Introduction 1 About This Book 1 Conventions Used in This Book 2 What You''re Not to Read 2 Foolish Assumptions 3 How This Book is Organized 3 Part I: Getting Started with Micro-Entrepreneurship 3 Part II: Finding Great Micro-Entrepreneurship Ideas 4 Part III: Marketing and Selling Your Micro-Business 4 Part IV: Considering Taxes and Legal Issues 4 Part V: The Part of Tens 5 Icons Used in This Book 5 Where to Go from Here 5 Part I: Getting Started with Micro-Entrepreneurship 7 Chapter 1: Micro-Entrepreneurship 101: Just the Basics, Please 9 Understanding What Being a Micro-Entrepreneur Means 10 Following your path to be a micro-entrepreneur 10 Figuring out whether you have what it takes to be a micro-entrepreneur 11 Recognizing potential opportunities 11 Deciding What Type of Business Works for You 12 Making Your Micro-Business Noticeable 13 Advertising your services or products 14 Identifying your market 14 Communicating with your clients 14 Marketing your business 14 Being Aware of Taxes and Other Issues 15 Getting others to help you in your business 15 Growing your business 16 Tackling taxes (but fortunately no death) 16 Chapter 2: Knowing Your Path as a Micro-Entrepreneur 17 Recognizing Whether You Need a Formal Business Plan 17 Eyeing What Your Business Plan Addresses 18 Naming the Type of Business Plan You Have 20 Looking Closer at a Business Plan and What It Constitutes 21 Updating Your Business Plan 24 Creating Your Business Plan: Helpful Resources to Review 25 Making Other Stops on Your Path 26 Making Your Business Path Easier: Tools for the Road 27 Going online for some education 28 Teleconferencing or videoconferencing 28 Using open-source software 29 Organizing and being more productive 29 Relying on colleagues 29 Chapter 3: Understanding Yourself: What Makes You Tick 31 Tapping Into the Process of Starting Your Business 31 Doing your 10-10 list to find your passion 32 Focusing on where enjoyment meets competence 34 Figuring out your personality and the type of entrepreneur you are 35 Remembering your great moments 36 Recognizing the Qualities You Need to Be a Micro-Entrepreneur 36 Having initiative 36 Being able to prioritize 37 Managing your time 38 Staying focused 38 Striving for excellence 39 Being persistent 39 Showing creativity 40 Beginning Your Business Life 40 Recognizing why starting at home makes sense 41 Setting up your environment 42 Chapter 4: Setting Up Your Internet Presence 45 Having a Web Presence: Something You Need as a Micro-Entrepreneur 45 Creating Your Website 46 Doing some pre-planning 46 Recognizing the four basic elements 47 Tackling marketing considerations after your website is up 52 Setting up Your Blog 53 Deciding on your blog''s purpose 53 Figuring out the blog''s set-up in advance 54 Understanding a blog''s features 55 Tapping into blogging resources 56 Marketing your blog 57 Considering Other Alternatives to Give You a Web Presence 58 Facebook 58 LinkedIn 58 Chapter 5: Honing In on Opportunities 59 Identifying Customers; Differentiating between Their Wants and Needs 60 Knowing the lifetime value of a customer 60 Recognizing the type of market: Horizontal or vertical 61 Eyeing the Basic Categories of Successful Home Businesses 61 Category one: The problem solver 62 Category two: Anticipating a megatrend 62 Category three: A combination 64 Getting the Lowdown on Niches: What to Focus Your Business On 64 Choosing the right niche for you 64 Recognizing recession-proof niches 65 Seasonal niches 67 Good times niches 68 Special interest niches 69 Searching for Success: Finding the Information You Need 69 Researching niches 69 Viewing educational tutorials 70 Searching news sites for information 71 Perusing article directories 71 Testing opportunities 72 Relying on Your Background for Opportunities 72 Avoiding Fraud 73 Steering Clear of Liability Problems and Other Legal Issues 74 Part II: Finding Great Micro-Entrepreneurship Ideas 77 Chapter 6: Creating Your Arts and Crafts Micro-Business from Scratch 79 From Nothing to Something Good: Entering the World of Arts and Crafts 79 Making your art and craft and a profit at the same time 80 Finding the raw materials 83 Buying