My children are getting older, so I dream about once again having an office space. I have three loud boys, and rather than tell them, “Be quiet!” throughout the day, it would be nice to have a quiet room where I can simply close the door when I need to. Ah well, a girl can dream…

This afternoon I had a wonderful phone interview with Laura Sultan, founder of Muslimah Speaks. We had a really good conversation about her website and what inspired her to start it. If you don’t know about this website, do yourself a favor and go there now. It’s such an empowering website for and about Muslim women.

How is your week going so far? Let us know what you’re up to.

Jummah Mubarak everyone! It’s been a busy week behind the scenes here at Muslimahs Working at Home. I’m working on a number of things including :

• The return of Saturday’s Muslimahs Business Spotlight. I’ve REALLY missed this! I love profiling Muslimah-owned businesses. They can be a great source of inspiration for someone who is trying to achieve the goal of entrepreneurship. Contact me if you’d like to have your business profiled.
• Tips for Marketing Your Home-Based Business (without going broke). An essential guide for anyone interested in attracting more customers and generating more sales.
• More information about where to find work-at-home jobs. Lots of sisters have contacted me asking for advice on finding companies that hire home-based workers. They just want a legitimate way to earn money from home. Although I focus mainly on starting a home-based business, I want to support ALL women looking to earn a living at home, insha’Allah. Soon you’ll notice more information available about work-at-home companies.

If you have a question you’d like me to elaborate on here at Muslimahs Working at Home, please contact me anytime. If you have a question about a certain topic, chances are someone else has the same question and we can share information to help everyone, masha’Allah.

I also welcome you to feel free to comment on any of the blog posts in this site. It’s a wonderful way to start a conversation. I know you’re reading because I receive emails from sisters each week. I’m very greatful for your interest and support.

Last, but not least, check out my most recent article over at American Muslim Mom, 7 Tips for Building and Working your LinkedIn Network. I’ve found LinkedIn to be a very valuable networking and marketing tool for my businesses. Insha’Allah you’ll find these tips useful in your own business.

Did you know you can make money as an assistant from your kitchen table? With the Internet and basic technology, you can provide a valuable service to clients around the world. Best of all, you can be online up and working in just a few short days as a professional virtual assistant.

Lots of small business owners and entrepreneurs, online as well as offline, rely on the administrative expertise of virtual Assistants.

What is a Virtual Assistant?

A virtual assistant is someone who provides administrative help. Instead of working in an office environment, they provide the work online. As a virtual assistant you might communicate with your clients via email or a project management system.

You can specialize in a specific task, for example, managing a forum or an affiliate team. Or you can offer a variety of administrative services. You can also specialize in an industry.

What Do You Need to Get Started as a Virtual Assistant?

• Computer with Internet connection
• Software to support your administrative services
• Telephone and related equipment like a headset so you can talk hands free
• Website to market your services
• Business Plan – Your plan will your business goals, marketing strategy, audience, services, policies and procedures and so on.
• Contact information – Email account/telephone number

You probably already have most of this,  and the rest of it can be acquired or created. The one thing you may not already have is a website. A one page website is all you need to get started. Once you have customers you can expand your website. You can add content and grow your business.

Making Money as a Virtual Assistant

Most virtual assistants charge by the hour, however, you might also consider charging by the project. Another option is to charge by the minute, word, or post depending on what service you’re providing. For example, if you’re offering transcription you might charge by the audio minute.

Marketing Your Administrative Business

Like many other businesses, it can be beneficial to specialize. For example you might market yourself as the 24-hour transcriptionist – turning around any transcription order in less than twenty four hours. You might specialize in managing affiliates, scheduling or managing customer service. You might also specialize in an industry. For example, you might focus on offering research for information marketers.

Your website will be your primary marketing tool. It’ll be where people can research your services, rates and view your work if you have any samples or testimonials.

Partnering with another service provider can be a great way to promote your business. For example, you might partner with a website designer who specializes in the same industry you do.

Social networking, advertising, and content marketing all help to build awareness too. Finally, some virtual assistants find great success by offering memberships. For example, you might offer five, ten and fifteen hour memberships. Members get a discount for committing to regular work. And you get regular work.

If you have an interest in offering administrative services and you want to work from home, from your kitchen table, you can do it. Create a plan. Build a website and start making money today.

