Baby Steps

Slowly, but Surely

A reminder: This was written previously and is now being shared.

We will soon have Sweet In-Home Care available for others to use our services. It’s been a process getting this company up and running. First being a first time female small business owner, all the nuances that come with a home care service, all these feelings, and top it off COVID-19 happened. Yeah 2020 has not been the year I was expecting as I’m sure the rest of you can agree. However, we are continuing to strive on with work and daily life. There are so many things you have to tick off your checklist to open a new business and when you think you are done there are five more steps. I’m sure others who have started their own company can relate. If any of you have completed the process that I am currently in or in the same boat as me I would love to hear from you. Leave a comment for me to read and respond to.

As I said, I would be taking you through our process of creating the company so I am breaking it into sections and explaining each. If you have any questions please feel free to comment below.

Name

First and foremost, I had to choose a name for the company. We went through some different options and none quite stuck. I came up with Sweet In-Home Care one day and that was it. I thought it was straight forward explaining what the company is as we are an in-home care services company with the addition of sweet utilizing the location being in the sweetest city, Sugar Land. Plus, the phrase “Home Sweet Home” came to mind because it’s true that there’s no place like home and I thought it was fitting.

Office Space

I went through the checklist and it was long, but starting at the beginning always helps. So I started with looking for office space because we need to have space so we can work and interview caregivers. We looked at different options and viewed a few spaces, but most weren’t right for us either too restricted or too expensive for what we were getting. Some of the added fees were ridiculous. It took a few months before we found one that we liked that was in our budget. Budget is always important. It is close by making it easy to get to and we think will work best for us. It is a little bare right now, but over time it will be better. I need to add some pictures and perhaps some flowers. I see some shopping in my future. If you have any suggestions please let me know. Hopefully, we do not have any issues and in the future we can expand to a bigger office because the company is doing well. Crossing fingers!

Website

Next, I worked on setting up a website so people can see and learn what we are about. Of course, if you are reading this then you know we have our website up and running. We chose Squarespace as our host for the website and purchased our domain. Hi😁 So far it has been good and no issues yet (Here’s to hoping). I am really loving the application on my phone because I can just open the app up and edit the website. It’s been easy to edit and make things the way I want. I really like that they configure the website to be mobile friendly besides desktop and tablet. I still don’t have it all learned yet and I’m sure we will be editing the website as we continue our services. I have been utilizing their support articles to guide me on inputting what I want into the website. The articles have been so great helping me set it all up. I would also love to hear from you if you have your own website and how you went about it. I’m trying to learn and figure it out as much as I can.

Logo

I went through a series of logo options and even tried my hand at being creative. Let’s just say they weren’t up to par. I am not as creative as I would like to be or a graphic designer. I wanted a logo that was easy to read and not too crazy, but different from others. I ended up using Squarespace logo creator and the end result is the logo we have now. It’s minimalistic and not abundantly creative or graphic so I had doubts about it. Debated on whether I should change it or have someone create one for me. Finally, I decided on leaving it because while it is simple it could also be considered classic and dare I say iconic. The same could be said for the website itself as being too simplistic, but minimal is pleasing to the eyes creating a beautiful site. At least I hope so. I realized that while the logo and website is important it doesn’t have to be flashy. What really matters is the company and the services we are providing.

Here it is! Our logo!

Media

After that was done, I did what I could while I handle the certification and paperwork with the state so all of the social media came next. While the social channels might not be necessary I went ahead and set them up so that way no one else could use our handle. Sweet In-Home Care is available on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Spotify, and Instagram. Be sure to look us up and follow us if you like. We certainly would appreciate it and love to interact with others. Then came the other social outlets like Angie’s List, Yelp Business, and Nextdoor. I am having difficulty with the social channels like Google Business because the postcard they are suppose to send to be verified never shows and I have requested three times now. Angie’s list has the company there, but will not show the company when you search for it. While these outlets may not be as active like our other media accounts I was hoping they are ways to at least expose people to the business and allow people to possibly review us. We will see how it goes.

Thank you 🙏 for taking the time to check out our website and reading the blog. I’m still new to blogging so bare with me. We are just getting started as I said baby steps so follow along and you can tell us how we are doing.

Best wishes,

Stephanie

View our slideshow below to see the social channels!