Young, service based business owners, how is life going for you? small business |
- Young, service based business owners, how is life going for you?
- When to do it yourself, when to delegate.
- Need advice for my online store
- Tax Act is not able to eFile taxes or accept payments for the next week. What other companies offer DIY taxes for LLC/Partnerships?
- Looking for an explanation on what taxes businesses owe, from start to finish.
- "Doing Business As" (DBA) Question
- How do you organize a central company e-mail inbox when accessing with multiple owners?
- Question about my business
- Buying a Business Crashcourse
- Explanation of SEO for small, local businesses
- Help please! Is business insurance required!?
- "The processing rates are Interchange plus 50 basis points."
- If you could change one thing about advertising, what would it be?
- How to streamline my design and digital marketing agency?
- What do I do about competitors who copy me?
- In need of marketing strategy help!
- I have 1 successful business but i wanna diversify/invest in other stuff.
- Starting business with a partner, I’m the bank.
- I'm about to start a very small niche business with myself and need help figuring if I have all my ducks in a row?
- Looking for Feedback on Hat Business
- How should I scale my business?
- Unique situation: Where to setup an LLC?
- Why is it that small businesses don't make having a good website a priority?
| Young, service based business owners, how is life going for you? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 05:26 PM PST I own a window cleaning business in a small rural town, life is going okay. I'm starting to really see a snowball effect with customers and I'm hitting the pavement with marketing a lot harder than in the beginning. The thing is, nobody ever seems to ask me how it's going and that bothers me so let's all talk! [link] [comments]  |
| When to do it yourself, when to delegate. Posted: 02 Feb 2018 02:53 PM PST Just been thinking about this: I'm working on starting my business and there are (as I'm sure you know) a million little things to do, and I don't feel like I have a framework for evaluating when I should be doing something myself/in house, or contracting an outside party. Perfect example: video editing. I film a lot of processes for promotional videos, and I procured a video editing software. I'm not going to hire someone to film on site and so I feel like it makes more sense for me to do the videos myself from start to finish as I've already invested in filming and everything that goes along with that. On the other hand, I'm not going to learn code just so I can build a website; that I'll outsource to Squarespace... But what considerations should I be making in these decisions? Cost of outside help, opportunity cost involved in doing it myself, what else? Where do you draw the line? The best rule of thumb that I can grasp is simply, set a deadline, if it doesn't get done by then, you need to be honest whether or not you need help; then consider your options according to cost. [link] [comments]  |
| Need advice for my online store Posted: 02 Feb 2018 10:54 PM PST Hey! I launched this online store about 4 months ago and I have only gotten 2 sales. I have 3,000 likes on facebook and 4 accounts promoting the store on Instagram with combined followers of 12.5k. I'm getting about 15-20 visits a day. I would love someone to take a look at the store and tell me what is wrong with it. Please be brutally honest in your advice because that is the only thing that will help! Thankyou for any advice. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 02 Feb 2018 03:28 PM PST I just got off the phone with Tax Act support after hours of resizing, using different browsers and different computers trying to attach my 8453. My business taxes are stupid simple so I prefer using a program myself instead of paying HR Block or a CPA $$$-$$$$s to do my taxes. But Tax Act is the only program I've found to be able to do them? Are there any others out there? [link] [comments]  |
| Looking for an explanation on what taxes businesses owe, from start to finish. Posted: 03 Feb 2018 04:09 AM PST I am thinking about starting a business in the US, but one thing that really concerns me is the tax aspect. To me, it seems like it should all be pretty plain and simple. If you keep even moderate track of your numbers, I don't understand how you could ever be surprised about taxes (whether owing or getting back). It seems like you would always know down to the cent exactly what is owed on taxes. And yet, so many people get surprised anyway, and the term 'Estimated Taxes' is used a lot but I don't get it. So maybe I'm not as familiar with what taxes are collected as I thought. I think I'm familiar enough with Sales Tax: A percentage added on to every sale (determined by state) that you set aside in your bank account. You then pay that amount (by the 23rd of the following month, if I'm not mistaken). I get a little hazy on the employee Medicare, Social Security, and unemployment taxes. I think it's a percentage of what you pay your workers must be removed from their paycheck for