As a boutique entrepreneur, you are required to wear many hats. When you start your business, you will be the marketing experts, bookkeeper, customer service agent, and inventory manager. Although you will be required to do much of the work on your own, there are some matters that should be outsourced to qualified professionals. Most importantly, you should always take the advice of your certified public accountant (CPA) and attorney. In this text, we are going to discuss the business solutions providers that you will need to work with as you establish your online boutique, Amazon FBA store, or brick-and-mortar location.
Certified Public Accountants and Bookkeepers
It is no secret that tax codes are extremely difficult to navigate. Every business, regardless of its size, is required to file certain quarter and annual reports to taxing authorities. For most entrepreneurs, these activities are simply too cumbersome and complicated to do on their own.
One of the best investments that you can make is to find and hire a qualified certified public accountant that can assist you with ensuring that you comply with all federal, state, and local tax laws. When issues occur, your CPA can properly represent you in front of tax authorities to remedy an issue. This is especially true if your business undergoes an audit. Your CPA will also be an invaluable source of advice as it relates to the ongoing expansion of your business especially as it relates to taking on investors or a business loan. Many CPAs often have MBA degrees, which makes them a trusted advisor for qualified business advice. Most CPA firms charge on a per hour basis for advice and a flat fee for completing certain tax filings.
As it relates to bookkeeping, many CPA firms have staff bookkeepers that can assist you with managing your books on a monthly basis. As discussed earlier on this platform, there are numerous software suites that can integrate with your ecommerce/point-of-sale systems in order to manage incoming sales. Additionally, these accounting/bookkeeping applications can tally your monthly expenditures. You can expect to spend $50 to $200 per month on a bookkeeper if you decide to have someone come to your location to render these services.
It should be noted that your CPA can also assist you with matters related to incorporation.
Attorneys and Legal Assistance
Every business needs to comply with the law as they progress through their business operations. Although the operations of a boutique are relatively straightforward, you will still need to have competent legal advice as it relates to reviewing contracts, non-disclosure agreements, purchase orders, and other legal agreements that you will engage as you develop and expand the operations of your boutique.
Although attorneys are expensive, you will save a substantial amount of headache and money from something going wrong. Your attorney can properly advise you on matters ranging from incorporation, affiliate market agreements, and legal filings that will occur from time to time. Generally, a qualified attorney will charge you $200 to $400 per hour for their advisory services. For most boutiques, the ongoing legal needs of these businesses are minimal.
As it relates to legal documents, you can always work with established template firms (such as LegalTemplates.net and RocketLawyer.com) to help you with these matters. It should be noted that these platforms should not be considered as a substitute for qualified legal advice.
Marketing Services
As discussed above, most likely you will be the person that manages your own marketing as you establish the initial operations of your boutique. The marketing disciplines that you will need to manage include:
- Search engine optimization
- Social media marketing
- Pay per click marketing
- Targeted advertisements
- Print marketing
- Affiliate marketing relationship development
From first glance, this can seem like an immense amount of work to handle on a day to day basis. One of the best things about the internet is that there are many qualified people that can help you manage each aspect of your marketing campaigns at a reasonable cost. Platforms such as Fiverr.com have a number of highly rated freelancers that you can use to outsource specific functions. For boutique entrepreneurs that are investing a significant amount of money into their businesses, you can easily find people that will engage search engine optimization and social media marketing on your behalf. Often, this will free up numerous hours of time that can be better spent promoting your boutique through traditional channels.
It should be noted that an additional benefit of working with third party marketing service providers is that they can often source additional needs given their experience in the industry. For instance, many marketing professionals have a number of graphic designers and web designers on retainer so that graphics and related content can be produced at minimal additional cost.
In some cases, some marketing firms are willing to forgo expensive upfront fees but will receive a success fee based on the performance of the marketing campaigns that they produce for your business. It should be noted that any company that offers this type of fee arrangements in regards to boutique marketing services should be thoroughly examined before engagement. These firms often use tactics that may not ultimately benefit your business in the long run.
Financial Services
Cash flow is the lifeblood of every business – especially new companies that are working to make sales while paying all of the underlying costs of operating a boutique. For many new entrepreneurs, the most common method of launching operations is by maintaining an extremely low cost operating budget that is expanded as certain sales goals are met. This is often referred to as boot strapping. Among business owners that want to more aggressively launch their operations – financing is often acquired in order launch and expand.
Traditionally, most boutique owners will approach banks, credit unions, and other loan granting institutions in order to source the capital they need to develop and expand operations. It should be noted that many financial institutions require that a business is operational for two years before any financing is provided. However, certain government programs – like those managed by the Small Business Administration or SBA – provide short term and small loans to startup businesses.
If you are struggling to determine which types of financing are most appropriate for your online boutique or store then you may want to consider working with a business loan broker or financial broker to source capital on your behalf. In many cases, you will be required to have a full scale business plan that your broker will present to their roster of establishing funding sources. Typically, these brokers receive 2% to 10% of the amount that they are able to secure on your behalf. The vast majority of these entities work to secure loans and lines of credit. If you are seeking to raise capital from private investors then you may want to consider working with a capital introduction firm or private placement brokerage. These entities are properly licensed to secure private investment on your behalf.
On this platform, we will continue to provide you with extensive lists of resources that you can use in to effectively manage your business on a day to day basis.