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What If Your Business Goes Away?Don't Put All Your Eggs In One Basket Yank Elliott
As a home-business entrepreneur you have spent a lot of time and money building your company. You have advertised, built and promoted one or more URLs, and maybe developed an e-mail list. Repeat customers for your products have been your constant goal. Suddenly your company tells you it can’t afford to continue in business. It will close its doors and shut down all websites tomorrow! Just as bad may be an announcement they have sold out to another company. Sales and mergers are seldom beneficial to people (other than the owners) associated with the sold company. Usually many company operations are already in place with the new owner. People performing the same tasks in the bought company are terminated. New compensation plans are put in place. If you are an affiliate or associate a new plan may reduce or eliminate your income. That is your worst fear! Should your product or service become obsolete you will be out of business. Technology is developing so rapidly that many things are quickly outdated. Even if your product is still useable people will buy the latest versions rather than your old one. The company supplying you with merchandise may execute actions beyond your control which are illegal. Some government body like the Federal Trade Commission or the Food and Drug Administration may put them out of business. You will have nothing to sell. These are all worst-case scenarios but they happen many times every day. Probably someone you know has experienced some of these. With the advent of thousands of Internet business opportunities the possibility of disaster is multiplied many times. A prime idea behind a home-based business is never having to work for an employer. You control your destiny and you get all of the rewards. Entrepreneurs must concentrate on only a few things. Stay focused on your business and avoid going off in all directions at once. With all the hype about great opportunities it’s easy to be distracted. While you remain focused on only a few things you still need to utilize the methods of very wealthy people. They all have several different “streams of income”. So should you. The reasons we’ll discuss are much different from merely making money. What we’re talking about is continuing to have any money at all! Some of the newer business opportunities are filled with many risks. They are subject to the same financial and market risks that have always been associated with every business. Everyone knows about the disasters of many dot.coms whose leaders thought the Internet was different from basic economics. Some of you may have suffered if your business was built around one of these companies that failed. Network marketing, or MLM, is another very effective business model for many people. Those who have been in this kind of business long enough have seen many network companies bloom and quickly fade away. Imagine if you had put in a great amount of time, effort, and money, built a successful down line organization, and suddenly your company goes away? The Internet has provided the concept of affiliate business programs. Some of them are very profitable. But, who owns the companies offering these affiliate opportunities? Most of them are individuals with an uncertain life expectancy just like you and me. Even if incorporated, they are still owned by one person or family. When the owner dies, the company dies. Or it may be sold to an unknown party whose attitudes and methods you know nothing about. The new owner may abolish the affiliate program or make it so you can’t make any money. There are many ways your business can go away, but these should make the point. Don’t put all your business eggs in one basket. If you do, and you drive over a bumpy road, you’ll have a big basket of broken business eggs! What can you do if your business fails? 1. Failure of your business causes personal devastation as well as financial distress. You may need professional counseling. The hard thing to remember is it’s not the end of the world. 2. Get up. 3. Start moving. 4. Move on with your life. 5. Treat losing your business like you would losing your job. See what you have and begin to rebuild. These are some resources you can salvage: 1. Your business knowledge and abilities. Consider these while you look for a new business. 2. The mailing list from your old business has all your customers and contacts. This information places you way ahead with whatever you do next. You won’t need to begin from nothing; you have a list! 3. If you were a MLM operation you still have a down line of contacts for your new project. They already know you. This makes it easier for you go get them involved with you again. 4. You have met many other people just by having been in a business. They may be able to help you. 5. Because you already have an office you don’t need office equipment. The place for your new endeavor is all ready to go. 6. If your business was your only income source you will need to curtail spending for a while. 7. The new opportunity will require some amount of money. Keep it small until you can see things beginning to work. 8. Immediately stop expenses specific to the failed business. 9. Budget whatever financial resources you have and live on these. 10. Choose a few people to consult. Outside experts are best if you can find them. Friends and close acquaintances will keep you from starving to death; they are not good about helping you get ahead. They don’t want you to be more successful than they are, so go outside if you can. Look for one or more businesses to replace your lost income: 1. Spend some time searching the net for businesses that interest you and perhaps you know something about. Don’t waste time learning entirely new stuff. Your time will be better spent working your main businesses which should all require somewhat similar knowledge to operate. 2. Pick three or four to thoroughly investigate. Stay away from those requiring a lot of individual effort unless the unit value is very large. You can only do so much by yourself. It is better to let your website or your down line help you do the work. 3. You may have to go through this looking process several times before you find one or two businesses that will work for you. After a close look just a few will pass your test. 4. When you finish looking you may have a number of prospects. You must restrict the number of things you are doing. All of us have seen websites with banners and buttons flashing all over the place advertising many different companies. These are distracting and ineffective. 5. Find three or four substantial products, services, or opportunities you can build, over time, into the kind of income you want. Then, if one of them goes away, you can find another but your income will continue from the streams that remain with you. Where can you find businesses? These sources will get you started: 1. This is a site where you can find a lot of different business ideas to replace those you have lost. They have a forum so you can ask others about a business or find answers to business questions( businessownersideacafe.com/bizidea/Welcome.html). 2. You will find reviews of many top-notch affiliate programs here. These are mostly very heavy hitters run by the likes of Ken Evoy, Mark Joyner, and Declan Dunn (ejobsrus.com/listings.htm). 3. Here you can lean about thousands of affiliate and associate programs. You ought to find one or two you like (associateprograms.com/search/index.shtml). The best thing is for none of this to happen to you. But if it does perhaps this report will help you. By reading this you will have found some good business ideas if nothing else.
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