each of these three things, and sent to the IRS. Your company is also responsible for matching the amounts of SS and Medicare. If you're the owner and sole proprietor, I get really confused. Because how is the government supposed to know how much you're getting paid? Which leads me to the even more confusing: Income tax. I guess this is just a tax on all profit your company makes? But I'm not sure how the government is supposed to know how much profit you made, or what exactly they call 'profit'. Like, if I spend $100 on stock, and then resell it for $200, then sure, I may show a $100 profit at that time, but what about at the end of the month when all of my $100 of bills are due? Technically if you look ahead, I'm at $0 profit there, so how does the government handle that kind of thing? I may also be missing some taxes. Not exactly sure what everything else is, those were the ones I'm familiar with. I just want to know exactly what needs to be collected, and where from and in what amounts. As a bonus question; If I do that, why would I ever be surprised come tax season? [link] [comments]  |
| "Doing Business As" (DBA) Question Posted: 02 Feb 2018 10:21 AM PST Does anyone know if I can do MULTIPLE DBAs? I've already got one for my small business however I'd like to work with another publisher, in secret, and would like to use a pseudonym for contracts and such. Thanks and happy Friday! [link] [comments]  |
| How do you organize a central company e-mail inbox when accessing with multiple owners? Posted: 03 Feb 2018 01:50 AM PST We're two people (guyA and guyB) who started a small company, and our central e-mail address is info@example.com We both access this mailbox. The problem is, when someone sends us an e-mail, if the other guy reads it, the mail is not shown as unread anymore. That means I don't see a new mail and thus don't check the inbox. How do you handle this? I thought about this: We set up two more accounts, guyA@example.com and guyB@example.com and auto-forward mails from info@ to both these accounts. But then we would respond to these mails from the guyA@ account, and a re-response would then likely go only to guyA, so guyB doesn't see it anymore. How do you guys with more than one founder solve the issue of everyone being notified of every new e-mail? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 02 Feb 2018 10:22 PM PST I have a question about my business, and I feel like you are well-placed to advise. I run a business in the educational sector in a US city. Initially the business was just me, until academic year 2016-17 I started working with independent contractors. The business has been growing really fast and so in the summer of 2017 I opened a physical office space and have taken on an admin employee working ca. 20 hours a month. Our revenues have grown year-on-year and as of last year are at $170,000. However, my business knowledge is limited, and I have found myself running a company almost by accident. Our profits are between 1k and 3k per month since September (the beginning of the academic year), which leaves very little for accumulation of capital (if at all), and very vulnerable to cash flow issues. I haven't previously taken on any loan, line of credit, or credit card. I was turned down in an application for a business credit card because I have only a short credit history in the country. Our business is definitely growing in terms of number of customers, and given we've spent nothing on marketing, our word of mouth reputation is really growing. I am confident that this could become a successful company and expand to other companies. We have some unique elements to our business that I'll keep schtum on for obvious reasons. So the question is this - where do we go from here? Should I be looking to work with an investor or a business partner? I love running the business, but the financial side of things is a real stress; is that part and parcel of every small business? Should I go for a bank loan to help with cash flow and costs, or would a line of credit suffice? Or am I missing something obvious and the business isn't going to work? I'm always impressed by the level of expertise I see on Reddit, and so, despite being something of a lurker, I thought I'd ask for some help/advice. Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 02 Feb 2018 06:08 PM PST Hello, I am planning on purchasing the business where I've been working for the past few years and was wanting any advice and knowledge I can get. I'll try to give you as much information as I can, hopefully it all will be useful. Background: I am the only employee of a small sales/service business and have been working there for just over four years now. My boss was 65 when I started, and his retirement has been coming up more and more over the past year or two and he finally decided that it will be this year in July. I have mentioned multiple times that I would like to purchase the business when he does decide to retire. I like the work and our clients. Over the past few years I have taken over almost all responsibilities, except for finances. The price he came to me with is lower than I was expecting, and