When a new client or a referral partner asks what you do, do you have a clean answer ready to send? This episode walks through the one-page handout I use for my own bookkeeping business — who we are, how we got started, and the ways we help. Mine is a simple black-and-white PDF I email when someone inquires; no printing, no design budget, nothing fancy. You can take it as a template and build your own. It fits a service business especially well, and it's a solid starting point for just about any business that needs a simple way to introduce itself.

Need our assistance? https://calendly.com/coeurbridge

Grab Your Editable Handout: https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Coeurbridge-LLC-One-Pager.docx

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

The cheapest, most reliable marketing for a service business isn't ads — it's people who send you clients. This is how you build a steady stream of them, on purpose. Start with your natural referral partners: people who already work with your ideal client but don't do what you do. For a bookkeeper, that's CPAs, enrolled agents, tax pros, financial planners, and solo CFOs — they all have clients who need bookkeeping and usually don't want to do it themselves. Bankers too: someone turned down for a loan over messy books is exactly who you can help. Find them on LinkedIn, in your network and just outside it, and ask for a short conversation. Most people say yes. The conversation is low-key — half an hour, often over Zoom. You're not pitching; you're introducing yourself: here's who I help, and if you ever hear someone frustrated with the financial side of their business, send them my way. Hand them your one-page handout so they've got something to pass along. Keep your antenna up, do them consistently — one a week if you're introverted, more if you're not — and reward the people who send you business with a thank-you gift or a credit. I'm highly introverted, and this still works because it's one person at a time, and you believe in what you do.

Be sure to update your documents!
Budget/Cash Flow: https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Sample-Cash-Flow-Forecast.xlsx

Business Plan: https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/SCORE-Startup-Business-Plan-Template.docx

Need our assistance? https://calendly.com/coeurbridge

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

The most daunting part of starting a business isn't the idea — it's finding the first client. This is the overview: where your people actually are, and how to reach them. It depends on what you're building. A retail shop has foot traffic; a virtual service business has to go find its people on purpose. So the first question is always the same — where do the people who want what you sell already gather? Festivals and farmers' markets for the honey maker, a Pike Place booth for the candle maker, referral conversations for a bookkeeper. Find where yours are, then start small: try one channel, keep it if it works, drop it if it doesn't. I'm highly introverted — and word of mouth still beat every ad I ever ran. Not parties and schmoozing, just sitting one-on-one and explaining clearly how I help. That, a simple handout your referral partners can pass along, and a clear sense of who your ideal client is — that's most of the early game. This episode is the landscape; the deeper how-tos come later.

Cash Flow: https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Sample-Cash-Flow-Forecast.xlsx

Business Plan: https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/SCORE-Startup-Business-Plan-Template.docx

Do you need bookkeeping help? https://calendly.com/coeurbridge

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

Getting a federal EIN — your employer identification number — is one of the first setup steps, and it's free straight from the IRS. The real question most new owners have is just whether they need one, and how to do it without paying a service to do it for them. You're required to have one the moment you run payroll. But even as a sole proprietor with no employees, two reasons make it worth getting: it keeps you from handing your Social Security number out all over town, which matters in an age of identity theft, and most banks want an EIN before they'll open a business account. You can apply online in a few minutes, or mail in Form SS-4 — either way, it costs nothing, and the IRS has a short questionnaire that tells you whether you even need one. One order-of-operations tip that saves a headache: reserve your business name with the Secretary of State first. I've watched owners get the EIN, then change the name — and now they're redoing the federal paperwork too. Name first, then EIN.

Snail Mail Fillable PDF: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fss4.pdf 

Applying online: https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/get-an-employer-identification-number

Do you need an EIN: https://www.irs.gov/businesses/employer-identification-number#whoneedsanein Need help doing this for your business?

Find a local bookkeeper or use our service: https://calendly.com/coeurbridge

If you prefer to learn by video: https://youtu.be/dOxmvkiww1k

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

To start a business in Washington State, you will reserve your business name with the Secretary of State. For those of you starting a business in another state, Google your Secretary of State site. Likely, the process will be similar. Otherwise, contact us or another bookkeeping or CPA company to help you!

If you need assistance, book time here: calendly.com/coeurbridge

Video of this podcast episode: https://youtu.be/g68xkyNmAS0

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

If you run an LLC, an S-corp, or you're a sole proprietor, the IRS wants its share as you earn it — not in one lump in April. Wait until then to catch up and they'll penalize you anyway. So you pay quarterly, in estimates. Here's the rough method. Take your net income for the quarter — your bottom-line P&L — and multiply it by your tax rate. Not sure what your rate is? Pull last year's 1040; it's near the top of the first page. It might be 10%, 15%, 20% — whatever yours is, that's your multiplier. It isn't exact, and it isn't meant to be. The goal is to land close, pay a little in each quarter, and stay out of penalty territory. A few wrinkles: in a partnership, split the net income by the number of partners first, then apply the rate. Federal payments go through directpay.irs.gov. And if your state has an income tax — Washington doesn't — you may owe estimates there too. The habit worth building: write your approach down in your business plan so you're not re-figuring it from scratch every quarter.

Need to speak to a bookkeeper? https://www.calendly.com/coeurbridge

Want to see the video instead? https://youtu.be/5oZWqQCqFmg

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

When starting a business, which legal form of business should you choose? You can always change this choice, so listen today and use this as a jumping-off point for making this initial decision about your own business. This is not legal advice; for that, you would need to consult a lawyer or speak with insurance providers. However, you will have a good place to start!

Do you learn better on video? https://youtu.be/nNkfg2SeSK0

Cash Flow Forecast Download: https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Sample-Cash-Flow-Forecast.xlsx

Business Plan Template Download: https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/SCORE-Startup-Business-Plan-Template.docx

Need bookkeeping help with starting your business? calendly.com/coeurbridge

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

Any business needs to consider marketing, contracting, tools, and operations in building a company. This is an overview of these areas, which will dive into each of the separate categories in much more detail.

Downloads:
https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Sample-Cash-Flow-Forecast.xlsx

https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/SCORE-Startup-Business-Plan-Template.docx

https://coeurbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/ToolsAssessment.xlsx

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

How long could a business survive if the money stopped coming in tomorrow? Worth asking about any company you're studying — and urgent about your own. COVID made it real for many owners, and most have never actually run the numbers. There's a simple way to find it — the same way you'd size up a personal emergency fund. Take a month of operating expenses, then the cash on hand that isn't already spoken for. Divide one into the other, and you get the runway: how many months the business could keep its doors open with zero revenue. The episode works the math on a company everyone knows — Costco. Pull the operating expenses, pull the free cash flow, and it's only about three and a half months of cushion, even for a giant. Then you turn the same lens wherever it matters to you — a company you're analyzing, or your own business.

If you prefer video, here is the YouTube video of the same content: https://youtu.be/PbG43B-Mfuw

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com

In my bookkeeping business, Coeurbridge, we have encountered issues with conflicting tax flows when paying sales tax for clients. The reason for this is that sales tax is collected on invoices and deposited into your regular operating expense checking account. However, if you do not transfer it into a separate sales tax agency payable checking account, you risk spending money that is not yours.

Want to talk to us about assisting your small business with bookkeeping?
calendly.com/coeurbridge

Website: www.coeurbridge.com

Video of podcast: https://youtu.be/0Md_eRitxqM

Hosted by Julie Bonner. Bookkeeping and financial help for business owners — https://coeurbridge.com