Business Setup Consulting
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Business Setup Consulting 1
When you start a business, your ultimate mission is to provide goods or services that the public wants. When they perceive your business's value, customers will pay for your products or services, and you can earn a profit.
It is a given that if you follow specific rules and procedures, it is relatively easy to start a business. However, it takes an understanding of some essential elements to put together the correct foundation that will allow you to operate efficiently and grow exponentially.
A lack of understanding of these basics can easily cost some companies twenty times more to market the same products or services than another company with more knowledgeable operations. Ask us about brand positioning.
It takes some companies up to eight times longer to obtain the funding needed to operate correctly and at a profitable volume. Ask us about financial positioning.
Other companies never have clarity on the requirements of operating a modern business. With these differences between those who don't understand versus those who have done their research and planning and taken the appropriate steps, it is easy to see why fifty percent of all businesses fail before they are five years old.
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To Start a Business...
You should have a general idea of the type of business that you want to create and do some preliminary research to ensure:
1. There is a market for what you want to offer, and
2. It is possible to make a profit executing your ideas.
I want to share with you what I have learned about building a company correctly. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Andre Mighty. I am the founder and Chief Project Consultant of Fluent Decisions, LLC. In the late 1990s, I started my career in computer networking.
Setting up computer systems for businesses allowed me to experience the environment within many companies. I often had to customize the functionality of various computer software to make it suitable for my clients' needs. This process involved gaining an understanding of portions of their operations.
During the 2008 Recession, I found that many companies needed much more than high tech computer tools. Companies large and small were looking for the most efficient way to utilize their resources. At this point, I found that researching, planning, and consulting, which I had been learning for years within the technology field, now must be utilized to deliver clarity to my clients. These skills were needed to help my clients gain the knowledge necessary to make important decisions about projects within their companies or venture out and establish entirely new businesses.
From Business Ideas to Business Plans to the Market!
Formulating an executable business plan and putting proper marketing in place will vary greatly depending on the product or services you want to provide, the place you choose to locate your business, your clientele, and even how much startup money you have available to launch your business.
Regardless of the type of business you start, the fact is that you will need customers. From the very start of your business, you will need to take specific actions so those in the marketplace who are interested in your products or services will become not just customers but repeat customers. A very important part of your business plan is your marketing plan. Without a business plan and marketing plan and action... it is just an idea.
Look at your Marketing Plan correctly from the beginning.
Marketing can be like a Pick-Your-Own orchard – you know, the fun nature activity where you pay an entry fee and just go harvesting! In the analogy (although not a perfect example), each fruit that is picked by you, the business owner, is a customer for your business. Some business owners will pay the orchard owner a fee and pick five well ripened fruits off of one tree; then happily (or in some cases, begrudgingly) pay again and pick a few fruits the second time, pay a third time, and pick a few more from tree number three and so on. When you look at the big picture, they are unwittingly wasting time, money, and overall efforts. The unfortunate fact is this method of operation can be a major contributing factor to the staggering failure rate of new businesses. There is another way to do it. Ask us about Marketing Smart.
Behind the Scenes - Under the Hood - Call it what you will... the stuff that actually brings your business together.
Regardless of what products or services you sell or the customers that you have, behind the scenes a multitude of steps must take place to fulfill each transaction.
STOP for a moment…. Refocus your mind on the fact that if these essential transactions do not take place, your business does not make a profit, which means that for your benefit, your business is useless.
Your business' organization and procedures will determine if a reasonable percentage of your income goes toward delivering the product to the customer or whether the cost and time it takes to create and deliver make it unprofitable to you.
All businesses need operating capital. The correct specific steps laid down during the foundational process of a successful business will allow that business to obtain the capital required to put in place the tools, arrangements, and flexibility to deliver the best products and services to their customers at margins which are profitable for the business owner.
During the startup stages and the early days of being in business, the minds of most people are focused mainly on the service or products that they will sell. Granted, that is vital, but understanding how to establish the business correctly will multiply the benefits of all the efforts and activities that every business owner must (by absolute necessity already) spend their time on. I have learned that while there is an infinite number of paths which you can take, the strongest businesses are established using a proven specific pattern.
In order to run a successful modern business: (1) you will need solid plans, (2) you must be legitimate and be trustworthy, (3) must have certain specific elements established so that you can build and utilize business credit, and (4) your company must have a credible presence on the web, both to better leverage your marketing and also to allow potential customers to research your business via the Internet.
