Helen – Page 244 – Business Plus Baby

April 15, 2011April 13, 2011

Balancing The Family Budget with Becky Goddard-Hill

Have you checked out Baby Budgeting? Becky Goddard-Hill is the author of How to Afford Time Off With Your Baby and Baby Budgeting is her blog. Both the book and the blog are packed full of useful advice for balancing the family budget for mums who want to take a career break to spend more time with their young children.

What I like about Becky is she’s determined that she will not only balance the budget but that her family will have fun doing it. So she’s turned what could have been a few years of penny-pinching into a really positive lifestyle where mums can enjoy their family time, see more of their children’s grandparents and and build the a community that wouldn’t have been possible if they worked full-time.

I also admire the way Becky leapt into blogging – she’s grown her readership incredibly fast and was a finalist for The MADs (Mums and Dad bloggers) Awards last year. She ‘s never afraid to try new things with her blog, which is why I was great to see her in this video…

Plus it’s really nice to actually see Becky because up until now I’ve only known her by blog and email! The video has some useful tips for budgeting with a family, including the recent changes to the UK’s child tax credit and child trust fund, so it’s well worth a watch.

Becky may be taking time off with her babies, but she’s got all the qualities of a true mumpreneur!

April 14, 2011January 23, 2012

Running a Business without Having to Travel

For work at home mums, travel is the ultimate enemy as it will take up a huge amount of time and take you away from your child. Indeed, a day spent going to visit a client will force you to arrange child-care and break up your daily routine. This is the kind of hassle no one needs, especially if you are juggling a busy home life and a growing business. Luckily, modern tools like international conference calls can let you cut out travel almost entirely.

Any major business deal will involve meeting in some way shape or form – yet nowadays there is no need to be in the same location. By setting up a conference call you can speak to everyone involved, and come to an arrangement. This means you don’t need to leave your home and can look after your little one while working at the same time. These systems are quite cheap and are very easy to use – if you feel the need to meet face-to-face you can opt to use Skype which allows people to chat for free via webcam.

The internet also offers a raft of tools that will allow you to work with people without actually being in the same room as them. This innovation is being led by Google Documents which will let you work on documents at the same time as one of your colleagues or clients – this allows you to create superb, collaborative pieces from the comfort of your own home. This innovation, which is known as cloud computing, is becoming very popular and many companies are starting to adopt it.

These tools make it much easier to work efficiently without leaving your own home. In fact sometimes it is far easier to do business this way as you can dedicate time that would have been spent on travel to preparation and research.

photo credit: swanksalot

I Started a Business With Kids: Libby Hill of Smart Talkers Pre-School Communication Groups

Tell us a little about your business

I have Small Talk Speech & Language Therapy which runs Smart Talkers Pre-School Communication Groups. The speech therapy side deals with children with all types of speech, language or communication difficulty. We work in their homes, nurseries or schools. The groups, however, are for all children to help them achieve their potential; we do this in a fun way with puppets, stories games and songs. Both the speech therapy and the groups have started to be franchised. Communication is so important for many reasons but if spoken language skills are delayed then it will have a major bearing at school. We can all improve our communication skills.

What was your job before starting your business?

I worked with my ex-husband in a business we set up together, manufacturing and supplying garden buildings. We’d also had a property development business and were in partnership with another couple to own a bar (called Libby’s!) in a local town. Continue reading “I Started a Business With Kids: Libby Hill of Smart Talkers Pre-School Communication Groups”

April 8, 2011April 4, 2011

Overwhelmed By Business Advice? Try This…

One of my weaknesses is my talent for over-complicating things. Whenever I have an idea, it usually expands into a massive project that would take me years to work through. And that’s not good while I’m working part-time around children.

Like many mums of small children, my life is very much online these days because it’s hard to travel far. Especially last week, when we were grounded by chicken pox. That means I’m exposed to a mind-blowing amount of information about running a business.

I think being a mum actually makes this worse. On top of all the practical info about marketing, legal requirements and tax, you’ve got the work-life balance, confidence-building, dressing-for-success stuff as well as all the guilt-inducing articles about being a good parent.

That doesn’t help me simplify things, that’s for sure.

Last week the UK Government announced their Start Up Britain campaign to help British entrepreneurs. It seems to have been widely slated by the small business community, but it was thrown together in less than a month (why?!) so let’s hope it gets better. Start Up Britain’s top tips are…

1. Find a great idea

2. Write a business plan

3. Get a free start up kit

4. Create a logo

So far it’s looking pretty straightforward, which makes a refreshing change. But great ideas don’t simply pop out of thin air – I should know, I worked through so many business ideas that I wrote a book about it! Most small business owners see a business plan only as a means of getting a loan from the bank and there’s no point in getting a logo unless you’re pretty sure your business idea is going to fly.

Not so helpful?

That’s why I loved the way JFDI Britain (presumably ‘Just F****** Do It’) was set up in response. JFDI Britain says…

“Contrary to popular belief, thousands of people create wealth in the UK everyday without great ideas, business plans, startup kits or logos.

You can too by following three simple steps and applying one golden rule:

STEP 1) Create something that would be useful for you and thus others

STEP 2) Keep changing it, whilst listening to and delighting customers

STEP 3) Cash is king, so find a way to get money from their pockets into yours

GOLDEN RULE: Don’t spend more time or money than you can afford to lose

Which is the most useful piece of business advice I’ve had in a long time.

So from now on I’m going to put aside my messing about with details and JFDI.

Want to join me?

photo credit: TinyTall

April 6, 2011April 6, 2011

I Started a Business With Toddlers: Alison Pinto of Menus4Mums

Hello, my name is Alison Pinto. I’m Mum to two children, and I run www.menus4mums.co.uk. Menus4mums is an online family meal planning service which helps busy parents save time and money and put tasty, nutritious dinners on the table for their families. Members get a new menu plan each week for dinners the whole family will enjoy, with recipe cards and a handy shopping list broken down into supermarket aisles. What sets us apart is that the meals take advantage of supermarket special offers to keep grocery bills down – especially useful during the Credit Crunch! Continue reading “I Started a Business With Toddlers: Alison Pinto of Menus4Mums”