Many people within the community are in need of help around their homes: the elderly (a fast growing market) new mothers, people with injuries or conditions that make it difficult to move around easily, etc. They need someone to help them, decorate, organize, clean or run errands. This can be a great business to start – especially if you like getting out of the house during the day and enjoy helping others.

What is a Home Helper Business?

A home helper business can involve any number of things. You might offer errand running and scheduling services for the elderly. You might clean homes or offer organization strategies. You could deliver/cook meals and shuttle children. You could offer to come into the home to sit with children while a mother works on other projects (I know a couple of work-at-home Muslimahs who hire other sisters to do this so they can work for a long stretch uninterrupted).The type of services you offer depends on your skills, interests and the needs of your potential customers.

How Does a Home Helper Make Money?

As a home helper you can charge by the hour or a flat rate based on the service. You might even consider creating a membership program. Members could sign up for a specific number of hours each month. Members receive a discount on their membership and you receive predictable income. Consider how you want to charge for your services. Do you want people to pay at the time of service? Or will you bill them at the end of the month?

What Do You Need to Get Started as a Home Helper?

A business plan is your first step. Outline what your business is going to offer. Who are your customers? What are your goals and how will you reach them? Spend some time researching your competition too. Position yourself to stand apart from them by offering a unique value or benefit.

The second step is to decide how you’re going to market your business. I strongly suggest building a website. It doesn’t have to be elaborate – a simple one page brochure site can do the trick. However, you might also consider regularly adding some useful content to your site in the form of articles or blog posts. This will help boost your website in the search engine results. Make sure your website includes a description of each service you provide, rates and contact information.

If you already have good connections in your community, a brochure or postcard and word of mouth might be enough. Consider offering a referral program or loyalty program. Provide incentives to refer your services to others. And provide incentives to use your service repeatedly. For example, after ten hours you get one hour free. You might even hand out punch cards like many coffee shops and restaurants do.

The equipment you need to get started will depend largely on the services you provide. If you’ll be cleaning homes, then you’ll need cleaning supplies. If you’re managing small repair tasks, you’ll need tools. If you’re running errands, you’ll need a car. You’ll most certainly need a business phone and a scheduling system.

All in, you can start a home helper business for less than a hundred dollars easy. You can likely start it for less. If you enjoy helping others and are looking to start your own business consider becoming a home helper.

When I have free time, which has been pretty rare these days, I like to spend time doing creative, crafty projects. I’ve been known to lose myself in a variety of crafty pursuits: refinishing/reupholstering furniture, sewing, knitting, making jewelry and  much more. I have several bookmarked crafty sites that I enjoy perusing. By the way – there are some very impressive Muslimah-owned craft-focused blogs showing up on the web, alhamdullilah!

Do you have a special skill or talent? Can you make things that people value? Are you crafty? If you are, you can make good money. You can turn your hobby into a business. For example, if you knit, you can create an online store. Sell products that you’ve knitted and take orders. It’s a wonderful way to make money doing something you love.

What is a Craft Business?

A craft business is a business you can operate online and off. You can create your own website and store. You can also use services like etsy.com and eBay.com to sell your products. In fact, many people sell handmade jewelry, candles, clothing, accessories and home goods. There’s a growing demand for unique, handmade products. If you have the skills, you can make good money.

What Do You Need to Get Started?

Getting started is fairly simple. You’ll need:

• A computer – so you can communicate with customers and market your product.
• A camera – to photograph your items.
• Product – you’ll want a few items for your inventory and to photograph for your website or store.
• A business plan – how much do you want to make? What expenses do you have? Who is your audience? How will you market your business? How much will your products cost?
• A website or store – Check out services like Etsy and eBay. eBay is an auction site however you can sell handmade goods at a fixed price. Etsy focuses on selling vintage and handmade items. It’s the perfect place to sell your handmade items. At both sites you can create a store. There’s a monthly membership fee but it’s generally less than twenty dollars each month. Both have a built in shopping cart system and payment and fulfillment system.

Tips for Marketing and Growing Your Business

#1 Research other craft businesses. Get online at Etsy and eBay and review their stores and websites. What works? What doesn’t? Before you create your store or website, plan it on paper.

