Introduction 1 About This Book 2 Foolish Assumptions 3 Icons Used in This Book 4 Beyond the Book 4 Where to Go from Here 5 Part 1: Getting Started with your New Business 7 Chapter 1: Preparing for Business 9 Understanding the Enduring Rules of Business Strategy 10 Focusing on focus - and a bit more besides 11 Appreciating the forces at work in your sector 13 Recognising the first-to-market fallacy 13 Getting in Shape to Start Up 15 Assessing your abilities 15 Discovering a real need 16 Checking the fit of the business 17 Confirming Viability 18 Researching the market 18 Doing the numbers 20 Raising the money 21 Writing up the business plan 22 Going for Growth 23 Gaining economies of scale 24 Securing a competitive advantage 24 Retaining key staff 24 Gaining critical business mass 25 Chapter 2: Doing the Groundwork 27 Understanding the Small Business Environment 27 Defining Small Business 28 Looking at the Types of People Who Start Businesses 29 Making your age an asset 29 Considering location 30 Winning with women 31 Being educated about education 31 Coming Up with a Winning Idea 32 Ranking popular start-up ideas 32 Going with fast growth 33 Spotting a gap in the market 36 Revamping an old idea 37 Wising up to the internet 37 Solving customer problems 38 Creating inventions and innovations 39 Marketing other people''s ideas 39 Being better or different 41 Finding a contract in the public sector 42 Banning Bad Reasons to Start a Business 42 Steering clear of bad assumptions 43 Avoiding obvious mistakes 44 Recognising That the Economy Matters 44 Spotting cycles 45 Readying for the ups and downs 46 Preparing to Recognise Success 48 Measuring business success 48 Exploring the myth and reality of business survival rates 49 Chapter 3: Can You Do the Business? 51 Deciding What You Want from a Business 52 Gaining personal satisfaction (or, entrepreneurs just wanna have fun) 52 Making money 53 Saving the planet 54 Exploring Different Types of Business 55 Selling to other businesses 55 Opening all hours 56 Making products 57 Servicing customers 57 Working from Home 58 Finding the space 59 Checking out the rules 61 Dealing with the family 63 Planning your daily life 65 Assessing Yourself 66 Discovering your entrepreneurial attributes 66 Working out a business idea that''s right for you 68 Figuring out what you''re willing to invest 68 Weighting your preferences 69 Chapter 4: Testing Feasibility 71 Finding Enough Product or People 71 How much is enough? 72 Buying in equipment and supplies 72 Hiring in help 73 Sizing Up the Market 73 Figuring out what you need to know 75 Finding your segment of the market 77 Checking out your competition 78 Budgeting for your research 78 Doing the preliminary research 79 Conducting the research 84 Understanding your findings 87 Working Out Whether You Can Make Money 88 Estimating start-up costs 89 Forecasting sales 90 Exceeding breakeven 91 Part 2: Making and Funding your Plan 93 Chapter 5: Structuring Your Business 95 Choosing the Right Structure 96 Going into Business by Yourself 98 Advantages 98 Disadvantages 99 Settling on sole-trader status 99 Building up to Network Marketing 100 Evaluating the pros and cons 101 Distinguishing pyramids from network marketing 103 Working with a Limited Number of Other People 103 Taking on an existing business 104 Forming a partnership 104 Looking at limited partnerships 106 Checking out co-operatives 106 Finding Your Way to Franchising 107 Looking at franchise types 107 Defining a franchise 108 Evaluating a franchise opportunity 109 Founding a Larger Company 110 Opting for a limited company 110 Buying out a business 111 Valuing a business to buy 112 Considering a social enterprise 113 Encouraging intrapreneurship 115 Chapter 6: Preparing the Business Plan 117 Finding a Reason to Write a Business Plan 118 Building confidence 118 Testing your ideas 118 Showing how much money you need 118 Providing planning experience 119 Satisfying financiers'' concerns 120 Writing Up Your Business Plan 122 Defining