Start a Business in Fargo, North Dakota

Are you starting a business in Fargo, North Dakota? This article discusses the most important things to consider when opening a business in Fargo.

Do You Have What It Takes?

Running your own business is demanding, much harder than working as an employee. Are you certain you have the stamina and skills to succeed on your own?

With so much at stake when you start a business, we strongly recommend you do the following before you proceed:

• Talk to other entrepreneurs in Fargo. Get their candid feedback on what it takes to start a successful business.
• We recommend reading Characteristics of Successful Entrepreneurs. For aspiring new entrepreneurs, it's a must read article.
• Seek the advice of somebody who knows you well. A support network of family and friends can be a great sounding board for good advice before you decide for sure to go into business.

What Business Are You Starting?

An important decision is what kind of business you want to start. You might get some good ideas about what kind of business to start by reading Free Business Ideas.

For in-depth how-to guides on how to start specific businesses, browse our Good Businesses to Start section of our site. For example, you might be interested in our How to Start a Paper Towels Business guide or our Starting a Tent Repair Business guide.

Remember that your new startup will be located in Fargo. Some businesses will do better in Fargo than others. Study Fargo demographics and do a competitive analysis as part of your startup planning process.

Fargo, North Dakota Demographic Information

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

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

As a new Fargo entrepreneur, you may also be interested in the table below. It shows how many businesses there are in Fargo 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.

Forming a Company in Fargo, North Dakota

A critical step is ensuring that your business is formed as a legal entity that is separate from its owners. Doing so will separate you from personal liability for business debts and obligations.

The entity you form can be a corporation, LLC, sole proprietorship, partnership or other structure.

Incorporation is a very popular way to form a business. A key decision is whether to form and S-Corp or a C-Corp, and you also must decide in which state you will incorporate. If you are starting a business in North Dakota, it doesn't mean you are required to incorporate in North Dakota. In fact, you are allowed to incorporate in any state you would like to. For example, it's very popular to incorporate in Delaware, and incorporating in Nevada has become very trendy as well. Don't forget, though, that you will have to register as a foreign entity in all states that you do business in.

There are many nuances to forming a company. We recommend you read some of the educational articles about company formation that are availabe on our site, such as Company Formation. You may also want to seek the advice of an attorney. Finally, if you are starting a business in Fargo, North Dakota, our information on Incorporating in North Dakota may be a useful resource if you decide to incorporate in North Dakota.

Where to Get Money to Start a Company

Finding the funds to fuel the growth of your Fargo business will be harder than you might expect. Bootstrapping, which means growing the business without outside funding, is the best alternative, but that's not a viable option for many startup plans.

Fortunately, this site contains dozens of articles on raising money, including one we recommend entitled How Equity Dilution Works.

For Fargo entrepreneurs who need startup capital, browse our List of North Dakota Angel Investors and our List of North Dakota Venture Capital Firms.

Promoting Your New Company

To grow your Fargo business, you need a great marketing plan.

You can learn plenty about marketing on our site. Working with an Advertising Agency is an article that will generate a few thoughts on your marketing plan. That's just one of the many useful articles we have on Marketing a Small Business.

How to Sell

Do you know how to sell? In order to attract customers to your new Fargo business, you need to focus on sales.

Clever sales techniques can transform any business from good to great. Fortunately, we've got plenty of good advice to help you improve your selling skills.

The Art of Customer Referrals is worth reading, as it may give you some good ideas on how to sell your products or services. We have many more good articles on selling that you may enjoy reading.

Now It's Up To You

As an entrepreneur in Fargo, you won't be working for the boss anymore. You are the boss.

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

We are here to help Fargo businesses to be successful. We have a wealth of experience in business start-ups, financing, marketing, sales and more...and we've made all of our knowledge available to you.

More Entrepreneurial Resources for Starting a Business in Fargo, North Dakota

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

• Resources for Fargo, North Dakota Entrepreneurs - Browse a variety of resources we've collected to assist Fargo entrepreneurs.
• North Dakota Entrepreneurial Resources - We've gathered state-level entrepreneurial resources to help new entrepreneurs who are based in North Dakota.
• North Dakota Small Business Development Center - The North Dakota Small Business Development Center's mission is to provide high quality business assistance in the form of counseling, training, and research to existing and prospective North Dakota small businesses.
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