The Colorado Solo Business Launch Checklist

The fourteen steps, in order

1. Decide it's real. There's a moment where a side thing becomes a business: the day you register it, get a tax number, and open a separate bank account. It feels like a lot. It's mostly three forms. If you're doing this, do the next five steps in a row.
2. Pick a name and check it. Search the Colorado Secretary of State's business database to see if the name is taken, and check whether the .com is available. The name can change later, but you need one to register and to buy the domain.
3. Decide how your business is structured. In Colorado the usual choices for a solo business are a sole proprietorship or an LLC. Which one fits you is a legal decision about your situation, so don't take it from me. Get it from the free Colorado Small Business Development Center or a business attorney. It's usually a one-conversation answer. Then file with the Secretary of State online.
4. Get your EIN. An Employer Identification Number is your business's tax ID. It's free, it's from the IRS, and it takes about ten minutes online. Only get it from irs.gov; anyone charging for it is charging for a free thing.
5. Open a business bank account. Take your state filing and your EIN letter to your bank. Most banks let you start online and finish in a branch. Move your business money into it and stop mixing it with personal. This is the step that makes taxes, bookkeeping, and getting paid by card clean from day one.
6. Track every dollar from now on. Everything you've already spent on supplies, tools, and mileage counts. Start a simple spreadsheet or a free bookkeeping app today, and put the receipts you already have into it. Your tax preparer will thank you and you'll pay less.
7. Check the side effects. If you buy health insurance through the marketplace, your price is based on your income, so tell your broker it's changing. Check whether your city or county wants a local business license (it varies). If you take Venmo or Zelle, look into their business accounts once you're registered.
8. Get insured before you grow. Most solo service businesses carry general liability, and some kinds of work (pet care, cleaning in other people's homes) have their own coverage. I can explain what those words mean; a licensed insurance agent picks the policy. Get two quotes. Then put “insured” on your website, because customers look for it. If a certification would reassure your customers (CPR, first aid, pet first aid), get it and say so.
9. Set your prices before you build anything. Put your full price on the site from day one. It's much harder to raise prices than to offer a discount. If you want to reward early customers, show the full price and a founders' offer for your first ten. Keep it simple: no packages yet. If your work is hard to price by the hour, show ranges by job size, do a walkthrough, then quote. Spend an hour researching what others in your area charge.
10. Write down what sets you apart. Not “reliable and affordable.” The real thing. The way you think about the people you're working for. The reason your first customers hired you again. Two or three sentences in your own words, plus one good photo of you. This is most of your website.
11. Get a website with booking and payments. One to three pages: what you do, where, what it costs, how to book, and how to pay. Buy the domain in your business name. Online booking and card payment are the two things that make you look real and save you the back-and-forth. This is the step I build for people. The Business Launch is $2,500 and includes everything on this list done with you, in order.
12. Get found where your customers already look. Set up your Google Business Profile completely, with real photos. Make a Nextdoor business page. Put a simple flyer in the coffee shops your customers use. Ask two local businesses that serve the same people (a florist, a groomer, a bakery) to trade referrals or a small cross-promotion. And when a happy customer tries to pay you extra, ask for a referral instead.
13. Set up one month of posts in one sitting. Write a month of simple posts about your work and the local businesses you use, schedule them in Meta's planner, and don't think about social media again until next month. Consistency matters more than cleverness.
14. Write the target down. What does this look like at the end of December? How many customers, how much a month? What does it look like a year from now? Write it on paper. Expect the first year to break even; that's normal. Then go back to step 12 every month.