your readership 122 Creating the plan 122 Maintaining confidentiality 127 Doing due diligence 128 Using Business Planning Software 129 Recognising the limits of software 129 Reviewing packages 131 Presenting Your Plan 131 Starring in show time 131 Handling feedback 133 Making an elevator pitch 134 Chapter 7: Getting Help 135 Connecting with Government Services 136 Accessing national government support 136 Relating to a region 137 Choosing Small Business Associations 138 The Federation of Small Businesses 138 Forum of Private Business 139 The British Chambers of Commerce 140 A few more strings to your bow 140 Universities and Colleges 142 Entering an Incubator 144 Finding the right type of incubator 144 Getting into an incubator 144 Considering the cost 145 Finding out more 145 Assisting Inventors 146 Chapter 8: Finding the Money 147 Assessing How Much Money You Need 148 Projecting receipts 149 Estimating expenses 149 Working out the closing cash balances 150 Setting out your cash-flow projection 150 Testing your assumptions 151 Reviewing Your Financing Options 153 Deciding between debt capital and equity capital 153 Examining your own finances 154 Determining the Best Source of Finance for You 155 Considering the costs 156 Sharing ownership and control 156 Limiting personal liability 157 Going for Debt 157 Borrowing from banks 157 Going with the government 160 Financing cash flow 162 Getting physical 162 Uniting with a credit union 163 Borrowing from family and friends 163 Sharing Out the Spoils 165 Benefiting from business angels 165 Playing to the crowd 166 Going for venture capital 170 Looking to corporate venturing 171 Understanding due diligence 172 Finding Free Money 173 Getting a grant 173 Winning money 174 Chapter 9: Considering Your Mission 175 Developing Your Concept 176 Composing Your Mission Statement 176 Seeing the Vision Thing 177 Establishing High Values 178 Setting Objectives and Goals 179 Chapter 10: Marketing and Selling Your Wares 181 Making Up the Marketing Mix 182 Defining Your Product or Service Parameters 183 Using Advertising to Tell Your Story 183 Considering the customer''s point of view 184 Making an exhibition of yourself 185 Setting advertising objectives 185 Deciding the budget 186 Defining the message 186 Choosing the media 187 Choosing the frequency 188 Writing a leaflet 188 Using the internet for viral marketing 189 Providing opportunities to see 189 Figuring your bang-for-the-buck ratio 189 Getting into the News 190 Deciding who to contact 191 Following through 191 Using Blogs and Social Networks 192 Selling and Salesmanship 193 Telling the difference between selling and marketing 193 Selling yourself 193 Outsourcing selling 194 Measuring results 196 Using Customer Relationship Management (CRM) 196 Settling on a Price 197 Caring about business conditions 197 Working to your capacity 198 Understanding consumer perceptions 198 Skimming versus penetrating 198 Avoiding setting prices too low 199 Pondering Place and Distribution 199 Choosing a location 199 Selecting a distribution channel 201 Appreciating People, Process and Physical Evidence 202 Understanding the role of people in marketing 203 Recognising physical evidence 204 Proceeding with process 204 Looking at Legal Issues in Marketing 205 Naming your business 205 Looking at logos 206 Protecting patents 206 Registering a trademark 207 Detailing your design 207 Controlling a copyright 208 Setting terms of trade 208 Describing your goods 210 Dealing with payment problems 210 Part 3: Staying in Business 211 Chapter 11: Employing People 213 Finding Great Employees 214 Deciding on full- or part-timers 214 Recruiting and selecting 215 Testing to find the best 219 Exploring Other Ways of Recruiting 219 Using agencies 219 Using Jobcentre Plus 220 Recruiting over the internet 220 What about the people you don''t select? 221 Outsourcing jobs 221 Motivating and Rewarding Employees 222 Getting the best out of employees 222 Dealing with difficult or demotivated employees 223 <.