Home based business with low cost

Hi! I work with entrepreneurs who are exploring opportunities and launching and I lecture in Entrepreneurship on the side. The answer to your question is it depends on the purpose of your business plan and who the audience is. If it's for yourself to help you plan the business, then a good place to start is a business model canvas which quickly captures your ideas and shows you areas you need to focus on. If you are planning on going to a bank for funding, you will need the traditional 20 - 40 page business plan. Some investors will want similar, some won't. You would produce different documents to get key partners or suppliers on board. If the planning and opportunity evaluation process is new to you, you will save a lot of time and money by getting someone on board who can guide you through this process. I'm happy to jump on a call with you to help you with this.

Making sales and figuring out what potential customers want. Really, everything else can be done after you've proven that there really is a business opportunity. www.DavidCBarnett.com

The best way to test a person's talent is to put them to work in the reality of your business. If these folks are all onboard for being partners, promise to give them a cut of all deals they bring in. Structure the plan so that the contract lasts three months. Then, let them prove themselves and show (not just say) they really mean it. Make no equity promises until you can validate their claims. What if someone balks at the offer? I'd imagine these folks will have main jobs during the testing phase. If they scoff or refuse, then you've won immediately. If they aren't willing to hustle a bit extra for a few months how in the world could they do this for many years ahead within a successful partnership? Why three months? People can fake their behavior for quite a bit of time. At two months people can't help but being themselves. You'll get a taste for how they work, they're ability to close, and their personality. Personality is the biggest factor, as they may do a great job bringing in business, but be simply unbearable to work alongside. A note of caution around the Head of Marketing SME: this person sounds like a problem. Are they acting immorally towards their current employer? Check, stealing business. Are they sure they can do it on their own, but for some odd reason never have? Check. Are they requesting for more stake than they deserve? Check. These alone are reasons to run. Immoral, unproven, and greedy at the start. To me, you sound like you need to hire a commission based sales person. Give them a stake of each deal. Don't give up equity for something like this. This company is your baby and equity is a last resort.

Please realize that my suggestion would be slightly different if I knew which two countries. However, without knowing that here's what I'd suggestion: 1. Since you're just getting started figure out which country provides the best legal benefits for starting a company. This should include tax benefits, legal protection, and ease when it comes to filing paperwork (incorporating, managing payroll, taxes, etc.). This will undoubtedly save you time and money moving forward, and staying lean. 2. Once you've established your home base country, you'll still need to hire people in the other country as you scale. You may want to think about using a service like oDesk or Elance, not necessarily to recruit people but to manage ALL the paperwork associated with hiring international people. They will of course be given contract status. If you are going to be providing employees equity then I'd suggest consulting a lawyer for how people in the non-home base country will be treated. 3. Reporting revenue. You need to be very careful about whether you are providing goods and services. If it's goods keep in mind that you might be subject to tariffs. If you're providing services then I think you might be in the clear, but please double check. Finally, some countries might have an issue with where the revenue was actually made i.e. are you sitting in your office in your home based country while servicing clients in the non-home base country, or are you actually in the non-home base country. 4. No matter what you'll need to setup a remote working environment for yourself. Invest in the best technology you can, and find clients who are willing to utilize your services on a remote basis. Here are a few additional posts on running a remote team that I've written: http://femgineer.com/2013/09/running-remote-and-making-progress/ http://femgineer.com/2013/03/how-to-transition-to-a-remote-team/

Clients before hire/ income before expense BUT start the interview process now too