Children in the Home Business Environment

Children in the Home Business Environment

by: Stone Evans

Operating a home business is seldom easy and interruptions come in all shapes, sizes and forms.

Between the family, friends and neighbors who call or come by, and the telemarketers who insist on ringing your number off the hook, getting through the workday can be a real challenge.

When you introduce children into the home office environment, your productivity and patience can be seriously tested.

For example, right now my threeyear old daughter is pulling on my shirt and begging me to read her a story. Clearly, Im in the middle of something important here, but how can I say no to those eyes? Ill be right back…

Ok, that wasnt so bad was it? Shes happy, Im happy (having bonded with my daughter) and now Im back to continue my conversation with you 🙂 Whats the lesson here? Flexibility is a major key to balancing your home business priorities with your familys needs.

I can tell you from firsthand experience that maintaining a deep level of concentration on work in a home business for long periods of time is next to impossible. Naptime does offer some reprieve, but any break from the kids is usually short lived.

Even with older children, summertime introduces new challenges with kids running in and out of the house all throughout the day.

I would like to share with you some of the tips I have discovered to help manage your home office with children in your midst. Since children of different ages pose different challenges, I will present my tips in terms of age groups.

OLDER CHILDREN AND TEENS

We will look at older children first since they pose the least challenge to our work productivity.

Children, who are old enough to understand the idea of schedules and chores, are old enough to understand the needs of your home business. Explain to your children that you do your work at home so that you can be near them when they need you. But also be sure they understand that you must do your work so that you will have the money necessary to keep your house, feed the family and to provide them with money for entertainment.

Once your children understand the necessity of your work, then outline a work schedule and explain it to them. Do make sure they understand that emergencies are definitely an acceptable reason to interrupt your work. Then make sure they understand that between hours x and y, you will be doing work and then hold them to respecting your schedule.

INFANTS

Infants will never understand your needs for work. But fortunately, babies do well under a schedule or routine. Instead of expecting your child to work around your schedule, schedule your work around the needs of your baby.

It is simple. Babies eat, sleep and poop. Sometimes they play. Fortunately, babies sleep more than they do anything else.

Naptime offers the best advantage for getting your work done. Get your baby into a routine of eat, sleep and play, and you will experience unexpected levels of productivity.

TODDLERS

If you have a toddler running around the house while you are operating your home business, then you may find that your hair turning gray or disappearing altogether. But, gray hair is a sign of character, right. 😉

I am venturing to guess that the person who devised the door lock for the inside of the house did so because he had toddlers in his own home. Inside door locks should only be utilized when you are making that important phone call and your toddler is screaming for your attention. At all other times, your door should remain unlocked with your door open.

Develop a routine with your children for meal times, naptimes, and play times. Work these times into your work schedule and adhere to them. If you fail to keep appointments with your children, your children will have less respect for your work and do more to prevent you from the completion of your work.

Don’t be afraid to let your children sit in your lap while you are working. It helps them to feel wanted and it helps them to be a part of your daily life. There are times when it is okay for them to be sitting in your lap while you work, and at other times you need them out of your lap. Don’t be afraid to tell them to get down and go play or read a book so that you can resume your work.

Permit your children to have their toys in your office. Often they will sit contently and play while you work. Just knowing you are near is enough to keep them happy.

Be prepared to take an hourly break to deal with your toddler. Try to do potty breaks at your hourly break and to do drink refills. This can help your child grow into a routine that will work well with your home business. At each break, spend a few minutes with your child giving hugs and kisses and talking with your child about what he or she wants to talk about.

Toddlers don’t always do well with the routine, so be prepared to take a few minutes when needed to give the attention that your child so desperately needs in the moment.

IN CONCLUSION

I hope these tips serve to help you in the challenge of operating a successful home business.

My home business permits me to fulfill my financial obligations *AND* see my children grow up. I would never contemplate trading my home business for another kind of business. Even with the added challenges of dealing with toddlers in my home office, the upsides far outweigh the downsides.

Growing my own home business with children around has definitely given me a new respect for all people who successfully run a home business with kids in the work environment. I tip my hat to you… You deserve it!

