How to Limit Personal Risk When Starting a Business

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You’ve got to be pretty brave to start a company. The failure rate is pretty high, it’s a lot of hard work, and, if it goes wrong, you might find that you’re in a difficult position. However, it’s probably not fair that people are punished for trying something and failing — the hit to their pride will be hard enough, must they really suffer in other ways too? We think not. There are ways that you can limit your risk when it comes to running a business. We take a look at a few ways how below. Incorporate them into your business strategies, and you’ll find there’s a reduced chance of your business having a negative impact on your life.

StrategyDriven Starting Your Business Article | How to Limit Personal Risk When Starting a Business | EntrepreneurshipDo Your Research

It all begins with your initial research. You could save yourself a lot of potential heartache and trouble by simply ensuring that what you’re trying to establish is, indeed, a good idea. Too many companies begin trading before figuring out whether there’s a demand for their products or services, who the competition is, and so on. If all the evidence suggests that it’s not a great idea, you should pull the plug.

The Right Set Up

It’s recommended that you limit the legal risk that you could face if your company isn’t as successful as hoped. You can do this by having the right set up for your company. As a business owner, an LLC offers the highest level of protection. Your business debts will stay tied to the business, rather than to your name. Similarly, if there’s an issue of negligence, then your assets could be at risk, even if you were only indirectly involved. It’s much better to set up as an LLC, rather than a sole proprietorship, with which your company’s debts would also be yours.

Stringent Quality Checks

Of course, while you can protect yourself financially and legally, there’s no hiding when it comes to your reputation. If your company is involved in an accident that was verifiably your fault, then it won’t just be your business that it affects – your name will be affected, too. As such, it’s imperative that you’re conducting stringent quality checks to ensure that everything is safe and high-quality. It’s when corners are cut and checks are not carried out when troubles can arise.

Legal Matters

You might think that everything is going smoothly for your business, only to discover that you’re in trouble with the authorities. Why? Because you were lax when it came to your company’s legal matters. Because of the threat that unlawful practices can bring, it’s recommended that you outsource the jobs to a law firm. They’ll make sure that everything is watertight.

Keep Things Separate

Finally, for your own sake, ensure that you’re keeping your business and personal finances separate. There are plenty of advantages to this, but one of the most important is that it makes it much easier to manage your money, and to ensure that you’re not screwed should your business flop.

Finding Your Feet: Your Checklist For Starting A Business

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StrategyDriven Starting Your Business Article |Starting a Business|Finding Your Feet: Your Checklist For Starting A BusinessIf you are thinking of starting a business, then this is a great step for you to take towards a new future for yourself. However, this is not an easy task to complete, and you are going to need to dedicate not just time, but a lot of money and resources into making this work. If you are not willing to do this, then you might as well quit now, because you are not going to make it on the market without this level of dedication. But, if you do have this level of determination and you are willing to commit to this venture, then you need to know exactly what you need to get your business started. Keep reading to find out some of the things that we have come up with!

Come Up With An Idea

The first thing that you are going to need is a good idea. Now, this might sound obvious, but a lot of people who are trying to start a business these days don’t think beyond their own company. You need to look at the market and figure out where there is a gap that you can slide into. If you are going to dive straight into an industry that is already crowded, then you are going to have to have an amazing strategy to get customers to choose your new business over an already established one. This is not going to be easy, which is why you are going to be better off trying to find somewhere that your company fits in easily, rather than trying to force your way in.

Having an idea is the first step to creating something great, and you need to have a solid foundation before you try to build on this. To do this, you need to make sure that you have done plenty of research on the industry you want to enter.

Get Started On A Plan

The next thing that you are going to need to do is to get started on writing a business plan. This is going to be one of the most important steps in the process because this is where you are going to figure out what’s going to happen with the finer details of your business. It is going to be your opportunity to get down the details of what you want to achieve, how you are going to do it, what your business is going to be all about, and all the other things that you need to have decided before you can start a successful company.

The sooner you manage to get started on your plan, the more time you are going to have to finalize it if you are looking to progress your business by a certain deadline. Make sure that you are setting yourself goals for things like this so that you have a time frame in mind.

StrategyDriven Starting Your Business Article |Starting a Business|Finding Your Feet: Your Checklist For Starting A BusinessFind The Funding

Something else that you are going to have to figure out is how you are going to fund your business. Before you can get up and running, you are going to need to find the correct funding that will keep you afloat. Now, there are a number of ways that you can do this, and one of them is to put the money up yourself. If you have the money spare, you are going to be able to put the money up, have full ownership of your company, and not rely on anyone else to help you out financially.

But, for many people, this is not going to be an option for them to consider, and this is where you need to look at alternatives. Finding investors for your business does not have to be too difficult, but it can take some time. One of the things that you can consider is taking your business to a trade show, where you will find plenty of people who are looking for their next business venture. Make sure that you are getting your business to stand out from everyone else that is there so that you can attract as much attention as possible. This way, you are in a better position for investors to choose your business.

