Starting a business...

[floodhound2]

Starting a business is time consuming but possible on a budget

With the help of Google voice (my phone) and a inexpensive suite address (the UPS store) I finally started my own business.

Some tools that I used starting my business and keeping overhead low:

- Learning to build a website helped out in magnitudes, here at suck-o many years ago I began learning to do just that and now I own many sites.

- Google, learn to use and love the dreaded Google. The software / widgets that Google has to offer are all free and work! Get a Gmail account you can thank me later. My business is running Google voice and Google answering service. It works fantastic and is absolutely free for local and long distance calls. All I needed is a microphone or a Bluetooth head set so I can pace around my home-office and talk on my computer as if it were a phone.

- Get some free advice. My wife is an attorney so she had a few good tricks that I never knew were possible. Filing for a business license in our state is required, filing for a business license in our city is also needed, so she knew that all city's fees are different. We looked around and my licenses was filed for a near by city. This city is about a 3 minute drive and the fee is 90% cheaper.

- A address, my business needed a physical address not a PO box, so the UPS store has suites that one can rent for $10 a month. This gives the appearance that the business is larger than it is as well as a shipping and receiving dock.

Hope this helps anyone that is wanting to start a business and thinks that its not possible because they need a lot of cash. So far I have spent under $300 and will start producing products in 2 days. I may need to hire some people soon. My first to jobs are $2000 and $4000 orders and should take me a few days to complete.

[leetnigga]

What exactly is your business?

Good thing you have one. I want to start a business as well, though I'll have to do it when I get some more spare time.

[floodhound2]

Opps sorry, forgot to mention.

My business is PCB manufacturing, assembly and design.

[computathug]

While i agree that it isn't that hard to set up in business yourself there are still a lot of factors to be considered. Just having a product for sale is just not enough to make it successful. I agree google is a bigger tool than most people realising in a lot of ways. The first thing that needs doing with any business is marketing and finding the right people in that target audience. Finding a niche in the market is also harder than it looks. If you start a business you hopefully not only know about it but having had hands on experience is also a big help. Making contacts and getting and maintaining contracts, customer service and continuous marketing, all play a big part in helping you grow as a business.

Google has many tools to help you with this from analytics, web master tools, keyword tools can all help if you are a web based business, getting yourself to the first page of google for keyword search terms, related to your industry is also a big must. Making you business easy to find by the people who don't know you, having a good clean, easy to navigate site, relevant information, and building a online community all play big parts in online businesses today.

Once you are noticed your customer service skills come into play. Bad publicity can mean a big drop in business, news travels and bad news generally travels faster than good news. Good customer service can mean a longer lasting business relationship, more custom from other related sources and the development and growth to your own company.

Once you have your product you must believe in your product. If you don't believe in it then how can you convince your potential customers that it is the right product for them.
Always look successful and confident even when times are hard.

Well done Floody, in this day and climate with the worlds economy it is harder than people will take credit for and to be successful, it is even harder, but with determination we can all do it, follow your dreams.

I will be writing some more on the blog about SEO in the next few days. If ya would like a chat about it you can get me on my yahoo any time ya free.

[lilrofl]

Hey Floody,
I was just wondering how the business is going?

I'm looking to start that project we talked about like a year ago, and need to get the boards etched.

[trickb0x]

Also, in a lot of areas, you don't need a business license as long as you aren't using a fictitious name (this is the official term for it) like Part Company X. Even that being said, you can hold off on getting such a license until you have a little more capital to buy the license. I know a good number of people who don't have licenses who never get in trouble. As long as you're not a major player or taking out ads in the phone book etc, the business license is not worth spending money on. Your city has better things to do.