How to start

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R.Lan

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North West Washington! In the land of rain and cof
I intend to start my own business in the near future, as soon as possible is my *goal*. I have a rough idea as to how to start but i'm not entirely sure. Who should i target at first? I was thinking friends and family, but i'm not sure how i would go about charging them. Another problem is my fear of screwing up. I hate screwing up and making a fool of myself, possibly more than i should. And i am quite good at screwing up. For instance, a few days ago a friend asked me if he should get another AV for his computer, (he currently uses Avast) and i told him it would be fine if he installed another such as AVG. Thankfully i quickly realized that it was a bad idea and informed him such, but what if he had gotten a virus? Heres a basic financial signpost list i came up with:

$10.00/mo - Get a blizzard from DQ
$100.000/mo Open a Business bank account, and Begin growing from family, friends, and friends of friends, onto a larger consumer circle
$600.000/mo Legally register the business and start paying taxes
$800.000/mo Begin renting a proper building and possibly hire an employee
$1,000.00/mo Top goal reached, hold meeting and establish new goals.

Feel free to pick it apart and give me advice, thanks in advance!
 
I think a good plan would be to get a job working for another tech service and gain some tech experience and observe how the business is run before venturing out on your own.

Incidentally, if you figure out how to charge family members for computer repairs, I would love to hear about that :)
 
R.Lan said:
Yeah i'm not sure how much money will be coming in. I do have an older friend who will be helping me. How much profit is average in a week for a typical computer repair business?
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There are too many variables to really have a useful "average":

Part-time vs full-time.
Small town vs large city.
Networking & sales skills vs no skills.
Advertising budget vs no advertising budget.
Trust-worthy appearance vs scruffy stumble bum.
Pizza tech vs legit business.
Repair skills vs wannabe.
 
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I was hired @ 21 with only a GED, no college, and no work experience in this industry. Been working on computers since I got my first when I was 6 :D

So it is possible for you to get a job somewhere. You at least need to half way know what you are doing and what your limits are.
 
look to possibly get an internship somewhere.... we currently intern a couple kids a year and it works well, gets you some experience.... also really any sales job will help as well, our biggest issue is finding techs who know their stuff, but are awful with people.... sales/customer service is a necessity
 
Here are my general words of advice:
  • Try to get some experience in the field before striking out on your own. Even a part-time tech job at a big box store would be helpful (if only to show you what not to do...)
  • People skills are as important, if not more so, than technical skills when starting your own business.
  • A CompSci degree is more about programming. If you're looking for formal technician education, look into industry certifications. The A+ cert is the best one to start with.
  • Be very careful when working for friends and family. They will often expect free work, and may not be happy if you try to charge them.
  • Your money numbers are too low by an order of magnitude. You couldn't rent a closet for $800 a month, much less hire an employee and turn a profit. $1000 a month is great for some spending money or saving for university, but it won't sustain a business. $10 a month will get you a Blizzard, though. :)
  • Find small business owners and entrepreneurs that you admire, and not just those in the computer business. Talk with them about their businesses and lessons learned.
  • Read a few business books. I strongly recommend The Emyth Revisited, by Michael Gerber.
 
R.Lan said:
I intend to start my own business in the near future, as soon as possible is my *goal*. I have a rough idea as to how to start but i'm not entirely sure. Who should i target at first? I was thinking friends and family, but i'm not sure how i would go about charging them. Another problem is my fear of screwing up. I hate screwing up and making a fool of myself, possibly more than i should. And i am quite good at screwing up. For instance, a few days ago a friend asked me if he should get another AV for his computer, (he currently uses Avast) and i told him it would be fine if he installed another such as AVG. Thankfully i quickly realized that it was a bad idea and informed him such, but what if he had gotten a virus? Heres a basic financial signpost list i came up with:

$10.00/mo - Get a blizzard from DQ
$100.000/mo Open a Business bank account, and Begin growing from family, friends, and friends of friends, onto a larger consumer circle
$600.000/mo Legally register the business and start paying taxes
$800.000/mo Begin renting a proper building and possibly hire an employee
$1,000.00/mo Top goal reached, hold meeting and establish new goals.

Feel free to pick it apart and give me advice, thanks in advance!
Click to expand...

Agree with others. Try to get some experience before striking out on your own. Because of your age you will not get much credibility - Im not saying this is necessarily 'fair', but its true and you will need some pretty solid skills under your belt in order to start reaching the income goals you have set. This is a relationship-based business, and you need to be able to impress people with your technical credibility in order to build long, trusting partnerships that will reach out and bring in more business.

Internship would be a good start. Network. Learn. Grow.

It would not be smart to try to run before you can even walk.

You have your whole life ahead of you. Dont be in a hurry. This field takes time to learn. After you have the basics, by all means, but probably not without a few years of pro experience under your belt.
 