Put Together A Team

You are also going to need a team that will be there to help you launch your business. You are not going to get anywhere on the market if you don’t have a team established before your business launches. A team of hardworking individuals is going to be invaluable to you and your business, which is why you want them on your side as soon as you can. They will be able to help you set up your business, and build it into a success!

Make sure that the hiring process is done thoroughly, though, because you are only going to want people to be part of your business if they are willing to put in the effort. There is no use in having people who aren’t dedicated to helping make the company the best it can be because this isn’t going to work out well.

Marketing Is Essential

Finally, you need to sort out some form of marketing for your business, or nobody is going to know about you. This needs to include social media, leaflets, setting up your own website, writing guest posts on blogs, and so many other marketing methods. Every step on this list is going to be important, but this final step is the one that could make or break the entire company. Without marketing, nobody is going to know about your business, and then you aren’t going to see any profits, and then your business could collapse. We don’t want that, and you don’t want that, so you need to make sure that you have the correct marketing strategies in place, long before the launch of your business.

We hope that you have found this article helpful, and now know what you are going to need to start your business. Follow this checklist, and you are going to have a higher chance of achieving success!

Must-have business services every start-up should consider

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StrategyDriven Starting Your Business Article |Start-up|Must-have business services every start-up should considerBritain is, according to a report in The Telegraph, “a booming nation of start-ups.” In fact, around 660,000 new companies are registered in the UK every year.

Starting a new company is hugely exciting. It is also a risk. The fact is, as many as 60 per cent of new businesses go to the wall in the first three years, and 20 per cent fail within just 12 months.

Making a success of a start-up and growing your idea into a viable business can be achieved if you embrace two rules.

Firstly, learning from mistakes is key (including learning from the mistakes of other start-ups) – there will be blunders and you’ll have to learn how to be agile and recover from them. The second and equally important part of any successful start-up journey is knowing when to invest in help.

Here I’ll be focusing on the five must-have business services every start-up should consider.

  • Funding and business planning
  • HR advice
  • Digital marketing and SEO
  • Intellectual Property rights
  • Business coaching

Let’s take a look at each of them in more detail.

Funding and business planning for start-ups

Researching possible funding avenues and finding an investor isn’t easy, especially when you are starting out and have a huge number of tasks to complete in order to set up your venture. Seeking the advice of a business adviser could be worth the investment. A business adviser can help you with your business plan, and give invaluable advice on possible funding avenues.

Business advisors and chartered accountants, Wellden Turnbull, say that it is astonishing how many start-ups set out without a well-thought out plan. They say that 1.5 million SMEs do not have a business plan and that it is often the lack of a plan that catches small businesses out.

HR Advice

As soon as you take on your first employee, you will need to ramp up your understanding of HR – that’s human resources. You’ll need to know which HR regulations you’ll need to adhere to and how to deal with all sorts of employee-related issues, such as absenteeism and sick pay, paying a fair wage, calculating holidays, overtime, dealing with staff complaints and much more.

Your employees are a precious resource – get the management of them wrong and you could lose them or worse find yourself at a tribunal. Every start-up needs a minimum level of HR knowledge – if you don’t have clue, you’ll need to learn fast or seek some professional HR advice.

Digital marketing and SEO

Getting noticed online is now more important to business success than ever before. Why? Nowadays everything happens online. Digital marketing is a cost-effective way to promote your business and can put you in a position to compete with established businesses which are much larger than yours.

While setting up a website, email marketing and social media are perfectly do-able in-house, optimising your website to move up the Google rankings is quite involved and requires a certain amount of technical skill.
Seeking help from an SEO professional to ensure your website is mobile-friendly, easy to navigate, fast-loading, and has backlinks from authoritative sources is worth the investment.

Intellectual Property rights

The World Trade Organisation (WTO) defines Intellectual Property rights as “the rights given to persons over the creations of their minds.” Also known as IP rights, Intellectual Property rights give the creator an exclusive right over the use of his/her creation for a set period of time.

IP is protected by extensive laws and disputes are common – in fact, there are specialist lawyers who only work on IP cases. There are two main categories for IP protection – Copyright, and Industrial Property (which includes things like trademarks and patents).

Why is IP important for start-ups? When you have a unique idea for a business, there will always be people who will want to steal your idea, so it is important to protect them. In order to prevent your IP being exploited by others it would be prudent to seek specialist advice. For a checklist on protecting your Intellectual Property, see here.

Business coaching

One-to-one coaching or mentoring when you are setting up a business may seem like an extravagance, but it could actually be the best investment you ever make. Research suggests that working with a business coach can increase your profit margin by an average of 46 per cent.

