steps for small business

Small businesses are common in many countries, depending on the economic system in operation. Typical examples include: convenience stores, other small shops (such as a bakery or delicatessen), hairdressers, tradesmen, lawyers, accountants, restaurants, guest houses, photographers, small-scalemanufacturing, and online businesses, such as web design and programming, etc.

•  Have an idea. It might be a product you've always wanted to make, or a service you feel people need. It might even be something people don't know they need yet, because it hasn't been invented!

It can be helpful and fun to have people who are bright and creative join you for a casual brainstorming session. Start with a simple question like: "what shall we build?". The idea is not to create a business plan, just to generate some ideas. Many of the ideas will be duds, and there will be quite a few ordinary ones, but a few will emerge that have real potential.

The legal definition of "small business" varies by country and by industry the Small Business Administration establishes small business size standards on an industry-by-industry basis, but generally specifies a small business as having fewer than 250 employees for manufacturing businesses and less than $7 million in annual receipts for most non manufacturing businesses. The definition can vary by circumstance – for example, a small business having fewer than 25 full-time equivalent employees with average annual wages below $50,000 qualifies for a tax credit under the health care reform bill Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

• Define your goals. Do you want financial independence, eventually selling your business to the highest bidder? Do you want something small and sustainable, that you love doing and want to derive a steady income from? These are the things that are good to know very early on.
• Create a working name. You could even do this before you have an idea for the business, and if the name is good, you may find it helps you define your business idea. As your plan grows, and things begin to take shape, the perfect name may come to you, but don't let that hinder you in the early phases—–create a name that you can use while you plan, and don't mind changing later.For a bit of fun, take a cue from the Beatles, who often use fun names for a song before it is finalized, like Yesterday, which had the working title of "Scrambled Eggs."

Problem may faced in small business

Small businesses often face a variety of problems related to their size. A frequent cause of bankruptcy is under capitalization. This is often a result of poor planning rather than economic conditions - it is common rule of thumb that the entrepreneur should have access to a sum of money at least equal to the projected revenue for the first year of business in addition to his anticipated expenses. For example, if the prospective owner thinks that he will generate $100,000 in revenues in the first year with $150,000 in start-up expenses, then he should have not less than $250,000 available. Failure to provide this level of funding for the company could leave the owner liable for all of the company's debt should he end up in bankruptcy court, under the theory of under capitalization.

• Define your team. Will you do this alone, or will you bring in one or two trusted friends to join you? This brings a lot of synergy to the table, as people bounce ideas off each other. Two people together can often create something that is greater than the sum of the two separate parts.

Create a business plan. A business plan helps to define what you think you need to launch your business, large or small. It summarizes the sense of your business in a single document. It also creates a map for investors, bankers, and other interested parties to use when determining how they can best help you and to help them decide whether or not your business is viable. There are seriously good books available on writing business plans that cover many chapters, and you should avail yourself of at least one of these as a guide (bookshops, libraries and online are good places to find these). 

Write your business description. Describe your business more specifically, and how it fits into the market in general. Who will you be selling to, and how will you deliver your product? If you are a corporation, LLC, or sole proprietor ship, state that, and why you chose to go that route. Describe your product, its big features, and why people will want it.

A solid public relations strategy that utilizes speaking engagements, press releases, feature stories, events and sponsorships can also be a very cost-effective way to build a loyal following for a small business.

• Sources of funding

Small businesses use several sources available for start-up capital:
Self-financing by the owner through cash, equity loan on his or her home, and or other assets.
Loans from friends or relatives
Grants from private foundations
Personal savings
Private stock issue
Forming partnerships
Angel investors
Banks
SME finance, including Collateral based lending and Venture capital, given sufficiently sound business venture plans

Designing a Marketing Plan for Small Businesses  

  

Come up with some marketing strategies. You must know your market if you are to be successful, so spend a great deal of time analyzing just who it is that will want your product, and how you plan on appealing to them to take cash out of their bank account and give it to you. What is the size of your market, will there be opportunities to expand the initial market, and what are your sales potentials? When you understand these variables, you want to sell them to the person reading your business plan.
Market Research – To produce a marketing plan for Small businesses, research needs to be done on similar businesses which should include desk and field research. This gives an insight in the target group’s behaviour and shopping patterns. Analysing the competitor’s marketing strategies makes it easier for Small business to gain market share.
Marketing mix – Marketing mix is a crucial factor for any business to be successful. Especially for a Small business, competitor’s marketing mix can be very helpful. An appropriate market mix helps boost sales.
Product Life Cycle – After launch of the business, crucial points of focus should be increasing growth phase and delaying maturity phase. Once the business reaches maturity stage, an extension strategy should be in place. Re-launching is also an option at this stage. Pricing strategy should be flexible and based on the different stages of the PLC.
Promotion Techniques – Its preferable to keep promotion expenses as low as possible. ‘Word of mouth’, ‘Email marketing’, ‘Print-ads’ in local newspapers etc. can be effective.
Channels of Distribution – Selecting an effective channel of distribution may reduce the promotional expenses as well as overall expenses for a Small business.

