Local businesses

Are you ready to start a bakery business: Learn more now

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Becoming an entrepreneur changes your life in so many ways. You become passionate about working, new experiences become a commodity, and you get a new perspective on common situations. If you enjoy baking and watching competitions on TV, wishing you were the one fighting to win the big prize, leverage your ability to make delicious treats. More exactly, start a bakery. Operating a home bakery allows you to choose clients and customers, set your own schedule, and reap the benefits of your hard work. Please continue reading to find out what it takes to start a bakery business.

Obtain the necessary licenses and permits

Bakery businesses are governed by cottage food laws, which can vary from state to state. Reach out to your city or county government officials and ask them what licenses and permits you need to start doing business. Make sure to inquire about health precautions too. Depending on your kitchen’s layout, it might be necessary to make modifications like installing additional sinks or updating the ventilation system. Many states have similar food cottage laws, yet some of them have many requirements. Checking the laws is helpful in this respect. After you get the details you need, file for your license or permit online.

Come up with a thorough business plan & calculate startup costs

Creating a business plan means that you’re taking your dream seriously. It will help you figure out where you want to go. As you write the business plan, take into account the startup costs. Some of the expenses you can expect for a home bakery business are renovations, kitchen equipment, insurance, and inventory (ingredients). Speaking of which, home based bakery insurance is an ordinary and necessary business expense. If someone chips a tooth on a cake decoration you’ve made, you’re liable. There are many other expenses to factor in when starting a home-based business. Detail the costs and apply them to your financial projections.

Decide what types of goods to sell

You can sell your baked goods locally or online; it depends on the options for shipment. Decide from the very beginning what you want to sell. Examples of profitable products at bakeries are:

  • Cakes
  • Cookies
  • Cupcakes
  • Brad/rolls
  • Yeast-raised doughnuts

It’s easier to focus on two items, just so you know. As you continue your entrepreneurial journey and understand what’s profitable, you can expand the menu and change your offering.

Bakery

Keep a positive business attitude

Last but certainly not least, it’s crucial to maintain a positive attitude in business. Innovate, identify new opportunities, and define new ways of working. Stay positive no matter what challenges you encounter. Adopting this kind of attitude will help you immensely. Even when things go wrong, try to find the irony of the situation. While it won’t change anything, it will make you feel better. The idea behind positive thinking is that, if your mind is in a good place, good things will come to you. Put an end to negative self-talk and enhance your ability to think positively.

6 Tips For Managing Your Federal Taxes as a Small Business

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The truth is, taxes can always be a time-consuming business, especially trying to make sense of all those complexities and issues revolving around which taxes are due (federal, state, or local), which filing process is required, and what type of taxes each level of government collects. However, it is always important for entrepreneurs and business owners to be able to understand the nuances around these and be adequately prepared even before tax days arrive. So, here are some tips on how to manage your taxes as a business owner.

Always plan ahead

In business, planning is everything and can be the difference between a smooth tax filing and payment, and a long drawn-out process with the IRS. First, have an idea of when to file early, so you can take advantage of early filing deductibles. You can mark out dates in your schedule or calendar every year for the quarterly tax filing and payment dates. Planning also hel[s to minimize your tax burden, and ensure you save money by paying as little as possible.

Make sure a digital and electronic record of every transaction is safely kept, as you will need to go through them when sorting your taxes. Make sure to keep a steady amount of money on the side, so you do not start running around when the date is due.

Figure out how much taxes you need to pay

The first step is to identify how much taxes are due, from local to state to federal. Determining your exact tax liability will help you identify the specifics involved in all obligations and give you the right framework when speaking to a professional. Generally, the task liability of most businesses will be governed by primary considerations such as business structure location, location, and assets.

Taxes are not only determined by revenue and deductibles, other notable considerations will include stock and inventory, structure, size, and the number of employees is also important considerations. Remember that if you are not a sole business owner and have employees, you will need to also file employment-related taxes.

Get professional help

It is always good for you as a small business owner to get professional help, so that all filings and payments are done correctly and under the law. Apart from the need to file correct taxes, professional CPA firms can be a very cost-effective way to get your filings done with minimal effort, and with much fewer complications. They can also help reduce the tax burdens and ensure as much money as possible is kept in the business, which is critical to the long-term success of your business.

As a small business owner, you want to minimize costs as much as possible, so you can either get a software tool to help with filing, or you can also decide to hire an accountant. Both measures can be effective but also quite pricey, an accredited CPA firm can be the best way to go.

It especially is the best option if such a firm focuses exclusively on small businesses, so it makes it easy to evaluate records and make sure it is the right fit for you. If you want to go with a professional CPA firm, Taxfyle is one of the best places to go when you want to file business taxes online. Other important tips to consider include;

Managing Your Federal Taxes

Revenue and Deductions

After proper documentation, it is important to calculate all taxable income so that you can get an appraisal on what you can expect to pay, and how to make a budget for it. A revenue for taxation purposes is any sort of income you receive that is connected to your business, whether it is a product or a service. Generally, the main question is, would this income have been made if you did not start the business? If yes, then it is taxable business income. If not, then it is not taxable business income.

So, how do you determine any deduction? Well, deductions are important if you want to reduce your tax burden and take up as much profit as you can. It would be best if you remembered that tax evasion is different from tax avoidance. The former is illegal, while the latter is legal. With the latter, you are essentially taking advantage of loopholes within the tax system. Common deductions include travel expenses, entertainment, home office deduction, casualty losses, and capital expenditures.

