Business Startup Funding - Are You Ready?

Business startup funding is an absolutely critical element in launching a successful business. If you assess your personal and business expenses, eliminate the extras where possible, and plan for sources of alternate capital then you should be able to secure adequate business startup funding.

Keywords:

Business Startup Funding, Business-Startup-Funding

Article Body:

Business startup funding is always a worry. Do I have enough money to start? Can I quit my job to concentrate full time? Will I be able to cover my monthly expenses?

When the time comes to actually launch your business you must have done your homework regarding your business startup funding needs. You need to be prepared so that if the opportunity to accelerate your launch presents itself, you're ready.

Assess Your Personal Finances

Take out your checkbook and credit card statements and review all of your personal expenses. Find all the frills and eliminate them. It's tough to do, but if you're really committed to getting this business of the ground you need to reduce your personal expenses.

Taking control of your business startup funding doesn't mean you have to quit enjoying life. You just have to prioritize for now. Skip the night show and catch a matinee instead. If you're going out for dinner, clip a 2 for 1 coupon or go to the early bird. Hold off on that tropical vacation for one year.

Evaluate Your Business Expenses

Another element of business startup funding is your minimum business expenses. Luckily, computer consulting is not a capital intense venture. You will have business expenses to cover though, so you must analyze what those are and figure them into your business startup funding needs.

Do the Math

Total up your personal and business monthly expenses. To launch a successful business you need to have at least six months of cash in the bank OR an alternative source of affordable capital. Many people won't have 6 months cash to cover their business startup funding needs. If this is you, you will need to find, or keep, a job.

Limit the job to 15 - 20 hours per week so you leave enough time to concentrate on building your business. Whether it’s teaching some computer courses at the college or working at an electronics store, you have to be bringing is some reliable income. This reliable income will give you the cushion you need to spend time building your client base.

Securing adequate business startup funding is one of the most challenging aspects of launching a small business. You don't want to minimize its importance though. Inadequate business startup funding is at the root of many business failures.

The Bottom Line on Business Startup Funding

Do what you need to do now, in order to do what you want to do in the future. Having enough business startup funding means conserving your cash mercilessly. You have to know where your money is going and have enough to cover 6 months of expenses. If your business startup funding is a little short, a part time job is often the most practical means of securing the funding you need.

Copyright MMI-MMVI, Computer Consulting Blog. All Worldwide Rights Reserved. {Attention Publishers: Live hyperlink in author resource box required for copyright compliance}

Computer Consultant Startup: What's The First Step?

Computer consultant candidates need to make sure they really want to start this career. Write down the top 5 reasons you want to become one and you're on your way to becoming a computer consultant.

Keywords:

computer-consultant, computer consultant, computer-consultants, computer consultants

Article Body:

If you're the typical person who’s considering becoming a computer consultant, then you are probably a LAN administrator, doing some kind of PC support job for big enterprise or maybe even working for a smaller integrator. In this article, you'll learn what you need to do first to realize your goal of becoming a computer consultant.

From talking to hundreds of people in this situation right now, the number one thing is that you have to decide that you really want to and really need to do it. Don’t put tons and tons of time getting all this IT training and business training and spending all this money until you’ve decided that you really want to do it.

Why Become a Computer Consultant?

There are lots of reasons why people want to become a computer consultant. You may want to be more responsible for your own career destiny, you may want to be able to build something from scratch that you can call your own, or maybe you’re just totally fed up with being stuck in the cubicle, reporting to your boss, and just in general being held back in your career over things that are way beyond your control.

Take Some Action Right Now

As your first step toward becoming a computer consultant, take out a piece of paper right now and write down “The Top Five Reasons Why I Have To, Need To and Want to Become a Computer Consultant.” Then go ahead and list them. This is really your declaration of independence.

Set a Deadline

You are now laying it on the line and saying all the reasons why you want to, why you have to, why you need to make this happen now. Why you need to start taking the right steps to get going in the right direction. Most importantly though, is when you get done narrowing it down to the top five list, preferably putting the most important reasons to you at the top of the list, give yourself a concrete deadline.

Take out the calendar and make a promise to yourself that you’re going to make it happen and write it down right on the bottom of your piece of paper. Print it out or rip it out of your notebook, put it up on the bulletin board next to your desk and look at it every day. The more specific this is, the easier it is going to be for you to make it a reality.

