Dealing with the Holidays and your Business

The Holiday season is usually pretty crazy for most people. We go straight from Thanksgiving into Christmas and then New Years. We have family gatherings to attend, finals in school, end of the year catch up, and don’t forget about the shopping. (That in itself gets me.) It’s like we are running a marathon for 2 months straight. With so much to do, it’s important to stay consistent with your business as well.

Being consistent means just that, you must be consistent at all times. Any time you take a step back, or take a “break” from building your business and marketing, it’s going to take you that much more time later to get your pipeline filled back up again. And I know personally that no matter how much you feel like you need that break right between Thanksgiving & Christmas, it is best to keep pushing forward just a while longer. Why is that? You don’t want to reach the holidays, knowing that there is no way you are expected to or should even be working because that is the time you are meant to be enjoying your families…only to have the guilt lingering in the back of your mind that you really haven’t done much with your business and you can see it starting to dwindle. How can you enjoy your time then?

And it’s not only your own fatigue that can get you down or discouraged during the holidays. Depending on what you do from home, what sort of product or service you have to offer, there are probably quite a few people that have told you that they will have to wait until after the holidays to do anything. This could be due to the fact that cash tends to be tight for most families after the gift giving and traveling that comes at this time of year. Or if you are speaking to people who are considering your business, they may think that it be best to get started after the busy schedules sort of subside in mid January or so, when they will be able to focus on learning something new.

When I start to feel the need for that little break right before the Holidays I simply tell myself that by sticking with it just a while longer, I won’t feel guilty when I do take the time off to be with my family. And by continuing to build that pipeline, you will find that many of those that you have spoke with will in fact be calling you back shortly after the new year begins and the traditional new year’s resolutions are in peak force.

Work At Home is Not For Everyone…

There was a time when I used to ask myself, “who wouldn’t want to work from home?” I mean, isn’t it the most ideal thing to do? Right? (That is if you are able to find something that is legitimate, and actually works the way it is meant to.) I soon came to realize that working from home is NOT for everyone. We are not all built the same, we all have different strengths and weaknesses, and that is what makes us who we are.

One of the most important questions to consider before actually making the decision to work from home is this…Are you capable, and self-motivated enough, to work independently? When you are under your own roof, no one there to watch over you, no boss breathing down the back of your neck, it is easy to let yourself get side-tracked from whatever work it is you are trying to accomplish. The problem with this is that by being your own boss, if you don’t work, you don’t get paid.

The ability to work from home is available to all, but it is only successful for the few that treat it as it is meant to be. As I have stated many times over, “if it’s meant to be, it’s up to me!”

Building a Pipeline

All experienced network marketer’s understand the concept of “building your pipeline.” When a new person decides to join our team, they may not understand what in the heck we are talking about, but they will soon come to find out.

You see, when you first start “prospecting” or calling prospects, it may seem as though everyone is telling you “no.” Why am I not getting anyone calling me back? But I have been calling for like 2 days already, and no one has joined my team yet…Sound familiar??

It’s happened to the best of us. We start to get discouraged, we make fewer and fewer calls over the next few days and then we quit calling all together. Because what’s the point, right?

Wrong! By quitting and giving up, all you have done is guaranteed that no one will ever call you back. If you continue to make those calls, soon enough you will start getting calls from people you may have spoke with 2 weeks, a month ago or longer. You have to build that Pipeline and by doing so you will be creating a constant flow of traffic to your website and your team. All it really takes is time, patience, and a continuous effort on your part in order to set your business to a smooth sail.

I’ve been slacking a bit…

It has been quite some time since I last added anything to my blog, and that is just simply unacceptable. I could come up with a hundred different reasons to try to explain myself, but I am not going to do that. I just simply let “life” get in the way, as we all have done at one point or another.
Anyhow, I am back to posting again. And I don’t plan to stop anytime in the near future. There’s too much that we have not yet covered here, so back to work…not so much work as responsibilities.

Working vs. Playing

Summer-time is one of those times when it seems as though you can find anything and everything to be doing besides the one thing you must do, which is continue to build your at-home business. I know because like so many of you, I am a mom of 3 little fish who would much rather be at the pool then stuck at home trying to find something exciting to do.

I have to admit, with the nice warm days of summer sitting there, begging to be taken advantage of, it’s hard not to find every excuse available to just go running outside, putting my work on hold for the time being. But just as I do so, in comes the guilt and the day doesn’t appear to be so much fun anymore. Not only that, but with each hour I push aside until “later,” all I seem to do is continue to build the pile of things that still need to be done until they are a huge, overwhelming mound, of which I must spend the next 3 days catching up on.

