Starting a Consulting Practice

You're just about ready for your grand opening! In this lesson, you'll learn about the eight physical steps you'll need to follow to start off right. Each of these steps, completed in sequence, will move you toward opening day. Among these eight steps, you'll examine issues related to licensing, legal construction, naming your business, and even choosing a business card style that will get you noticed.

In this lesson, you'll explore the financial aspects of your company. You'll begin by developing a series of budgets for various stages of your company's growth. You'll create a complete start-up budget, and then forecast your ongoing expenses for one year. Next, you'll estimate your gross income and use the income and expense figures to estimate your potential profit. After developing those financial sheets, you'll learn why you'll need to use contracts and letters of agreement. Finally, you'll learn all about billing, including several options that can help your cash flow.

Now it's time to go after your first client! This is the first part of a two-part lesson in which you'll learn how to obtain customers. In this lesson, find out how to correctly identify the kinds of customers who want or need your services. You'll learn how to recognize them using two market analysis tools: demographics and psychographics. You'll also learn why you should target your customer base first, and then create advertisements aimed toward those customers.

In this second marketing installment, you'll learn how to select advertising forms that will best reach your customers. You'll explore the four major categories of advertising as well as their subcategories. You'll use a marketing plan worksheet to detail which forms of advertising you'll use to reach each type of client. Then, you'll learn about the major difference in strategy between marketing to a consumer clientele and marketing to a commercial clientele. Finally, the lesson will explain the concepts of frequency and response rates and how each will increase your chances of success in securing paying clients.

Now it's time to learn about the administration of your business, namely record keeping. In this lesson, you'll learn about the seven basic components that comprise your record keeping system. The lesson will discuss which kinds of records you should keep for management and tax purposes. After you learn which items to record and track, you'll learn about the calculations you'll need to perform and how to read the financial condition of your company. Finally, you'll practice these computations using real-world scenarios.

In this lesson, you'll learn the basics of business tax deductions and how to estimate your business taxes. You'll find out how to identify tax deductions for your business, as well as how to unearth potential tax deductions from your personal affairs that could be related to the business. You'll also learn how to work with your accountant to properly plan for tax time and help minimize your tax obligations. The lesson will conclude with two case studies that will help you practice estimating taxes owed.

In this final lesson, you'll learn about dozens of resources that can provide you with assistance as you build your business. You'll get information about government agencies at the federal, state, and local levels, as well as local organizations that exist to serve entrepreneurs like you.