Despite the promises some people will make you about running a home business, it’s not all rainbows and kittens. And even once you start doing well things can go awry for a time.

Just call it learning experiences.

You can take the best instruction on how to build a home business out there, follow it to the letter, and still have things not work. Or they work for a time, then someone (often Google) changes the rules and you’re in a tailspin, little to no money coming in.

I’ve gone through a few of these. That’s why I’ve been working so hard on having more than one income stream.

Some of my income peaks have come at exactly the times I’ve needed them, such as when my son needed Doc-Band helmets to reshape his head after he had craniosynostosis surgery at 3 months old. The insurance only paid for half. My income somehow jumped up just nicely enough to let us handle that.

Then it just as mysteriously dropped.

Actually, I know why it dropped, in part. Great rankings in just one search engine do leave you very subject to the whims of that search engine.

When my husband was laid off, once again I managed to drive my income up, a bit more deliberately this time. Odd thing was that the week before his new job started my rankings started back down again.

Since this was more deliberate, I’ve been able to hold onto things better. I have a broader base of traffic coming in. Still, it would have been nice to hold the peak a while longer. Say a number of years longer.

Even though the lows are frustrating, I’m keeping in mind that each low is a bit higher than the one before. That’s because I’m learning with each one.

The more you understand about why things go bad for a business, the better you can work around the problems. This isn’t something you always pick up from ebooks, especially if what the ebook taught you is what changed and caused the drop in the first place. This is what you learn from experience.

What’s the Best Way to Get Experience?

I mentioned multiple streams of income. I love multiple streams of income. But until you have some idea as to what you’re doing, they’re probably just a distraction. Doing too much slows down your learning curve, and what might have been a drizzle of trouble with your business can turn into a downpour if it all crashes at once.

It’s often smartest to start with one focus. One site. One marketing tactic. Master that first, or at least get pretty good with it.

Once you’re comfortable, start adding on.

I generally try adding in marketing tactics first. You can start with pay per click for the quickest start, then do blog commenting to start getting search engine attention, then Squidoo lenses, article marketing, Twitter… in whatever order works for you.

You Can’t Stop All the Rain

No business will ever run perfectly smoothly, no matter how many streams of income, how many types of traffic you bring to your site, things can go wrong. That’s just life.

But the more you learn, the better your chances are. The harder you work, the better your chances are.

And if the rain’s falling hard enough, maybe there’s a new opportunity. Could it be time for a bucket?

Despite the people you hear about making a delightful living as bloggers, it’s not an easy way to make money for most people. It’s hard work. Coming up with post ideas can be time consuming. And it can really be frustrating if you aren’t getting feedback or you get a lot of negative feedback.

And yet you cannot let that stop you.

Finding Post Ideas

One of your best resources for blog post ideas can be other blogs in niches related to your own. You don’t want to copy them, of course, but you can be inspired to do your own take on the topic. Just give credit where credit is due and make sure your opinions stand out. Writing a post that says, in essence “I think exactly what this other blogger thinks” isn’t going to make much of an impression on your readers.

Keep up with news stories related to your topic as well. Subscribe to appropriate RSS feeds for your news. Google News can make this pretty easy, for example.

Relate your own experiences to the things you blog about. I posted recently about how freebie marketing worked in getting my daughter interested in karate classes.

And of course, brainstorm. A single concept can explode into dozen of posts if you just start thinking about it. Many people like to use mind mapping while others do more of a free association. However you do it, just get going and write it all down. Don’t do it in your head; you’ll forget too much.

Finding Readers

This is the part I’ve always found most challenging. With so many new blogs started every day it takes a lot of effort to build your readership.

The very first thing you should do is make it easy for your readers to subscribe to your blog feed, so they keep coming back. Have both an email and an RSS version available. Not everyone knows about RSS even if they use it in their My Yahoo or feed reader, so give them the options.

Then get the word out. Comment on other blogs. Good comments, not just “Great post” as every blogger sees all too often. Many sites will just delete such comments, as they add nothing to the conversation. And the conversation is a big part of what makes a blog interesting.

Network too. I’ve had some great interactions with other bloggers on Twitter, for example. It’s amazing how many bloggers are on there. It’s very casual sort of conversation much of the time, and it can be easier to make a quick (140 character) tweet to someone than to meet them other ways. Your tweets still have to give some value to get people interested, but it can really work well.

Coping with Negative Feedback

Negative feedback will happen, no matter how good your posts are. It doesn’t matter what you do, you cannot please everyone. And that’s a key thing to remember.

There are also people who simply delight in saying horrible things to people online just because it can all be anonymous. It can be ridiculous, but there it is. Don’t let yourself be drawn into heated exchanges with people. It’s better to keep your temper and learn to dismiss the people who are only trying to make you angry.

Genuine criticism, on the other hand, can be quite useful. If someone catches you with incorrect information, thank them. Hopefully they will at the same time point you to a better resource for information.

Your Own Doubts

It’s easy to doubt yourself, especially if you start comparing yourself with other bloggers in your niche. They can sound so knowledgeable!

If you aren’t sure, you can even ask questions in your posts. Questions can be a great way to get readers participating, and no one will think poorly of you for asking. Most of us feel uncertain pretty regularly. We know we don’t know everything and odds are there are others who know a lot more. But you still know a lot more about your topic than other people too, right?

Don’t Give Up

It takes a long time to succeed as a blogger in most cases. The blogger who appears to be an overnight success may have been working at it for years. They may have had several failed blogs. They’ve definitely been working hard to gain the knowledge that is interesting their readers now. Nice as it would be to succeed so quickly, for most it takes a bit longer. Be prepared for that and keep trying.