> As a mostly technical person, I'm not allergic to the business side of things, but I kind of don't even know where to begin.
I’m kind of biased. I think b2b sales experience selling anything is a great way to learn core business skills — things like finding the true business problem (it’s rarely what your customers say), navigating the gatekeepers and decision makers, negotiations, etc.
As I have said elsewhere, starting a small agency is a good way to start. If you know some 1s, figure out ways to do sales and business operations for them. Many 1s are terrible at sales and hate the scut work of business operations. Just make sure to charge enough so that you can pay them well and pay yourself enough to be worth your time. The key is learning how to add value above and beyond supplying access tech talent.
Note that this is not easy. There is a lot of suck in sales (and agency management), and there is a reasons sales people make a lot of money. But if you can’t do this, you probably shouldn’t start your own business. Running a business is a lot of dealing with day-to-day suck and embracing it.
> LLCs
This is a one-day or less research project.
> accounting
Word of mouth in your area. Possibly online if you’re in the US. Also possible in a day (or maybe 8 hours across a few days).
> finding lawyers
Same as accountants. The good ones will jump out at you by the way their clients talk about them with effusive praise and specific examples.
> figuring out how to hire marketing people
Ahh… now this is a tough one.
The short answer is that you have to be the 3 in marketing — that is, you need to know enough to hire and work with specialists who aren’t willing or able to do the business or tech work on their own, and you need to know enough not to be bamboozled by the charlatans (and there are a lot of charlatans in marketing/sales).
At early stages of a business, you should probably do it yourself, and you have to be good enough to do that. A 70% effort is usually enough to get a solid business revamp off the ground. This is all learnable.
Once you hit growth and revenue, you can hire an agency. The best agencies will not try to milk you, since they have enough business. Pro tip — don’t be an agency’s smallest client.
If you are savvy, you will ask around for folks who have had good marketing people, and you will get to know these folks. Tap them and/or their network when you need people.
A lot could be written about this, but I will just say that learning marketing has a huge roi, and having access to a good network of marketers also has a huge roi. Communities like the Dynamite Circle or Hampton are low key ways to help develop these networks.