This is the second entry in a series of Getting Up To Speed posts I plan to write documenting how Seen Creative came to exist. In the first post I gave a short introduction and description of our business. In this post I am going to explain how we went from idea to execution.

Once we collectively decided that the business opportunity was worth pursuing, we needed to make the business entity official. This alone was a big decision as it required a bold commitment. If we were going to do this, we were going to do it 100%. Out of all the statistics you hear about businesses failing within the first year, I would surmise that a number of failures come from lack of commitment.

TIP #1:If you are going to start your business, make sure all partners are 100% committed to the venture. Make sure everyone is on the same page and buys into the same vision. Problems will arise and things will never go as smoothly as planned. If the team isn't strong enough to endure this, your business is more at risk to failure.

Now that we decided to make our business official we had even more choices to make. What should our Business Plan contain? Should we incorporate? Should we get a lawyer? How much money do we need? These questions are daunting, but it's good to learn by getting dirty.

The first step was our Business Plan. While the road to completing our first version was slightly curvy, I did come to a realization: Everyone has a different idea of what the plan should contain. Because of this I feel it is important to first write the plan for you. Forget accepted formats, business jargon, and investor ass-kissing. The most important thing is that everyone on the team understands the business and the vision.

TIP #2: Your first business plan should be written for your team. It should be your Manifesto. Make sure everyone is completely behind this vision. The most important aspects should be your target market, their current problem, how you solve this problem better than your competition, and how you will generate enough cash to offset your expenses. Everything else is worthless without these building blocks. You can tweak your plan for other purposes when they arise.

Once we fleshed out our Business Plan, we needed to determine the structure of our business entity. We mulled over our options and ultimately decided that we would establish a Partnership and register our business as a DBA. The key to a Partnership is a solid Partnership Agreement. Because of the nature of partnerships, your written agreement plays a very important role. Take time to cover all of your bases and plan for even the most "out there" possibilities.

If you are wondering, we did originally plan on incorporating but decided to hold off for 1 year. We we were taking an initial risk by not protecting our personal assets and taking a potential tax hit, we determined a Partnership was the best approach for us at the time. But every situation is different and the best way to come to your own conclusion is to talk to people with experience in this area. This brings me to my next tip.

TIP #3: Take advantage of free consultations. Lawyers and Accountants almost always allow for a free consultation. Use this time to squeeze out as many answers as you can. If you come prepared you can usually get a lot answered within the hour. And even if your questions would fall outside the realm of the free consultation, most lawyers and accountants would much rather answer the questions (they are trying to impress you as a potential client) than turn you down. It is also to your advantage to consult a few firms and play them against each other when negotiating to become a paying client.

Now that we had an official business entity it was time to find a home. In the next installment I will talk about the decisions involved with renting office space.

Hopefully this post contained some useful information others in a similar situation. I do realize that this post barely touched the surface of some things but I didn't want to write a book. So I will expand on a few of these topics in a seperate entry in the future. If you have any specific suggestions, leave a comment. I will tweak my future entries accordingly.