Product Description

This how-to book provides step-by-step guidance on starting a successful home typing business, including everything from explaining the benefits of having a home typing business to getting clients, how much to charge, advertising and promotion, business letters with samples, and much more.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1276631 in Books
• Published on: 1990-06
• Binding: Paperback
• 128 pages

From the Back Cover
This is a Must Book for home typing businesses. There are reasons why every person considering a home business should consider establishing a typing or secretarial service: To make more money at home; To have a recession-proof business; To be your own boss; and To have low investment with good profits. This book provides all the secrets on how to: Get started, set up your business, promote your business with no or low cost, obtain free advertising, get clients, set rates for your work, and more. This book is your reference manual for starting and successfully operating a home typing business. Whether you already have a typing business or plan to start one, you will find this guide to be the best available.

About the Author
Frank Chisenhall has written numerous documents over the past 20 years for various organizations within the U.S. military and Florida State Agencies. With a BA from Saint Leo College and an MA from Central Michigan University-both degrees in business administration and management-his knowledge in establishing sound business practices has been successfully applied time and again by users of his advice. His experience as an auditor for the State of Florida has reinforced his thinking about proper business methods and procedures that guarantees successful business operations. Before college, the author had a deep interest in the art of making money at home. He started his first home typing business while in high school with a five-dollar, used Underwood brand typewriter purchased at an auction. Typing after school and on weekends, he created a real moneymaker. His typing resulted in repeat business and new clients from word-of-mouth advertising. For his remaining years in high school, he received a steady income. The author established a second home typing business after entering the military. The experiences he learned in high school ensured the success of his new venture. His second home business ended when he was assigned to a remote overseas tour. For two years, using his own experiences, college education and in-depth research, the author wrote and prepared The Complete Typing Business Guide. The author observed two trends: that the two-person family income was becoming a real necessity, but was having a severe impact on families with small children; and that a growing shortage of qualified secretaries was creating a need for independent typing businesses. He wrote The Complete Typing Business Guide to solve both of these social problems. The author currently lives with his family in Florida, and is writing additional How-To business books that will be published by SuperText Publishing.

Excerpted from Complete Typing Business Guide : Everything You Need to Know to Start and Successfully Operate a Home Typing Business by Frank Chisenhall. Copyright © 1990. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved
From Chapter 1: A home typing business is one of the most lucrative types of businesses you can start out of your home and can cost almost nothing to get into. Money can be made immediately. The biggest problem most home typists face is not how to get enough business, but how to prevent obligating themselves to type more than they can handle. There are scores of home typists who make two thousand or more per month. Many of them started their business as a part time venture while holding down a full time job. The available numbers of prospects are staggering. If a person were able to contact all and get them as clients, they would have so many possibilities for typing that they could not handle more than a fraction of the workload. If the demand is so great, why are more people not into the home typing business? Most people who think about starting a home typing service do not know how to begin. There has been little guidance in this area, and most books on the subject are out of print. Those who try to start a business - whether typing or a different venture - without knowledge of how, what, where, when, and why usually fail. To do a professional job that people are willing to pay for, to find people who will pay for it, to know all you need to know to start a business and be successful requires knowledge. In this book, everything you need to know to start and operate a successful home typing business is presented in a clear, easy-to-understand text that will have you making money in a matter of days. Typing clients come from a broad cross-section of people; businesses, individuals, older as well as younger people, both men and women. The possibilities are limitless. As a home typist, you possess a skill that is in higher demand today than ever before. Most skilled typists work for half of what they could get if they had a typing business of their own. Conversely, most employers pay more for secretary and typists employees than they would if they used the services of an outside typing agency. Although an employer pays a secretary or typist employee less salary than he or she would pay for your services, the employer has other employee expenses that they would not have if they contracted for their typing needs. The employer has furniture and office equipment expenses, rent, matching funds for employee Social Security payments or some other retirement plan, vacation pay, costs associated with absenteeism, medical insurance plans, and accounting and payroll expenses. When all these costs are added up, the employer pays more for an employee than they would pay you. This fact works to your advantage and this book tells you how to turn such information into moneymaking advertising. Some small businesses, particularly those just starting out, cannot afford to hire secretaries. They are prime targets for your business advertising. Getting them as clients is almost as easy as falling off your typing stool. However, if they do not know your services exist, their business won't be yours. That's where advertising can pay tremendous dividends. This book will tell you how to get the word out and take in the profits that are waiting for you. Students and educators need your services for term papers, reports, and theses. People who are looking for or are changing jobs need rsums typed. Writers or authors are looking for typists to put their books, essays, articles, or short stories into printed pages. Organizations, clubs, and churches need letters, reports, flyers and newsletters typed. Businesses and individuals need many of the above as well as taxes typed. The list can go on. You have the skill to satisfy their needs at a price that will give you a handsome income. Follow the guidance given in this book and your typing business can be more successful than you imagined, all from the comfort and convenience of your home. A home typing business will not make you a millionaire. Such claims found in thousands of classified ads are pure Bunk. A typing business will however, give you a steady, reliable income for as long as you want to stay in the business. To be able to earn good money working for yourself is a great feeling. Being your own boss, calling all the shots, and making money through your own efforts are very rewarding. The effect is hard to equate to any other emotion. After reading this book, you can put into practice the guidance and be very successful. With effort and a can-do attitude, you can generate far more income than you could get working as a secretary or typist for an employer. The world is yours; clients are out there eager to give you their business.