Copyright MMI-MMVI, Computer Consulting 101 Blog. All Worldwide Rights Reserved. {Attention Publishers: Live hyperlink in author resource box required for copyright compliance}

Eine neuer Startup

Vor wenigen Wochen wurde wieder ein neuer Startup online veröffentlicht. Der Online Service heißt foodJoker und kümmert sich um die Restaurantbranche. Das sagen sich viele gleich, "na, einer von vielen", aber bei foodJoker ist es anders.

Keywords:

Wir leben in einer Zeit der Modernen und Dynamik. Tagtäglich ändert sich die Mode, tagtäglich wird etwasneues erfunden oder entdeckt, tagtäglich werden neue Startups gegründet. So wie vor ein paar Wochen. Ein neuer Domain im Internet wurde aktiv, www.foojoker.com wurde zum Leben gerufen. Ja wieder ein neuer Startup, wieder eine neue Idee, die ihr Glück in dieser so lauten und dynamischen Welt der Informationen versucht. Doch bei foodJoker ist alles anders!

Wenn man die Seite von foodJoker betritt, versteht man gleich um was der Startup handelt! Ein frecher, orangenfarbiger Joker mit Kochmütze lächelt einem ab und lädt willkommen ein. Unter dem freundlichen Logo sticht der Satz "Restaurants of the wolrd" heraus.

foodJoker wirbt mit dem Slogan "der erste vollständige, vielsprachige Restaurantführer der Welt", der schon alles über sein Plus aussagt!

foodJoker.com ist der erste vollständige, vielsprachige Restaurantführer der Welt übersetzt in acht verschiedene Sprachen, repräsentierend Länder aus 4 Kontinenten der Welt (Europa, Asien, USA, Australien). foodJoker ist der neue Guide Michelin der Restaurants im Internet!

Die Guides Michelin sind Hotel- und Reiseführerbuch, die jährlich in unterschiedlichen Länderversionen erscheinen. Die Benotung des Guide Michelin gilt schon seit Jahre als extrem wichtig und aussagen. Guide Michelin wurde besonders für die Vergabe seiner Sterne, die seit 1926 für die Küche vergeben werden, hoch angesehen.

Doch foodJoker funktioniert ein bisschen anders. Zu einem handelt es sich bei foodJoker nicht um ein Buch, sondern um eine Internetseite, die für jedermann kostenlos erreichbar ist. Zu anderem handelt sich um ein Restaurantführer und nicht um ein Sternen vergeben. In foodjoker werden zwar keine Sterne verteilt, doch jegliche nötige Information über dem Restaurant vorgestellt, die für den Besucher wichtig ist.

FoodJoker hat in seiner Database Restaurant aus aller Welt, aus den verschiedensten Ländern, aus den verschiedenen Städten aufgesammelt. Jedes Restaurant wird mit einem Profil, seinem Küchenstil, seiner Speisekarte, seiner Karte und weitere Informationen repräsentiert.

Profil beinhaltet jegliche Information über den Stil, die Küche und die "Message" eines jeden Restaurants. Hier kann der foodJoker Besucher sich einen ersten Eindruck vom Restaurant machen. Jedes Restaurant wird unter verschiedenen Kategorien festgelegt, wo sein Küchenstil genau definiert wird. Handelt es sich um ein Chinesisches Restaurant, um ein Koscheres oder um sogar beides. Das besondere bei foodJoker ist jedoch die Möglichkeit, schon mal in die Speisekarte eines jeden Restaurants "reinschnüffeln" zu dürfen! Jedes Restaurant gibt sein ausführliche Speisekarte zur präsent, inklusive Beschreibung und Preisen. Ein kluges Plus bei foodJoker ist die Möglichkeit, die Währung der Preise auf Mausklick zu ändern. So kann jeder Gast, woher er auch immer zu Besuch kommt, die Preise in seiner Währung besichtigen. Auf der eigentlichen Karte kann ein jeder Gast die Platzierung des Restaurants finden, in den zusätzlichen Informationen werden Adresse, Telefonnummer, Zahlmöglichkeiten, Parkmöglichkeiten, Raucherverbot etc in einer Symbolleiste erläutert.

foodJoker ist eine einfach zu bedienende Internetseite für jeden Restaurantliebhaber, Touristen, Geschäftsleuten, Reisenden, oder anders hungrigen Menschen. Egal wo man sich also befindet, welche Sprache man spricht und egal auf was man gerade Hunger hat, foodJoker ist für jeden zur jeden Zeit erreichbar und zeigt einem, wo man was für wie viel Geld essen und genießen kann!

