As you get your business up and going, you may find that working from your home office might not be the best solution. Besides not wanting to communicate your home address for security purposes, you also want to look professional by having a real business address. So what are your options and what will it cost you to move when you outgrow your first office?
Many home-based businesses opt for a PO Box which can provide security. However, a simple search on the internet of the main address will result in the person finding out that suite 101 is actually a postal box! This method of disguising a PO Box is well known – and anyone who does not want to deal with businesses using them will check. In the post A Virtual Office is Better than a PO Box you see that there are many advantages to a virtual office or mail-forwarding service over a PO Box.
Besides the cost of physically moving your office and your office furniture, you have to consider the costs of changing services and changing your business address on all your printed materials when you move. You also do not want to miss any mail while you give all your clients and potential clients your new address. So, you have to pay a mail-forwarding fee to the Post Office to change your address, but that is only temporary. Remember in this Internet age that old links to your business address usually need to be updated.
When it comes to your business NAP (Name Address and Phone number), keeping it up to date and consistent across the Internet is very important to your branding and the way that local searches help potential clients find you. If your NAP is not consistent, your search rankings could be effected. When you move and change your office address, not all old links will be updated, so you have to reach out to all the sites and review boards that have you business listed – and have them change your published business address ASAP. Sometimes sites who have listed you are not reachable, so the address they say you are located at cannot be changed.
So what are the answers to moving your your business without changing your business address?
In the early start-up phase of a small business, some business owners will choose to establish an almost permanent virtual office business address at an office business centre. This means that, regardless of where your business is physically located, your professional business address does not change. This method is very affordable and can even act as a central reception for your business phone calls and courier packages.
Telsec Business Centres has clients that have started off using virtual office services, such as their mail service and telephone/mail services, who eventually became office-for-rent clients. These clients were able to move out of their home office and into a physical office space without having to change their address or business phone number. In an office business centre, clients know they can grow and take more office space without any changes to their NAP.
One of Telsec’s office clients wanted to move his physical office space closer to home in the suburbs, but did not want to lose the prestige of having his office located at 1 Yonge Street in Toronto. He downgraded from being an office tenant to being a virtual office client without needing to change his address or phone number. All his calls still come through the central reception and are directed to the extensions of the right people, without the client having to hire a receptionist at his new physical office location.
Even foreign companies needing a central business address in Toronto will use an office business centre for a Canadian business address, but have their phone calls directed to their business in another country using a VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) service. This gives them a Canadian identity and a local phone number without actually having employees in Canada. The company could also use our VoIP service and save long-distance and other phone expenses as well as establishing the company phone number moving forward.
Conclusion?
One of the biggest problems for a business is getting just the right amount of office space to accommodate growth or alternatively, downsizing. A business centre enables you to establish a permanent address and phone number. Also, it is important to note that most business centres can easily accommodate your growth without searching for a new location – not to mention the moving expenses and lost business due to people losing track of your location.
