Fighting cancer is difficult enough, but living with it is even tougher - and that's where the Cleaning for A Reason Foundation steps in. This nonprofit offers free professional housecleaning, and maid services to improve the lives of women undergoing treatment for cancer - any type of cancer.

The applications can be filled in online by women with any type of cancer as long as they are currently under cancer treatment. In 2011, the American Cancer Society estimates there will be 750,000 first time diagnosis of cancer in women over the age of 18. They have over 800 maid services participating in our program nationwide, however, resources are limited and they are experiencing huge demand. The professional residential cleaning companies that participate in their program do not receive payment for their services. These small business owners agree to take a minimum two patients at a time, pay their employees to perform the work, and absorb the cost of materials and supplies. They have a heart for assisting women in cancer treatment and provide this service as a way to give back to their local communities.

To begin the application process for you or a loved one:

1. Check to see if they have a participating maid service in your geographical area by clicking the locations tab on their main website. Click the state in which you reside on the pink U.S. map or if you reside in Canada, click the Canadian map. This will take you to a list of the cities where they currently have partner maid services affiliated with their foundation. Not all cities are served even though they do add approximately 25 – 35 new partners each month.

2. If you are a qualified cancer patient fill out the online application under the cancer patient tab on their main website. Fill in the required information. When you submit, the online process will inform you if a maid service covers your area. In large metropolitan areas, some maid services limit the distance they will travel to the area they normally serve.

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1. Tell us about your business:

   Kidzola is an online marketplace where people can buy and sell everything for kids. People can buy and sell new, handmade and resale children’s items. We have everything from clothing to toys, video games, furniture, books and just about everything else parents need for their kids.

2. Why did you start this business?

   My partner, Lisa, and I decided to start Kidzola because we just weren’t happy with any of the other kids resale options. We wanted to create a site just for kids’ things that was simple to use and let parents buy and sell locally or nationally.

3. What is your background?

   Lisa and I both graduated together from Cornell University and then went into the corporate world for about 7 years until we had kids. We both have two children and stay home with them while pursuing our dream of running our own company.

4. What skills did you need to acquire for your new endeavor?

   We’ve done so much learning on the fly. We’re never afraid to try new things and we simply try to do more of the things that work well for us. Of course, Lisa’s background in computer programming has helped us tremendously, too!

5. Biggest challenges?

   Our biggest challenge by far has been reaching a large number of parents on a limited budget. As a small start-up company, we just don’t have the deep pockets of some other organizations. Whenever we come up with a new idea that we’d like to try, the first question is, “how can we do it for less”?

6. What have you learned and advice to others:

   One thing that we’ve learned is that you don’t always know exactly what you want until you put your plans into action. When we first started out, we would spend forever trying to perfect each detail before we launched a new part of our site. And then when we introduced our new addition, people wouldn’t use it the way we expected them to. So we’d have to undo our hard work and make changes. Now, we operate in a much different way. We launch a very simple, bare-bones trial version first. Then we make improvements to it once we see it in action.

Tell us about your business:

YourNovel.com can put any couple into their very own personalized novel. We currently have 30+ novels and eBooks set at exotic location around the globe available for personalization.

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Today, we're talking to Gabriella, who recently turned her travel blog into a subscriber-only website that provides readers access to unique travel experiences and great deals on travel...