Mississippi Business Startup Guides
Opening a Business in Hattiesburg, Mississippi
Contemplating starting a business in Hattiesburg, Mississippi? We walk you through the process of opening a business in Hattiesburg.
Are You Sure You Want to Do This?
Most startup businesses do not succeed, in part because the entrepreneur did not have the perseverance and abilities that are necessary to succeed. So, before you open a business, consider all of the implications of being an entrepreneur.
While entrepreneurship has become a popular career choice, we recommend you do the following before you take the plunge:
- Talk to other entrepreneurs in Hattiesburg. Ask them candidly what it's like to run a business.
- We recommend reading Should You Become an Entrepreneur?. For aspiring new entrepreneurs, it's a must read article.
- Have a candid conversation with friends and family. The people who know you best are often in the best position to tell you bluntly whether you will be a good entrepreneur.
Hattiesburg, Mississippi Demographic Information
Hattiesburg has an active business community that includes small businesses, mid-sized businesses and large businesses.
To give you a better feel for Hattiesburg demographics for small businesses, we have tabulated the small business sizes, based on number of employees, for business in Hattiesburg.
Businesses
As a new Hattiesburg entrepreneur, you may also be interested in the table below. It shows how many businesses there are in Hattiesburg 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.
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.
Company names need to be easy to spell, easy to pronounce, and easy to remember.
To get up to speed on what makes for a good company name, we encourage you to read this useful article: Naming a Company.
There's one other important factor when naming a business. Since you are starting a business in Hattiesburg, it's imperative that you check now that no other Mississippi company is using the business name you want to use.
Forming a Company in Hattiesburg, Mississippi
It's very important that you are forming a legal entity that operates independently from you. Doing so will protect you from personal liability for business debts and obligations.
The entity you form can be a traditional C-corporation, a Limited Liability Company (LLC), or an S-corporation.
Incorporating is a very popular way to form a business. Of course, you have to decide which type of corporation to form and where to incorporate. If you are starting a business in Mississippi, you don't necessarily have to incorporate in Mississippi. In fact, you are allowed to incorporate wherever you want. However, if you do incorporate in another state, you'll have to register as a foreign corporation in your home state.
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 Where to Incorporate. You may also want to seek the advice of an attorney. Finally, if you are starting a business in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, our information on Incorporating in Mississippi may be a useful resource if you decide to incorporate in Mississippi.
Don't Skip the Business Plan
A business plan is vital 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 is a recipe for disaster.
If writing a business plan is on your to-do list, be sure to read Business Plan Contests. A great resource for business planning assistance is the face-to-face free consulting available from your local SCORE chapter in Mississippi.
Marketing Your New Venture
To grow your Hattiesburg business, you need a excellent marketing plan.
There are myriad resources on this site to help you with your marketing plan. PR Versus Advertising discusses marketing strategy and tactical marketing in a way that should get you thinking about how to creatively promote your business. That's just one of the many useful articles we have on Marketing a Small Business.
Building Up Your Sales
Mastering the art of selling is priority one if you want your new Hattiesburg business to do well.
The key to selling is to set sales goals goals and monitor your progress towards those goals. Let us help you refine your selling techniques through our many useful sales advice tips.
Sales Forecasting 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.
Interviews With Hattiesburg Entrepreneurs
We're compiling a number of interviews with Hattiesburg entrepreneurs. Enjoy!
Next Steps
Most new Hattiesburg businesses underestimate the number of challenges they will face.
From this point on, you control your own destiny.
Our goal here is to promote the vitality and growth of small businesses in Hattiesburg and throughout the United States . We want to be there for you to answer your business questions, whether you are a new Hattiesburg entrepreneur who is just getting started or you are already up and running with your new venture.
More Entrepreneurial Resources for Starting a Business in Hattiesburg, Mississippi
Here are more links that we believe will help you be successful in starting a business in Hattiesburg.
- Resources for Hattiesburg, Mississippi Entrepreneurs - Browse a variety of resources we've collected to assist Hattiesburg entrepreneurs.
- Mississippi Entrepreneurial Resources - We've gathered state-level entrepreneurial resources to help new entrepreneurs who are based in Mississippi.
- Mississippi Small Business Development Center - The Mississippi Small Business Development Centers (MSBDC) is dedicated to helping build and grow businesses in Mississippi. For new entrepreneurs, this is an excellent resource.
Starting-a-Business Guides for Other Cities in Mississippi
Starting a Business in Gulfport
Starting a Business in Hazlehurst
Browse All Business Startup Guides for Mississippi
Starting a Business Guides for Other States
Share this article
Additional Resources for Entrepreneurs