Part III of our "start your own business" series.

1. Starting a Business
Entrepreneurial Resources
Muncie Public Library

2. Starting a Business
Introduction
• Welcome to the Starting a Business resources
list from MPL.
• Our list is organized into five sections:
• Section One will provide resources for
ideas, legal structure, planning and intellectual
property.
• Section Two will have links for
starting, buying, and financing a business.

3. Starting a Business
Introduction
• Section Three continues by adding resources
for networking, sales & marketing, and the
day-to-day running of the business
• Section Four lists links to case studies and
interviews of interest.
• Section Five has two parts, famous
entrepreneurs and a general set of resources
for sites pertaining to starting a business in
Indiana.

4. Starting a Business
Section 1-1 Business Ideas
• The two resources offered here deal directly
with ideas for a start-up business.
• www.entrepreneur.com/businessideas/index
• This site lists 969 business that you could
“start today”. You may browse by nine
different categories. As part of the
Entrepreneur Magazine site it is well worth
getting to know. MPL subscribes to the
magazine.

5. Starting a Business
Section 1-1 Business Ideas Contd.
• Another good resource that you should look at
is www.youngentrepreneur.com
• This site has and eclectic selection of ideas for
starting a business in the starting up ideas
page and down to earth advice and dialog in
the Forum area under starting up.

6. Starting a Business
1-2 Legal Structure
• If you are going to start a business then you
will need to become a legal entity. There are
several choices to make. To help you
decide, please look at these resources.
• www.about.com find other source

7. Starting a Business
Section 1-3 Business Plans
• These two sites have good instructions for pre
paring a good business plan.
• www.startupnation
• Look for the link “10 Steps to open for
business” click on it an then click on step
three, and start working on your business
plan.

8. Starting a Business
1-3 Business Plans Contd.
• The business data base that is available from
the Inspire has a lot of business plans.
• It can be reached by going to Inspire at
http://www.in.gov/library/inspire
• We will be looking at the business database
called the Small Business Resource Center.

9. Starting a Business
1-3 Business Plans Contd.
• Using Inspire data base contd.
• Starting from the Basic Search page, we will
look for the link called ‘Search by data base’
which is near the search entry box. When we
click on this link, it will take us to all the
databases that are a part of Inspire. We will
scroll down the list and click on the ‘Small
Business Resource Center’ link.

10. Starting a Business
1-3 Business Plans
• Small Business Resource Center contd.
• For our example we will search for
information about Pet Grooming salons. If we
type this into the search bar we will get
several different kinds of information.
• Notice that the business resources are divided
into five different areas. These include
business plans, articles, overviews, directories
and websites.

11. Starting a Business
1.4 Intellectual Property
• Intellectual Property is defined as ‘property
from original thought protected by law,..that
can be legally protected by patent, trademark
or copyright. (Bing dictionary)
• A good beginning to learn about how this
works for the small business is to go to the
following site and read its contents on
intellectual property.

12. Starting a Business
1.4 Intellectual Property
• One we have chosen is
www.entrepreneurs.about.com We will go to the
site and look for the ‘Browse Topic’ list. On this
list we will choose ‘Intellectual Property’.
• Another equally useful site is: www.gaebler.com
This entire site is about the issues of running a
small business. We want to go to the menu at the
top of the page called ‘Operations’ click on it and
select ‘intellectual property’ from the list.

13. Starting a Business
3.1 Business Networking
• There are lots of different social networking
sites. The following url is just for one that
focuses on social networks for entrepreneurs.
• Its address is www.mashable.com To get to
the article, choose Mashable Business and
when the site comes up, type ‘Top 10 Social
Networks for Entrepreneurs’ in the search box.

14. Starting a Business
3.2 Sales And Marketing
• As you begin to think about putting a business
plan together, selling and marketing your
product or service should be on your mind.
Now is the time to start thinking about how
you will make it work.
• We start with this
site, www.forentrepreneurs.com

15. Starting a Business
3.3 Running a Business
• The day-to-day running of the business is another
area that the entrepreneur needs to be aware of
and prepare for.
• Two sites to help with the learning curve are:
• www.entrepreneur.com/article/250234 Your
Entrepreneurial To-Do List
• www.inc.com 10 Secrets of becoming a successful
entrepreneur Please enter ‘10 Secrets of
Becoming a Successful Entrepreneur’ in the
search box.