Similar to what frequently occurred during the Gold Rush in days of yore, business people who wish to obtain sales prospects or viable and potential customers made use of business leads (as gold prospectors identified sites that were teeming with valuable ore that contained gold). The importance of leads to almost any type of business cannot be stressed enough, as leads such as these help provide the seller with prospective customers, with which he or she can close deals and finalize agreements towards sales of a companies products or services. Sales or business leads are conventionally thought to be the initial step in any sales procedure or process.As an increasing number of profitable small-scale and large companies in the world today have been started from many an entrepreneurs home, home based business leads are also applicable to these types of businesses. Home business leads may be found in the form of a single individual who can potentially do business with ones company, or by way of another entity that ones company can work with. Sales people, whether these are individuals who work from home or within the confines of an office, may choose to locate business leads independently through various means. Accumulating more home based business leads may result in an actual sale, a business agreement between two companies, or simply the opportunity for one entity to give another a business proposal via a presentation.Leads can also be amassed or accumulated via various modern methods, such as those comprised by Internet lead generation. The marketing term ‘lead generation’ may be defined as the process of creating a list of possible customers or leads through evoking interest in a company or in business products or services, or encouraging any business-related inquiries. Simple lead generation may be accomplished by contacting potential business partners or customers through the phone, or more contemporary means such as e-mail newsletters but the end goal of methods like these is to acquire more revenue with new business contacts such as individual customers or numerous companies.Home based business leads may also be found in sign-up or opt-in forms that advertisers use, as these may require the potential lead to input his or her full name, company or business name, related contact information, and demographic data (which the inquiring company or entity can use not just for purposes of lead generation, but also for the streamlining of the companies promotional or advertising campaigns, and the improvement of ones offered services or products). Home business leads also comprise marketing leads, aside from sales leads.

One of the keys to succeeding in information product creation is to break the process up into discrete steps. This frequently isn’t an instinctive reaction for the typical information marketer. Especially on the internet where small sized learning products are the norm.

However, it is extremely important to your ultimate success. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if you don’t do this you probably won’t succeed… even when you are starting out let alone as you move forward.

Your product creation system should do this for you if only to help you to understand the overall task.

But why?

In this article, I’m going to ignore chunking and focus on the practical aspects. That’s not to say that chunking isn’t important. It is. It’s important to understanding and to learning the process. But while you can use the same chunks as you move forward, long term your focus needs to be on the operation of the system not the understanding of it. Unless of course you are constantly training new people!

So why is chunking important to long term use of the product creation process? (Yes, I know systems design uses a different term for this process but I’m not teaching you systems design. So I’m going to use the word learning content designers use.)

The first reason that having individual discrete tasks is important is one of schedule estimation. Frequently it is very difficult to estimate how long the total task of creating a product will take. After all, the size and type of the products matters as does the number of products in your product funnel. And those are just the most obvious elements. However, estimating a discrete task is often much easier. The total can then be estimated as the total of the discrete tasks.

Secondly, scheduling a large task can be problematic. However, by segmenting the task into a number of discrete tasks, you gain a much greater flexibility in scheduling. Not only that but as your business begins to add people you are able to schedule multiple people to the product creation.

Finally, segmenting a large task into smaller discrete tasks allows you to have much better control over the product creation. This affects two different areas — status and quality.

By segmenting your process into discrete tasks you are able to schedule and record the progress at much more detailed level. As a result you are more in control of the status of the product creation. You know what everyone is doing. When they should complete it. And how much it should cost. You also know exactly what has been done.

You also improve your overall quality. Instead of waiting until everything is done you can check quality as you go. This allows you to immediate react to low quality products without absorbing their costs. This means that you have less rework and your rework costs less. And if the product is not going to meet its quality requirement you will know about it in time to stop the development, change the requirement or fix the product.

The benefits to having your own home based business are very exciting. You can be your own boss! You decide when you want to work. You go to work straight from the bedroom. Not having to deal with traffic, rude clients or demanding bosses can be quite a relief.But wait a minute, have you seriously thought about what kind of small home based business opportunity you should bank your future on?Before you start your own small home based business, do the following and you’ll get your home based business off to a good start.What marketable skills do you have that you can use to work from home? Some examples of people who have made a good transition to home based businesses are accountants, sewers, teachers as tutors or educators of toddlers, musicians who teach musical instruments, etc… If you have a skill, you can market it and have a home based business.What’s your capital and operating budget? Even businesses from homes need capital investment. Find out what your home based business needs. It can be as simple as having space for office files and to meet clients. Your home based business still needs the veneer of professionalism.How do you get clients for your own based business? You can start with your present company. Some companies are happy to pay for outsourcing services. The specialist they’ve hired is knowledgeable about them and can be trusted. From there you can add on more clients.Advertising and promoting your home-based business is crucial. That’s right…even if it’s a small home based business, you’ll need to advertise and promote. Print your business cards on the home printer, and distribute them. Or put your company details on a promotional calendar and give it away for the holidays. These are small things to do for your home based business, but they do make a big difference.Lastly, add up your monthly expenses and check your savings and insurance. When your home based business starts, you may not gross enough. Make a projected budget and see what the bare minimum you can live on while the home based business is just starting out.By doing your research on home based business opportunities and educating yourself on the various scenarios, you’ll set yourself up for success. For you’ll be better equipped on solving future problems such as competition taking business from you, low cash flow and any other problem that may crop up as your home based business grows.Reference: [http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/resources/article.php?mcid=1&scid=12&aid=1258]Copyright 2005 Kent Thompson