The dream of working from home resonates with many different types of people.

Your reasons for choosing to do so, may differ from someone else, but in essence the benefits are largely the same.

So whether you choose to work from home in order to be available to fetch your kids from school, so that they can be home in the afternoons, instead of at day care, or if you’re a single person, or married with no kids, perhaps the attraction lies in being able to go to work in your pajamas and fluffy slippers, either way there are a multitude of benefits!

Whatever your particular reasons, the following 5 points are facts when you decide to work for yourself, at a home based business.

1.  Better Flexibility

Hey, all you Moms out there in the Workplace, who of us hasn’t cringed at the thought of having to tell our boss that we have to leave to fetch a sick child from school, and then wondered if perhaps *this* is why you keep being skipped over for promotion? Do your childless coworkers roll their eyeballs at you behind your back as you take your child to yet another doctors appointment, because they see this as nothing more than slacking off‘?

The fact is that you immediately have a much greater flexibility over your life when you choose to work for yourself, and particularly so, if that business is run from home.

Do you remember that scene in The Devil Wears Prada where “Nigel” (played by Stanley Tucci) tells “Andrea” (played by Anne Hathaway) that, “For the first time in 18 years, I’m finally going to be able to call the shots in my own life! I’m going to be able to come to Paris, and actually SEE Paris!”

That could be you!

Though realistically, unless you have ridiculous amounts of start up capital, or you actually already live in Paris, chances are you won’t be jetting off immediately.

So, let’s keep it real.

But don’t stop dreaming, because when the going gets tough, if seeing Paris is on your bucket list, it will certainly keep you motivated!

2.  Lower Overheads

If you are able to start up your business from home, naturally, you will save on business premises rental costs. Since most homes these days already have an internet connection and telephones etc, then you may not need to splurge on any large items to start off with, although it may be best to evaluate your existing plans, and factor in the fact that you will now be using more bandwidth etc, so perhaps you may need to upgrade your internet deal.

Even if you are starting out as a photographer, with the really affordable prices of DSLR cameras currently on the market, your startup costs could be relatively small and won’t break the bank either. There is no need to go and buy an entire studio set up, until you have sourced a few clients first. You may even find that you have a knack for shooting without expensive studio equipment, and may decide to focus on outdoor, natural light photography. You never know.

The one expense that you should always remember however, is the designing of a decent business identity, by a reputable graphic designer. This is vitally important that your business immediately has an brand that your future customers can begin to identify with. Also make sure that you factor in marketing costs, as you will need to get the word out in order to begin to source clients.

We’ll cover things like choosing a business name, where to find a good graphic designer in upcoming posts.

3.  Choose Your Clients (You get to call the shots in your own life!)

If you’ve come from a full time position where you’ve been employed by someone else, and you have decided to become a freelancer, then there is a good chance that you have already built up a relationship with some of your clients and they may decide to follow you.

This is the ideal situation for a freelancer, if the client has been a regular, and a prompt payer!

However you are now in a position (if you can afford it) to pick and choose the types of clients that you want to deal with. Do not be tempted to just accept anything (unless you have a family to feed!) in order to make money.

My point really is this: You may have a great interest in cars (for example) and yet the only design work you did at your previous job was on footwear or pharmaceutical campaigns. You are now in an ideal position to target the car related market, in order to begin to do the work you love.

4.  Tax Benefits

Depending on where in the world you live, and whether or not you begin to run your business as a sole proprietor, or register a corporation there may be significant tax benefits associated with running your business from home.

Please note, that it is very wise in this situation to seek advice from a registered accountant or tax advisor in this regard in order to obtain the correct information for your locale and situation.

In some cases, you may be able to claim a portion of your home mortgage payment  as ‘business premises rental’ (in some countries), and you may be able to write off the purchase of items such as computers, faxes, telephone systems against your expenses, providing of course that these items are predominantly used for your home business, which they will be given that you’re going to be working from home!

Again, please seek professional advice on what you can, and cannot do, pertinent to your country’s laws.

5.  Your Achievements are All Yours

No snarky co-worker to steal your thunder!

No one claiming credit for your brilliance!

The joy you will feel at starting your own business, running it successfully and building it into a viable entity will be one of the best achievements in your life. If you’re a WAHM, then even more so, because you did it, with kids on your lap!

I will never forget hearing (on the Ellen Show) how Stephenie Meyer (author of the Twilight series of books), when she wrote the first book, she did so, with her one year old on her lap and TWO other kids at home!  She had never written a book before! She wrote five books in four years, with three kids!  She got 27 rejection letters! She did not give up!  There are great examples of powerful successful women role models all around you. Be inspired by them!

You don’t have to become the next Steve Jobs or Bill Gates in order to consider yourself a success (although their income would be nice right?). Perhaps you’ve built yourself a great little team of Avon sellers, or you set yourself a target of reaching certain measurable goals and you achieved them ahead of schedule. (We will be covering various programmes like Avon, and other home based enterprises aimed at women in greater detail over the coming month).