#2 Prosper with partnerships. As a craft business owner you might even partner with other business owner to support each other’s success. For example, if you know someone who makes hand blown glass holiday ornaments and you make hand knitted holiday stockings you might band together to promote each other.

#3 Consider choosing a niche or specialty. It’s easier to find an audience if you have a specialty. For example, if you’re a painter you might enjoy painting a variety of scenes and using a variety of mediums. However, if you specialize you will have an easier time marketing your products. Specialization makes you the go to person for a specific type of product.

If you are a skilled artist or crafter, you can make money with your hobby. Research your target audience. Choose a specialty and set up your store. With a small investment you can begin making money right from your kitchen table.

My very first home-based business six years ago was providing ghostwritten web content for hire. As more and more people took to the web to market their businesses, or establish websites, blogs and e-commerce sites, they quickly realized the saying “content is king” was undoubtedly true. What they also realized is that it takes time to write quality content – time that could be spent creating a more profitable business, so hiring a professional writer made sense. I wrote everything from web page content, blog posts and press releases to case studies and whitepapers for corporations.

As this blog and my other businesses grow, I frequently hire the services of other to get things done. One thing I quickly learned as a contract writer for hire is that there are a lot of people and companies that have no idea how to work with a contract writer.

There are many benefits to hiring someone to write your content. It’s a huge time saver. Instead of spending your time writing you can focus on other income generating activities. Additionally, it may be one of those tasks better left to an expert. If you don’t like writing, or aren’t confident with your writing skills, hiring a contractor makes good business sense.

In order to get the most benefit from your outsourcing experience, consider embracing these five tips for using a contractor to write your content.

#1 Have a Plan for Your Content.

Before you hire someone to write your content, make sure you have a content plan. This includes a plan that identifies your:

• Keywords
• Content goal – what do you want your content to achieve?
• Voice – how do you want the content to sound or feel? For example, warm and friendly or authoritative?

#2 Start Small

Assign your new writer a small project first. For example, start with five blog posts or a short report. Jumping in and asking a new contractor to write 100 articles may be asking for trouble. You want to make sure your writer understands your topic and market first. You also want to make sure their writing style matches your needs. And that they’re reliable.

#3 You Get What You Pay For

You can find a writer that charges a dollar an article and you can find a writer that charges $50 an article. In most cases, you get what you pay for. If you want to be able to instantly publish the content on your blog or website make sure you’re hiring a qualified writer. That doesn’t mean you have to go with the most expensive writer. It does mean that price may not be your most important criteria for hiring a writer.

#4 Provide Feedback.

It’s almost guaranteed that the first project won’t be 100% exactly what you were looking for. It does happen and when you find that writer, keep them! However, in most cases it is extremely helpful to provide feedback. Use the sandwich approach if you want to keep your writer. Tell them what you like about the content so they know for next time. And tell them what needs fixing. A professional writer will respond positively to your feedback.

#5 Keep them Busy.

Once you find a good writing contractor, keep them busy. Writing schedules fill up and you may find that when you have a need, they’re too busy to fill it. If you provide your writer with a steady stream of work, they’ll make room for your content emergencies because they value you as an ongoing client.

Working with a writer can be one of the best business decisions you make. It’s a great way to supplement your writing efforts or to completely replace them. You can also use writers to repurpose and rewrite existing content and maximize your content development and marketing efforts.

Do you enjoy teaching others? Do you have specialty knowledge? Then you can turn your enjoyment for teaching and your specialty knowledge into a business offering tutoring services for hire.

How Does a Tutor Make Money?

As a tutor you have a variety of choices on how you set up your business. You can offer online tutoring. You can offer one-on-one tutoring in you home. You can also offer both. Online you can host your tutoring sessions in chat rooms. You can offer them on a membership site. Or you can pre-record them and offer sessions as information products. People can pay for “how to” sessions.

This means you can charge by the hour, by the membership level, or you can charge for the products your customer purchases.

What You Need To Get Started

The first step is to take some time and choose a tutoring topic or specialty. What are you going to teach? Who are you going to teach it to? What is the best method to teach it? Once you have the answers to these questions you can begin to create a business plan. The plan will include your business goals, pricing, competition and marketing ideas or strategy.