Doch foodJoker dient nicht nur dem Restaurant Feinschmecker, sondern auch dem Restaurant selber. In foodJoker hat jedes Restaurant, in welchem Land oder welchen Stadt auch immer, die Möglichkeit, sich nun im Internet auf einer einfachen Weise zu veröffentlichen. Sich bei foodJoker einzuschreiben ist ein simpler und schneller Prozess. Mit foodJoker kann jedes Restaurant mehr Kunden und Gästen erreichen, als er sich erträumen kann. Bei foodJoker profitieren also beide Seiten, das Restaurant und der Restaurantsucher.

foodJoker hat eine geniales System und Idee auf die Beine gestellt. Nun seit ein paar Wochen ist foodJoker für jeden erreichbar. Benutzer aus 40 verschiedenen Ländern können nun beim Reisen unterstützt und geholfen werden. foodJoker als Restaurantführer hat ein großes Potenzial bald der neue Guide Michelin der Zukunft zu werden!

Article Body:

Wir leben in einer Zeit der Modernen und Dynamik. Tagtäglich ändert sich die Mode, tagtäglich wird etwasneues erfunden oder entdeckt, tagtäglich werden neue Startups gegründet. So wie vor ein paar Wochen. Ein neuer Domain im Internet wurde aktiv, www.foojoker.com wurde zum Leben gerufen. Ja wieder ein neuer Startup, wieder eine neue Idee, die ihr Glück in dieser so lauten und dynamischen Welt der Informationen versucht. Doch bei foodJoker ist alles anders!

Wenn man die Seite von foodJoker betritt, versteht man gleich um was der Startup handelt! Ein frecher, orangenfarbiger Joker mit Kochmütze lächelt einem ab und lädt willkommen ein. Unter dem freundlichen Logo sticht der Satz "Restaurants of the wolrd" heraus.

foodJoker wirbt mit dem Slogan "der erste vollständige, vielsprachige Restaurantführer der Welt", der schon alles über sein Plus aussagt!

foodJoker.com ist der erste vollständige, vielsprachige Restaurantführer der Welt übersetzt in acht verschiedene Sprachen, repräsentierend Länder aus 4 Kontinenten der Welt (Europa, Asien, USA, Australien). foodJoker ist der neue Guide Michelin der Restaurants im Internet!

Die Guides Michelin sind Hotel- und Reiseführerbuch, die jährlich in unterschiedlichen Länderversionen erscheinen. Die Benotung des Guide Michelin gilt schon seit Jahre als extrem wichtig und aussagen. Guide Michelin wurde besonders für die Vergabe seiner Sterne, die seit 1926 für die Küche vergeben werden, hoch angesehen.

Doch foodJoker funktioniert ein bisschen anders. Zu einem handelt es sich bei foodJoker nicht um ein Buch, sondern um eine Internetseite, die für jedermann kostenlos erreichbar ist. Zu anderem handelt sich um ein Restaurantführer und nicht um ein Sternen vergeben. In foodjoker werden zwar keine Sterne verteilt, doch jegliche nötige Information über dem Restaurant vorgestellt, die für den Besucher wichtig ist.

FoodJoker hat in seiner Database Restaurant aus aller Welt, aus den verschiedensten Ländern, aus den verschiedenen Städten aufgesammelt. Jedes Restaurant wird mit einem Profil, seinem Küchenstil, seiner Speisekarte, seiner Karte und weitere Informationen repräsentiert.