That’s why it is key to schedule “work hours” and stick to them, especially in the summer months. By simply setting aside 2-3 hours each day, strictly for the purpose of “working,” you will find that there is plenty of time left to do all the fun stuff, and your business won’t go downhill in the meantime.

To have a successful business from home, you must first and foremost be Consistent and you, and only you, are responsible for your success. It takes effort, but it is definitely worth it, and you will be so glad that you put in that 3 hours each day.

"If it’s meant to be, it’s up to me."

This quote could not be any truer concerning success in any work at home opportunity. When we take the leap, and decide to work for ourselves, from the comfort of our own homes, it’s not always easy to make the decision to actually work. Especially on a nice, hot summer day.

However, I will tell you this…you will get absolutely nowhere by simply going to the beach day in and day out. Or by keeping your house spot-less clean. Not even by spending the day chit-chatting with friends and family. (Even though we would like to tell ourselves, or more so make ourselves believe, that this is Networking…face it, it really just boils down to daily gossip.)

The only way to actually achieve results is by doing! There may not be a boss hanging over head telling you when and how you must do something, but that same boss is also not there to issue you a weekly paycheck. We are our own bosses, and we determine how much our paychecks will be. The only thing left to do is treat your home business with the same respect you would if you were in a traditional office.

Schedule time out of each day to do your prospecting. (And ONLY do prospecting…) Make sure your family and friends know when your “business hours” are, and that you will not be taking any personal calls or visits during that time.

Just because you work from home, doesn’t mean that your work is any less important than your neighbor who works a 9 to 5. Give it the time and credit it deserves and you will soon begin to reap the results.

Using your time efficiently

As you may have noticed? It has been a little longer than I would have liked since I last posted here. I apologize. That is why I have decided that there is no better time than now to stress how important scheduling your time is.

Personally, I have many different projects that I am currently working on. That is actually nothing to relatively new. However, I failed to sit down and set up a plan as to how I would start to accomplish each task. In doing so, I spent more time than I should have on certain projects and not nearly enough on others.

I honestly believe that if you plan to be successful in any work at home opportunity, you must create a schedule and follow through with it! A few of the areas that are extremely important, especially for me personally, are…

1. Set a specific time to handle emails. Let’s say for 30 minutes at 8am, noon & 4pm, then maybe once before you shut down for the evening. That may seem like a lot to some, but if you would see the amount of emails that I get on a daily basis…if I do not stay on top of things, it can definitely get a bit overwhelming at times trying to catch back up.
2. Start your day with a good, solid 2-3 hour period to get all of your prospecting done. It is inevitable that you are going to have to call people. Who you call, that’s up to you. I don’t do cold calls, you may. All I’m saying is to be successful you need to talk to people. So, if you are like most people, this is the one area that is most difficult to stick with in the beginning. The phone may feel as though it weighs a ton, at least for the first few calls. But I assure you it will get lighter. Setting your hours so that you do nothing except make calls from 9am-noon will bring your business to new levels. Just think of it like this…by noon, you will actually be done working, if you would like to that is. You will have the entire rest of the day to do whatever you would like.
3. Schedule cleaning time and household chores. (This is huge) Often times, we as work at home business owners, will find all sorts of things that could be done around the house. I was so guilty of this at one point. I would find anything & everything I could think of that needed to be cleaned, just so that I did not have to make calls or do “work.” There is no boss standing over your shoulder making sure you are getting things done. We are the only ones who know if and when we are working. The problem here is that when we do not work, we do not get paid. We are paid on results, not the time we put into it. So, schedule blocks of time throughout the day as to when you will wash dishes, or do the laundry, etc.
   

These are just a few areas that I feel are extremely important in terms of scheduling your time. In doing so, you will also free your mind to be able to concentrate on the task at hand. When your making calls to prospects, you won’t be thinking of how badly the bathroom needs cleaned, or how much laundry you have to do, etc. You will get so much more done in a shorter amount of time, and trust me, it will definitely pay off.

One resource that I have found that is awesome for setting up daily chores for everyone in your household is Chore Buster. It is free to use and you can add every single chore you would do & have it schedule what needs to be done, and what day to do it on.

So, to sum it all up…even if you are the type of person who is not really into doing the whole schedule thing. (I was that person.) Take the time right now to sit down and just do it. You will save yourself so much time, as well as stress, among many other things as well. But the time you will save by doing so will be huge.