We often get calls with the question, "How do I incorporate?" and while most of these questions mean the person would like an explanation on how our process works. While anyone can incorporate their own business (most states do not require an attorney), a lot of clients come to us so they don't have to deal with the fuss of drawing up or preparing their own articles of incorporation. Our process is one of the easiest online, and it also gives you a chance to review what we're filing on your behalf, which not many companies do. How it works is, once you place your order one of our staff members does a name search and if the name appears available, they will prepare the documents for you to sign. You are then able to log in to our website, review the information you either put in online, or gave us over the phone, and download your articles of organization. Most states allow us to accept faxed or emailed copies of your signed articles, though some will require you to mail these documents to us with original signatures. We do one last review prior to sending your documents out to the state. Once the documents are sent to the state we monitor the filing daily to ensure you're notified by email as soon as they're approved. It is a pretty simple process when you have us file your documents, as we take responsibility for making sure the state is paid their fees and you are notified upon approval. If you have any questions regarding forming a corporation, call us at 866-999-8200.

While many of you out there are working from home, especially when just opening up an LLC or forming a corporation, the attire is often pajamas, or comfortable clothing that allows you to feel relaxed. Although it doesn't really matter how you look while in your home, it's important to dress professionally when going to meetings or even having Skype or video chats with clients or employees. If you're meeting up with a client be sure to dress professionally, for men, slacks, dress shirt and dress shoes is often good enough, if you're having a more casual meeting, polo shirts and khaki pants are also acceptable, be sure that your clothes are always clean and pressed, regardless of what they are. For women, there are a little more options, slacks and a dress shirt also work, but you can also wear a skirt or a dress. It's important to make sure that your clothing isn't too flashy, or you don't have too  many accessories, as they can be distracting. When having meetings from home, be sure to find a quiet clean place to have the meeting from, whether it's a video or phone meeting, background noise can cause major distractions.

Citi  is a the top bank world-wide when it comes to big business banking. As of now, Citi bank has a corporate client list of 2,500 out of the 3,000 top corporations globally. While it's clear that Citi has dominated the big corporate market, their CEO, Vikram Pandit, just announced that the company will be hiring 200 bankers to target the small business market. Small business to Citi means any business with less than 20 million in annual sales. The bankers should all be in place by the end of 2011. If you have questions about starting your own small business, we can help in all aspects, from incorporating to creating a website, give us a call at 866-999-8200.

American Express is giving away free Facebook advertising for small businesses as part of their Small Business Saturday promotion. If there was ever a time to start a corporation of form an LLC, the time could be now, this isn't the first time American Express has decided to help out the small business community and it seems to be a growing trend among banks and credit companies. For this campaign, American Express is providing the first 10,000 business who sign up for the program, $100 in Facebook advertising. The promotion also is giving $25 to American Express users who vow to use their cards towards small businesses on November 27th, Small Business Saturday. Being tied in with the Facebook portion of the promotion, Amex is also giving away $1, (up to half a million dollars) for every "Like" they get on their Small Business Saturday page, to Girls, Inc., a charity that helps teach young women to succeed in business.

For every corporation that is formed in this country, each corporation must have a certain amount of shares outstanding.  The number of share must be one or greater.  Rarely will a corporation have only one share.  The implication of having just one share is that only one person can own the company since the corporation is owned by its shareholders.  Typically we default to 1500 shares when we form new corporations. 

There is one thing to note for those corporations that would like to issue millions of shares.  Most states will allow for your corporation to have that many shares but in some circumstances, the fees to incorporate with this many shares can be substantial.  Fees can range to hundreds or thousands of dollars depending on the amount of shares you authorize.  In most cases, having more than 1500 shares is not necessary.  Most companies don't go public and therefore wouldn't need that many shares. 

The only time where you would really need to worry about the number of shares is when the company is to go public or if they need to sell partial ownership of the company to raise capital.  In this case, many companies choose to add additional shares and to get advisement from lawyers. 

If you wish to form a corporation, please contact us.

When you first get the idea to start your own business, it's important to set aside time to work on your new start up. There are so many people out there who take the first step in starting an LLC or forming a corporation and never continue with their dream because they don't set aside time to push the business forward. While it's great to see people starting things, you should make it an important part of your day to push things forward, if you need help doing this, set up a calendar and write small tasks down each day. Because so many people are starting their own business on the side of their regular job, it's often an afterthought. In this day, it's important to work for what you want, and if you want to be your own boss eventually, you're going to  have to work for it.

