What is the best organization to approach to get advise to start a business?
Answer:
It depends on who you talk to and how the person understands your business. I've had good experience and bad experience, for example, with SCORE -- good when the person I talked to was able to give me great marketing tips; and bad when the person I talked did not understand Web marketing.
My suggestion is to talk to various organizations/people and pick their brains and see which one can better steer you to your objectives.
Here are some places that you can try and where you can find a mentor:
- Government Mentoring Programs such as SBDCs, which works with community colleges and local business development councils to offer mentoring programs http://www.sba.gov/sbdc/sbdcnear.html. ; or the Women's Network for Entrepreneurial Training http://www.sba.gov/womeninbusiness/wnet_.
- Volunteer programs such as SCORE http://www.score.org which is composed of mostly retired executives and entrepreneurs
- Formal mentoring programs such as Athena Foundation http://www.athenafoundation.org/programs. , Helzberg Entrepreneurial Mentoring Program http://www.helzbergmentoring.org/hemp/. , or The Aspen Institute MicroMentor Program http://www.micromentor.org
- Professional organizations such as the National Women’s Business Council http://www.nwbc.gov/mentoring/programs.h.
- Industry and trade associations
- Local business groups, such as the chamber of commerce
- Local chapters of business groups
your local government, they will have an office for registering company.
Two offer free assistance to entrepreneurs. Small Business Administration (SBA) and Council of Small Enterprises (COSE). Check them in your local phone book or online directory. Your local library should also have a business referral area for free help. Go for it!
SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives) which is a group made up of retired executives, provides just that advice and input. Contact them at www.score.org. Best of luck.
simple answer - the Small Business Administration website has a wealth of resources and information on how to start a business, and how to plan for it. See http://www.sba.gov
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