About The Author

Stone Evans owns the Home Business Resource Directory where you can find everything youกll ever need to start, run and grow a home based business at: http://www.HomeBusiness.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on March 19, 2004

by Stone Evans

How to use Emotional Content to Increase Visitor R

How to use Emotional Content to Increase Visitor Response

by: John Alexander

Did you know that many folks make กbuying decisionsก when they are moved emotionally? Other traditional medias have made the most of these principles and taken advantage of them for many years, whether it be a TV commercial or an ad in a magazine. People are emotional beings and people make decisions (either good or bad) when they are emotional. If something causes a customer to become upset, they become angry and try and solve it. If they become upset enough…theyกll make a decision to perhaps discontinue your service and hire another service. On a positive side, the TV media bombards us with commercials that try to make an advertisers product seem fun or cute. The กemotional contentก tactic is in nearly every advertising and communication media from print to radio to TV and yes, even the web. Emotional content is used to sell everything from fast food to childrenกs toys.
What every Toy Marketer knows:
Toy marketers have known for years that the focus in a toy commercial is not so much on their new product, as much as it is on the facial expressions of the child. They’re showing the absolute joy and delight of playing with that toy. Often images in the mind of the child who is viewing the commercial might evoke a sense wonder, adventure and excitement. Sometimes, a toy marketer may aim much deeper psychologically by showing the child in their commercial, enjoying their toy with either Mom or Dad sitting on the floor playing with him or her. The child viewing the program may even desire that toy more simply because they think that กif they only they had this toyก, their Mom or Dad might take more time to sit down and play with them too!
Emotional Content in Traditional Marketing:
In the example above, a TV commercial does not focus on the parent…they are selling to the child. However, selling a toy on the web, in an online toy store, is different in the aspect that you are actually selling to the parent (a child does not have a visa card to place an order). The benefits of a toy that appeal to the parent will be things like, itกs safety features, the fact that it กeducationalก. However, focus on appealing to the child might zoom to the top again in a childrenกs entertainment site. If you want to sell a toy, you must make it desirable to have on the childกs level. Most of us who have kids, know the impact and the drive that a child can have towards getting something from a parent. When a child กwantsก something, that child will persistently find a way to go after that item until usually, the parent often gives in and buys it.
What about the silly characters brought to life in a fast food commercial and various the toy giveaway promotions? Certain fast food restaurant marketers know that children have the power to drag their parents to the local fast food place based on the fact that they can get this neat toy. All of this starts by a commercial in which that tiny little toy is made to appeal to the childกs emotions. Is this not true also with certain breakfast food cereals and the กfree prizeก or กgameก you get in every box? Of course as we grow from children to adults, we are not influenced by emotional media elements anymore….or are we. Letกs look now at a few actual examples from my experiences on the web.
On The Web, Emotional Content Influences Peoples กBuying Decision.ก Actually, with the web being a multimedia experience, we have lots of opportunity to work with emotional content. After all, your visitors are just human beings too? We’re really no different online than offline. We have an important emotional side of us that can be appealed to. Hereกs what I have learned from my client successes.

If you are trying to sell a baby crib, but nobody is buying it,…put a cute little baby in the crib and PEOPLE WILL BUY IT!
If you are relying on graphics, photos, animated gifs or any type of images, you want a combination of quality with uniqueness. Will your image make your audience smile or will it make your audience cry? Where might it be appropriate to make your audience cry? Actually, all it takes it the right scenario.
Example: I know of several businesses who are utilizing messages based on the events which occurred September 11 in the US. (The Sept. 11th tragedy in the US). In these examples, the websites selling products are appealing to the visitors sense of patriotism or they may deliver messages of hope and inspiration. As important as these points are, they are also making good sales. In the case of the Sept. 11 example, some sites are selling but also contributing a portion to the cause.
This leads to another thought….be very mindful of current events and current interest topics that you hear about on the media. Sometimes the most obvious strategies can be staring us right in the face. Be mindful of all media topics and in many cases you can bring about some good out of what would otherwise be missed.
Whatever you are selling for retail online….กLifestyle graphicsก work best!
Example: If your selling a piece of furniture for the living room….display a picture of the furniture being used in someoneกs living room. The visitor may say to themselves….กlook at this comfy looking couchก. ‘this guy looks like he is really enjoying himselfก. (The image might be of a person sitting comfortably on the couch, in their living room….feet up and arms relaxed).
TIP: Lifestyle photos like this are much more influencing that just a product displayed in a showroom.
Create pages that are not กhard sellก. Instead, focus on the product benefits in way that it appeals to the emotions. (Keep in mind that many people will buy spontaneously, but they do not want to กbe soldก something). Most people come to a web page in search of information. The กloudก or กhard sellก approach does not work on the web.
If you are promoting something with emotional appeal which is already established through other medias, then also use it in your web page and tie it in.
For example, what do you think of when I say the 3 words…Zoom Zoom Zoom.
Remember the web has the potential to be a powerful multimedia experience. Is there a place for the use of music to contribute to the right atmosphere? Moving your audience just takes a little thought. Let your mind think outside of what is already being done. I am not talking about traditional stuff here, like putting a flash commercial on your site. Extend your creativity and be original. li>Does your product or service offer a solution to people’s problems? Is there a way that it can be promoted with an emotional angle to it for greater impact?
I learned that the use of Humour at times is very important. It can be in the form of text, graphics, audio, and video but just make sure it is good humour. People want to feel good on your clientกs web page. Good humour will influence emotion and กgreat humourก can funnel volumes of traffic into your site just by word of mouth.
Can you recall seeing humour used on a web page that made you laugh out loud? If so, just think back and see if you don’t recall telling a friend to กcheck it outก! Then there may be sites where it might be hard to use humour (A funeral Parlour or perhaps a Divorce Lawyer). On the other hand, with a little creativity, who is to say it could not be done….with greatest of tact of course.
A good example of the power of emotional content can be seen in instance where something about a site is so moving that it makes the viewer want to tell everyone they know!
Example: Interview with God (Very emotional feel good stuff)
Example: Alien Song (a simple 30 second animation that is guaranteed to have you telling your friends to check it out).

