Thursday 9 January 2014

Build A Home Internet Business For Extra Income Stream

Why build a home internet business in the first place?
Believe it or not, the world economy is changing. While
multinational expanding to global economy, employees are the
most vulnerable group of people. Therefore, looking into
a secondary income like build a home internet business become
an increasing viable option for many.
Why you choose to build an Internet based business among other
business opportunities our there?
There are a few good reasons why Internet based business is a viable
start for most employed people who want an extra stream income
for financial security.
Low Cost- Choose a low start-up and low maintenance business
idea to work with.
Easily Access To The Market Place - The Internet can reach out to
the global market place without you stepping out from your home.
Flexible Time - An Internet business allows you to choose your time to work.
For example, most people will spend one to 2 hours after work hour on it.
Learn Extra Crucial Survival Skill - While you are holding on to your day
job, you gift yourself an opportunity to develop a crucial survival skill.
Can Do It From Anywhere - Since Internet can be easily access either from home
or public place like Internet Cafe or library, you can choose to work anywhere
you like.
Low Risk - The risk to build a home Internet business is rather low compared to
other types of business like a franchise.
Leverage - When your Internet business is up and running, you need not be there
physically at a shop to run your business.
The Barriers
However, there are a few barriers that may hinder you from starting a home
Internet business.
Technology- A Internet business model can be complicated if you have
to start from scratch.
The Know-how - Though there are a number of turn-key Internet business around
to resolve your technology barrier, you still need the knowledge how and where
market your Internet home business.
After knowing the advantages of an Internet home business and it possible barriers,
many people get stuck at the next step, which is evaluating and selecting a
good home business.
Key Criteria To Consider When Evaluating An Internet Home Business
The first and most important rule to remember when
you looking for a home based business is the one
that
a. Works For You
Often times the best Internet business idea you can come up
with is one that you will have fun doing, the product you like
and must be in demand across the Internet world.
b. Have A Good Marketing System
The second rule you should remember when selecting the best
home internet business is if there is a good marketing system
in place. The sales page and follow-up email must be there ready
for you to convert visitors to customers.
c. Have A Strong support System
It is crucial to get a company who has a physical back office
and staff like the CEO, Training Officer and Support Team who will be there
for you. Their commitment to support you is a key factor to differentiate
a good company from the rest.
d. Have A Local Support Team
Like most beginners, you do not know all the possible ways to get
your business running. But with a local support team, who will
coach you how to get a fast start, will definitely same you some
previous time, effort and dollars.
e. Show Evidence Of Success
Your home Internet business must have show evidence of
success for at least pass a year. Better still, the company
must be evaluated by main stream business analyst for their
credibility and stability.
f. Helps You To Produce Residual Income
The best of the Internet business opportunities usually have a
a very good tracking system that will track your returning customers
and therefore pay you commission again and again. Residual income
reword will make your marketing effort worthwhile.
g. Can Create Leverage For Your Effort
Why not get rewarded when your customer refer other customers
to purchase? Some Internet business company rewards you for your
effort of helping other to build a home Internet business. These
business model enable to create a huge leverage on other people's
effort.
h. Pay You Promptly And Hassle Free
One of the most important but always overlooked by many Internet marketers is
how you get paid. From my years of Internet home business marketing experience, many companies
still send their checks using snail mails. This causes two major issues to
International affiliates. Firstly, the checks arrive about 2 months later.
Secondly, hefty bank charges due to international check clearance.
Some Internet based home business company have started using electronic
means to pay you directly to your account. Prompt and bank-charges free payment
is an important aspect to consider while you select an Internet based business
especially if you are not with the North America region.

Wednesday 8 January 2014

Building a Home Internet Business - 6 Block Cash Pulling System

Are you willing to know how my six steps help me to build a home internet business and earn money out of it? In this article you can see some points to learn for your business.
Step 1 - Create a Squeeze Page.
Here squeeze page is very important technique in building a home internet business very quickly.
Here site owners or vendors gather email and contact information of visitors and they keep updating about their upcoming products for future business.
This is one kind of request to get name and email address to record that data for future transaction.
You can provide your subscribers some valuable gift like free e-book, report, video and e-commerce to grab their attention towards your home Internet business.
Step 2 - Setup Your Autoresponder System.
This is auto responding system that is been developed by the business owner to attain more customers or clients by providing auto generated mail which have useful information about new products and services, in this way they bind their clients for future.
Step 3 - Attract Tons of Traffic.
To attain or grab more and more traffic is a necessary step of internet business. Then and then one can earn money from that traffic.
For building a home internet business you have to attract traffic to your squeeze page.
There are various tactics like article writing, blogging, search engine optimization, social networking etc for getting heavy traffic for your site.
More traffic will generate more business and potential clients but for this you have to put in efforts to attract targeted traffic to your website using several traffic generation tactics.
Step 4 - Build a Relationship.
Relationship is very important in building a home Internet business for a long run because more contacts also bring more business for you through mouth publicity.
You can build relation via daily updating your website news, weekly emails about growth and upcoming products and services etc. if you keep updating this on regular basis then your door will be knocked by clients for sure and you can see high demands of your hot products.
Step 5 - Now Sell Them Something.
Now it's time to build a home Internet business widely by selling something that your clients or visitors are willing to buy from you.
Once you satisfy them by offering something, which is very crucial for them on daily basis, then you see constant flow of income towards your bank account.
Step 6 - Track Your Conversion.
Most important thing for building a home Internet business is to make sure that you are going in right manner or not, means whether you are spending your time and money in right direction or not?
For this it is very important to track each and every move of your website visitors and your sales conversion rate.
That's it. Now you have enough knowledge & guidance to build a home Internet business easily.

