| When you start a home based business, remember, the most crucial element is Marketing. You will need to market yourself / your product. Initially you may not be in a position to employ personnel for marketing, so you will need to handle the marketing yourself.
What is Marketing Yourself?
Marketing yourself is the same as advertising yourself / your product / your services to the potential and existing clients. For this you will need to:
 |
Determine your audience |
|
Determine the needs of your audience |
|
Analyze the information so that you can target your marketing suitably. |
|
Learn everything there is to know, about your client |
Networking
|
Meet people, and the people who matter. |
|
Learn to connect from person to person. |
|
Get referrals |
|
Follow up referrals |
|
Learn to write thank you notes. This will help people remember you or your product. |
|
Attend workshops and seminars |
Tempt Your Clients
Your client is the most important person in your business. Remember clients are always wary of working with someone new. It’s important to build trust and faith. Clients like to test things first, and like to feel comfortable. Once they are satisfied, they will continue to do business with you.
|
Give your clients enough reasons to work with you. |
|
Identify that one thing that they should keep coming back to you for: it can be your expertise, your product, your services etc |
|
Build brand loyalty |
|
Tailor your services to client specifications |
|
Offer value-additions |
Polish Your Skills
Last, but not the least, you need to polish your skills
|
|
Improve your communication skills |
|
Learn the art of patience and perseverance |
|
Try to be assertive, not aggressive |
|
Update your knowledge / skills |
|
Remember, if you stop marketing yourself, you may be out of the game! |
The role and responsibility of entrepreneurs is changing as India changes. This is an important issue to think about, because the nature of entrepreneurship is different in India- it is more complex, complicated and more granular than the West. 
List out business ideas and make your choice. Once you have identified your business idea, find out what you will require eg. Staff, inventory, storage space, communication network, stationary etc 