So what other ideas might you consider using to make emotional impact with your audience?
Is it possible to take old ideas and put a new spin on them?
What I mean by this is taking some older ideas and refresh them. There is nothing wrong with older concepts if they work, but sometimes all they need is re-thinking. One of the first things I ever experimented with was the idea of having a little fun with the old กprintable couponก idea. You know the old กdiscount couponก which can be put on a Web page so the visitor can print it and bring it in to get a discount? At the time, I thought, what else could we do besides give folks a discount coupon to print off? It needs to be fun and have a little emotional appeal and still deliver value.
I created what I called the กSAY THE MAGIC WORDก campaign for a client.
Instead of printing coupons from my clientกs web site (a local Garage), I introduced the following promotion, which became somewhat popular with the clientกs customers.
When you visit the site, the visitor would scroll down the page and click on the image of a speaker. Suddenly you would hear a voice say ‘the Magic Word Is….ก and it would give you a กwordก. Now this was not just any word, this was quite a magic word because when you take your car into the garage for a tune up, give your keys to the service manager and กsay the Magic Wordก you learned from the web site, they would cut your bill by 15%! Better yet, keep changing the magic word and you kept your audience coming back to the site.
People had fun with it…everyone told their friends about it, it delivered value. Honestly though, it was just a new spin on an old idea, but both the client and customer loved the concept.
I challenge you to put on your thinking cap.
You see as you introduce things like กhumourก or other emotional content into use….you can also widen your scope of SEO promotion. Have you checked the top KEI values around subjects of comedy and humour? Hmmm…Well I guess thatกs an idea to be examined then isn’t it?
Explore your clients business, explore whatกs going on in the world, but always remember the powerful impact that emotional content can deliver, if tastefully done.

About The Author

John Alexander is the Co-Director of Training of Search Engine Workshops with Robin Nobles. Together, they teach 2-day beginner, 3-day advanced, and 5-day all-inclusive กhands onก search engine marketing workshops in locations across the globe. John also teaches online search engine marketing courses through http://www.onlinewebtraining.com, and he’s a member of Wordtracker’s official question support team.

[email protected]

This article was posted on July 28, 2004

by John Alexander

Make Your Child an Executive!

Make Your Child an Executive!

by: Brandy Latshaw

So youกve decided to work from home, but you have one big problem….How do you juggle working from home and taking care of your child at the same time? At 16 months old my daughter is my executive assistant. Find out how you can make your child into an executive assistant.

Crazy?

When you’re working from home you learn how to setup and organize your home office space. One of the things that is essential to this office, if you have little ones at home, is a place for your child! Iกve read a lot of articles that talk about making your home office a quiet space for you to go and work. I have a different perspective on this. Instead of making your office a space that your child shouldn’t be in, why not give them a place to work alongside of you? Crazy? Read on…..

My Daughterกs a Work at Home Mom!

O.K. So you’re asking, if I encourage my child to play in the same room Iกm working in, how am I going to get anything done? One of the ways that your child learns as the grow up, is to immitate the actions of those around them. Especially you! Have you ever really stopped to look at how your child plays on a day to day basis? I was completely amazed to see what Melody does while not under my direct supervision. Sheกs a work at home mom! Allright, so thatกs a bit of a stretch…but she parents her stuffed animals, and กworksก throughout the day. I was astonished to see how much she really imitates my actions. I took this knowledge and used it to develop a play space that she has come to love.

The Executive Secretary is In!

