I give a lot of advice on this blog that involves some sort of cost for your business. A lot of those things, while important, can be tough to take on right as you’re starting your business. Given that, we’re going to cover some free steps you can take that would help.
We talked about this on YourBrandYourBusiness, if you’d prefer audio/video format.
Separate business and personal banking
We’ve discussed this before here. Basically, you should have a separate bank account for your personal and business money. It makes your accounting, tax prep, and just life in general easier.
Fortunately, you can open some free bank accounts or even subaccounts at your current bank that should make this step relatively easy.
Separate Paypal account
You will really want a separate Paypal account. Many broadcasters have their Paypal linked to whatever tipping service they use (think Streamlabs). However, if you use your personal account you risk your name and address being public.
When someone sends money to your Paypal they can see the attached name and email address. Beyond that, if they were to dispute a charge and you wanted to fight it they’d potentially see your address.
Creating a separate one for the business could solve these problems without needing to mangle your original account.
Accounting Software
You should know what you’re earning and spending in your business, correct? That’s one of the most basic things you should do.
Unfortunately, most people aren’t super familiar with bookkeeping so it can appear intimidating.
Fortunately, one of the free steps you can take is to start up with Wave, a free accounting app. It’ll make your life a lot easier.
Google tools
Google has replicated essentially the entire Microsoft Office suite in free tools.
Here are some of the ways you can use their free tools to help your business.
- Google Sheets can be used to do basic bookkeeping and projections.
- Google Slides replaces PowerPoint and you can use it for your basic pitch deck.
- Google Docs replaced Word and you can use it for putting together proposals, taking notes, etc
- Hangouts replaces Skype or Zoom and you can use it to set up streams with multiple people on screen at the same time.
Social Media handles
This one’s straightforward. Grab your stream name on every social media platform you can and do your best to make sure it’s consistent across the board.
Business plan
We’ll get in to this in a lot more detail in a later article.
For now, suffice it to know you can search for free business plan templates. Walking through those will go a long way to help you set the direction of your stream.
Conclusion
There are a ton of free things you can do that improve your business without breaking the bank. Most of them cost time but when you’re early on in business you’re likely spending time instead of money.
You don’t have to figure this out alone. This is what we do- help streamers make great money and business decisions. If that’s something that sounds interesting to you reach out me or schedule some time for a free consult. You can check out what I do here.