Customer Reviews

this is a nice but outdated book...
This is a nice book, written clearly, stays focused. This is more than a how-to book -- it's loaded with pep talk to encourage you on your way to starting your own typing business. I'm sure some readers take to this style of writing; I don't particularly like it myself.

The book is a lot smaller than it first seems: It was typeset on a very old-fashioned word processor and printed on what seems like a 9-pin dot matrix printer with a large and low-quality monospace font... To this, someone added titles in a letter quality font, and this typographical nightmare was then sent to the printers... I mention this, because one would hope that a book on how to start a typing business would be able to give some typographic advice -- after all, most word processors today are typographically rich and capable, and one needs to learn how to use these features effectively while not abusing them. No chance for that here, and not because of the author's oversight! --

The most amazing thing about this little book is that it's almost totally outdated. The book was published in 1990 and the information about typing was outdated already back then. Today, it's practically useless: The book discusses typing paper (remember that erasable typing paper? -- if not -- the author will remind you), typewriters and how to test them, and has some information on what appears to be very rudimentary word processing technology. VERY rudimentary.

What is still relevant about this book is the information on how to start and manage a typing business: The advice the author gives is plain and simple to follow, makes sense, and works. Everything from how to start a business, how to advertise cheaply or freely, how to keep costs down, etc. Frankly, some of this is a bit outdated too, because I imagine that most home typists would run their accounting, book keeping, invoices, etc on line, that is, on their personal computer...

Still, this is a nice book, and if you want to make a little extra cash on the side, you can get this book and learn a thing or two. It isn't an expensive book, and even if it doesn't teach you anything new it will at least help you plot a concrete course of action -- what to do to get started. If you want to use this book, you should try to make up for its weaknesses:

- Forget about typewriters unless you're a collector.

- Forget about word processing systems that come with a typewriter -- special purpose computers that only work as a word processor -- they're good for anyone but you: (A) You can't upgrade the word processor -- you'd be stuck with whatever you got; (B) These word processors are universally and severely limited as far as typesetting features are concerned; (C) You're locked into them -- they generally don't let you export your files to the format of a PC/Mac based word processor; (D) They're expensive; You could get a PC for the kind of money they cost. The bottom line is that a typist needs to be able to offer typographic flexibility and those systems offer anything but flexibility.

- Get a real word processor -- MS Word, Corel Word Perfect, Adobe Framemaker, Interleaf, etc, and MASTER IT. At least glance over the manuals once, just so you know what it can and cannot do.

- Follow the advice in The Complete Typing Business Guide as to how to get some business. Focus on colleges and universities.

[ There is a lot of money to be made from scientific typesetting -- formulas, equations, tables of formulas and equations, graphs, etc -- This is a skill in itself, and you may want to get some more specialised software. Generally, most math and physics professors HATE to typeset their papers and they'd do anything and pay almost anything for someone else to typeset their papers for them. ]

- [The cheater's guide to typesetting; A crash course:] Keep a few examples of neat typesetting work in various categories: A novel, a science book, an article in the humanities, an article in physics, a term paper, resumes for different kinds of jobs -- examples of work that looks sharp and clean and crisp and nice. Configure the macros, styles, formats, etc in your word processor so that you can immitate THOSE styles quickly and effortlessly. Then, when you get some typing work, use those styles. Yes, COPY those styles. Stick to the styles that look best for the category of work you're typing in, and remember: In typesetting, consistency is the greatest virtue.

Very informative and detailed
I found the book was very informative and detailed, also very easy to follow. I would highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to start a home typing business.

Start your own home typing business--very informative
I found the book was very informative and detailed, and also easy to follow. I highly recommend this book to anyone intersted in starting a home typing business.