POSITIONING YOUR HOME BUSINESS

You may be shaking your head and asking but won’t my home business sell more products or services if I have more of them to offer? The answer is no, not really. What happens is that you end up with too many things to advertise and market for which actually dilutes your place or position in today’s marketplace.

This costs you money, time, and energy that would be better spent on one product or service for your home business. In other words, don’t start out trying to be Wal-Mart. Be a book or e-book seller. This way you have one thing to sell and one thing to advertise for. This means your business has one focus and that makes it easier to position your home business and to promote it.

Finding a niche and filling it also gives you the advantage of narrowing down your competition. For example, one man was looking for a product for his home business. He wanted to do something in the automotive area. After doing some research, he found that there weren’t a lot of people selling truck bed liners. So now he is selling a lot of truck bed liners. Because there was a market for them, there just weren’t people reaching them! Another great example is Nike. Nike didn’t begin with all the products it now makes and sells: It started by making and selling a great running shoe. So be a Nike and go from there.

Finally, focus on what your home business has to offer your customers. Not on what your competition is doing wrong. There are a lot of companies trashing each other these days—and a lot of people are ending up in court because of it. And trashing another business just makes you look petty. So concentrate on what your business does well. Because ultimately that’s what your customers will use to judge you.

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