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Thinking about starting a home-based business? While many modern ventures thrive online, a successful home business doesn't always require an internet connection. Many people are running successful internet-based businesses, but countless others find success with more traditional models. The key is to carefully choose the right business that aligns with your skills, interests, and lifestyle.

Starting a home business can be the easy part; deciding what kind of business to run is often the real challenge. So, how do you begin the process of selecting the perfect home business for you? The key is to be methodical, realistic, objective, and patient. Here's a helpful guide for aspiring home entrepreneurs.

Taking a Personal Inventory

The first step is to take stock of your experiences, skills, interests, and personality characteristics. These are your raw ingredients, the foundation of what you have to work with. Make a list of personal qualities and factors you can bring to a business, including:

• Personal background
• Training and education
• Work and volunteer experience
• Special interests and hobbies
• Leisure activities
• Your personality and temperament

These qualities and factors define what you know and what you excel at. However, knowing a lot about something or being good at it is different from enjoying it enough to make it your career. Review your list and remove anything you don't genuinely enjoy or aren't interested in, regardless of how skilled you are. If you're fortunate enough to like what you're good at, as a general rule, stick with what you know.

Matching Your Skills with Business Ideas

Once you've identified what you enjoy and are good at, brainstorm how these attributes can translate into marketable activities. Consider various categories:

• Crafts: Pottery, ceramics, jewelry making
• Health and Fitness: Aerobics instructor, network marketing for health products, home health care services
• Household Services: Cleaning, gardening, personal shopping, organizing
• Professional Services: Attorney, architect, interior designer, consultant
• Personal Services: Makeup artist, hairdresser, personal trainer
• Business Services: Business plan writer, meeting planner, virtual assistant
• Wholesale Sales: Antique dealer, specialty product distributor
• Retail Sales: Children's clothing, niche products
• Computers: Web design, internet training, tech support

This is not an exhaustive list, but it gives you an idea of the possibilities. By the time you're done, you'll have a list of potential matches between your skills and interests and viable home business ideas.

Researching Your Home Business Idea

Next, identify the ideas you believe have marketable potential and research whether that belief is accurate. For an idea to have marketable potential, it must satisfy the following criteria:

• It must satisfy or create a need in the market. The golden rule for any business is to either find or create a need and then fill it.
• It must have longevity. If your idea is trendy or faddish, it might not last. Focus on substance over fleeting trends.
• It must be unique. This doesn't mean you have to invent something entirely new, but there should be some aspect of your product or service that sets it apart from the competition. This is often easier if you target a niche market rather than trying to appeal to everyone. Don't try to be all things to all people; you'll likely end up being too little to too many.
• It must not be an oversaturated market. The more competition you face, the harder it will be to make your mark. While no competition can be a red flag (either no market or a market controlled by a few giants), you want healthy competition where you can differentiate yourself. If you can't compete on uniqueness, you'll be forced to compete on price, which can significantly reduce your profit margin.
• You must be able to price competitively yet profitably. The price you set for your product or service must allow you to compete effectively, be acceptable to consumers, and return a fair profit. If any of these three elements are off, consider moving on to another idea.
• Your business must fit with your lifestyle. If you're a parent of young children and want to work from home to be with them, a business requiring frequent client meetings outside the home might not work. Instead, choose a business that can be conducted entirely from your home office.
• Your financial resources must be sufficient to launch and sustain the business until it becomes profitable. No business is profitable from day one, but some break even faster than others. A business requiring significant initial capital (e.g., computer, printer, software for a web design business) will take longer to break even than one primarily relying on your existing knowledge, like working as an attorney from home. If you need to keep your day job while building your business, it will naturally take longer to achieve profitability. Do what you need to do.

Developing a Business Plan

Once you've gone through the process above and identified what appears to be the right business for you, the final "gut check" is to write a business plan. Treat it as if you were presenting it to a bank for financing. Include sections for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT analysis), and set clear goals for what your business needs to achieve, by when, and how you will get there.

Even if you don't intend to seek outside financing, taking the time to write a business plan forces you to focus on critical issues. This discipline will help you look at your idea through objective and realistic eyes. If your idea passes the business plan test, you can be reasonably confident it's the right business for you. If you feel hesitant, uncertain, or unsure after this exercise, either conduct more research (if the hesitancy is due to a lack of information) or discard the idea (if you don't think it will succeed). If that happens, simply repeat the research and planning steps until you find an idea and a business plan you're confident will work!

While it can be frustrating to wait once you've decided to start a home business, this is truly a situation where patience pays off. By taking a methodical, systematic, and disciplined approach to identifying the right home business for you, you give your venture the best possible chance for long-term survival and can avoid costly mistakes along the way. So, if you're ready to step into the world of home-based business and profits, start with careful planning.