While there is plenty of information out there to help you get your business started, there’s nothing quite like personalised custom advice. Business coaches are usually expert entrepreneurs who know what it takes to make a start-up succeed.

A business coach will train you in the skills you need and teach you how to set goals and grow your brand.
Choosing the right business coach to work with is obviously important. Get this right and your start-up could be catapulted to success.

Ensuring Your Business Starts On Stable Footing

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StrategyDriven Starting Your Business Article |Starting Your Business|Ensuring Your Business Starts On Stable FootingWe can often see businesses as stable institutions, perhaps absolutely secure on the platform upon which they stand. But most of us who have experience in the industry know better. For example, industry titans can easily lose plenty of their stock if rocked by deep controversy, if failing to live up to their obligations, or if investing in a bad route without caring for the sunk cost to make that work.

But all of that is in the future. For a business just starting out, ensuring your firm begins on stable footing can allow you to move forward to the future and develop a more cohesive output, potentially allowing you to sidestep issues before they occur and staying optimistic about meeting challenges.

After all, a tree with deeper, more secure roots will take much more effort to become uprooted in winds of chaos. This means that no matter what your business weathers, these essential preliminary tips can help you start in the best possible sense, and for the best possible reasons:

Plan Effectively

Planning effectively is not just a nicety, it’s a requirement. You need to be able to list, to the letter, exactly how you hope to proceed in a certain capacity. This means knowing how you will commit to a certain task, how much it will cost, who will be assigned to it, when your deadline is, and potential variables that can go wrong. Time is money in a small business trying to establish itself, and so as far as that is concerned you need to be as careful as possible. Chart each step as delicately as you can. When you follow this process, you can treat your clients with the care they might require, offsetting the risk they have taken by using your services despite the lack of testimonials.

Dot The I’s, Cross The T’s

Ensure that your paperwork is perfectly considered. For example, a fein application can help you immediately find an ID number that allows you to curate your best taxes planning and payment schedule. Additionally, taking an accurate view to your paperwork can help you more appropriately catalog it, even if you then offset that to a professional accountant or tax management lawyer.

Hire A Consultant

Many firms feel as though there’s something shameful in hiring a consultant, but of course, this couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, a consultant can help you inject the experience that you may have never been able to curate on your own, and this can be a real problem. Additionally, you might find that hiring a consultant can help you dispel your own foolish or inexperienced notions, allowing you to refine your own skillset and embark upon your own necessary training. Business leaders who are unafraid to admit this need can only come out stronger and more capable in the end – and that’s never a negative thing to consider or promote.

With this advice, you’re certain to ensure your business begins on stable footing. We wish you the best to that end.

How To Choose Your First Business Premises

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StrategyDriven Starting Your Business Article |Business Premises|How To Choose Your First Business PremisesPerhaps you started off at the kitchen table. Or maybe you were in a spare room. Crammed into a garden shed or a loft conversion, occasionally working out of a cafe with free WiFi when you could. Launching your own business often starts with unglamorous surroundings – and when the time comes to finally move into a proper business premises, it feels like a significant milestone. Where your business is based has the power to be transformative. Whether you’re seeking warehousing space to become the logistical hub of operations, or an office environment where you can expand your team and make new hires to grow your business, it’s an exciting time but also a potentially stressful one. Securing premises generally involves a cash outlay and being bound to various contracts, so it’s a decision which needs to be right. If you’ve never chosen a business premises before, what do you need to know to make sure that you get the choice right?

Think Through Your Requirements

Despite your business straining at the seams for growth, choosing a location is not something that you should rush into. Before you go signing up to every commercial lettings agency in town, take the time to draw up a comprehensive list of the unique requirements that your business has, so that you can make viewings with a logical mind. Think about the size of space you need – and how quickly you’re likely to grow. You don’t want to sign a contract only to find that you’ve already run out of space six months down the line, but equally you don’t want to be paying for space you don’t need. If growth is unpredictable, then place a short term leasing agreement higher up your list. Think about things like access and proximity to public transport hubs for your employees. Look into parking restrictions, nearness to your suppliers, building facilities, business rates and the security of the property – even things like the Access Entry System. Now is the time to both think of the big picture and zero in on the details to make sure you make the right choice.

To Buy Or To Rent?

One of the main considerations to bear in mind with your first business premises is whether it’s better to rent or take the plunge and seek capital funding to purchase. This decisions depends on a variety of factors. If you work in a smaller scale, high growth industry such as software development than it makes more sense to rent – this gives you more flexibility and requires less outlay of precious capital. In other situation, where business growth is more steady or you require a very specific space for specialist manufacturing equipment, you may well be better off making a purchase, as you can manage and modify the building to fit your needs. This also gives you the option of renting the premises out in the future if it no longer suits your requirements and creating an additional income stream.The decision has to be up to you – but make sure you enter the process with a clear mind, and you’ll make the right decision for your business.