Profil beinhaltet jegliche Information über den Stil, die Küche und die "Message" eines jeden Restaurants. Hier kann der foodJoker Besucher sich einen ersten Eindruck vom Restaurant machen. Jedes Restaurant wird unter verschiedenen Kategorien festgelegt, wo sein Küchenstil genau definiert wird. Handelt es sich um ein Chinesisches Restaurant, um ein Koscheres oder um sogar beides. Das besondere bei foodJoker ist jedoch die Möglichkeit, schon mal in die Speisekarte eines jeden Restaurants "reinschnüffeln" zu dürfen! Jedes Restaurant gibt sein ausführliche Speisekarte zur präsent, inklusive Beschreibung und Preisen. Ein kluges Plus bei foodJoker ist die Möglichkeit, die Währung der Preise auf Mausklick zu ändern. So kann jeder Gast, woher er auch immer zu Besuch kommt, die Preise in seiner Währung besichtigen. Auf der eigentlichen Karte kann ein jeder Gast die Platzierung des Restaurants finden, in den zusätzlichen Informationen werden Adresse, Telefonnummer, Zahlmöglichkeiten, Parkmöglichkeiten, Raucherverbot etc in einer Symbolleiste erläutert.

foodJoker ist eine einfach zu bedienende Internetseite für jeden Restaurantliebhaber, Touristen, Geschäftsleuten, Reisenden, oder anders hungrigen Menschen. Egal wo man sich also befindet, welche Sprache man spricht und egal auf was man gerade Hunger hat, foodJoker ist für jeden zur jeden Zeit erreichbar und zeigt einem, wo man was für wie viel Geld essen und genießen kann!

Doch foodJoker dient nicht nur dem Restaurant Feinschmecker, sondern auch dem Restaurant selber. In foodJoker hat jedes Restaurant, in welchem Land oder welchen Stadt auch immer, die Möglichkeit, sich nun im Internet auf einer einfachen Weise zu veröffentlichen. Sich bei foodJoker einzuschreiben ist ein simpler und schneller Prozess. Mit foodJoker kann jedes Restaurant mehr Kunden und Gästen erreichen, als er sich erträumen kann. Bei foodJoker profitieren also beide Seiten, das Restaurant und der Restaurantsucher.

foodJoker hat eine geniales System und Idee auf die Beine gestellt. Nun seit ein paar Wochen ist foodJoker für jeden erreichbar. Benutzer aus 40 verschiedenen Ländern können nun beim Reisen unterstützt und geholfen werden. foodJoker als Restaurantführer hat ein großes Potenzial bald der neue Guide Michelin der Zukunft zu werden!

Business Start-up Costs

If you are considering starting your own business, then you have no doubt considered the investment required for various business start-up costs.

Keywords:

Business Start-up Costs

Article Body:

If you are considering starting your own business, then you have no doubt considered the investment required for various business start-up costs. The first thing you need to do is find a market that your business can be successful in. Next you must look at approximately how much it will cost you in just basic business start-up costs; business licenses, lawyer consult fees and form preparation fees, accountant fees/accounting programs, inventory costs, business insurance, leases, and utilities are just a few of the standard traditional business start-up costs. You must also consider how you are going to support yourself and your family while you venture takes off; this could be at least two to three months, and you want to make sure you can pay your mortgage, all your bills, feed your kids, and have a little extra left over for incidentals, in addition to business start-up costs.

If you choose to not have a physical location for your business, you may want to consider offering your goods and services via a website or mail order catalog. This is a great way to reach a large audience all at once, but business start-up costs associated with this mode of doing business can be expensive as well. By the time you pay someone to create your website, host it, register your domain name, and start a merchant account, you have made quite an expenditure, unless of course you are capable of building your own website, which many people are. Yahoo! offers web hosting, domain name registration, business email, and store front options for a very reasonable price worth checking out. This is a great way to save on some of those business start-up costs that could otherwise break the bank.

The traditional way that business has been conducted in this country has changed dramatically since the advent of the World Wide Web, opening the door for a number of new ways to conduct business. You no longer have to have a physical storefront address to sell your goods or services, a rather archaic point of view. More and more people are buying goods and services on the internet, which is a great place to feature your business while keeping your business start up costs at a minimum. You don’t need to lease that 900 square foot shop for $2800 a month to sell what you can sell just as easily with a website and a little marketing campaign. Business start-up costs do not have to be astronomical, in fact, they can be quite the opposite. You can visit a number of online sources that offer an abundance of information on business start-ups costs and links to essential sites that can help you get your business up and running!