wholesale 84 Touring the World of Crafts 84 Adding Beauty and Profit 85 Selling Your Creations: Focus on Etsy 86 Setting up on Etsy 86 Selling on Etsy 87 Identifying Other Online Selling Venues 87 Eyeing Offline Selling Opportunities 89 Focusing on the Four Rs 89 Chapter 7: Selling Other Stuff: The Golden Rules of Success 91 Identifying Your Selling Options 92 Understanding What You''ll Sell: Specialize and Understand Value 94 Finding Items to Sell: Buy Low 95 Buying from individuals 95 Buying from businesses 96 Buying from the government 97 Making a Profit: Sell Higher 98 Going the eBay Route 99 Listing on eBay 100 Managing ongoing auctions 103 When your auction expires 104 Chapter 8: Selling Your Services 105 Knowing Who Your Prospective Clients are 106 Focusing on consumers 106 Capitalizing on companies 107 Selling to government agencies 108 Meeting and Finding Prospective Clients 108 Horizontal venues 109 Vertical venues 109 Directly via search engines and directories 110 Hooking Up with Elance and Other Horizontal Sites 110 Identifying the client 111 Signing up and understanding the set-up process 112 Grasping how the bidding process works 113 Gaining the assignment: Now what? 114 Maximizing your Elance success 114 Becoming a Virtual Assistant 116 Recognizing what a virtual assistant does 116 Marketing yourself and finding work 117 Micro-Tasking for Small Bucks 118 Using Fiverr 118 Investigating more about micro-tasking 119 Chapter 9: Writing for Money 121 Discovering the Writer inside You 121 Cultivating important writing skills 121 Grasping some important business skills 123 Identifying your equipment needs 124 Avoiding pitfalls in freelance writing 124 Choose Your Writing Specialty 125 Blogging in the blogosphere 126 Providing website content 126 Locating Places That Pay for Writing 129 Finding websites for cold, hard cash 129 Perusing freelance writing resources 130 Accessing other freelance resources 131 Getting Paid Multiple Times 132 Chapter 10: Getting Into Self-Publishing 133 Tapping into Written Self-Publishing 134 Getting started 134 Naming your self-publishing tools 135 Considering your delivery option: Digital and physical together 136 Identifying the different types of written self-publishing 137 Using resources for written self-publishing 140 Trying the Audio Publishing Route 140 Recognizing the formats you can use 141 Creating your audio product 142 Seeing what equipment you need 144 Considering Video Publishing 144 Spelling out the ins and outs to video 145 Creating your own video 146 Knowing what equipment you need 147 Using YouTube 148 Handling Legal and Management Stuff 149 Getting an ISBN 149 Respecting copyright 149 Stating your disclaimer 150 Setting up your ecommerce for digital content 150 Chapter 11: Being a Successful Affiliate 153 The Lowdown on Affiliate Programs 153 Eyeing the pros and cons of being an affiliate 154 Knowing the types of affiliate programs 155 Viewing additional resources for more info 156 Starting As a Beginning Affiliate 157 Step 1: Discover your interest 157 Step 2: Identify your competence 158 Step 3: Investigate before deciding 158 Step 4: Select your marketing approach 159 Step 5: Focus and be persistent 160 Spotlighting the Top Affiliate Sites 161 Clickbank 161 Commission Junction 165 Amazon 166 Chapter 12: Cashing In on Advertising 169 Generating Cash from Advertising: Spotlight on AdSense 170 Content is king 170 Keywords are queen 171 Ad placement is the third consideration 172 Tracking and changing your approach 174 Identifying other advertising sources that pay you 175 Getting Customers and Sales with Pay-Per-Click: AdWords or AdCenter 176 The lowdown on PPC and how it works 177 Creating your first PPC ad 180 Keywords 101: Just the basics 184 Part III: Marketing and Selling Your Micro-Business 187 Chapter 13: Understanding Your Marketing Approach 189 Identifying Your Target Market 189 Understanding the importance of having a target market 190 Choosing your target market: The how-to 190 Researching and focusing on your target market 192 Knowing where your target market is 193 Identifying Your Competitors 194 Positioning yourself versus your competitors 195