If you have ever baked a cake and did not follow the directions in the recipe, you may have had an inedible disaster. If you are lucky (and creative) you may be able to rescue it by crumbling it over ice cream, or some other way to think of cake.
It’s pretty much the same with most things – there are correct ways to do things, and some ways work better than others. Some things lend themselves to creativity in that you can sometimes do them slightly differently and they will still work. You may even be able to improve upon them. For others though it is imperative that you stick to the recipe if you want the same results as you envision – for example our cake.
When you are doing something new, that you have never done before or that you are really not sure of how to do it exactly, it is a logical conclusion to realize you need some direction. Even the hyper-creative or non-conformist should have some frame of reference – or ‘ballpark’ idea of what is involved at least in getting started.
Following directions requires a certain amount of humility but it doesn’t mean you are not in charge of your own business or that you are working for someone else again. You just need a plan and some idea of what to do, where to get what you need to do it – just general direction at the least.
With art for example you can’t learn ‘talent’ – you either have it or you don’t. However even someone with great talent will likely need to learn technique and do some experimenting before they find their ‘niche’ or to find the medium that they can excel at. Someone with little talent or experience who has a real desire to learn how to do something well, can often develop their expertise.
The point is it is probably best to have some kind of expert advice at the least when you are thinking about starting a home business. You can actually benefit and save yourself buckets of money and time if you are willing to consider what those with a successful track record have to share with you in the way of information and more.
With that said, what worked in 1998 in many cases, will have played itself out by now, as people are learning more and developing tools and resources that we can use ‘off the shelf’, rather than to have to learn a programming language or anything super-technical. Each generation of software for example often has more ease of use as well as ‘upgraded’ capabilities.
We just need to be aware of and try to understand to the best of our ability what, where, why and how to. If one is very analytical it would be to their advantage, as long as they know when to stop analyzing and start taking action with what they know. This is a fine art in itself and many people hide behind learning and never feel they know enough to actually do it. This is a mistake.
With any business that requires marketing and advertising (and they all do if you want to attract customers and income), it is best if you get started as soon as possible. Even while you are still learning, because it requires lots of momentum to be building at all times. This is because not everyone you reach will respond and you need to eliminate them to find the people who are interested and will take action.
For example at getting started soonest, at point A you learn you will need to use an autoresponder for your business; and you will need to load it with messages and create a list of prospects to send them to.
First you would do a comparative analysis of good autoresponder companies and see what the costs are, what the functions are, and determine the superior one with a good reputation that you can afford. Then you would either start composing your messages or enlist the help of a ghostwriter or copywriter.
Next, for an online business you would need to create a ‘web form’ for people to add their email address to (‘opt-in’) from your website or blog. If you have the money to accelerate this process you may participate in a ‘list building’ program or send out ‘solo ads’ that invite someone to receive information from you. To incentivize you might want to add a free gift for doing so.
So each one of these steps requires analysis and making a decision based on your own situation. If you skipped one step you may create chaos and confusion (and waste) because you will not be able to do what you intend unless you have covered each detail sufficiently.
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