Technically, there are only three times during the life of your business when you absolutely need a small business coach: when you’re first starting up, when you’re ready to grow and expand, and when you’re ready to move on.

What do most people do? They hire one small business coach to help them start up. Then, they hire another specialty coach when they’re ready to expand and, finally, another business transition coach to help them close out their business.

That’s completely three different coaches for three different stages. And, each time you hire a different business coach, you lose continuity. Is that really what you want?

After all, your start-up coach has been with you from the very beginning, through it all. Thick and thin. She knows everything about you and your business. She’s walked with you through your start-up fears, she’s pulled from you the heart of your business plan, and she knows what dreams you hold for your business.

Do you have any idea how valuable that kind of knowledge is?

Well, let’s say you phase out your relationship with your start-up coach, and it takes you 40 hours to bring your next business coach up to speed. At approximately 0 per hour, that’s at least ,000. And we haven’t even added a dollar amount for your valuable time spent “training” your new coach.

At that price, wouldn’t it be more cost-effective for you to have one business coach who could start up your business, help it grow, and stay with it through its entire life cycle?

Enter, the small business advisor.

What to Look for in a Small Business Advisor

Why do we treat hiring a business coach differently from hiring a financial advisor? You wouldn’t hire three different financial advisors—one; at the beginning of your investment years, one in the middle, and another when you retire—do you? No, you hire one financial advisor with the intent of maintaining a lifetime relationship with her, from beginning investments to retirement dividends.

The same should be considered when hiring a business coach. Instead of thinking “business coach”, think “business advisor.” Instead of thinking “short-term coach”, think “long-term relationship” with a small business advisor who can be with you through the entire life of your business.

Do you think that’s impossible? Think again!

A small business advisor is the golden egg of small business know-how and do-how. She’s not only capable of helping you write your business plan, she can carefully analyze your business circumstances, assess the business market environment, and help you develop a long-term strategic plan that will take you from start-up to exit plan.

Some small business coaches are actually small business advisors, whether or not the title “advisor” is on their business card. Don’t be afraid to ask questions to find out whether or not the coach you’re considering has the desire and the skills to work with your business from beginning to end.

A skilled small-business advisor has the training, skill, and insight to:

+ Understand your goals, your dreams, and your reasons for starting up, growing, and transitioning your business.

+ Create a small business growth strategy that meets your short and long-term needs.

+ Understand the nature of business and offer wise counsel and continuous monitoring that will help ensure that your small business is positioned for success whether the market is booming or fraught with uncertainty.

Most importantly, she is someone you can trust who will be with you from start to finish.

What You Can Expect from a Small Business Advisor

First and foremost: a comprehensive approach.

The first thing she’ll do is sit down with you in order to obtain a comprehensive understanding of your current business situation and find out what you want to accomplish.

Very much like a financial advisor, your small business advisor will ask you questions about your current business, the future of your business, your growth timeline, the level of risk you’re comfortable with, and the return you expect to get when you sell your business.

Periodically, your small-business advisor will want to meet with you to revisit your business strategy to make sure your business is on track. She’ll also work with you to make any necessary adjustments. That way, you can make certain that you’ll reach your business goals.

Just as having a financial advisor manage your investment portfolio makes good financial sense, having a small business advisor who offers a comprehensive, long-term approach also makes good business sense. A trusted small business advisor can add an enormous amount of value by guiding you through the many complicated business challenges you’ll face from start to finish.

So, take advantage of all the expertise your small business advisor has to offer. Share your dreams and goals with her to build a valuable relationship that goes beyond traditional small business coaching to encompass the whole life of your business.

Do not quit your day job. Yes, it is tempting to do so right away and jump into your business with both feet, but remember that until the money comes in, you will still need to pay your bills! So instead of quitting your jobs altogether, go ahead and see if you can cut your hours, and perhaps work part time. If things go well with your business, you can go ahead and quit your job; on the other hand, if things do not go as well as you anticipated, or if perhaps you decide against running a business at this time, you can increase your hours again to full time status.

Save up some money. When you start a business from home, there will be some expenses you will need to be able to pay. Perhaps you need to get permits or licenses, or maybe you simply need to buy some equipment. It is tempting to go ahead and use your credit cards to get started, or if the expenses are great to take out a second mortgage on your home. Do not give in to these temptations, instead, go ahead and save up some money to use it for these reasons.

Create a workspace you will enjoy. Depending on which kind of home business you will start, you will need to have a suitable work area. Make sure that the work area you have mapped out for yourself meets your needs; after all, you will be spending quite a bit of time there!

Create a marketing plan. Whether you are selling a good or service, you want to make sure to get the word out. Networking is important, but do not underestimate the power of email signatures, business cards, and handing out freebies and coupons!

Enjoy your business! You have probably decided to start the business because you want to do something you love and because you want to spend more time with your friends and family. Go ahead and enjoy your business and resist the urge to overwork yourself, especially in the beginning! You do not want to suffer from burnout!

These tips and tricks should help you to start a business from home, keep your sanity, and make it an all around enjoyable process!

Many things make starting an online business so attractive. First, starting a web-based business is much cheaper than starting a brick-and-mortar business. That means you’ll be able to become profitable a lot faster and earn real money from your efforts. The costs of having websites that earn you income online are negligible compared to what other business-owners pay. All you’ll need is web hosting and a domain name, which can cost under .

You’ll also have the ability to reach a large audience of people. The Internet puts you in touch with the world, and a big customer base. If you don’t have a local base that is big enough to support your business, you can definitely find one online.

There are many different ways to earn money online, and you can use one or all of them. The first basic way of earning money online is to create digital information products that you sell from a website. Products can be digitally delivered and, once you set up the website, you can have it running on autopilot, making money for you while you sleep.

You can also make money by selling advertising on a blog or a website. There are many different programs that allow you to sell advertising space on a website. When someone clicks on a link on your website, you’ll receive a few cents to a few dollars in payment. This doesn’t sound like a lot, but it can add up very quickly as you build a good flow of traffic to your site.

The third way to make money online is to become an affiliate for another person’s product. You can use your own website to direct traffic to someone else’s website, where the visitor will have the opportunity to buy a product. When they buy through your link, you’ll make a commission. Commissions on affiliate products can run anywhere from 1 percent to as much as 75 percent, depending on the type of product you choose to promote.

All three of these methods can be combined so that you can have multiple streams of income from the same site. You can create a website on a specific topic and then create your own product to sell there. At the same time, you can sell links for advertising and promote someone else’s product. These three streams of income will give your site long-term earning power.

The only piece missing from this set up is the topic, or niche, that you use for your money-making website. Ideally, you will want to find a topic that has a lot of interest, but not a lot of competition. There are several keyword search tools that can help you determine the right topics that people are interested in. Once you find a good topic to work with, you can start either creating a product, finding advertisers or finding an affiliate product to promote.

This is a simple formula, but it’s very effective for online income. The part that takes time is building traffic to your site, and that’s where you’ll be focusing much of your efforts as an online business owner.

Once you’ve established yourself with one topic and one website, you can move onto the next and create a network of money-making websites that will earn you money over time.