Tuesday 7 January 2014

14 Unique Ideas for Window Treatments



I love thinking of unique ways to upgrade something basic and turn it into something custom and special. When it comes to window treatments a small customization can go a long way. I've rounded up some of my favorite ideas to take your window treatments to a whole new level! 


1. Another take on the striped curtain is to do it with smaller stripes. I really like how these stripes are spaced far apart and kept really thin. It seems like you could create this look with some Ikea curtains and ribbon. 



2. I love the way this roman shade is trimmed. It's a fun idea to keep the valance and the trim the same. 

Miles Redd for House Beautiful 

3. I think adding a color block to plain white curtains makes them extra dramatic! 


image via Samantha Pynn

4. This idea takes the bottom banded color look to a new level! By adding a thinner separate band it breaks up the bottom color and the white curtains. 



5. I am so blow away by this scalloped detail in a contrasting color on these window treatments. If you look closer you can see the scallop was even trimmed out in another color. I love attention to detail like that. 

Photo by Laurey W. Glenn for Southern Living magazine

6. Who doesn't love a good grey key trim! You could add it in any color to a pair of white curtains and get a luxe look! 


7. This curtain concept is really interesting. It looks like they did a sheer up top and maybe a silk for the rest. 


8. I think we've seen that you can add color stripes any which way on curtains and it always looks fabulous! I like this idea of adding the bands of color to the top and bottom. 




image via signed by Tina

9. I think the unique shape of these roman shades makes them so beautiful and I love how they are trimmed out in red to add even more drama! 


image via SF Gate

10. Although you don't often see the lining I think it's a fun idea to add a bright color for a little wow factor. 



11. We've seen stripes all the way up a panel but this take on the striped curtain is really unique! What a good idea to just do stripes on the lower half of the panels. 


image via Lonny

12. A great pattern can really be enhanced by a dramatic color. The red on these shades totally pops off of that floral fabric. 


photo via Bijou and Boheme

13. I thought the idea of adding a ruffle hem to the bottom of a curtain panel was genius! How sweet would this be in a nursery.  



14. It looks like these sophisticated roman shades got a little dose of fun with a pink ribbon fringe. 

Fore more great window treatment ideas visit my Pinterest page.

Monday 6 January 2014

Flower arranging inspiration...pink and lime

One last look back at 2013, I just have to share the flowers from my Christmas table with you.  I knew I was going to use pomegranates and ended up selecting of pinks and limes, with a few white touches, to go with them.
I was really pleased with how they turned out, many thanks to Antonia from Ruby Slipper Floral Design for her invaluable tips on how to create this type of centrepiece, see her tutorial here.  I would not have had the confidence to tackle these without her guidance.



From left: pomegranate, Christmas flower, green amaranthus, pale pink David Austin rose, lisianthus
Greenery: gardenias and viburnum

Step 1: Start by creating a green frame with the viburnum, gardenias, and Christmas flowers. (see above).
Step 2: Add the pomegranates and roses (for how to arrange with pomegranates see here)
Step 3: Finish with the lisianthus and amaranthus - love how the amaranthus drapes!

The fresh lime of the amaranthus and soft pink lisianthus looked wonderful together, next time I may use these on their own.

It looked wonderful with the gold polka dot table cloth, and the whole house was filled with the gorgeous scent of David Austin roses and gardenias.

Antonia and I are planning to work together again this year, if you have any arrangements you would like to know how to make let me know.

{Arrangements, flower selection and all photos by Eva of Build House Home}

A peek at our new place


Words cannot even describe how happy we are to be in our new place... we're still surrounded by mess for the most part, and it will take weeks or months more before we're truly settled in, but to have this space of our own back, and to finally enjoy the fruits of nine long months of waiting... pure awesomeness. :)

I'm going to whine for one more minute about the process, and then you'll never hear a peep about it from me again. But for posterity's sake, I feel the need to mention one more time how frustrating it was to get here.

This is not a custom home. It's a small (by Texas standards), 2200 square foot track home, albeit a very beautiful quality one, which is why we chose the builder we chose. However, in the interest of sales, we were essentially deceived into believing our home would take four to five months to build, when this was contrary to everything our builder most definitely knew about the upcoming process. We said to ourselves it would probably take about six months, since these things never go as planned, and we signed on the dotted lines. From there on out, absolutely NOTHING went as planned. We signed the first week of April, and framing didn't even go up 'til mid July. Our "worst case scenario" October move-in date rolled around, and the home had barely just been drywalled. Then we were told we'd be in by November. Then we were told we'd be in by Thanksgiving. Then we were told we'd be in by December 16th or sooner. But in reality, we closed the day after Christmas, just after construction manager number four had taken over.

