Ok, what a fun subject this is! But, it's necessary.
Finding a good lawyer that has your best interest is key to any business.
For me, this wasn't too difficult.
Fortunately in the business that I came from I had the opportunity to work with some great lawyers.
After thinking about it I settled on one that I had a good working relationship with and closely matched my own personal morals and values.
Morals and values in a lawyer you might ask? Yes, it is possible.
Anyway, the lawyer I chose also happens to work for a big law firm, so he has people in his building that specialize in what we're doing with JustBummin.
com.
Not only that, but since they have experience in this type of thing, they have many of the forms already created that just need to be customized to fit our business, which brings the costs down.
I needed a lawyer, and you will need a lawyer for several things, several of which I probably haven't even experienced yet.
The first of which was an NDA or Non-Disclosure Agreement.
You need an NDA for a couple reasons.
One, anytime you are sharing your ideas with someone else that you might be wanting to do business with, you need to protect those ideas in the event you don't end up doing business with them.
You don't want them running off with your idea and making your fortune.
Second, if you have a job and you want to keep it that way until you're ready to go out on your own, you need an NDA so people don't open their big mouths and start blabbing about you wanting to go out on your own.
Having a NDA is a note to any potential business partner that you are serious about your business, it lets them know that you want and need their confidence, and it's a subtle reminder that ramifications will follow if they betray that confidence.
All lawyers have a draft NDA in their file that they can customize for your purposes, so their not expensive and quick to get.
So get one.
Second, setting up your business.
In our case, we are an LLC.
You will need to discuss with your lawyer what scenario best suits your needs, but you want to make sure it's done right.
Many people feel comfortable doing this on their own, but I don't.
If your business has any big potential of taking off, spending a little money up front could save you a lot later on.
Third, operating agreement.
This basically contains the details between you and your business partner(s) and what you've come to agreement on.
If there are any real sticking points between you and your partner(s), they will come out here.
This should be done early on so you can get the details out of the way and get to work on making your dream come true.
Fourth, since we are starting a business that will largely live online, there are documents and procedures that must be followed and these are things you just don't want to mess around with.
The biggest of which is the infamous Privacy Policy.
We are all familiar with these.
It's that annoying check box you much check before you can subscribe to an email list or become part of an online community.
Another item you may have to address with starting a website is Terms of Use.
Anytime you are allowing people to interact with others, post user generated content, or you need users to follow a certain set of rules, you will need this document.
There are many other legal docs, but these are the big ones that come to mind and ones that you should execute.
Myself, I'm not a big legal person and I don't understand a lot about it, so I need to leave it to the pros.
I know there are templates out there that you can use to get you by, but I would rather not risk it and suggest you don't either.
Finding a good lawyer that has your best interest is key to any business.
For me, this wasn't too difficult.
Fortunately in the business that I came from I had the opportunity to work with some great lawyers.
After thinking about it I settled on one that I had a good working relationship with and closely matched my own personal morals and values.
Morals and values in a lawyer you might ask? Yes, it is possible.
Anyway, the lawyer I chose also happens to work for a big law firm, so he has people in his building that specialize in what we're doing with JustBummin.
com.
Not only that, but since they have experience in this type of thing, they have many of the forms already created that just need to be customized to fit our business, which brings the costs down.
I needed a lawyer, and you will need a lawyer for several things, several of which I probably haven't even experienced yet.
The first of which was an NDA or Non-Disclosure Agreement.
You need an NDA for a couple reasons.
One, anytime you are sharing your ideas with someone else that you might be wanting to do business with, you need to protect those ideas in the event you don't end up doing business with them.
You don't want them running off with your idea and making your fortune.
Second, if you have a job and you want to keep it that way until you're ready to go out on your own, you need an NDA so people don't open their big mouths and start blabbing about you wanting to go out on your own.
Having a NDA is a note to any potential business partner that you are serious about your business, it lets them know that you want and need their confidence, and it's a subtle reminder that ramifications will follow if they betray that confidence.
All lawyers have a draft NDA in their file that they can customize for your purposes, so their not expensive and quick to get.
So get one.
Second, setting up your business.
In our case, we are an LLC.
You will need to discuss with your lawyer what scenario best suits your needs, but you want to make sure it's done right.
Many people feel comfortable doing this on their own, but I don't.
If your business has any big potential of taking off, spending a little money up front could save you a lot later on.
Third, operating agreement.
This basically contains the details between you and your business partner(s) and what you've come to agreement on.
If there are any real sticking points between you and your partner(s), they will come out here.
This should be done early on so you can get the details out of the way and get to work on making your dream come true.
Fourth, since we are starting a business that will largely live online, there are documents and procedures that must be followed and these are things you just don't want to mess around with.
The biggest of which is the infamous Privacy Policy.
We are all familiar with these.
It's that annoying check box you much check before you can subscribe to an email list or become part of an online community.
Another item you may have to address with starting a website is Terms of Use.
Anytime you are allowing people to interact with others, post user generated content, or you need users to follow a certain set of rules, you will need this document.
There are many other legal docs, but these are the big ones that come to mind and ones that you should execute.
Myself, I'm not a big legal person and I don't understand a lot about it, so I need to leave it to the pros.
I know there are templates out there that you can use to get you by, but I would rather not risk it and suggest you don't either.
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