Free Counseling And Advice Every Startup And Growing Business Needs To Succeed

Business counseling fees can be extremely expensive and not knowing where to turn for business advice can be a significant waste of valuable time. That is why there are 80 Business Information Centers (BICs) in the United States and over 1,100 Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs). Not only do they provide small business owners with free counseling, but they also have an extensive reference library of books, publications, and video tapes. Small Business Development cente...

Keywords:

business loans, business finance, business funding, business capital, business information, business

Article Body:

Business counseling fees can be extremely expensive and not knowing where to turn for business advice can be a significant waste of valuable time. That is why there are 80 Business Information Centers (BICs) in the United States and over 1,100 Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs). Not only do they provide small business owners with free counseling, but they also have an extensive reference library of books, publications, and video tapes. Small Business Development centers and Business Information Centers help with start-up business planning or assist in expanding an existing business.

BICs are partnered with the Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE) to provide businesses with free business counseling. Retired business men and women volunteer their expertise and experience to assist with any issues that may be confronting your business. These men and women can also assist you in developing a customized business plan for your specific business needs. There are over 10,500 SCORE volunteers in 389 chapter locations who assist small businesses across the country. SCORE also provides an online counseling initiative for businesses. More information on this can be obtained at the SBA.gov website.

Business Information Centers are constantly adding new resources to serve the needs in their local business community. Some BICs, such as the Sacramento Business Information Centers, offer bookkeeping, tax planning, budgeting, business financing and loan information, developing business plans, legal information, management skills, and marketing techniques to name a few of the areas BICs specialize in. The majority of all major cities provide BICs.

The Small Business Development centers are a training resource which is a cooperative effort of the private sector, the educational community and federal, state and local governments. It is the Small Business Administration’s (SBA’s) largest resource partner and an initiative that enhances economic development by providing small businesses with management and technical assistance. There are more than 1,100 SBDC lead and service centers located around the country. To locate the nearest development center to you visit the following page created by the Small Business Administration (SBA): http://www.sba.gov/sbdc/sbdcnear.html.

The SBDCs, SCORE, and the Women’s Business Center all fit into the SBA’s Office of Entrepreneurial Development.

Finding Offshore Customers for a Call Center Startup

Finding offshore customers for a call center startup is a difficult proposition. The real challenge, however, comes afterwards - delivering and meeting the expectations of those customers! First things first though - how to go about finding your initial customers? The first question that you need to ask yourself is why some organization should outsource work to you?

Keywords:

call center,outsourcing

Article Body:

Finding offshore customers for a call center startup is a difficult proposition. The real challenge, however, comes afterwards - delivering and meeting the expectations of those customers!

First things first though - how to go about finding your initial customers? The first question that you need to ask yourself is why some organization should outsource work to you? For them outsourcing is certainly an attractive, but high-risk proposition. It is attractive not only because it lets them concentrate more on their core activities, but also because of cost-savings. Their risks are primarily quality and reliability related. As a startup you should be prepared to address these risks in a satisfactory manner.

For starters, you should be able to back the quality and reliability of your service. This can be done in many ways: you should try to do them in as many as possible. A standard device guaranteeing the quality and reliability is a Service Level Agreement (SLA). You should develop an SLA defining industry-standard performance criteria for your company.

You should also show the prospective customer some evidence about your track record (e.g. list of customers and testimonials) in the running of call centers. As a startup, you may not have such testimonials. In that case, you should highlight the call-center-related experience of your key team members.

Call center customers prefer specialists over generalists. Try to select a niche for yourself, e.g., order taking, helpdesk, telesales, etc., and try to build your whole selling pitch around that niche.

Before making a pitch to prospective customers, try to understand how their business work and be ready to tell them the following: how they can make-more-money or save-more-money or get-more-business or enhance-the-quality-of-their-service or improve-their-product by outsourcing their call center function to you?

Do tell them about the processes that you have in place to assure the quality of your services. An industry-standard quality certification will be invaluable in this regard. Do develop a disaster-recovery plan and share it with the potential customer.

Here are a few more suggestions: get in touch with your country’s expatriates in the target country for leads and other assistance. Register your company with country-specific organizations (like NASSCOM in India, PSEB in Pakistan) and international portals like offshorexperts.com. Write to other offshore companies in outsourcing powerhouses like India, Philippines, and Canada and see if they would like to develop a partnership with you.