You’ll also need a bit of equipment. You’ll want a computer and an internet connection. You’ll also want to create a website to promote your business. If you’re holding tutoring sessions online you’ll need a means to make this happen. You can use a chat room or video conferencing. If you are creating how to tutoring sessions then you’ll need a video camera or screen capture software depending on your topic and how you want to teach it.

Marketing Your Tutoring Business

Your website may be the most powerful marketing tool you have. Content published on your website will attract potential customers. Your website will increase your visibility making it easy for anyone seeking tutoring services online to find you and help establish your credibility. It will convince people to hire you to help them learn.

In addition to your website, you might advertise online. Consider also embracing the power of social networking (Facebook, Twitter, Google+) to spread the word about your services.

Partnerships are another way to build a business and a clientele. Once you have a few customers you might want to start a referral program. Reward participants for referring new customers to you.

If you’re going to be primarily tutoring in your home, consider posting flyers around town. You might also connect with relevant business owners. For example, if you’re teaching people how to use a computer or computer software you might connect with computer retailers.

Finally, email marketing is extremely successful. It is a way to connect with people, offer value in the form of a newsletter, and to also market yourself. You can build a subscriber base by offering a free video tutorial or report in exchange for an email address.

What is your specialty? How can you use this knowledge to help others? If you enjoy teaching and you are looking to own your own business consider becoming a tutor. You can make a living helping others.

Do you enjoy traveling or talking about places you’ve been? If so, you can start your own halal travel website. This type of niche website has the potential to make a good income. Best of all, you can easily start it from home.

What is a Halal Travel Website?

A halal travel website focuses on a specific location in the world. It provides all of the information a Muslim visitor might want to know. If you live in a destination city or region, then you can create a site about your home town. You can also choose an area that you love and build your information around that location.

For example, if you’ve been to Honolulu, Hawaii a few times and enjoyed your time there, then you might create a website about all of the Halal places in Honolulu that would interest Muslim Travelers. You’d highlight local masjids, activities, halal restaurants, halal hotels and places to stay. You might also provide reviews, maps, halal travel travel information (maybe recommend a Halal travel travel guide if there’s one in the area?), and itineraries. A halal travel website is essentially an information website. You provide information about the area. You can include articles, videos and an abundance of travel and travel planning resources.

How Does a Halal Travel Website Make Money?

The key to a successful and profitable Halal travel website is to choose a destination that is in demand but doesn’t have too much competition. You could also specialize in a travel topic like halal hotels, halal restaurants or a hala cruise for example. Narrowing in on a specialization, or a niche, will help you attract targeted traffic. This will result in more profits for you.

The profits will come in the form of selling advertising space to businesses that have the same target audience you do. You can also earn money from pay per click advertising programs like Google AdSense. Much of your income may come from affiliate commissions. For example, you might choose to be an affiliate for a halal tour guide organization or travel agency. Each website visitor who clicks on your link to the company and makes a reservation earns you a commission.

How Do You Get Started?

There are really only three things you need to get started. You’ll want to research and find a travel destination that has a good demand and not too much competition. You’ll also want a solid business plan. In your plan you’ll outline who your audience is, what your business goals are and how you are going to reach those goals.

Finally, you’ll need a website. Consider a theme based website like WordPress. They’re easy to set up. They’re inexpensive. And they’re easy for your visitors to navigate.

If you enjoy traveling and talking about the places you’ve been, consider starting your own halal travel website. It can be a fun home-based business business to own and a great way to build residual income.

When I first decided to start my own business, it didn’t occur to me to seek out a mentor. Looking back, I realize having someone with experience to turn to when I needed guidance would have reduced the learning curve dramatically. I had been employed by various companies since the age of 18 and understood very little about what it really took to be self-employed.

I logged in lots of time lurking on blogs, websites, forums and reading “how to” books. Some of the information I collected was helpful, but most of it was either vague or regurgitated from another source. Eventually I discovered a way to earn the income I needed, but a mentor might have made the process progress more smoothly and happen more quickly.

If you’ve been thinking of starting your own small business but have no idea where to start, a mentor may be just what you need. Here are some tips to help you find the right small business mentor for you and your business:

Understand how to work with a mentor

I speak from experience when I say don’t contact someone asking them to be your mentor if you’re not willing, or able, to do the work. If someone offers to take time away from their business to help you start or develop yours, respect their time by doing what you say you will when you say you will. Nothing is more frustrating than carving out time in your busy schedule for someone who is only putting forth 25% of the work and research necessary to meet their goals.

