Remember who your friends are - and why. Your core customer base is reason you're still in business. Take a moment and thank them for their continued patronage. Take particular note of reasons why your most loyal customers stand by you, through good times and bad. Ask them, if necessary. As economy shifts gears, you have an opportunity to discover very profitable facts about your market that can go unnoticed in both recessions and expansions. Learn those facts and refocus your communications appropriately.

Finally, get back to basics. Now's time to take a good look at your business, in light of long-term goals and your original reasons for being in business. Dust off your business plan, reload your mission statement, and evaluate your core communications in terms of fundamental principles that make up your company; use your marketing to not only bring in new business, but to also inspire your company to grow great into vision that gave birth to it in first place.

Your written communications are instrumental to bringing your company's vision into world; coming year is going to bring great opportunity to those businesses prepared to take advantage of it.

As economy shifts gears from recession to expansion, make sure your marketing does as well.

Other important elements to successfully finding work from home include:

-- Opening doors for themselves by starting out as volunteers.

-- Knowing how to network.

-- Having self-discipline and good management skills.

-- Having a supportive supervisor or manager.

Before starting any type of venture it is always helpful to be clear on what that venture is and to have a plan for that venture. Very often people decide they want to work from home (for various personal reasons), yet they aren’t sure what type of work they will do, or even if they’re suited for a telecommuting life. Our survey respondents offered some suggestions and ideas to look at before even beginning a job hunt. In order of their most common responses, these suggestions are listed below:

1) Be able to recognize a scam. If you plan to use Internet at all for your job search, save yourself a lot of time and energy by knowing different types of scams out there so you can bypass them altogether.

2) Locate sources of legitimate telecommuting opportunities. This, of course, is easier said than done. But it is possible.

3) Learn how to research a company. Don’t just browse a company’s web site. They won’t tell you on their site if they have a problem paying their workers, or if this is a third attempt to start this company, or if work they have for contractors is extremely inconsistent. Look at company from other sources, such as Better Business Bureau, Rip Off Reports.com, message boards that focus on type of business that you’re interested in, and even Google.com will have information about them.

4) Understand what are realistic earnings for each type of profession when performed as a telecommuter. Do not be surprised if as a counselor you made $30,000.00 at your local rehab center, but only make $10.00 as a home-based, telephonic counselor. (Approximately $19,000 a year.) Companies that use home workers know that you won’t have usual commuting costs and work expenses. Working from home is NOT a way to get rich quick.

5) If necessary, get resume assistance. If you think you have a great resume, look at resumes of other people and compare. Chances are you could use a resume expert to write one up for you. Remember: Your resume will be what determines whether or not you even get in door to make a proposal for telecommuting.

6) Be sure you have an up-to-date home office. Up-to-date does not have to mean “top of line”, “super expensive”. It means that you must have: a computer with at least WIN98, a fax machine, a printer, and usually high-speed Internet access. None of these things are luxuries anymore. They are basics. Also, part of having an up-to-date home office is actually having a workspace that is separate from rest of house. The dining room table will not do.

7) Know realities of a telecommuting life. Some most common ones are: constant interruptions by children or non-work-related phone calls, and distractions of home such as laundry or lawn. For some teleworkers, they have to constantly struggle with family and friends to convince them that just because they are home, they are still at work and cannot be at everyone’s beck and call. Their time at computer needs to be treated as work time, without interruptions.

8) Companies who hire telecommuters do so to save themselves overhead. Part of saving money is hiring independent contractors rather than employees. This eliminates need to pay employment-related taxes such as unemployment and workers‘ compensation. This means that you will be responsible for your own taxes. Learn what it means to be an independent contractor from IRS’s perspective.

9) Another part of a company‘s telecommuting plan is often not having to pay for benefits. Be prepared to fend for yourself when it comes to health insurance. If your husband or wife works outside home and receives benefits, this makes things a bit easier. However, health insurance options are still something worth researching in event you end up being responsible for obtaining healthcare for family.

10) Finally, life of a telecommuter can be a lonely and independent one compared to those who work in a company’s office with all hustle and bustle of fellow workers. Not only do you not have someone close by to share latest jokes with, but you also do not have a conveniently located person around to bounce ideas off of or discuss work-related issues.

Taking all these things into consideration, as well as all bumps that come with finding a telecommuting position, how important is working at home for our survey respondents? On a scale of one to ten (one being lowest), almost every one said “ten”. Having their independence makes it all worthwhile. Being able to spend more time with their family instead of on highways outweighed any downside of telecommuting. Having a personal life, even if it wasn’t an exciting one, was of more value to them than any other benefit a company could give.