Great Business Startups
The establishment of a great business comes in 3 main parts.
Part 1: Planting the Company
Part 2: Effective Operations (Marketing, Sales, Management, Customer Services)
Part 3: Fine-Tuning & Development
Like any creation, businesses take time to grow. The key is having all of the essential elements needed to establish a solid foundation in the right order and adequately implemented.
Based on research, planning, and experience, we recommend that all businesses beginning in this modern "information age" start in the following manner – Part 1: Planting the Company.
My team and I have found that these procedures, when followed, will allow for the best implementation pattern. The specific recommendations for planting a company take into account (1) the general rules of the modern marketplace concerning how a company must be registered, listed, and aged in order for that business to best take advantage of the most effective marketing methods: inbound sales, where clients are seeking you out, (2) business credit as it applies post-recession, and (3) client relations for the modern age.
All three of these elements come about in Part 2 and Part 3 of business establishment. However, it is essential that the foundations for the three elements be first positioned from the very beginning - Part 1: Planting the Company.
Part 1: Planting the Company
A.
Create a Preliminary Business Plan to use as a basis for putting things in order, a vision of the path forward, and also specific plans of how to obtain and serve customers.
B.
Decide on the foundation of the business (Incorporated or not; whether there will be partners; where the business will operate, etc.)
C.
Choose a name for the business. Research the availability of the desired name and availability of acceptable variations of the name for Internet / social media profiles.
D.
Establish Mission Statement, Vision Statement, and a solid description of the business' purpose. These items will be very necessary as you proceed to plant and nurture your business. With these important definitions being put in place, the path forward will become focused.
E.
Get a Business Phone Number and fax number (There are numbers which you may use via your mobile phone, for starters, yet qualify as genuine business numbers).
F.
Get an Address (a physical address which qualifies as a location to build business credit).
G.
File necessary documents for business establishment in the national, state, and local jurisdiction where the business is to be located (these are establishment documents, different from operational documents which is referred to in R).
H.
File for Federal Tax ID number.
I.
Start a business bank account (at least one checking account, additional accounts or merchant services depending on the need).
J.
Establish a domain name which matches your business name and register it. Establish other versions of your domain name, if needed.
K.
Create the main business email address. An example would be yourname@yourdomainname.com
L.
Determine the colors, logo, and slogan of your company; design the official letterhead for stationery.
M.
Design and Order Business Cards, Checks, Stationery, Initial Presentation material (an initial flyer, brochure, or portfolio).
N.
Setup email signatures, a professional recording for the voice attendant on your phone system, etc.
O.
Create a Professional Starter Website (to start the process of being established online).
a. Site needs to include a full explanation of services, contain pictures, testimonials, etc.
b. Site needs to include a 1-2 minute video.
c. The wording of the site needs to be professionally edited
d. Optimize the website to gain ranking in search engines / Establish the foundations for Proper Organic SEO
e. Establish Online profiles which link to the website
f. Create Citations w/ Google, Bing, and major directories
g. Reserve and setup relevant social media sites
P.
Get DNB Number
Q.
Put in place all policies, procedures, tools, and systems needed to hire employees (if required), accept clients and fulfill the orders or services which the business offers.
R.
Obtain any licenses, Permits, Insurances, or bonding which may be needed for your specific business operations.
In order to establish a company that will be appropriately marketed, grown to obtain business credit, be positioned to create a following for potential customers, and be differentiated from competitors, the above-listed steps must be carried out in the general order given, and that is just doing the bare minimum.
Of course, it is possible for you to do all of the listed steps in Part 1, A through R, by yourself. However, it may take a good deal of your time, depending on how knowledgeable you are about each step's laws, agencies, and requirements.
You could hire specialists in each area to assist you. Hiring help may take less time but is more expensive. Alternatively, Fluent Decisions offers the know-how, experience, and connections to implement all of Part 1: Planting the company within as little as ten business days from signing a service agreement with Fluent Decisions.
Naturally, as your business begins to grow, we will be available at Fluent Decisions to help it flourish with assistance in Part 2 and Part 3 as well.
If you have an existing company and cannot correctly leverage marketing or business credit, we would be happy to provide you with a free evaluation. It is worth investigating if changes should be made to enable your business to operate efficiently and profitably.
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starting a business or improving your existing business and would like some help?
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