This is a guest post by Maria Palma, author at Online Business Resources and The Good Life (originally posted February 28, 2008)

Starting a business is an exciting time for any entrepreneur. It’s something new and it’s certainly another way to produce an income. However, how do you know that this is something you should be doing? If it is you want to do, then how do you stay motivated? What can you do to make sure you don’t make the same mistakes other business owners make?

For many women who are interested in going into business, the biggest obstacle to getting started is simply getting started. If we get bogged down in doing market research, perfecting a business plan, doing surveys, questionnaires, and focus groups, and tinkering with the item in question, we actually don’t get sales. If we start looking for customers and selling, we do get sales.

Margaux Cameron is a guest blogger for An Apple a Day and a writer on sonography schools for Guide to Healthcare Schools.

So must us chic girls be confined to our stoops, mourning a better time when women packed trunks onto steamers for months of unbounded travel? Of course not. Airline costs merely force us to be more creative, more self-aware, and--if it were possible--better shoppers.

Having done my Malcolm-Gladwell-esque "10,000 hours of experience" (in his book Outliers, Gladwell suggests that it takes 10,000 hours for someone to become an experienced professional, in any field), I feel like there are some fixed principles that apply to all of our clients, who run the gamut from nonprofit to small business to public agency.

We've found that the individuals or organizations that are successful follow these five principles.

1. Figure out what you want.
If you don't know what you want, it's pretty difficult to get someone else on board with your vision. Attempt to discern, in as much detail as possible, your vision for your endeavor.

These days your Google search results are your resume (or so some would have you believe).

I use Gravatar to add a photo near my comments, and I keep my online profile up-to-date on most of the channels Claimid.com/monicadear.

Here are ten steps to managing your online identity and protecting your personal and professional identity, reputation, credit score, and bank account on the web. 

1) Protect your password.