New business idea, where to start.

clearodara

Hi all, just looking for some advise on starting a new on-line business. I haven't got that much money but was wondering what options would be available to me in terms of start up grants etc. The main costs involved would be designing a web site / mobile app and then some marketing costs also. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

Lostinspace

Hi there,

The first port of call should be your local enterprise board. You'll need some sort of business plan, or even an executive summary to present to them. They'll ask you to complete an application form (Priming Grant for example) and then it'll go to the board. There is quite a bit of funding available. Have a look at an e-book that a company called Bullet HQ recently created. It's called "How to get 100k off the Government". Well worth a read. If you do a Google search you'll come across it.

Best of luck.

clearodara

Thanks very much for your helpful post mate, really appreciate it. Will have a look at the info. Cheers

Lostinspace

clearodara wrote: »

Thanks very much for your helpful post mate, really appreciate it. Will have a look at the info. Cheers

No problem. Hope it helps.

Audax

How profitable is this business likely to be?
The obvious first step is to estimate the cost of getting your project up and running (you can do this by requesting various quotations from app/website makers and getting and average.) As well as the cost of running the project on a monthly basis.

If the potential rewards vastly outweigh the potential risks then we're good to go. Really though, start off by getting it very clear to yourself what you want exactly, how much it's gonna cost.

More importantly once you have your project up, if it's successful then people will begin to copy it, which means you will need to work hard to be the best, should be fun.

session savage

Get your arse straight into your local County Enterprise Board and enquire about the "start your own business course" It costs €50 but youll come out of it with some really usefull information and a business plan. They vary from county to county but they usually go one night a week for 10 weeks.
As far as doing a business plan goes go to this page and download the free business plan software. I cannot recommend this enough. Its brilliant.
http://www.sage.ie/sage-planning-for-business

I did the start your own business course and it was invaluable. I seriously recommend it. It went through everything from legal issues, payroll, tax, marketing etc etc.

Good luck.

clearodara

Cheers for the replies guys. Basically the costs involved from my side would be building a website, marketing the website. The work involved would be contacting irish bars all over the world in order to get them to sign up to be a member on the website. The idea I have is basically a subscription service for irish bars worldwide to join the website and have access to certain services for an affordable and reasonable price. I don't really want to devulge to much information in case my idea gets taken but there's no stock involved and at the moment I would be the only person working and maintaining the website once it's up and running. Does anyone know how much of a grant would be available and any other costs that might be involved in setting up?
Thanks again lads, really appreciate the input

session savage

If it involves international trade and you can see it eventually employing 5 people then Enterprise Ireland could be interested. They run the new frontiers program and phase 2 of that is funded with a grant which allows you to work at it full time for 6 months.