Computer Consultant Startup: Identify Your Business Skills

Computer consultants need to have the right mix of business and technical skills to succeed with small businesses. Do you have the right skill-set to be a successful small business computer consultant?

Keywords:

computer consultant, computer-consultant, computer consulting, computer-consulting

Article Body:

Since you're taking the time to read this article right now, it's a good sign that you have what it takes to become a computer consultant. You're in the small minority of people who have recognized that this is a business and needs to be run like one.

A Good Computer Consultant Has More Than Just Technical Skills

It's not about playing with the latest routers or wi-fi device or VPNs or firewalls. Sure, you have to have a certain amount of skills to make a successful computer consultant because people are buying your expertise. At the end of the day, though, it's a business.

In order for the business to be successful, you have to know a few things about getting revenue in and keeping your expenses down. You also need to forecast and be able to bill, negotiate, and network properly.

There are a lot of stubborn techies out there who think that studying the Windows Server Resource Kit is going to tell them what they need to know about running a business. Not true. It's going to teach you about registry keys and directories and things like that.

Even a Computer Consultant Needs a Good Resume

If you're currently self-employed, you may not have an up- to-date resume, but for most people looking to transition into the business to become a computer consultant you probably do have a resume. Take out a copy of your resume and a yellow highlighter marker and go through and highlight every sentence or phrase in your resume that describes a project or a job or a skill that you think would be relevant or marketable to the owner of a small company.

Categorize the Items on Your Resume

Go through it and look for all the phrases and the jobs and the projects that you've worked on for the past couple of years and think about what's going to catch the eye of a typical small business owner or manager. Once you've done that, go back through each highlighted item and mark whether it was IT related, whether it had to do with understanding how to run a business or whether it had to do with being able to communicate effectively.

Copyright MMI-MMVI, Small Biz Tech Talk. All Worldwide Rights Reserved. {Attention Publishers: Live hyperlink in author resource box required for copyright compliance}

Free Counseling and Advice Every Startup and Growing Business Needs

Free Business counseling information is available, and can save your business money.

Keywords:

business loans, business finance, business funding, business capital, venture capital

Article Body:

Business counseling fees can be extremely expensive and not knowing where to turn for business advice can be a significant waste of valuable time. That is why there are 80 Business Information Centers (BICs) in the United States and over 1,100 Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs). Not only do they provide small business owners with free counseling, but they also have an extensive reference library of books, publications, and video tapes. Small Business Development centers and Business Information Centers help with start-up business planning or assist in expanding an existing business.

BICs are partnered with the Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE) to provide businesses with free business counseling. Retired business men and women volunteer their expertise and experience to assist with any issues that may be confronting your business. These men and women can also assist you in developing a customized business plan for your specific business needs. There are over 10,500 SCORE volunteers in 389 chapter locations who assist small businesses across the country. SCORE also provides an online counseling initiative for businesses. More information on this can be obtained at the SBA.gov website.

Business Information Centers are constantly adding new resources to serve the needs in their local business community. Some BICs, such as the Sacramento Business Information Centers, offer bookkeeping, tax planning, budgeting, business financing and loan information, developing business plans, legal information, management skills, and marketing techniques to name a few of the areas BICs specialize in. The majority of all major cities provide BICs.

The Small Business Development centers are a training resource which is a cooperative effort of the private sector, the educational community and federal, state and local governments. It is the Small Business Administration’s (SBA’s) largest resource partner and an initiative that enhances economic development by providing small businesses with management and technical assistance. There are more than 1,100 SBDC lead and service centers located around the country. To locate the nearest development center to you visit the following page created by the Small Business Administration (SBA): http://www.sba.gov/sbdc/sbdcnear.html.

Further information on SCORE can be found at SCORE.org. Their website contains more free information for businesses including a unique template gallery which gives businesses templates for business plans, cash flow projection reports, balance sheets, break even analysis reports, cash flow statements, competitive analysis reports, and more. You can also locate the nearest SCORE office via their website.

The SBDCs, SCORE, and the Women’s Business Center all fit into the SBA’s Office of Entrepreneurial Development.