The truth of the matter is that we would have never in a million years chosen to build if we'd known it would take nine months, and if we'd known we would impose on my mom's hospitality for four months longer than we estimated, but it is what it is, and we're here now, and we have a really lovely home to show for it. So that's that.

Here's a little glimpse of the mess we're so, so glad and grateful to finally call home...


Last Week's Links


1 || Amy Meier is one of my design heros. I love this room reveal.
2 || Way to go Kim! This video is beautiful.
3 || I had no idea you could make your own birthday candles.
4 || Any little girl would love this DIY crown.
5 || Teeny tiny adorable shoes.
6 || If you've ever wanted to reupholster a chair on your own this tutorial is perfect for you!


7 || My kids will love this snow ice cream
8 || Pretty sure I could wear these earrings every single day. 
9 || This is a hairstyle even I could handle. 
10 || This trench looks far more expensive then it is. 

top photo: Amy Meier Design // bottom photo: Gimme Some Oven

DISCLOSURE: COMPENSATED AFFILIATE LINKS USED

Friday 3 January 2014

Changes to Story of My Life in 2014

Because this picture makes me chuckle. Gracie is like "no more pictures, ma!"

Happy third of January, my friends! Hope you had a fabulous week-after-Christmas as we're all easing back into regular life. My office is still a bit chaotic here, but I've cleared off a nice little space for myself, and I'm mostly back in business. :)

I've been wanting to outline the changes you'll be seeing here on SOML in the coming months, most notably to how I run my advertising. To cut to the chase, I will be majorly scaling back the advertorial content on this blog - to the tune of no more Friday Features and less sidebar ads in general. The content on this blog will be purely my own, with the exception of a (maybe) weekly giveaway, occasional courtesy-of items worked into style posts as usual, and very occasional reviews if I'm offered an opportunity I think you'll enjoy hearing about. 

Why am I cutting back on advertising, you ask? For a couple main reasons, really. One, my attention has turned a great deal towards my photography business (which has much more income-earning potential than this blog), and I don't feel I have the time and energy to run a really booming blog-business anymore. I don't like to half-ass things, so something had to give. I was previously running giveaways on Tuesdays and Friday Features on Fridays, which put a lot of pressure on me to put up lots of other original content in between those posts. That isn't sustainable for me anymore, as my clients and my business have to be my #1 priority. So, no more Friday Features. 

My second over-arching reason for this is because blogging has not felt fun for me in a long time. I started this blog way-back-when in 2010 because I love to write and I love to connect with people, and then it morphed and changed into something else for a while (more of a business), and that was totally OK while it lasted. I have zero regrets. But that way of running things doesn't work for me anymore, and so I'm changing it. I'm going to get back to my roots a bit and blog because I love to write and I love to create good content that comes from an inspired place - a place I haven't been in far too long.

So what does that mean for you? Not really a whole lot, I guess. You'll just see less advertorial stuff (which, let's face it, no one really loves as much as original content anyway), and probably a little less posting in general. I'm going to aim for about three times per week. 

Also, if you have been thinking about advertising with me, here's a little more info on the changes now in place for my sponsors:

+ there will now be no more than 20 sidebar sponsor ads at a time (where previously there were 30-35)
+ sidebar ads are now more affordable to reflect the fact that blogger-sponsors will no longer receive a   
  "feature," however I didn't drop the prices TOO low because I still expect you'll receive a lot of good 
   traffic since there are about 33% less sidebar ads to compete with on click-throughs. 
+ Shop sponsor ad spots cost a tad bit more because they also come with an individual giveaway, 
   which brings a lot more exposure to your business than just the sidebar ad alone.  

All pricing info and more details HERE. I will be accepting new sponsors beginning in February, as I am still currently phasing out some sidebar ads to bring my tally down to 20. 

On a final note, thank you all for sticking with me as this blog (and me! and my life!) has changed bit by bit. I don't know where I would be right now without this supportive community and how it's helped me to come into myself, so to speak. I am forever grateful and indebted. I am still about two solid months behind on emails, so if you've written me a personal note lately, I WILL respond sometime in 2014. Hehe. Thank you again for your patience.

HAPPY FRIDAY!

Feature Friday: Houston House

Today I am featuring the home of blogger Ashley from the blog Houston House. Here is what she says she loves most about here home:

My favorite part about our house is that it's comfortable. I love spaces that are not only pretty to look at but are easily lived in as well. Spaces that invite you to kick off your shoes and stay a while. Our home makes me want to do just that. 

Enjoy! 










Read more about this room here





Read more about this room here









You can read more about this room here







Read more about this room here





Read more about this room here

Thanks to Ashley for letting me feature her home. Make sure you check out her blog here