Starting a New Small Service Company

How to Start a Service Business by Meir Liraz

This guide will walk you step by step through all the essential phases of starting a successful service based business. To profit in a new service business, you need to consider the following questions: What business am I in? What services do I provide? Where is my market? Who will buy? Who is my competition? What is my sales strategy? What merchandising methods will I use? How much money is needed to operate my firm? How will I get the work done? What management controls are needed? How can they be carried out? This guide will help you answer all these questions and more.

Here's what’s in the book:

~ Things to consider before you start - crucial things you must consider before you start pouring in your hard earned money. Ignore it at your own peril.

~ How to plan and start your new service business - complete, step by step instructions, this is must-know must-do information; ignore it and you stand a good chance to fail. You get specifically designed instructions for each phase.

~ How to develop winning marketing strategies for your service business.

~ How to plan and execute a results driven advertising program - tips and strategies to make your advertising pay off big.

~ How to promote your business - an arsenal of 43 super-slick promotion ideas that help pile up profits, boost your sales and leave your competitors in the dust.

~ How to find new customers - new customers and more sales are essential for profit and growth. Here's a little known yet extremely effective ten-step formula to locate and find new customers. This same formula helped one client of ours to increase his customer base by 46% last year.

~ How to set the right prices - pricing secrets to help you make money and still be competitive. You get specifically designed instructions for a service based business.

~ All these and much much more.

My name is Meir Liraz and I'm the author of this book. According to Dun & Bradstreet, 90% of all business failures analyzed can be traced to poor management. This is backed up by my own experience. In my 31 years as a business coach and consultant to businesses, I've seen practically dozens of business owners fail and go under -- not because they weren't talented or smart enough -- but because they were trying to re-invent the wheel rather than rely on proven, tested methods that work. And that is where this book can help, it will teach you how to avoid the common traps and mistakes and do everything right the first time.

Sample Content:

When you have decided what business you're in, you have made your first marketing decision. Now you are ready for other important considerations.

Successful marketing starts with the owner-manager. You have to know your service and the needs of your customers.

The narrative and work blocks that follow are designed to help you work out a marketing plan for your firm. The blocks are divided into three sections:

Section One - Determining the Sales Potential

Section Two - Attracting Customers

Section Three - Selling to Customers

Section One - Determining the Sales Potential

In the service business, your sales potential will depend on the area you serve. That is, how many customers in this area will need your services? Will your customers be industrial, commercial, consumer, or all of these?

When picking a site to locate your business, consider the nature of your service. If you pick up and deliver, you will want a site where the travel time will be low and you may later install a radio dispatch system. Or, if the customer must come to your place of business, the site must be conveniently located and easy to find.

You must pick the site that offers the best possibilities of being profitable. The following questions will help you think through this problem.

In selecting an area to serve, consider the following:

Population and its growth potential

Income, age, occupation of population

Number of competitive services in and around your proposed location

Local ordinances and zoning regulations

Type of trading area (commercial, industrial, residential, seasonal)

For additional help in choosing an area, you might try the local chamber of commerce and the manufacturer and distributor of any equipment and supplies you will be using.

You will want to consider the next list of questions in picking the specific site for your business:

Will the customer come to your place of business?

How much space do you need?

Will you want to expand later on?

Do you need any special features required in lighting, heating, ventilation?

Is parking available?

Is public transportation available?

Is the location conducive to drop-in customers?

Will you pick up and deliver?

Will travel time be excessive?

Will you prorate travel time to service call?

Would a location close to an expressway or main artery cut down on travel time?

If you choose a remote location, will savings in rent off-set the inconvenience?

If you choose a remote location, will you have to pay as much as you save in rent for advertising to make your service known?

If you choose a remote location, will the customer be able to readily locate your business?

Will the supply of labor be adequate and the necessary skills available?

What are the zoning regulations of the area?

Will there be adequate fire and police protection?

Will crime insurance be needed and be available at a reasonable rate?

I plan to locate in ___________ because:

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Is the area in which you plan to locate supported by a strong economic base? For example, are nearby industries working full time? Only part time? Did any industries go out of business in the past several months? Are new industries scheduled to open in the next several months?

Write your opinion of the area's economic base and your reason for that opinion here.:

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Will you build? ________ What are the terms of the loan or mortgage?

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Will you rent? _________ What are the terms of the lease?

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Is the building attractive? _________ In good repair? _________

Will it need remodeling? __________ Cost of remodeling? __________

What services does the landlord provide?

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What is the competition in the area you have picked?

The number of firms that handle my service _________

Does the area appear to be saturated? _________

How many of these firms look prosperous? _________

Do they have any apparent advantages over you? _________

How many look as though they're barely getting by? _________

How many similar services went out of business in the area last year? _________

Can you find out why they failed? _________

How many new services opened up in the last year? _________

How much do your competitors charge for your service? _________

Which firm or firms in the area will be your biggest competition? _________