With limited budgets and small teams, entrepreneurial ventures can be a difficult and lonely process. Luckily, the Internet is full of resources to help start and/or grow your business. The following is a list of our top 10 favorites:
1.Cofounderslab.com
Don’t want to run your startup solo? CoFoundersLab operates like a dating site to pair together entrepreneurs, developers and anyone else interested in getting in on a new business off the ground floor. Not only can you search and browse through different users online, but CoFoundersLab also host numbers of events for people to meet in person.
Creating a profile is free, but a pro option is available at $5/month to access advanced features like a list of who has viewed your profile.
2.StartupCompanyLawyer.com
Starting a company requires considerable legal knowledge. Unfortunately, most startups don’t have the funds to have a lawyer on retainer, let alone legal time. So for those companies that don’t have the financial resources to have their own lawyer, Startup Company Lawyer provides free legal information relevant to startups. You may still have to go through a lawyer to take actions like incorporating your company, but this site will ensure you make informed decisions and aren’t wasting your money.
3.MeetUp.com
Socializing and networking is a critical part of starting and growing your business. Users can find events near them or even start one of their own through this social site. MeetUp.com is not only great for business networking opportunities, but also for finding hobby-related events like ‘Sunday Knitting.’ Business-related meetings range from local business owners getting together for weekly meetings to annual corporate business leaders speaker series.
It is free for anyone to join. There are some groups that require a fee of usually $5-$15 to attend their events.
4.Entrepreneur.com
The website affiliated with Entrepreneur magazine is a great resource for aspiring and seasoned entrepreneurs alike. The easy-to-read content—housed under categories like leadership, growth and strategy, marketing, technology, social media, franchises, and finance—is packed with reliable tips, tricks and strategies to help start and grow your business. This site differentiates itself by providing really specific advice.
5.Odesk.com
With oDesk, your small business can outsource labor all over the world for a price within your budget. Need a website and app built cheap? Upload a job description and freelancers from all over the world will bid on your project with their hourly or flat rates. The power is in our hands—you pick the best freelancer with the budget you want. To ensure freelancers don’t falsify hours worked, the oDesk software that all freelancers are required to download takes screenshots when the worker is “currently working” on a random basis. It also tracks how much mouse and keyboard movement has been made.
Finding a freelancer is free, but oDesk takes 10% of each payment made.
6.LinkedIn.com
LinkedIn is a tried and true networking powerhouse that can be used by entrepreneurs to vet employees, investors, clients and contractors. With it, you can let the rest of your network know all about your new venture. You can start a LinkedIn page for your business as soon as you have a URL, instantly giving the company an air of legitimacy. Other often-overlooked features of LinkedIn that are of use to entrepreneurs are the ability to share original content, as well as the ability to join industry specific groups and communities.
LinkedIn can be utilized effectively for free. There’s also a Premium account available for $29.99/month, with plans specific to job seekers, salespeople or recruiters.
7.Onevest.com
One of the most important things an entrepreneur needs after developing a great idea is funding. Onevest connects founders with pre-vetted accredited investors. The site facilitates all steps of investment from initial point of contact to the actual transfer of funding.
Onevest is free upfront, but involves a $2000 processing fee deducted from the 7.5% commission the site gets off of all investments. Before you apply for funding, keep in mind that Onevest is looking for start-ups with at least two full-time employees and some funding already secured.
8.KISSmetrics.com
Understanding the customer is key to any company, but tracking web metrics can be difficult for businesses that mange their own website. KISSmetrics goes above Google Analytics to help companies track how users engage with their website.
Access to these valuable insights comes at a cost of $200/month for the starter package and rise up to $2000 a month for the professional package, although you do get a free two-week trial first.
9.Hootsuite.com
Social media is an important way to engage with the public and create a brand identity. Hootsuite lets you manage all your social media sites on one single dashboard and provides you with data to track your social reach across the web. The best part of Hootsuite is that you can schedule posts ahead of time, making it perfect for businesses without a full-time social media team.
The free version allows you to manage three social profiles. The pro version starts at $9.99 per month, which includes 50 profiles, with the option to add more.
10.Basecamp.com
Technology has made working remotely a possibility, but nothing beats being in the same space as your whole team. Basecamp helps facilitate project management with a virtual base camp that puts everyone on a team under one big to-do list slash calendar. The site is available across all platforms and integrates seamlessly with email, so all communication can happen in one place too.
Prices start at $20/month for up to 10 active projects and go to $3000/month for unlimited projects.