wish to be in business for yourself, is it the money? being the boss? creative freedom? time for family? Then, ensure you’re picking on the right business for you.

Picking the right business for you is often a matter of questioning yourself on what it is you are really good at and passionate about! After all, he who works at his passions is not really working at all. Think strongly on this as working on something you’re really interested in help you maintain your stamina in the early stages while you overcome the inevitable hurdles.

Of course the business idea has to make sense in that it has to be capable of producing the income required. You will need to research whether your idea is going to fill a need or at least fill a need better or differently to the competition. Can you charge enough for your product or service to pay the costs and leave enough left over for you?

Think ahead as to how you will complete the many tasks involved in setting up and running the business, are you allowing enough time and funds for the various things you need be they equipment or insurance or running about to banks, accountants, clients etc. Who will help with these tasks, what happens if you fall ill or want to take a holiday?

These are just some of the basics you need to think about in developing your business plan. We’ll return to the business plan in the next post when we look at a possible outline to get you started.