I've been talking to retired friends who want to start a little online business. I ran across two excellent posts this week that tie into this topic nicely, one by Joe Pulizzi of Junta 42 Blog, and other by Seth Godin.

According to Seth Godin, there are 6 steps to success:

Let's talk about Approach, what does that mean? How do you approach your new project, your new business, your customers?

My advice to my retired friends Lucy and Tom is to explore their mindset and expertise by writing about it on a blog. That's step 1, attitude. You express that attitude with 3 key content pieces: your message, your bio or backstory, and the big problems people encounter in your niche.

With Step 2, you need to collect information about the needs of your targeted audience by creating conversations with them and finding out what they want. You need to listen.

Before you can set goals for your business, you need to research your customers by having conversations, really listening to people, running polls, doing surveys and finding out what people want.

Here's what Joe Pulizzi of Junta42 blog says about Step 2 of these six steps to content marketing success:

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 I've been talking to my retired friends Lucy and Tom who asked me how they could supplement their income by starting "a little online business."

My advice was a little counter-intuitive, because I said to just start blogging! Before even having a business name, a business plan, or a clear idea of what they're going to be selling.

But then, that's the way I get clarity for new ideas, by writing on my blogs. Not everyone thinks like I do, or is comfortable publishing incomplete business ideas.

Then I ran across an interesting post from Seth Godin, who also advises a counter-intuitive approach to becoming successful. He says the last thing to pay attention to is the actual execution. The first thing is attitude.

Attitude Matters

For me, clarifying thoughts and attitudes comes with writing on a blog. In fact, the first things you should publish on your blog have everything to do with your attitude about your expertise, the reasons you're passionate about it, and your attitude towards the customers you want to serve.

It's also a good way to create a community of readers who will give you ideas and information about their needs, what they will buy. But the natural impulse is to start with the product or services you want to sell.

I say first develop your mindset, your attitude, and connect with people, then develop your products and services.

The Secret Sauce

Another brilliant content marketer, Joe Pulizzi, of Junta42 blog, agrees with Seth and explains it this way:

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Some of my friends are retired now, others want to be…(and some of them are just plain tired!) But just about all of them tell me this: "If I could start a little business on the Internet, you know, bring in a few extra bucks each month, that'd be great."

Many of them are very successful human beings, a couple have some great ideas that could actually work online, and some already have a presence on Twitter, Facebook, or blogs. They're computer savvy. (Photocredit: Shutterstock)

Most are overwhelmed when they sit down to figure out what "little business on the Web" they should do. Here's their line of thinking:

1. I'm smart, educated, why aren't I rich? Where can I make some money online?
2. When I "Google" my questions on how to do this, I get a bunch of scams and flaky sites
3. I don't want to invest in some Guru's $1,000+ program, just tell me what I need to do
4. I don't have a lot of time to learn all about Internet marketing or copywriting, just give me the abridged version…
5. I've got this idea, I know a lot about "xyz", I could sell my expertise to everyone …

My friend Lucy and her husband Tom recently got bad news that their retirement income dropped 30% in one month. Until things turn around, if and when they do, they'll have to make do with less.

Or, they could look to find an additional income stream. Lucy asked me what was the best way to start an online business, using information products.

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