Start a Business in Jacksonville, Florida

Thinking about starting a business in Jacksonville, Florida? This step-by-step guide walks you through the major decisions you should consider before opening a new business in Jacksonville.

Jacksonville, Florida Demographic Information

Jacksonville has an active business community that includes small businesses, mid-sized businesses and large businesses.

To give you a better feel for Jacksonville demographics for small businesses, we have tabulated the small business sizes, based on number of employees, for business in Jacksonville.

As a new Jacksonville entrepreneur, you may also be interested in the table below. It shows how many businesses there are in Jacksonville for each business category. By looking at this chart, you can get a general sense for how much competition there is in the business niche that you are pursuing.

Is Buying an Existing Jacksonville Business a Good Strategy?

An excellent way to get started in business is to Buy a Business in Florida. Follow that link and you may find several good businesses for sale in Jacksonville.

Before buying a business, be sure to read this article: Hold Harmless Agreements When Buying Businesses.

Naming the Company

A big decision when starting a company is choosing a company name. Believe it or not, choosing a good company name can be a big contributor to your business success.

Companies like Starbucks, Apple, Target, Microsoft and Intuit all have strong company names that are easy to remember and have become well-loved brands. Wouldn't it be nice if your new company name got on a similar track?

To get up to speed on what makes for a good company name, we encourage you to read this useful article: Branding Advice.

On a final note, given that you are opening a business in Jacksonville, it's imperative that you check now that no other Florida company is using the business name you want to use.

Make Sure You Have a Business Plan

Having a business plan is critical to the health of your new business. Simply put, a business plan is a written description of the future you envision for your business. Failure to write a business plan makes you more prone to becoming a business failure statistic.

To learn more about business plans, read Reasons to Write a Business Plan. A great resource for business planning assistance is the face-to-face free consulting available from your local SCORE chapter in Florida.

Getting Money to Start a Business

Getting your Jacksonville business the capital it needs to succeed is a difficult chore. Bootstrapping, which means growing the business without outside funding, is the best alternative, but that's not a viable option for many startup plans.

Take advantage of our many articles on raising capital, such as Borrowing Money from Friends and Family.

For Jacksonville entrepreneurs in need of startup financing, check out our List of Florida Angel Investors and our List of Florida Venture Capital Firms.

Marketing Your New Venture

Whether your goal is to attract Jacksonville customers or you plan on selling elsewhere, having an excellent marketing plan is fundamental to your business achieving its goals.

We have some helpful resources on this site for entrepreneurs who are working on marketing plans. Business Logo Design discusses marketing strategy and tactical marketing in a way that should get you thinking about how to creatively promote your business. There are many more articles on marketing on our site. Visit our Small Business Marketing resource section to see them all.

Moving Forward

Most new Jacksonville businesses underestimate the number of challenges they will face.

Owning your own business will be a daunting task, but you can do it.

This site is all about helping entrepreneurs in Jacksonville and elsewhere to achieve real success. We believe entrepreneurship is an amazing engine for job creation in Jacksonville, neighborhood development and overall economic health.

More Entrepreneurial Resources for Starting a Business in Jacksonville, Florida

Here are more links that we believe will help you be successful in starting a business in Jacksonville.

• Resources for Jacksonville, Florida Entrepreneurs - Browse a variety of resources we've collected to assist Jacksonville entrepreneurs.
• Florida Entrepreneurial Resources - We've gathered state-level entrepreneurial resources to help new entrepreneurs who are based in Florida.
• Florida Small Business Development Center - The Florida Small Business Development Center Network (FSBDCN) is a statewide economic development partnership between higher education and other stakeholder organizations dedicated to providing entrepreneurs and established businesses with the assistance needed to start, grow and succeed, contributing to the Florida economy.
• Jacksonville, Florida Newspaper Ad Rates - This is a nearly comprehensive list of advertising rates for Jacksonville, Florida newspapers, including ad costs for newspapers serving the Jacksonville area.
• Jacksonville, Florida Radio Advertising Prices - To help you in your marketing efforts, we've gathered radio advertising rates for Jacksonville, Florida area radio stations.