When you’re first starting out on your home business journey, you’re generally a.) excited, b.) scared shitless, or c.) both. The fear generally comes from the fact that you have no clients and no money and the possibility of sleeping in a cardboard box seems quite likely.

Home business growth traditionally comes verrrrrrrrrrry, verrrrrrrrrrry slowly and then at some tipping point explodes to the point of ridiculousness. (Just ask the charming gentlemen who hang out at Men With Pens.) If you’re in the beginning phases, though, it seems like the tipping point is either so far into the future that you can’t see it or completely impossible.

This growth explosion usually comes by word of mouth. Word of mouth is awesome, but you have to have a few mouths going before you can benefit from it. There are a bunch of ways you can do this, but today we’ll tackle barter. Read More

So I’m in a sex shop today, because that’s the kind of thing I do on a Tuesday morning. (And they ask me why I run a home business.)

It’s fairly new, and it’s one of those women’s only deals that markets nice things, not sleazy things. Body balms, belly dancing costumes, very lovey dovey. It’s a good idea, and from what I can tell, business is going gangbusters. (Do things “go gangbusters” or do they “do gangbusters”? Is “gangbusters” really a word I should be using when discussing sex shops?)

So I go in and it’s all pink lighting and nice displays and there is a zero sleaze factor. There’s even a sign on the door that says, very politely, that they don’t sell novelty items so don’t even ask. Everything is going well. My could-be shopping experience is all good. Read More

IttyBiz has been awful busy lately, and I figured I’d give y’all an update on what’s going down at the home business HQ.

IttyBiz and Brazen Careerist Get Together To Make Sweet, Sweet Love

Brazen Careerist is:

“We’re an online career center aimed at Generation Y — young professionals who want to design and define their careers using the new rules for success.

“The Brazen Careerist network is made up of a vibrant, curious and ambitious group of career-minded bloggers, passionately covering a variety of fields: personal development, entrepreneurship, public relations, technology, marketing, and politics, each blog offers a unique, informed perspective to our ever-expanding audience.”

They’ve included me in that network of bloggers, which is damn nice of them, wouldn’t you say?

IttyBiz and Alltop Get Together To Make Equally Sweet, Sweet Love

Moving on to the lovely folks at Alltop: Read More

This is a guest post from Mark Dykeman of Broadcasting Brain. It takes a brave man to tackle a Moral of the Story post. I told him I’d post this last Tuesday. You’ll notice I am a little late. This is because I am a deeply flawed human being. Thanks for your patience, Mark.

“You canna change the laws of physics, Captain!” I don’t know if Mr. Scott actually said that classic phrase in a Star Trek movie or episode, but I learned that lesson very well during one of my summer jobs. It was a messy, embarrassing, humbling experience. Since this is IttyBiz, and Naomi slipped away for a few minutes, I’m going to share this story with you. Because that’s what IttyBiz is about — embarrassingly personal stories that (should) teach someone a lesson! Read More

“So what do you actually do for a living?”

This question came to me in an email from somebody I know. I clicked ‘reply’ and was all set to type out an answer when something very disturbing occurred to me. This person reads my blog.

Not just casual reading. Not just you-say-you-read-it-but-I-call-bullshit. The person who wrote this email has commented frequently and we’ve shared emails back and forth on several occasions. I would have thought they would have known.

I took a moment to get all up in arms about how they haven’t been paying attention. Then I got over it. If they don’t know what I do for a living, it’s not exactly their fault, is it? Read More