Imagine if businesses like Starbucks or McDonald's opened at different times everyday, it would be a little annoying to know that some days you were able to get your coffee or breakfast and some days you aren't because they decided that their businesses will open when they're going to open whenever they feel like it. Many people who start a small business feel that they can do that, because you are a small business and may not have anyone to answer to about being inconsistent. The truth is, if you don't have employees and are working by yourself, your boss is the clients. If you work in a coffee shop or somewhere where you depend on word of mouth marketing or repeat clients, it's extremely important to set yourself a schedule, so that loyal clients will become familiar with it. If there's a day you will not be open for any reason, or will be opening late and if you're aware in advance, let you customers know in advance, they will be appreciative if they see a note on the door that states you will be closed on a certain date. This also gets rid of the confusion on potential new clients if they happen to stumble upon your business on that day you happen to be closed, if they see a sign "We will be closed on 10/28/2010" they know that they can come back on the 29th and you will be open. Whatever your schedule might be, be sure to stick to it, and only stray from it when absolutely necessary.

When some people are eager to start their own business they often have focus on one part of the business, they seem to forget paper work such as forming an LLC or incorporating, business licenses, city permits, bank accounts etc. The reason I bring this up is because many people tend to jump on business trends prematurely because they have a great idea that will be great if it's correctly executed. With so many business trends popping up these days, a lot of people jump head first into starting a business without doing the proper research and development. For someone doing this, they should avoid jumping on the bandwagons for business trends and crazes. For example, in bigger cities, food trucks are all the rave, and though they are on top of the world right now, most of the food trucks just getting into the game will not succeed, because they are prematurely opening up shop to join the pioneers at the top.

If you have a good idea it should still be a good idea in a few months, so take the time to develop a detailed business plan which includes all aspects of your business including all costs to the business. If you have questions about forming your own business please don't hesitate to call us at 866-999-8200.

Many businesses are run online these days, from businesses forming corporations to consulting business and even online retail establishments. When businesses are run online they tend to generate a lot of email traffic. It's important to convey the messages in your emails in a professional manner when emails are required to a client. Being professional can mean lots of things depending on your industry, but the basics are to keep emails simple, clean and error free. By simple, we mean get to the point without a lot of filler text, too many times people are worried their emails look too short because they are only a couple of sentences long, but if you're sending out an email with a tracking number for something someone ordered, keep it simple and get to the point, there's no need to a full page email just to provide a simple tracking number. Another thing to consider when sending emails out is keeping the email clean, what we mean by keeping an email clean is to minimize the images, and HTML code. Many people retrieve their emails from their mobile device and can't read an email if the HTML code is too complex or if there are too many images in the email. Another way you can clean up your emails is to minimize your default signature by only including necessary information, that means you don't need to include your home phone number or your personal email address or a motivational quote, etc. The most important part about writing emails to clients is that they are error free. Most email clients include a spell check, but you should also read over the email before you send it to make sure that the language sounds right.

It is also a good idea to have a list of common emails that are sent out to clients, so that emails that are sent out are all uniform. Just remember, simple, clean and error free is the way to go when sending out emails.

Studies have shown that breaks increase productivity, and not just breaks during your work day, but days off, where you're not thinking about anything work related. Often times when you start a business, there are so many things to do, from incorporating or forming an LLC to creating an online presence. When you're first starting out there's not much time to take off, but it's important to set aside time to take off, even if it's only a one day break, the work to be done will still be there when you pick up again the next day. Often times when breaks are not taken, your body will feel exhausted and you will not be as productive, even though you have been continuously working. Breaks also give the brain time to relax and generate new ideas, which doesn't happen as often as if you were overloading yourself with work.

Breaks are also important to take during the day, many people these days tend to each lunch at their desk while continuously working, while lunch at your desk might be the most convenient way to eat, be sure to take a break from work related subjects while on your break, surf the net, talk on the phone, listen to the radio or even take a nap. A lot of companies these days are allowing employees to take naps during work time also, power naps also increase productivity. The point is that it's good to take a break from work once in a while.