Net profit

An easy way to calculate what you make at the end of the day is by calculating your net profit. First, calculate your entire gross income, which is money made across the board with no deductions. Then make all the necessary deductions such as operating income, cost per acquisition, running costs, inventory, purchases, and other business expenses. The difference is the net profit of your business, for taxation purposes.

If you are a sole business owner, then you are obligated to pay your self-employment taxes from your business income. You can smartly reduce tax liability by choosing the right amount for self-employment and compensation, thereby giving you enough deductibles to compensate yourself, while ensuring that you have minimized your tax liability. Another interesting thing is that you can also deduct this loss against any business income accrued over the business year, or even let it roll over to the future, thereby offsetting income in the following years.

Tax credits

Another easy way to reduce tax liability beyond deductions is by claiming tax credits. The major advantage they hold is that they can be deducted from your business income for your tax bill. However, you need to have a good understanding of how tax credits work, so getting professional is the best way to go. They involve very complicated conditions, which can be problematic for first-timers.

The Bottomline

Taxes can be a frustrating process because apart from their time-consuming nature, they also eat into precious profits. So, it is always best to make the process as easy and seamless as possible, while still ensuring you get to keep as much profit as you can. Following these steps is a good way to ensure that.

Positive Words Research – 6 Tips For Managing Your Federal Taxes as a Small Business owner

How To Make Money Selling Mobile Apps To Local Businesses

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One challenge that every app developer often has is selling their mobile apps to local businesses. Be it a company dealing in software development or an individual developer, both have to go through a phase when they have to convince local businesses to buy their apps.

Though it can be a hard process, there are some strategies that can be implemented for growing your sales with a properly laid out marketing plan.

Nowadays, every new business is looking to get their apps developed for iPhones to give their customers or employees an easy way to coordinate with them.

Some may look for off-the-shelf best iPhone apps solutions, while others want to have more customized solutions to meet their specific requirement. No matter what your prospective customers need, here are some steps you need to take:

Decide On What Sets You Apart

Competition is always inevitable. Even if you’re a startup with a completely unique offering, you’ll soon find yourself surrounded by competitors. And, when you’re in the business of selling apps, you already have stiff competition to deal with.

However, you can use this as an opportunity for setting yourself apart by identifying exactly how you and your offerings are different from the rest in the market. This uniqueness will become your strength in beat the competition and convince your prospects to choose you ahead of them.

It can be the stepping stone in convince prospects to choose your app and you can base your entire strategy on your uniqueness.

Research The Prospects 

It’s critical! When you first contact a prospect, it always pays you to quickly look at their business websites to grab as much information about them as possible.

This can even help you with find out specific points where your mobile app can help the prospect in driving growth to their business. As a result, you’ll be well-equipped with all the information you need. Will also be prepared for discussing how your mobile app fits in to help them achieve their goals.

Set Up A Marketing Campaign

After researching the prospects, you should set up your full-fledge marketing campaign. In fact, it’s not just about going out there, finding out your prospects and pitching your idea to them. There may be lots of prospects who you may not even be able to find out. So, it is important that you market your offerings on every front so that people come looking for you.

Decide on the channels you want to use for marketing your products and make sure that you use positive words in your marketing message. Portray how your offering can be beneficial to the prospects and how exactly it can help them step forward towards better business process and growth.

Besides, take care of the SEO aspect of your marketing campaign as well. Get business listed in “Google My Business” and try to give as many details as you can.

Besides, get yourself listed in relevant online directories, contact the influencers in the industry and get them to somehow bring business to you. Promote your offering on social media and ask your current clients to feature your website link at their business website.

This particular approach will give a huge boost to your marketing campaign.

Never Drive Conversations While Meeting The Prospects

When meeting the prospects, one of most important things that you have to do is to listen to them. That will allow you to find out exactly how your mobile app can be helpful in accomplishing something that’s really important for them.

If all you do is to try and sell your thing and drive the entire conversation towards closing then you may not be able to achieve anything at all. And again, do some positive words research to make sure of how you can tackle the changing situations during conversation.

Take A Proactive Approach

Everyone of us knows that sales do not happen automatically. After pitching your idea, you really need a strong follow up and clear the prospects doubts so that you can be able to cut the deal.

Always stay motivated as it will allow you to keep pedaling regardless of what each new day brings.

Make The Transition Easy

Once you have captured attention of a prospect and they’re ready to buy your app, you really have to ensure that you make transition as seamless as possible.

If too many problems come along the way, that little amount of trust and patience that you had acquired with the pitch will be quickly destroyed. This may lead to ending the deal as prospects can quickly change their mind seeing the hindrances coming in the process.

Keeping transition unnoticeable proves to be the key as it will give local businesses a message that they’re going to make things easier for themselves in the bid to achieve desired results and see growth.

Making money selling mobile apps to local businesses may not be too easy unless you take a systematic approach to the process. Taking the most appropriate route will ensure that you’re able to achieve your own business goals seamlessly as well.

Author Bio:

James Barret is an accredited tech writer with a focus on latest in technology. He usually concentrates his efforts on product descriptions, reviews, and news from major tech brands. James is currently a contributed author at many renowned tech blogs and websites and enjoys everything he writes for them.

Here at Positive Words Research, we are looking to share with our readers original content that hasn’t been published on other sites so if you are comfortable with Positive Words Research being your sole publisher, we are more than happy to share with our readers your inspiring and empowering story.

How to Make Money Selling Mobile Apps to Local Business