It doesn’t matter what you decide to do from home, because provided you have the will to succeed, the desire to work hard and the motivation to never give up, then you have at least half the battle already won.

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So you have taken the plunge and decided to start working from home, congratulations!

These are indeed exciting times!

You have a product to sell, and now you want to be able to sell to customers online. Fantastic. But what now?

When Work at Home Moms (WAHMs) start their own business, they very often do not know of many online tools available to help them.

Some mistakenly turn to some of the larger companies, who quickly quote and roll out very expensive, e-commerce and website options, and as a result, many small business are hamstrung right at the start by massive start up costs. If you just do a little research on the web, it  is possible to discover your own way of setting all this up, without the need to sell a few vital internal organs in order to finance it!

Now is a better time than ever to start your own business from home, whether you decide to sell cosmetics, tupperware, scrapbooking supplies like Creative Memories or have your own line of products that you want to bring to market it is far easier than you think, and costs virtually nothing in terms of getting set up to sell these products on line, and better yet, accept credit card payments.

Contrary to popular belief you do not need a merchant account with your local bank, and you do not need a credit card machine sitting next to your phone in order to do this.

Get set up to sell your product online, and accept credit card payments, instantly.

With AlertPay!

Who are AlertPay, and what do they do?

Alertpay are a company that facilitate online transactions securely, much like the much more well known company ‘Paypal‘. However, the difference with Alertpay, is that they allow South Africans to receive money for credit card transactions, whereas Paypal, have restricted South African accounts to only be used for sending money using a credit card.  So in otherwords, Paypal only allows you to BUY goods using their service, but Alertpay allow you to BUY and SELL goods using their service.

Here are the ins and outs of it in a nutshell.

Let’s say that “Jennifer” has just started selling Avon from home. Her friend “Alison” wants to buy moisturizer and lipstick from her and sends her an email (or orders by phone/in person i.e. it doesn’t matter).

Jennifer logs into her Alertpay account, and sends Alison a ‘payment request’. This is easily done with a few clicks, just like sending an email.

Jennifer fills in the amount that Alison needs to pay her for the moisturizer and lipstick and then hits the send button.  Within seconds, Alison has received a secure email from Alertpay asking her to process the payment.  The first time Alison does this, it prompts her to open an Alertpay account (free!), but once she has an account set up, it is a simple matter of clicking through the email, and logging in to her own Alertpay account. She can then simply send the money either using the balance in her Alertpay account (you can hold a balance in electronic funds) or by simply filling in her credit card details, and Jennifers email address.  Jennifer receives the payment, and then sends or delivers the goods as per her arrangement with Alison.

It really is that easy.

Here are some answers to questions that people ask frequently:

1. Opening an AlertPay account is free.
2. There are three different types of accounts, Personal, Personal Pro, and Business.
3. Transacting with Alertpay is secure. At no time does Alert Pay divulge the contents of your credit card details to the vendor. They are an accredited financial institution (based in Canada) who carefully verify each user. You are required to scan and send them a copy of your identity document or passport, as well as a current bill, as per FICA requirements, in order to be an Alertpay VERIFIED user.  Being a VERIFIED user, gives your customers complete peace of mind that you are a real person and not a scam artist!  I have personally been transacting with them for well over a year, and they are fantastic, efficient and really the answer to a WAHM’s prayers when it comes to accepting credit card payments online from customers!
4. How do you get the money? Once you’ve opened an Alertpay account, you can link it to your bank account. Only YOU can choose to ‘upload’ or ‘withdraw’ funds, they are not able to access your bank account for any reason, merely verify that you are the owner of the account, so your Alertpay account and the bank account you choose must be in the same name.
5. To withdraw funds is easy, once your bank account is linked (you can link a savings, cheque or credit card account), you instruct Alertpay to pay all or just a percentage of your Alertpay balance into your bank account. There is a set fee for doing this and it is withdrawn from your balance before they pay the rest into your bank account. It is very low compared to what you would pay if you had to go to the trouble of opening a merchant account, obtain the necessary machines to process card transactions, and then still deal with foreign currency exchange regulations as well – which brings me to my next point:
6. You can accept payment from anyone in the world, and in a very large number of currencies. You can convert from any of these currencies into your local currency (at no charge) before withdrawing the funds to your bank account, saving you even more money.
7. One of the really great things about Alertpay is the ability to send money around the world, quickly and easily especially to friends and family to and from overseas. All they need is an Alertpay account of their own, and your email address.
8. If you hold funds in your Alertpay account, it does not incur any monthly fees, nor does it earn any interest. The amount remains static until you use it or withdraw it.

Alertpay is the fastest way to begin to accept credit cards and earn money through online transactions, and selling your own products and can be an absolutely invaluable tool to WAHMs starting their own business.

Why not sign up for an account now? Remember its free, and one of the most affordable ways of transacting! Your business is a drop in the ocean, and Alertpay is one of the tools that will allow that ripple effect to reach around the globe.