Starting your own company is the most exciting thing in the world. You finally decided and you are ready to do it but then you run into little problems that slow you down and take away the excitement. Years of experience in business and administration have taught me a few lessons that I wish to share with you and hopefully, you will find some wisdom in them.
LLC vs Corp
You will find very rich discussions about this, but an LLC is the easiest most economical way to get started. You can pay an accountant or hire us to do it but really, do it yourself by going to incfile.com. Remember you can always convert to a corporation at any time.
What state should I incorporate my biz in?
Everyone loves Delaware, Biz school teaches you to incorporate in Delaware. I love the state but I’m going to let you in on a secret. You can do it in Wyoming and it’s cheaper than Delaware and you get the same biz friendly regulations that make people choose Delaware over their own state. For the record, I am not from Wyoming or never been.
What Should I Call My Biz?
This is my logic and I hope you like it. Pick your domain first. Most of the time the name that you want is not available as a domain name. Therefore people create the company but the domain ends up being very different. I like uniformity and when things match. Pick your Domain, and for that I recommend godaddy.com because it’s easy and efficient. Once secured, you now can use the same domain name for your LLC. For example our LLC is called Interim CFOs LLC and our domain name is https://interim-cfos.com/ PLEASE keep in mind that the name should describe what you do, it has its benefits such you score higher in SEO and get more organic traffic. In our case customers are looking for an interim CFO and they will google just that therefore the chances of them getting to our website that is called exactly that are higher. If we would have called it “The best CFOs,” it’s corny and it does not tell you important info such as “interim” Do not come up with initials that are hard to remember just because you want your company name to start with an “A” you are better off coming up with something short and memorable Lastly don’t be cheap buy the .com and .net and others if you can afford it
What bank?
honestly, any bank would do, however if your intention is to raise funds then SVB bank caters to you and they have a nice offering. What I have found more useful than anything is Brex it’s a biz credit card, bank card, a reimbursement solution and a bill pay solution rolled into one. We love it and we have partnered with them so if you click on the link you will get extra benefits. And why do we like it because it makes simple tasks easy so you spend less time doing accounting and more time selling and you don’t have to pay me for a lot of hours when All i have to do is reclass and reconcile.
What Accounting System?
Hands down Quickbooks Online (QBO) is what you want. You will not find more value, and/or a more flexible accounting system anywhere. They make it easy for you to find your inner accountant. Unless you are in manufacturing or you know that you will have a lot of subsidiaries, for the price, the ease of use and a ton of other futures and connections to other platforms, QBO is the king when it comes to accounting platforms for startups, In addition it’s easy to find people with experience in QBO. If you are in manufacturing, I can tell you how to hack QBO and other platforms if you want to keep the cost down, just reach out.
What Payroll Company Should I Use?
Gusto has the best platform. It’s easy to navigate and it’s intuitive and affordable. Why would you want Gusto? You can pay W2 employees as well as contractors and they take care of all the payroll filings at the end of the year. It easily and efficiently connects to QB so you just have to do the right mapping and your payroll entries are easily and automatically downloaded into QBO. It offers the ability to manage benefits through their platform and they follow a more traditional approach like ADP and Paychecks in which the biz owner selects benefits from the different options, prepays benefits and then the platform calculates whatever share you decide to cover for the employee. Their platform performed beautifully when every customer was looking for guidance to file for their PPP loan and filing the R&D credit was a breeze. Although I like Gusto and I will pick it anytime, Justworks is Gusto’s closest competitor. Their platform needs more time to mature, for example you can connect to QB but the download has to be done manually. Mapping options to the GL is limited. The one thing that they have going for them is that they offer access to group benefits this means that they insure your employee under their name/group/policy and then charge you accordingly so there is no need for prepaid or accrual entries plus even if you have one employee you can offer competitive insurance packages. Despite their shortcomings in the user experience, I see customers selecting Justworks over Gusto in early stages. It’s worth mentioning that in the last 2 years another benefit of Justworks became self-evident. Unemployment it’s also easier to handle in justworks because once again you are part of the group, there are exceptions because every state views this differently. With everyone working remotely, companies are hiring in all 50 states which means that unemployment must be filed in all 50 states. Gusto tackled this problem by introducing a 3rd party that does the filling for you for a reasonable price and the system works the same way a registered agent does. A lot of this you can do yourself but if you don’t have the time or feel more comfortable having an expert do it, we would like the opportunity to give you a quote
