Small businesses are undoubtedly the heartbeat of many economies worldwide and in America. As per the Small Business Administration’s 2019 data, small businesses in America account for about 99.9% of all businesses in the country. These companies own various tangible and intangible assets crucial to their operations and success, making sense for small business owners to secure them. If you wish to learn more about protecting your business assets, please consider the following points.
Secure Your Business Premises
Company premises are vital assets that all enterprises must protect. Thankfully, there are numerous ways small business owners can secure their company premises. For instance, you can change the locks around the office, particularly if you have moved into a new building recently. Furthermore, invest in property lighting to illuminate your premises and deter burglars from targeting your office.
Additionally, consider installing CCTV cameras and access control systems at various vantage points to screen the people who visit your premises daily. Finally, you can hire experts like ROS Electric to install a fire alarm on your business premises, ensuring that fires are detected in time to prevent your building from burning down.
Insure Your Company Assets
Many business experts agree that insurance should be every company’s strategy to protect its assets. However, several small business owners ignore insurance, assuming that disaster won’t strike anytime soon. Therefore, they are often taken aback when physical and digital assets are compromised, suffering many consequences ranging from reputational damage to financial loss.
Consequently, insure all asset types crucial to your business operations, like your premises and other property. In addition, insure your cash, credit, stock, or machinery your business uses. Furthermore, insure your goods-in-transit, commercial vehicles, and even your IT systems against cybercrime. This way, your small business can bounce back from unexpected setbacks and replace lost, stolen, or damaged property.
Apply For Patents, Trademarks, And Copyrights
Intellectual property disputes in the U.S are more common than you think, with data indicating that up to 5,000 copyright cases are filed in the country annually. Every company has some intellectual property that equates to tangible assets. Therefore, register all your intellectual property to prevent others from using them without permission. Also, you can rely on other excellent ways to secure intangible assets like trade secrets and business data. For instance, you can use employee, third-party, and contractor confidentiality agreements to protect your essential data from leaking, preserving your competitiveness in your industry.
Form Business Entities
Many small business owners tie their enterprises and personal assets in one bundle. However, failing to distinguish between them is a bad idea since bundling assets makes them vulnerable. As such, you may lose all your properties if a customer wins a lawsuit against you. Therefore, consider forming business entities to separate your business and personal assets. Generally, limited partnerships, corporations, and limited liability companies are the three major business entities to consider, so put great thought into selecting one that works best for you.