includes payments over five years rather than lump sum so there is very little chance that I do not plan on taking over. For the upfront cost I will need a loan, would the bank I have my mortgage through or would any other local bank work or should I look at bigger banks? I want to have a lawyer draw up official paper work, what key words should I be looking for with regards to a lawyer? Is this "business law" or something else? How many years of the books should I look at? I know the company has grown quite a lot in the last three years or so, would older records still be worthwhile? The offer includes all assets, such as our warehouse, the truck I've been driving, current inventory, and tools. Figuring out insurance is also something on my list, and getting everything put into the businesses name or my own. I think he currently has everything in his name since he ran the business by himself for so many years. Rapid fire question time: I currently have insurance through the ACA Marketplace, should I finish the year out with the current plan or is this enough of a "life event" that I should get something new going? Should I not worry about his taxes and just send him a 1099 at the end of the year or keep him as an "employee"? I recently found out a little about S-Corps, should I try and turn this into one or maybe an LLC? Any questions I should be asking but I'm missing? Should I crosspost this anywhere else? Thank you so much for your help. I'll do my best to answer any question you have. [link] [comments]  |
| Explanation of SEO for small, local businesses Posted: 02 Feb 2018 09:43 AM PST I came across this article from a local agency this morning and thought I'd share it with the small business community: https://drakkardigital.com/seo/ I think they're right that outside of the marketing world, there's not as much understanding on how it all works, especially for small, local businesses. What do you all think? [link] [comments]  |
| Help please! Is business insurance required!? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 02:10 PM PST Hello, I'm a sole proprietor in Washington State, run an online business and was wondering if you needed general business liability insurance? [link] [comments]  |
| "The processing rates are Interchange plus 50 basis points." Posted: 02 Feb 2018 07:20 PM PST IS this a good option for credit card processing? the options for a POS tabletop or a credit card machine are pretty lackluster. (Verifone VX520) or (PayAnywhere POS) [link] [comments]  |
| If you could change one thing about advertising, what would it be? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 10:04 AM PST I'm having a debate on advertising, and it has reached a stalemate. We initially thought to settle it through a respectable and dignified duel, but we've agreed that getting some fresh perspectives might work instead. So please help us out! If you could magically change ONE thing about advertising, what would you change (and why)?Don't worry about practicality or implementation (this is a "magical" change!). All perspectives are welcome - advertisers, agencies, consumers, etc. And if you're perfectly happy with advertising as it is now, tell us that (we won't believe such a person exists until we come across one). Thanks in advance for saving us from the terrible fate of needing to wake up before dawn. Assuming the pistols stay safely packed away, I'll summarize the results here for anyone who is interested. [link] [comments]  |
| How to streamline my design and digital marketing agency? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 06:27 PM PST I'm 23 years old and I started my own design and digital Marketing agency in India couple of years back right after finishing my college. At present I have 6 people working including 2 developers, 2 designers. 1 content writer and 1 business development. I'm lucky to have amazing clients top players from various verticals including hospitality, healthcare and education and I work with most of them in retainership basis. The major issues I'm facing right now is that I'm unable to deliver works on time I feel I do not have a structure proper work flow in place. At present I'm using Trello for project management where I list the works everyday and move the cards as per priority for everyone however when some works/revisions pops up(most of my clients request stuff very immediately) the priority gets changed and we end up not completing he actual planned works for the day. My business development guy sometimes acts a designer and developer because we are unable to meet the deadlines. And since I'm coordinating most of the time I'm unable to send out the invoices on time and there is huge pile of bills to be sent and followed up I kinda feel(not sure) these are few of the places where I'm going wrong 1) I don't have a proper structure or workflow in place 2) I'm not giving proper delivery time estimates to my clients; I'm agreeing to whatever deadlines they give and end up and not meeting them. I don't know how to make it proper 3) I'm not sending out invoices on time 4) I do not have specific financials targets and I'm not tracking it either These are some of the strategies I tried implementing last week 1) implementing Trello for managing tasks 2) using google calendar to track what project people are working on everyday Some advice I which I feel would help me to a great extent 1) how to effectively structure the agency so that the workflow is proper 2) tips or strategies to deliver services on time with the best of quality 3)how to check of I should to hire more people or what I have is enough 4) how to fix and track targets and growth 5) any links/ books / tutorials where I can study to run my business effectively with proven methods Thank you [link] [comments]  |
