What do you need to consider when starting your own business?

Owning your own business

Everything in this answer is accurate to some extent but, the first thing you need to do to someday own your own business is: decide the day on which you are going to own your own business. Once you make the decision, commit to a course of action and you will own your own business.

Unless you make the decision, none of the things mentioned below will make you a business owner.

Get a general business degree.

Make passable grades.

If your university has a "entrepreneur track", or small business-related courses, take them.

Go to work for someone else in the field you want to eventually go into. You may like it. On the other hand, it may not be all that it's cracked up to be. Work 2 or 3 years at least in the field.

Get a mentor. Preferably someone who has done the small business startup thing before.

Hang out your shingle before quitting your present job, if possible. Or be prepared to work another unrelated job while you're getting started.

After startup, join the chamber of commerce or another networking group.

Read Guerrilla marketing or another sales book geared toward making sales on a shoestring. Without sales, you WILL fall flat. <br /

More input from WikiAnswers Contributors:

• Time and a lot of patient

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You don't need a degree to start a business. You do need to learn about marketing, business math, etc...

Do research in the industry you want to be in and make sure there's a big enough market for you to make money in.

You could join a network marketing company, heaven-knows there's enough of them out there! But you still want to do the research anyway just to make sure you're going in the right direction.

For more info, try the SBA (Small Business Administration). They have classes, mentoring (via SCORE) etc.. Good luck:-)

Answer

As a business owner, I get asked this a lot from people. I recommend several years of work experience in the business you want to open. Follow this with at least 1-2 years of management experience actually doing everything you would do as if you were the owner. While this is going on you want to enroll in the local community college and take 5-10 courses related to business. Then get a business license from your local town, and a tax number from the state. After that you are only required to pay your taxes and renew your license.

First answer by tara hartley. Last edit by Sdresh. Contributor trust: 164 [recommend contributor]. Question popularity: 239 [recommend question]