Making Your Home Business Look More Professional With These Steps

Like it? Share it!

When you start a business online from home, you are starting from scratch. You don’t have an IT team to manage your data and you don’t have a design genius to get your logo from your brain to paper. You don’t have any way to write your website copy (unless you’re excellent with words!). Many new entrepreneurs use as much of their current resources as they can so that they can get their business going, but it takes a little time to get all of this up and running at the same time. You don’t have to be a Fortune 500 wannabe to work from home and run your own business, but you do have to focus on your branding.

You want to be a brand new business, but you also want to be recognized without waiting too long for it to happen. Your brand matters a lot to your business – in fact, your business IS your brand. The problem is that when you start out from home, you’re not going to be as recognized as you expect to be. You’re new, and it takes time to build up your brand into something amazing. You need to make your home business look more professional, and sometimes that means that you start out with a virtual service to answer the phone before growing into having your own PA working in an office with you. So, with all of this in mind, why not consider the following steps to make your home business look more professional?

1. Getting a new phone number for your business is a must more than it is something that’s going to help your business. If you have a separate phone line put into your house, you have a business telephone number for your customers to contact you. This is going to help you to answer the phone professionally and not mix up your personal life and your professional life.
2. Think about your business address. It’s nice to have a virtual service to answer the phone but a PO Box is going to make a big difference. You can set up a mailing address so that your customers can reach you anytime. You can get your mail whenever you want it and this can help you to appeal to your local customers. A PO Box also stops you from having to advertise your home address on your business letterheads.
3. If you haven’t already got your own domain name for your business, you need to invest and do it. People need to be able to find you and a lot of services offer you the chance to take on free domain names when you first sign up. Of course, this means that your business URL is going to be long and impersonal, and that’s just not the look you should be going for. Get your own domain name and invest in it reflecting your brand. It needs to be short and sweet and get your message across in one or two words.
4. We mentioned a physical business address, but you should consider your business email address. The most important thing that you need for your business is your image, and you can make sure that your business looks really good with a professional email address set up and ready to go. Use a good email provider and avoid the “Gmail” trap.
5. A business that wants to look professional is a business with proper business cards. Even in today’s digital world, a business card can go a long way when you have a meeting to get to. Use a professional printing service so that you can save some money and get the business cards that you need.
6. Speak to someone who knows how to write websites and get their help. You need to have a catchy page all about your business and a page on how to contact you, including your social media details. These are the pages that are most important on your website – so do your best with them!
7. Speaking of websites, don’t try to do it yourself unless you are actually a website designer. You want to get the professionals to make the improvements; otherwise you end up with a website that makes no sense. You want a professional website that is usable, pretty to look at and designed by someone who knows exactly how to make your brand the best it can be. A website takes time to build and make secure – this isn’t something that you want to do alone if you’re not experienced with websites.
8. If you are online and selling products, you should command the help of a great photographer. Images sell more than words do, which is why images and vlogs do so well. You need to hire a photographer for your product photos and not use a cell phone with bad lighting. Your home business can be far more professional when you hire the experts. Think of this as an investment.
9. Lastly, you really need to look the part. Just because your business is based from your garage doesn’t mean that you can’t think about getting a uniform and suit up. You’re going to meet clients and you’re going to be out of the office to network. Jeans may be great in some industries, but you need to make an impression. You want your brand to reflect you properly, and you can only do that when you dress the part.

Your home business needs to be a hit and it takes time to build it up into the best thing that it can be. Think about working on the tips above and you’re going to have a professional image in no time at all. It’s all about your brand, right? Well, make it count and make it look like your home business is actually a force of nature in the industry. Eventually, you’ll grow out of the garage and into the office that you always dreamed of working from.

Like it? Share it!