Advise purchasing personal health insurance for you / your family directly through a state exchange or medical carrier of your choice, then simply pay the expense through your business entity.

No need to overcomplicate or try to set up a medical plan for your business.

Fellow business owner here.

I have been slammed by disgruntled clients / competitors a couple times through nasty reviews, the exec summary is there is no credible way to have scam google reviews or articles slandering your business removed. That said, all consumers these days are used to seeing these type of vindictive / unreasonable reviews. Best thing to do:

1. respond to every negative review and call out that the reviewer was not a customer. Be polite but firm.

2. respond to all positive reviews too

3. encourage past customers to leave reviews, make this a standard practice and consider encouraging people to leave reviews by offering small discounts or giveaways

4. create an online profile for your business on as many profiles as you can think of - it helps give your business credibility online and the backlinks are important for search ranking in your geo. This includes yelp, fb, the local chamber of commerce, bing, industry associations

5. make it a habit to review your online platforms monthly and post something to keep these fresh - some platforms will consider your business inactive if you do not do this, therefore penalizing your discoverability in search

Hope this helps. I work with a lot of different business owners as a Business Broker, believe that too many owners think they need to spend $$ to make their business better. Here is a post on some no cost things every owner can do:

https://wabusinessbrokers.com/2022/10/13/no-cost-actions-to-increase-the-value-of-your-business-in-this-economy/

Notice #1 is actively maintaining and enhancing your online presence :)

Fellow business owner here.

I have been slammed by disgruntled clients / competitors a couple times through nasty reviews, the exec summary is there is no credible way to have scam google reviews removed. That said, all consumers these days are used to seeing these type of vindictive / unreasonable reviews. Best thing to do:

1. respond to every negative review and call out that the reviewer was not a customer. Be polite but firm.

2. respond to all positive reviews too

3. encourage past customers to leave reviews, make this a standard practice and consider encouraging people to leave reviews by offering small discounts or giveaways

4. create an online profile for your business on as many profiles as you can think of - it helps give your business credibility online and the backlinks are important for search ranking in your geo. This includes yelp, fb, the local chamber of commerce, bing, industry associations

5. make it a habit to review your online platforms monthly and post something to keep these fresh - some platforms will consider your business inactive if you do not do this, therefore penalizing your discoverability in search

Hope this helps. I work with a lot of different business owners as a Business Broker, believe that too many owners think they need to spend $$ to make their business better. Here is a post on some no cost things every owner can do:

https://wabusinessbrokers.com/2022/10/13/no-cost-actions-to-increase-the-value-of-your-business-in-this-economy/

Notice #1 is actively maintaining and enhancing your online presence :)

Lot of competition and low barriers to entry in this business. Any 17-year-old with $500 and a bit of hustle can compete against you.

The cost of labor and gas have both shot up, making the importance of geo targeting a local neighborhood more important strategically. In other words, you don’t want to be paying your crew to drive 45-min between jobs.

Seasonality is another challenge in this business, depending on where you are in the country. You can mitigate this by getting into snow removal.

Get ready to hustle and market the hell out of your services.

First, if you are based in the US, reach out to your local SCORE chapter for a free business mentor. Local SBDC groups also offer this. Amazing resource and the folks in my local Seattle chapter are outstanding operators and genuinely enjoy helping local business owners.

Next, have you joined an industry peer group or owner best practices group? I’m in a best practices group of 15 business brokers and it has been invaluable. If you are not part of a group - start one - either locally or online, does not matter. The impact on your business, and your personal ability to overcome business challenges, can be profound.

Many small business owners pay little attention to pricing. Have you mystery shopped your competition in the last 6 months? Are you chasing revenue? Do you need to drop unprofitable accounts?

Some context on what is driving the operating loss will help us weigh in. Is it a pricey lease commitment? Wage and food cost increases? Are you booked for events but have no pricing discipline, as in are you chasing revenue?

If a good portion of the operating loss is driven by interest payments (either on commercial, SBA, EIDL, or RRF loans), then the business profitability may be different under new ownership.

Many people on this thread are confused about the difference between an asset vs stock sale.

I have a good, 2-min video on the difference here:

https://wabusinessbrokers.com/resources-videos/#buying-101

Businesses with $3M or less in revenue are transacted as asset sales 95%+ of the time.

Have helped many sellers transact their business - maintaining confidentiality through the sale process is critical, typically this is the #1 concern from a seller’s perspective. It is normal for employees to be notified of a sale after a deal closes. Sharing the seller’s perspective for some context. If employees learn an owner is exploring a sale…they may consider finding new jobs, demanding incentive $ to stay through a transition, customers could get spooked, it can be difficult to win new business, etc. There are many valid reasons for why an owner wants to keep a sale confidential.

In my experience, smart employees view new ownership of a business as an opportunity. A new owner (buyer) is obviously excited about the business and brings a mix of new ideas, energy, and resources to a business to grow it. Growth = opportunity for all. As the new owner, you want to see the business continue to flourish and grow…translating to a bigger, more profitable business.