| What do I do about competitors who copy me? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 10:28 AM PST So I am asking this so I can help my mom who runs a small business which I help her out with. She hosts a few ethnic/cultural events that draw a lot of people. It tends to go well and vendors and customers leave happy for many years now. We make a modest profit believing fully in win-win for us, our customers, and our vendors. The problem is that there is someone who started as a vendor and for the last few years she decided she wanted to copy my mom and run her own event and constantly comes to our events and tries to solicit people for her own events. Often times she crams as many vendors as she can into the same venue we have been at for 7-8 years. She doesn't spend anything on advertising, tries to cut as many corners as she can and purposefully chooses to bank on the buildup we do for our event and then selecting the next day on the weekend so if we do Saturday she does Sunday and vice versa. The venue owner could care less as long as he gets rent paid and I strongly suspect he tells people that her event and ours is the same so that his venue gets more advertising and the other woman can continue year to year. We built sooo much recognition for his venue over the last 7-8 years and he repays us by raising our rent year to year because this other woman creates "competition". There is absolutely no point discussing this with the venue in business terms, they are completely greedy for short term profit, if it doesnt generate dollars today they dont care at all. There's nothing wrong with healthy competition but she leeches our advertising, runs a mediocre to bad event and then due to customers not being able to differentiate negative associations are made with our event which is not as terribly managed as hers. Vendors get unhappy and then blow us off and use her event as an example of why we should charge less or criticize for things that have nothing to do with us. We also obviously lose potential customers who associate with the venue more so than the event host. We changed venues (AT A MASSIVE OPPORTUNITY COST) to avoid confusion, having to rebuild brand recognition 15 miles away in another town and now she is attempting to follows us there too wanting obviously to do the exact same thing. Her ads and marketing are blatant copy pastes of our own marketing. She is super fake, super slimy, makes fake/alt facebook accounts to track my mom's every new move to copy her. She's manipulative and runs in the same business/social circle making this whole thing more complicated because she's deceitful but doesn't show that outright, some people have seen her for what she is but my mom wont speak ill of her to anyone and keeps taking the high road. I know this is a huge block of text, don't know if this is the right spot, but I was just wondering if anyone on this sub had any suggestions. [link] [comments]  |
| In need of marketing strategy help! Posted: 02 Feb 2018 11:32 AM PST I've got a problem I can't quite seem to solve yet. I run a brick and mortar tutoring center in a low-mid level income area in the U.S. The target audience is parents with kids in middle school or high school. I've found it quite difficult to effectively 1) get in front of this demographic and 2) educate my audience of the benefit of academic assistance. Any ideas or input on how I should approach solving this? [link] [comments]  |
| I have 1 successful business but i wanna diversify/invest in other stuff. Posted: 02 Feb 2018 05:19 PM PST What other investments / business ideas do you recommend getting into? Do you have any ideas / proposals that need a savy young tech partner with a lot of capital, time and experience? I'm from Toronto btw! I currently own and manage one of the most successful event rental companies in Toronto. [link] [comments]  |
