More and more people are looking into working at home, as it has many advantages to it. There are, however, many pitfalls and you can easily fall into negative traps which ultimately can end in failure for your small business.

I now work from home and have been self-employed for over 10 years. I had previously worked in a large office environment and although the pay was quite good, I soon became annoyed at my long commute to work, and also with some of the people I was working with. I have always wanted to be my own boss, set my own hours and be able to take holidays whenever I wanted to. Working from home seemed the perfect answer for me.

I run a small business, and do not employ anybody, it is just me. Now, you may think that this is great, and I have to say for the most part it is. For my business to succeed, I need to work very hard, and I need to keep coming up with new ideas to keep myself motivated, and to keep the business alive. I have to admit, I am not a Monday person, and in the early days, I found it very hard to actually do any work on this particular day. Working on my own and not having anyone to answer to made it very easy for me to just go back to bed for example. This, of course, did not help my business and was something I had to come to terms with.

The first tip therefore, is that you need to have self discipline to make your home based business work. Each week set yourself business goals of what you want to achieve. Treat working from home like you are working in an office, do not be tempted by watching the television, or by any other distraction. You have to ensure you put in the required hours to make the business the success you want it to be.

My second bit of advice is to be careful what you eat. I fell into a trap of eating a lot of snack-type foods, and did not ever feel that I had the time to cook myself a meal for lunch. I soon started to put on weight and this caused me to lose some of my self-confidence. I needed all of my self-confidence to keep up my belief so that I could succeed at working from home. I now make sure that I give myself an hour break for lunch and to re-charge my batteries. I am also careful not to snack in between meals.

Finally, you are likely to experience good months and bad months financially. It is important, therefore, that you start, saving so that when you are having a lower income, you have the cash flow to keep the business going. Also keep some money aside to pay the taxman. When I first became self employed I loved the fact that I didn’t need to pay taxes each month. When I received my yearly tax bill it was quite a shock, however, and I have since started to put an amount aside each month to cover it.

Most businesses have these peaks and troughs. When business is not going so well, it is very easy to become downhearted and even depressed. I found that out by working by myself. I had nobody to pick me up from these lows. I have since realized that feeling sorry for myself is not going to help the situation, therefore I have to work even harder during these periods and that I have to keep thinking positive.