Successful businesses require the diligent effort of the individual entrepreneur. Success-ful businesses have clearly identified their product or service, their market, and the competition. A person considering a home-based business needs to gather a variety of information about starting a business. Own-ers may need help to carefully evaluate the business potential of their ideas. Many people have good ideas for a business but fail because of poor planning.
Planning involves making in-formed, thoughtful decisions.
Such careful development of a business can enhance the chance of suc-cess. By writing down ideas, fuzzy thinking can be clarified and needs or gaps in knowledge can be identified. Many home-based businesses are financed by family, relatives, and friends. Few entrepreneurs successfully obtain outside venture capital. What Communities Can Do to Help What the community does to foster the development of home-based businesses is almost as important as what individual entrepreneurs do.