| Starting business with a partner, I’m the bank. Posted: 02 Feb 2018 05:18 PM PST So I'm 23 and finishing up an AA in Accounting, and I'm trying to skip the 9 to 5. I have money ($30,000) saved up to invest in a multi-unit rental property, and I have a part- time job where I make about $18,000 after taxes. But it's verrrry part-time. I have a lot of time on my hands, so a long-time friend of mine who has a very entrepreneurial spirit, like myself, wants to start a business with me. Sounds great, and we have a couple different ideas, but I'm The one with capital ($10,000 that is separate from my savings and savings for rental property). I'm willing to take a risk, but I'd obviously be more invested than he (no pun intended). So what's the best way to approach this? Hire him as an employee and have to pay him? Forego the venture for now until he has capital? Write up some sort of contract entitling me to lions share of profits down the road? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 02 Feb 2018 10:17 AM PST I have all the resources I need, mostly because as working with else in a related industry (property management), I discovered I have the tools and skills to make accurate floor plans (not blue prints). I am developing samples and a PDF presentation to bring to businesses, to offer different types of floor plans for an hourly fee. Besides making my PDF and learning who to contact where, what else should I prepare? Where else can I get input on the PDF and plan itself? What goals and structure should I make for myself? [link] [comments]  |
| Looking for Feedback on Hat Business Posted: 02 Feb 2018 03:53 PM PST Starting a company named Valor Caps in which I sell hats with a portion of the proceeds going to certain military causes that support our service members and their families. This is a very important cause to me (coming from a military family) and I am currently seeking feedback on my designs. A survey I created is located here:https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSen-z5RGVUqP4QtGPOLxottiee7ylgjU5LQ4dgiAdX55gSm8Q/viewform?usp=sf_link Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| How should I scale my business? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 03:24 PM PST I accidentally started a "business" from my home few years ago where I buy broken and non-functioning TV's from people where I pick them up directly from them. Then I repair and sell them locally if possible or take them for parts and sell eBay. This business is surprisingly responsible for 75% of my annual income. I am hitting a brick wall when it comes to getting my hands on more broken TVs. Right now I "advertize" on Craigslist in different relevant categories with different title and picture on each ad to diversify the key words and visual appeal. I do the same on Facebook. I also look for sale posts on Craigslist, Facebook and OfferUp for people who have a broken TVs for sale. I have tried doing paid Google and Facebook ads to drive in traffic, however that has cost me more than it brought in. I went to local recycling centers/places (city, BestBuy, Goodwill,...), however they have their own internal procedures to deal with broken TVs and don't want to deal with me. I live in very lager metropolitan area and I am sure there are more broken TVs being thrown out every day, I just don't know how to get to them before they are. Vast majority of people find my ad on Craigslist, handful of few are "repeat" customers, even less get my number as referral or find my website. Any ideas? I am currently working on trying to get a partnership with local TV repair shops (those very few that are still reputable) where they would give out my number to people who can't afford a repair or when TV is not repairable in exchange of me sending them customers who accidentally called me for repair quote. [link] [comments]  |
| Unique situation: Where to setup an LLC? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 01:27 PM PST I have a unique situation that I could use some advice on. I am self-employed and intend to start an LLC for my business. I live in Boston, MA but conduct most of my business out of state (FL mostly, about 75%... but other states include RI, SC, CA, etc.). I am trying to figure out where it is best in terms of tax benefits for me to setup an LLC? My clients are from all over (Chicago, Connecticut, Massachusetts, etc) but our business is almost never conducted in their home state. The business revenue is between $50-100,000 a year. I am the only employee. For example, a typical transaction would be to fly to Florida, work on a consulting project for 3-7 days, fly back to MA, and receive a check from the client/client's bank that is located in their home state such as CT. The options I have come up with are: 1) Register in MA as it is my home state/physical address 2) Register in FL because most of my business takes place there 3) Register in either Delaware or Nevada to take advantage of tax benefits. My questions are: 1) Which of these would you recommend (or pros/cons for each)? 2) Would I have to setup a bank account in the state in which I register? 3) Does Nevada provide better protection from asset sales taxation (I also do some buying/selling of assets (such as cars/small boats) for profit...from what I have read Nevada would be the best option to avoid paying taxes on these)? 4) Any other tips/advice you would give me? [link] [comments]  |
| Why is it that small businesses don't make having a good website a priority? Posted: 02 Feb 2018 09:41 AM PST Why is it that small businesses don't put much effort into their websites? And how do I convince them it's worth caring about and ultimately paying for? [link] [comments]  |
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