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Another friendly tip: I would stay far away from AVG now. It just slows everything down and is not effective at all anymore.
 
codegreen said:
Here are my general words of advice:

<snip>
[*]Your money numbers are too low by an order of magnitude. You couldn't rent a closet for $800 a month, much less hire an employee and turn a profit. $1000 a month is great for some spending money or saving for university, but it won't sustain a business. $10 a month will get you a Blizzard, though. :)
<snip>
Click to expand...

I am looking at a location here in town for $450 a month. Only 1400 square feet, but it is perfect for what I want. I figure even if I only have the store front open by appointment only and still focus mainly on house calls, it would work fine. It was previously a stove store, so I will have to change some stuff. I am thinking more of a place to work, have a good work bench, instead of a corner of my bedroom as is my current plan/situation. Another $200 for water, electric, gas and trash, I am up to $650. Definitely not right now, but I hope this place is available when I am ready. It is only 3 blocks from my house, LOL. So I agree with you, you need to make more than $800 a month to want to rent a place, otherwise all you are doing is spending all your income on rent, and what is the fun in that? But saying you can't rent something for that ignores location.

To the op, I will agree with everyone else. A few ways to look at it. First, whether it is right or wrong of me, I would never hire a company being run by a 16 year old to work on my expensive equipment. I wouldn't care that they hired a 16 year old, as long as a much more experienced person oversaw them, or at least guaranteed the work. It is no offense to you. It is probably a bad prejudice to have. If nothing else, I want an adult I can sue if things turn ugly, since you can't sue a 16 year old. A 16 year old can't enter into a contract with me without his parents permission. Get a job somewhere, work for them for a few years, at least till you are 21. Then look at this option again.

FYI, doing work for family and friends is not included in the above. If you can make enough money to support your goals by charging family and friends, then I need family and friends like yours! However, most strangers will treat you the same as I would, and that would be to walk away quickly.
 
^^ ok, if your state has more people than 2-3 small suburbs in california, rent will probably be more than $800

If you are renting a place at the one stoplight in town, 800 might be fine - for rent.

Throw in utilities, licenses, tax, insurance, advertising, accountant, supplies, alarm, etc, untill you can pull in lots of thousands, a shop isn't a good idea.
 
compnet said:
^^ ok, if your state has more people than 2-3 small suburbs in california, rent will probably be more than $800

If you are renting a place at the one stoplight in town, 800 might be fine - for rent.

Throw in utilities, licenses, tax, insurance, advertising, accountant, supplies, alarm, etc, untill you can pull in lots of thousands, a shop isn't a good idea.
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Yeah, unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, this town is kind of hard. Most of the businesses in town are on 2 main roads, that stretch east to west throughout the whole city, about 6 miles each. None of our computer stores are on these two roads, coincidentally. But the rent on these two roads are ridiculously high, because that is where the money is. Anywhere else, you find a lot of boarded up buildings, where the rent is between $350 and $800. In fact, right now, there is a 7k square foot store front available for rent for $750/month. I personally am no where near ready for this extra expense, no matter at $450 or whatever amount. I haven't officially opened my doors, although I am working an odd job here and there. The location I have in mind is one block over from one of those main roads I was discussing though. I wish I was in a position right now to take it while it is available, because of various reasons. However, it would be a stupid, stupid, stupid thing to do right now.

I can't even dream of bringing in the numbers some of you from larger cities bring in daily here. The thought has never even crossed my mind. So I will grow my business, become as big as I can here, and I will still only be a fraction of the size most of you are after a year. Dang it, now I want to cry, that is so depressing! But I guess success also has to be location based as well, can't judge what you can do compared to what I can do, because otherwise, I really will cry.
 
Rocco said:
So I agree with you, you need to make more than $800 a month to want to rent a place, otherwise all you are doing is spending all your income on rent, and what is the fun in that? But saying you can't rent something for that ignores location.
Click to expand...

Fair enough. I'll qualify it with you can't rent a place in most locations. But we both agree the main point still stands: $800 a month is nowhere near enough to rent a shop and hire an employee.
 
Wow, Thanks for all the advice guys! This really helped me get my head straight. i'm thinking i'll apply for an internship here pretty soon, and then possibly a job. Then once i get enough experience i'll strike out on my own. And i'm sorry, but now that i think about it, i'm not sure how to go about charging family members, let alone friends. :rolleyes: However, if i do come up with an idea, i'll be sure to let ya'll know.
 
R.Lan said:
Wow, Thanks for all the advice guys! This really helped me get my head straight. i'm thinking i'll apply for an internship here pretty soon, and then possibly a job. Then once i get enough experience i'll strike out on my own. And i'm sorry, but now that i think about it, i'm not sure how to go about charging family members, let alone friends. :rolleyes: However, if i do come up with an idea, i'll be sure to let ya'll know.
Click to expand...

My family members take their computers to staples since I started charging them... now I just sit back and laugh at the stupid crap they get cross sold and the fact they pay 3x more than what I would charge and it takes 20+ days...

No sweat off my back
 
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