Easy Tips that will Help you to Start a Small Business

Starting a brand-new business is not easy, but these steps here will help you make the best decisions. If you want to find out more about starting a small business these few points below will help you. However, this is not a comprehensive how to, these are just some points to consider.

Write a Business Plan

First, you’ll want to ensure that you have a solid business plan. A solid business plan will help you gain a lot of clarity and help you quite a lot if you decide to apply for funding in the future. Most business plans fall under the category of a lean start-up. This means that you will have to summarise the leading, most essential parts of your business, but it’ll only need to be a page or so long. A one-page business plan will be quick to create, but at the end of the day, if you need funding, an investor may need to get more information from you.

You will also need to think about your target audience, who will you be selling you products and services too? Think also of cashflow projections and the risks that the business might have to face i.e. competition, stock shortages etc.

Decide on a Legal Structure

Choosing the proper legal structure for your company is crucial to ensuring that you run your company in the best possible way. Suppose you know that you want to get started relatively quickly and with minimal hassle, then it may be a good idea to opt for a sole proprietorship. If you decide to run this type of business, you will not have any partner or an executive board to answer. You may also find that you are in control over any decisions that you need to make. In contrast, if you want to start a Pty Limited Company, this will give you way more flexibility, and you may also find that you have some degree of legal separation between yourself and the company. Pty Ltd stands for Proprietary Limited. Proprietary means that the company is private (rather than publicly owned or listed) and therefore, would have a smaller number of shareholders and owners in the company. In saying that, the paperwork can be intense and you should take advice from an accountant.

Work out your Budget

You then need to work out how much of a budget you have. You will need to account for things such as, stock, warehousing, pallet racking, returns, staff, rent, communications, website, marketing, shipping, insurances etc. If you can work out your expenses now, then this will give you a number that you can target when the time comes for you to start getting your finances in order. The last thing you want is to go to your investor or your bank for money, only to find out later that you need way more than you thought you did.

If you are not warehousing products, you might like to think of a print on demand, dropshipping business which is much easier for you to start up without huge expense.

Other

When you have established your company and what you want to do, you should think about getting a business bank account. This will split your finances from the business and help you secure the proper funding if this is something you require. If you can do this sooner rather than later, it’ll help you out quite a lot in the long run.

You will also need to register your business with the local authorities, consider registering for GST (when your turnover is over $75,000 and setting up a legal structure. Again, hire an accountant to help you with all this.