I gave Melody her own office within my home office. My daughter loves working with me every day. I have set up a corner of my office that is just for her. Sheกs got her own little desk and chair set up right next to mine. The desk is packed with coloring books and crayons, puzzles and books. She even has her own phone! Melody loves sitting at her desk and กworkingก while I am working. She also has an easel in the office that has a magnetic board on one side with all different magnets. She loves playing with alphabet magnets. I also have a toybox with a lot of toys that she can play with throughout the day. She loves that she has a space that is กher ownก that she can watch me and play alongside me while I work.

The Boss Needs a Break Too!

So my office isn’t the traditional office that you would find working in the กoutside worldก, and I often trip over toys on my way to work, but it is the perfect office for a work at home mom. My daughter is close to me all day long even if I am working. We even have a work schedule that we follow throughout the day. We take frequent breaks to play. She knows when to expect breaktime so she will be calmer in those times that I am working. I find that having a schedule that we follow really helps her to be happy throughout the day. Melody thrives on a schedule. She knows exactly what time lunch is even though she can’t tell time. At 11:00 each day she comes up to me and says Mommy, กeat eat.ก The schedule keeps her happy and ensures that I spend a good amount of quality time with her each day and don’t get caught up in my work.

My Little Executive Assistant

Itกs really a winwin situation for the both of us. Throughout the day Iกll also give her little tasks to complete. Right now they are easy tasks such as putting the shapes back in her shape ball, or working on completing a puzzle. As she gets older I will start adding crafts and other things that will help her learn while playing in our office. She is my little executive assistant. I realize that this may not be a practical solution for everyoneกs house, but take the concept, and take a look at your กofficeก to see if this might be something that you can incorporate into your life. It is a huge help in our house.

About The Author

Brandy is the webmaster of Melodyกs Mommy and is committed to helping Moms and Dads work from home. She lives in MA with her daughter Melody and is a successful work at home Mom. This article may be used on any site or in any newsletter as long as it is not altered in any way and this signature line remains intact. http://www.melodysmommy.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on March 31

by Brandy Latshaw

กMy Child Has Opie Eye!ก

กMy Child Has Opie Eye!ก

by: Thea Swafford

7:00 a.m., the silence in the house is broken by my childกs call to me, from another room, กMom, please take care of my Opie eye!ก

Huh?…

My mind is spinning trying to process this information, what sort of illness is Opie eye? Is it a variation of Pink eye? What is the cure? What is the cause? Why didn’t I notice it? Why hadn’t I heard of it?

I must be a terrible parent.

My mind goes back the 1960กs sitcom ‘the Andy Griffith Showก where Ron Howard played the sheriffกs young son Opie. This must be the reference for Opie eye, I surmised. I can’t think of a single thing wrong with the adorable little guyกs eyes.

Iกm not doing well sorting this out.

Then I hear it again, กMOM, Puhlease take care of my Opie eye…. I can’t go to school until you do!ก

I decide to go to my child and have a look, perhaps this problem has another name that Iกm familiar with.

As I walk up to her, tilt her head toward the light and have a look at her eyes she says in her best teenage Iกmdisgustedwithyou tone, กWhat ARE you doing?ก

กWhy, Iกm looking at your eyes. Which one is bothering you?ก I counter in my best Doctor Mom voice.

To which she flatly retorts, ‘there is nothing wrong with my eyes.ก

‘then what is all this about you having Opie eye?ข I asked now very confused.

She held out an extended hand with a form and a pen. The form that she wanted signed was saying that I have seen and agree with her Spanish teacherกs guidelines for (are you ready) an Oral Proficiency Interview.

Thatกs right, O.P.I.

In my best Gomer Pyle voice I loudly declare, กShazzam! Andy call Aunt Bee to bake a pie, my child don’t have Opie eye!ก

While we laughed ourselves silly over this early morning incident, it provides a very important lesson in business. Nothing defeats your purpose faster than using acronyms that nobody understands.

I have articles submitted to me for publication every day using acronyms that are meaningless to my readers…. they are not published here. I receive publications everyday, that I can not find the web site because the publication is sent as an acronym and I don’t know or can’t remember what the acronym stands for.

You can’t sell to people that don’t know what you’re talking about. Therefore, by using acronyms you defeat your purpose and I would advise that you stop P.D.Q. (Pretty Darn Quick) It is your job to educate, not intimidate or confuse your clientelle.

About The Author

Thea Swafford is the owner of, The Shepherdกs Inn Inc. and two very successful web sites that focus on helping both the novice and netpreneur to reach their objectives with wisdom and humor.http://TargetedAd.Com and http://SecretsToYourSuccessful.Com, for our free newsletter [email protected]

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This article was posted on September 04, 2003

by Thea Swafford