So you want run a SL business (part two)

Hi all! I am posting this because of people still coming to ask about how it’s done and I am trying to be patient …. Please forgive any eventual repetition, but I am just going to hand out the link here - not specifically to my bloggie part but to the general one @ blogs/ so folks will actually see that there’s a lot of biz buzz going on in here! :)

I am limiting this to land business for now :

- Buy as much joinable land as you can afford (for the tier) and make sure that your plan is together for a new sim opening and you have the lindens or US$ ready. Make sure you can join it afterwards or there is some room for negotiating. If you absolutely cannot join (island, not mainland, that’s different) make sure you are comfortable with that as the maintenance borders on islands are exactly there to prevent you from building your own haven and running it.

- Pay upfront if there are several tier plans. Make sure you understand what the reservation fee implies if it is a reservation fee! Often the first tier has to be paid within 1 hour, sometimes within 24 hours. So better have a verified PayPal account ready and maybe SL Exchange account to back that up. Some accept Visa and lindens. If you only pay the minimal fee your tier will be so high you might want to abandon your land before you know it. Communicate and negotiate! Most things can be worked out before doing such a desperate thing.

- Read the covenant, read the covenant and read it again! :) EDIT : If it seems a bit off after buying, negotiate if it’s locked … the sim creator has some rights and land owners should too.

- If you want to rent out land, observe businesses that are well run. Build your business structure before jumping into renting out. You might want to control or not control your guests and have them in a “x friend” group or have a tiered system with residents as VIPs (officers eventually) and their friends as x friends. (I am not monitoring friends’ friends, just prims and who owns what. I tend to find good matches and also believe that basic gut feeling about someone and putting some trust in people goes a long way.

- Skyboxes count as prims on parcel no matter high up so you may want to keep your skybox prim count as low as possible to still have something on land :). This is to those who may have … ahem … forgotten. I had to take down my art gallery today because of that and still working on it :s but it sure will be back :)

- Keep good relationships with neighbors. Be nice and act as the ombudsman when you sense tension among people. Maybe the most important thing! Keep them posted about events around via notices. And say hi when it seems suitable, let ‘em live when it looks busy :)

Anything you would like to add as advice to land business? I have a couple friends asking, some who might want to know, and will go hand the link in-world now so they might want to take a few hints from the posts around buzz :) Thanks all in advance!