Linda Sikut, Watkins Independent Manager

Linda has been in the Watkins business for almost 7 years. Her decision to start with Watkins was largely due to the fact that the products, product research, promotional and other materials were already developed.

She strictly did sales for the first two years of business. Then she met a young mom who wanted to start doing home parties too. This young mom began doing parties one or two times per week and was able to quit her job. That was the beginning of Linda's understanding that she could help others build their businesses and make money too. Today, Linda helps people all across the US and Canada build thriving businesses.

Although Linda runs her business on and offline, she's built so many online relationships that she could easily run her business solely online.

Customer service is number one to Linda. When you care about your customers and treat them well, they will come back over and over. They will refer friends and help your business grow. Even though your business is home based, always remember to treat it like a business, Linda urges. You can't put it aside for weeks at a time and expect to be successful. She recommends setting regular business hours and sticking to that schedule.

Success in the online community relies on developing relationships and helping others, says Linda. Linda maintains that her online success is directly related to the people she meets and what she has done to develop friendships. She always makes sure to provide helpful advice and finds that this can be the beginning of a friendship and business relationship.

When it comes to search engine ranking, Linda says keywords are not enough. You need to have content that reflects your keywords for many search engines among many other factors. There is so much involved with good ranking and web site promotions. So that Linda could concentrate on her business and building a great website, she decided it was well worth the money to hire Success Promotions, a web site promotions company. This company helped Linda develop a newsletter subscriber base of 1400 people in only 2 1/2 months. In addition, she ranks in the top 10 at Google, Netscape and AOL with some of her keywords.

When asked if she would enter her site in the Great Internet Based Moms Search, Linda answered, "I've thought about your contest and yes, it is an idea for me to enter, however here's what is going through my head. I am an 'older' mom, my kids are grown and on their own. I would really be happier if a younger mom with small children won your contest." Now that's class!

Linda Sikut is a wife, mom to three grown children and grandma to two wonderful granddaughters. She lives in the Western New York area near Buffalo. Visit her web sites at http://www.bakingabusiness.com, http://www.sikut.com, http://www.rising-stars.com and http://www.watkingsonline.com/LSikut. She also publishes a weekly newsletter with articles, recipes, tips and more. You can subscribe by sending a blank email to bakingabusiness-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

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