Contact trade associations

There are several benefits business owners receive from memberships to trade associations. Some even have mentorship programs available. Even if an association doesn’t have an actual mentorship program in place, you can still reach out to fellow members by introducing yourself and asking for advice or direction. Most entrepreneurs are more than happy to provide assistance when asked. Having another business owner available to answer questions and offer guidance is great, but if that business owner is a member of the same trade association as you and happens to serves the same market (or operates in the same profession), you’ll receive much more invaluable advice.

Find someone within your network

Think of all the people you know – family, friends and acquaintances . Do any of these people work for themselves in some capacity? Do you attend meeting locally for small businesses, participate on industry forums or social media? Then you probably have a wide network of valuable contacts at your disposal and you need to start making contact and building relationships.

Offer to work for free as an apprentice or work as an intern

I know this is not the ideal for a lot of people, but it’s an excellent way to get the hands on experience you need and meet people who actually do what you want to do for a living. I interned with a pretty well-known Internet marketing expert about six years ago when I first started building my own web-based business. There was so much I didn’t know, and when an opportunity was presented allowing me to learn from someone I respected who had her own thriving, successful business, I jumped. I knew that even though I was working for free that it was temporary. The knowledge, information and skills I’d get from the experience would more than pay off.

Speaking from personal experience, as someone who has been approached by individuals seeking a mentor relationship and guidance with things like getting a business up and running, bringing in new business, the best advice I can offer to someone seeking a mentor is to make sure the person you contact is qualified to offer advice. Do they already operate a successful business? If not, how can they help you? Before approaching anyone, make sure you do so professionally. Have some sort of business plan (even if it’s only one page long) with measurable goals for your business. Do some research on your target market. Who will be interested in buying what you sell? Most important, be committed to your idea and what it takes to turn your vision into reality.

A few months ago, I posted here that a well-known coach was searching for a general transcriptionist to help out with transcribing her teleseminars and other tasks. Although the position was quickly filled, I received a number of emails and DMs via Twitter asking about it. I even met an incredible woman via email who as a single mother has built quite a successful home business working as a professional transcriptionist. Learning about her success inspired me to explore this potential home-based business idea a bit further.

Transcription is a service that has the potential to become a profitable home business. Believe it or not, general transcriptionists are in demand to handle these sorts of tasks :

• Medical Office Transcription
• Psychiatric Evaluations
• Recorded Statements (Legal)
• Insurance Claims
• Teleconferences
• Teleseminars
• Interviews

Medical and legal transcription typically require specialized training to master the complex terminology. Medical transcriptionists also need to know how to transcribe medical data and hospital records. Legal transcriptionists testimony, depositions, interviews, etc. It’s much easier to become a general transcriptionist. You can choose from a variety of different projects.

Basic equipment requirements for home-based transcriptionists are:

• Computer
• High-speed Internet
• MS. Word
• Headphones (optional, but can make it easier to hear so you can transcribe more accurately)
• Foot pedal (optional – you can get started without a pedal and rely instead on transcription software; but eventually you may want to invest in a pedal will help improve productivity by helping you work faster).

Most audio files are now delivered as digital files.  Downloading a transcription software program makes it easy to get started. Accuracy is very important when working as a transcriptionist. You’ll need good grammar, spelling and proofreading skills. You should also be able to type a minimum of 65 words per minute. You can find several typing tutorials online to help bring your typing skills up to speed if necessary. The transcription process isn’t just about listening and typing what you hear. Sometimes there’s a fair amount of research involved as well.

The best way to gain experience is to start working with companies that hire transcriptionists as contract workers. The rates and requirements will vary from company to company. Here is a list of companies that hire transcriptionists:

•  Tigerfish
• Rapidtext
• Ubiquis
• TASK Transcription Services
• Morningside Partners
• Neal R. Gross
• Cyberdictate

As you gain confidence, accuracy and speed, you may eventually consider branching out and prospecting for private clients on your own. You can make more money without a middleman. Building a reputation as a reliable, productive worker can also lead to more business via client referrals.

If you work as an independent general transcriptionist, share your self-employment experiences.