Are you interested in starting a home-based business? You may want to work from home for several reasons, including dissatisfaction with your current job, because you have small children or elderly parents that require you to be at home, or you may just need income a home-based business opportunity can provide. Since you have come this far, you are already an Internet entrepreneur ready to take first step in creating a steady income and implementing your home-based business ideas. You can be your own boss and generate steady income with your own home-based Internet endeavors.

The first step in starting a home-based business is to develop a business plan. Researching your options thoroughly and making wise decisions can make your home-based business very successful and give you a steady stream of income, all from comfort of your home. There are numerous business opportunities geared towards those who want to work from home. Some promise instant wealth and long lasting success for simply signing up. The truth is that any home business will require effort, marketing, and a network of contacts. The amount of work you are willing to put into your home-based Internet business is directly related to amount of income you may earn.

Your product is dying. With same inevitability that we humans move ever closer to death, so does every software application move towards its eventual demise.

The difference is that we have become increasingly competent at caring for ourselves and each other with result that our chances of a longer and fuller life continue to increase with time. We have learned to recognise our own and each other's positions in life cycle, and become aware that we have means and ability to provide care and environment necessary for our continued survival and prosperity. We nurture and care for our small children, and accept and encourage their ability to stand on their own two feet as part of their journey towards day they will become are fully self-supporting. In due course, they will care for us when we become old, and in turn will one day be supported by their own children.

And so to software. A product's life cycle is not much different from our own, yet despite our ability to cater for our own changing needs, many of us are quite oblivious to needs of our products and software as time goes on. The concept of Product Life Cycle is a simple one, and allows you to see where your product stands at any one time, and to assess what circumstances lie ahead, by providing information that you need in order to react accordingly. In much same way that we do not wait for a child`s teenage years before starting their education, or for an older person to become so frail that they are unable to care for themselves, we should not wait for negative points in a product's life cycle to be so obvious that it is too late to respond effectively.

There are four stages in Product Life Cycle each with their own recognisable symptoms, threats and opportunities, all of which should be addressed individually.

The Early Days

Firstly, Introduction stage. When a new product is introduced to market, initial impact is usually very slight, and spotting any emerging patterns is often close to impossible. You're likely to enter market with only barest of ripples, let alone a splash. There are exceptions to this. Large advertising budgets, hype, pre-launch public interest and new technologies may all increase initial visibility of a product's launch. Yet even a high-visibility campaign will take time for customers to learn that a product is available, and time for a significant demand to build up and become apparent. For most of us, even with most stringent of marketing budgets, viable profits at this stage are unlikely, and possibility of actual short-term loss a very real one.

So how long should this stage last? The answer is almost impossible to estimate with any degree of accuracy, as there are so many variables involved. So much depends on market demand for software, marketing budget, visibility and so on.The basic strategy at this stage is simply to get product "out there", and draw as much attention to it as is possible.

Growing Up

Next in product's life cycle is Growth stage. If all goes according to plan, this stage should be easy to recognise both in terms of sales and profits. But risk is that many companies will simply sit back and enjoy ride and success. Absolutely not! The growth cycle is time to aggressively seek-out new opportunities, and to gain as much of market share as possible. Some fairly clear patterns should start to emerge quite quickly at this stage, and it is usually obvious what is working and what is wasting your time. Look for three factors. The “successful” factors need to be looked at, studied and improved. If a magazine editor gives you a glowing write-up, capitalise on this by actively seek-out more magazines, more editors and more glowing write-ups!