Getting Your Business Off the Ground: Where to Start
So you’re thinking of setting up your own business. You’re far from alone in this thought process. Since the pandemic has destroyed so many businesses and resulted in many redundancies and cases of unemployment, more people are looking to become their own bosses and hold more control over their income and career path. Of course, getting a business up and running does require hard work and determination. Hopefully, some of the information below will help you to determine whether this journey is right for you!
Decide What You Want to Do
If you’re going to start a business, you need a clear idea of the products or services that you’re planning on selling, as well as insight into whether there’s sufficient consumer demand to make a profit. You should carry out plenty of market research, product testing and other testing to ensure that this business can be a success.
Get the Funds Together
Setting up a business is always going to take financial investment. You’re going to have to spend in all sorts of areas to get things off the ground. Whether that’s purchasing a laptop or desktop computer to be able to work from, investing in manufacturing, investing market research or anything else. So, make sure that you have the money required to make this venture work. There are a number of ways to achieve this, but the majority of people tend to work their usual jobs and save in advance or take out a business loan from a provider like ondeck. Make sure to get financial advise on this to prevent issues with debt.
Register Your Business
Once you’re certain you want to make this business a reality, you’re going to have to officially register your business. You will do this through Companies House. Now, there are a number of reasons you need to register your business. The first is to ensure that it is officially recognised. The second is to make sure that it is deemed a separate legal entity to you as an individual. This helps to split your personal finances and assets from your business’ finances and assets, meaning that if your business fails or gets into trouble, your personal assets won’t be seized and you don’t have to worry about your personal finances being affected directly. This is a good safety net.
Register as Self-Employed
When you run your own business, you’re working for yourself, so will need to pay your taxes on an annual basis through a self assessment. It’s important that you register as self employed in order to receive a UTR number that will allow you to do this. You can register as self employed online in a quick and easy manner.
These are just the first few stepping stones you’ll face when it comes to getting your business off the ground, but hopefully, some of them will help you along the way!