• Do a competitive analysis. As you develop the above sections, you will learn who your key competitors are. Find out who is doing something similar to what you are planning, and how have they been successful. Just as important is to find the failures, and what made their venture fall apart.
• Consider finding an attorney or other legal adviser. There will be many hurdles to leap as you go from working stiff to overworked and underpaid small business owner. Some of those hurdles will be composed of stacks of documents with rules and regulations, ranging from building covenants to city ordinances, county permits, state requirements, taxes, fees, contracts, shares, partnerships, and more. Having somebody you can call when the need arises will not only give you peace of mind, it will give you a much-needed resource who can help you plan for success.
• Get an accountant. You’ll want someone who can deftly handle your financials, but even if you feel you can handle your own books, you’ll still need someone who understands the tax side of running a business. Taxes with businesses can get complicated, so you’ll need (at a minimum) a tax advisor. Again, no matter how much of your finances they’re handling, this should be someone trustworthy.

• Form a business entity. You’ll need to decide what type of business entity you want to be, for tax purposes and hopefully to eventually attract investors. Most people are familiar with corperations, LLCs, etc., but for the vast majority of small business owners, you will need to form one of the following.

A sole proprietorship, if you will be running (not including employees) this business on your own or with your spouse.
A general proprietorship, if you will be running this business with a partner.
A limited partnership, which is composed of a few general partners, who are liable for problems with the business, and a few limited partners, who are only liable for the amount in which they invest in the business. All share profits and losses.
A limited liability partnership (LLP), where no partner is liable for another’s negligence.

Manage your running costs. Keep a close eye on your running costs and keep them in line with your projections. Whenever you see something spent wastefully—like electricity, phone plans, stationery, packaging—look around, and estimate how much really need, and minimize or remove the cost in every way possible. Think frugally when you start up, including hiring items instead of purchasing them and using pre-paid plans for services your business needs instead of locking yourself into long-term contracts.

Find a way to get paid. You will need to do something to get payment from your clients or customers. You can get something like a Square, which is great for small businesses since it requires the minimum amount of paperwork and the fees are minimal. However, if you feel uncomfortable with technology, you can go the old fashioned route and get a merchant account.

• Get a website. If you're selling online, get your ecommerce in gear and either build a website, or have one built for you. It's your storefront, so anything and everything you can do to make people want to visit, and want to stay, do it.

• Discover your inner publicist. You might truly believe in your product or service but it won't fly unless everyone else believes in it too. If you're new to advertising and marketing or you dislike doing the sales pitch, now is the time to overcome such feelings and put on the publicist persona. You need to develop an excellent short pitch to convince people they need your product or service, one that reflects the value, purpose and potential of what your business is offering. Write down this pitch in many ways until you find one that you feel satisfied says it all and is something you can say readily. Then practice it like crazy!

• Have interesting, eye-catching business cards printed.

Spend time developing an excellent social media presence. This can be done well before the business is ready, increasing anticipation. Use Facebook, Google+ and Twitter, and any other social media you participate in to build excitement and spread the word. You want to build a buzz so that people will begin following your progress. (Be sure to choose business accounts for your business and keep your personal accounts separate. The messages you send should be tailored differently,

• Secure space. Whether it's an office, or a warehouse, if you need more space than your garage or your spare bedroom, now's the time to get that.

If you don't generally need an office beyond your home, but may occasionally need meeting space, there are often places downtown that can address those needs. A quick Google search on "business meeting rentals [your city/state]" will deliver plenty of rental options in your area.

• Build your product or develop your service. Once you have the business all planned, financed, and have your basic level of staffing, get going. Whether that's sitting down with the engineers and getting the software coded and tested, or getting materials sourced and shipped to your fabrication room (aka "garage"), or purchasing in bulk and marking up the price, the building process is the time during which you prepare for market

• Launch your product or your service. When the product is all built, packaged, coded, online, and ready to sell, or when your services are fully worked out and ready to go, hold a special event to launch your business. Send out a press release, announce it to the world. Tweet it, Facebook it, let the word resound to all corners of your market—you have a new business!

Don't be afraid to experiment with prices.
Try to add more and more great ideas as you go!
Keep learning, and be adaptable to change. Find buddies, mentors, local business-related organizations, Internet forums, and wikis to discuss the daily details of running a small business. It's much easier for everyone to perform their core businesses well and prosper when they don't waste time and energy "reinventing the wheel" on housekeeping.
You can also consider trading on eBay or Overstock.