BLOGS
Time To Grow: how to start your own business
Small-and-medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) represent a staggering 99.9% of UK businesses and account for 61% of all employment.
For many, being your own boss is the dream, with two-thirds of Brits planning to start a business, but how exactly do you turn your hobby and passion into a legitimate venture?
We’ll be covering exactly that in our new ‘Time To Grow’ blog series, examining the following:
- Dealing with tax obligations: National Insurance, VAT, and MTD
- Complying with business regulations such as GDPR and IR35
- Managing your business finances
- What to think about when you start employing
- How software can help you
Starting your own business: initial considerations
So, how do you start your own business?
Before we begin the Time To Grow blog series - keep an eye out for the upcoming blogs - it's important to cover a few initial considerations:
- Choose a name and logo that reflects your brand; logos and names are the first things your customers will see, and initial impressions last a lifetime.
- Determine your legal structure, are you a sole trader, limited company, or partnership – then register your business.
- Create a business plan that sets out your strategy and objectives, helping you focus and prioritise your time (a business plan is essential if you want to raise finance or get a business loan from the bank).
- Check the rules around your type of business: do you need a licence, permits, or insurance? What about patents or trademarks?
- Work out what business records you need to keep, i.e. tax Or VAT – this is where software or a good accountant can help.
- If you’re employing people, will you run your own payroll or outsource the responsibility to a managed service provider?
- Plan a marketing strategy to promote your business and gain new customers; social media, website creation, and how you’ll communicate are all crucial.
- Conduct industry research to help you understand the market and inform the price of your product or service.
It’s Time To Grow
With so much to do when running a business, time is undoubtedly your greatest asset.
That’s why we’re helping small businesses find Time To Grow by offering up to 50% off our software solutions that can help you simplify and streamline admin-intensive tasks.
For more information and to become a master of time, click here.