Starting a business in Calgary is a serious and challenging venture. This is especially true if you’ve never done it before. For anyone who is considering setting up their own company, here are seven essential steps to covering the fundamentals.

  1. Have Your Final Goal In Mind

Decide whether you want your business to grow into a large company or stay smaller, how many workers you expect to hire, and so forth. Decide if you will have partners or investors, or control the company on your own. Make sure you have a way out if everything goes wrong, and that everything will scale if your success exceeds your wildest dreams. If you have both a predetermined exit strategy and an ultimate goal for your business, you will be better able to make intelligent choices along the way.

  1. Know Your Market

It is important that you get to know the details of your industry before starting your business. Do you know how large your market is? Is your industry highly competitive? How much market share does your competitor have? Is your market attractive to investors? Doing your due diligence and research is key.

  1. Proper Planning

Now that you have effectively researched your market, you need to create a business plan, develop a business model, and establish both a startup and sustainability budget. Make sure all of your goals and objectives are realistic.

  1. Register Your Business in Calgary

After you have done you market research and planned the inner workings of your business, you are ready to officially start your Calgary Small Business. The exact process depends on where you live, but you will likely have to decide whether to incorporate or just register a trade name. You may also have to obtain a city/town license.

Once you have these things taken care of, you can open bank accounts for your company. Policies and procedures need to be identified, as well as your place of business or registered office. If you need a board of directors, establish it at this stage.

  1. Develop Your Offer

At this point you will manufacture your product or develop your service, build your inventory, and determine your delivery method. You also need to figure out the best way to introduce your offer to the marketplace. If your product needs to be manufactured, you must either contract with third parties or hire workers to produce your goods.

  1. Raise Capital

Startup capital is fundamental and arguably the most important part of starting a business. Whether this money comes from you, your family and friends, or from investors, you want the financing structured in a way that benefits all parties involved and also offers a realistic path to a tenfold return on their investment.

Business owners who plan properly place themselves in a position to do well. Starting a successful small business in Calgary is by no means easy, but with proper execution of the steps outlined above, you can get started on the right foot.