How You Determine Your Business Structure
Show Notes for Episode 2
After you thought about the services you will be offering, let’s think about what your business structure will be. Will you be a sole-proprietor? Do you know if you will need to get a business insurance? Not all small business owners need them. Your working hours will you be flexible or have a set schedule everyday to work with your clients or in your business.
Transcript
[Music intro]
This podcast is about our experiences with being self-employed, entrepreneurship, and bootstrapping it. Sometimes I have a spectacular guest that join me and share their stories. Also it’s about connecting to our soul, our inner selves to unwind and chill. My name is Lourdes, and I hope you enjoy this episode!
Welcome back! In today’s episode, I am going to talk about legal structure for your business, bank accounts, and insurance for your business.
Let’s start with the four types of structure for your businesses. There’s sole proprietorship, and that’s pretty easy to understand. It’s just you, being the sole person in the business. There’s general partnership, a limited liability company or an LLC, and a corporate or C-corp or S-corp. I myself am an LLC. Most small business owners that work for themselves are either sole proprietorships or are LLCs.
You’ll need to go to the Secretary of State website and look for form and how to form an LLC. You’ll also need to submit an Articles of Organization form. That Articles of Organization form just tells them who is in charge of this business, and you’ll need a register agent that they can send paperwork to, just in case for any legal reasons in the future. But that is all you would need for an LLC.
The next thing I want to talk about is a business account. Try to keep your personal banking accounts and your business accounts separate. So, you might need to open up a separate business account to keep that all straight.
The next thing is you want to think about whether you need business insurance or not. If you’re a home-based business and nobody comes to your home, I think you can skip it. That’s my opinion. If you have clients or prospects that may be visiting you in your own property at home, then you may want to have some type of insurance to cover any type of liabilities. But seek the advice of legal counsel or a professional in the insurance business and have them help you with that.
I know I just talked about business insurance, banking, and registering your business, but the other thing is to get yourself organized. So, you may wanna have a file cabinet for such things as your bank statements. You also wanna see if you can go paperless. So, you might need to create folders on your desktop or laptop. You wanna have a “Client” folder. You wanna have a folder for proposals only. You wanna have a folder for your invoices. And you wanna have a folder for contacts. Let me see what else… Just keeping track for your customers, you know, organizing your passwords.
Speaking of password, you wanna get a password management system or app. So that one day when you hire somebody and you must share your password, you don’t give that person the password. You give them access. And they never see your real password for that software. So, you are gonna need a password management system later on.
Oh, and by the way, I also forgot to mention social media accounts. Start creating those social media accounts when you register your business. So, let’s say your business name is Purple Rock LLC. So, you wanna go to Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, TikTok, whatever you use, and reserve those names now. And if that business name you have doesn’t match your social media name, you can put the word “The” or “A,” just be creative. I think that’s about it for now.
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Resources
IRS (US only)
Four Types of Business Structure
https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/business-structures
*Disclaimer: All the episodes in this podcast provide general information on starting your remote service business. Individual experiences are unique. The views and expressions from the show and our guests is their own and we are not liable for any business outcomes or your success. Please to seek professional advice from tax preparers, legal, financial counseling, and other services you see that fit in your business. For a more information of our terms and disclaimer, please go here.
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About the Host
Lourdes McCombs is passionate about helping you take your unique skills into the online world, learn digital strategies, and scale. She is a Business Mentor & Success Coach and helps men and women transfer their local business online to create a global impact and to attract more clients. She is spiritual transformation coach that helps people make changes in their life without compromising their mission and their soul.
If you need clarity, or defining your life’s purpose, visit her business website: click here for her website at: BlueLarimarCoach.com
Or schedule a 30-minute complimentary meeting to get to know her, ask questions about business development and kickstart your business ventures here.
*****Disclaimer: All the episodes in this podcast are for information purposes only. The views and expressions from the show and our guests are their own. 8th Level Podcast, its subsidiaries and owner are not liable nor guarantee any business outcomes or your success. Seek optional advice from tax preparers, legal, financial pros at your own discretion. For more information of our terms and disclaimer go here.