SBC Solutions

We’re an extension of your team

SBC Consulting acts as an extension of your team, delivering tailored solutions to the common challenges faced by business support organizations. With a team of over 18 dedicated consultants, we expand your capacity by providing one-on-one advising, allowing you to serve more businesses without additional hires. Our specialists offer expertise in key areas such as financial planning, digital marketing, and capital readiness, ensuring your clients receive the guidance they need. We also reduce administrative burden by handling data entry directly within your systems and provide data-driven impact reporting to help secure funding and demonstrate program success.

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Accounting Services & Financial Advisory Services
SBC consultants take a step by step approach to organizing business finances. They will set up, train and assist clients start to finish with QuickBooks software implementation. They also provide financial literacy assistance and training so clients can feel confident in areas such as: Preparing audits, reviewing financial statements, maintaining business records, digitizing financial records, developing presentations for potential investors and creating financial models.
Capital Acquisition, Loan Document Preparation & Grant Application Support - Federal, State, and Private
SBC consultants will assist clients with the establishment of banking relationships or other financial services, assisting with applications for government small business programs (including preparing financial analyses), identifying sources of credit, capital, grants, and other financing. Clients will receive advising on factors that may impede access to financing for the business and best practices for financial management.
Business Plan Creation with LivePlan (Pre- and Post-Funding) Our business consultants utilize LivePlan software to walk clients through the process of creating and utilizing a business plan from start to finish. Clients will be provided with a LivePlan account and when they are finished they will have a plan ready for SBA or private funding.
Our QuickBooks consultants focus on teaching financial literacy and sound financial decision-making as part of the QuickBooks training. We serve clients through the set-up and training process; often meeting with clients regularly to review their books for progress and errors.
SBC has a QuickBooks accountant profile so we can log in and see the actual books of our clients to provide them with real (not conceptual) information on an ongoing (sometimes bi-weekly) basis.
Our consultants serve as accountability partners to review month reconciliations and assist with integrating apps, e-commerce, etc. with QuickBooks. The goal is to help clients succeed so that they can invest in their business and hire additional people.
● Full company financial health review and recommendations
● Financial statement creation, review and recommend improvements
● Financial literacy training for small business owners
● Understanding capital needs, products, and risks
● Accessing needed capital and informed product selection
● Payroll setup and training
● QuickBooks setup, implementation, and training
● QuickBooks weekly and monthly review and support
● Advanced QuickBooks topics
● Full company financial health review
● Cost reduction planning and recommendations
● Cost analysis (improving same-sales profits)
● Spending trends analysis
● Revenue and spending projections
● Pre-sale preparation and planning
Our advisors work with clients to create, or recreate professional websites using the Wix platform. More than just developing a website, our advisors work alongside the business owners (often using Zoom) to teach them to use the platform to develop and maintain the website on their own. Our goal is to help them build independence in maintaining their website and social media channels as a cohesive footprint and reduce reliance on outside web developers.
Our business planning specialists help pre-launch businesses, funding applicants, and pivoting businesses create a business strategy plan using LivePlan. It takes business planning from a vague, daunting uncertainty to specific educated guesses, and links them together. This exercise has proved especially useful, as our consultants help business owners organize their goals, processes, and financial projections to help ensure even ongoing enterprises have a plan. As a testament to our mission, SBC pays for the client’s subscription to the software during our work together. Even mature businesses benefit from LivePlan’s sophisticated financial planning and projections feature. Research shows that businesses with a plan tend to grow 30% faster.
● Full LivePlan business plan writing for new and pivoting businesses
● Financial projections in LivePlan for funding opportunities and financial planning
● Existing business plan review and recommendations
● Conversion of the existing business plan document to LivePlan
Our credit repair consultants specialize in helping small business owners improve their credit rating to increase their chances of qualifying for small business loans and securing favorable interest rates, ultimately helping their business thrive.
Our consultants can review the client's credit report to identify any errors or inaccuracies and work to dispute these items with the credit bureaus. They can also provide guidance on debt management strategies, such as negotiating with creditors and setting up payment plans.
Additionally, they can offer personalized advice on improving credit utilization and building a positive credit history.
A majority of the businesses we serve are owned by women and minorities. We assist business owners through the complex application and submission process to apply for a WBE or MBE designation.
Our team breaks the process down into five steps so that it does not seem so arduous, and we guide them every step of the way. The Clients understand the documentation that they need to bring for each step so that it is an efficient yet not cumbersome. The consultants explain the advantages of having the designations so that they stay involved with the process.
● MBE/WBE/EDGE certification and research
● Government grant research, recommendations, and application support
Our consultants collaborate with clients to help them understand how to responsibly use loans as a tool for growth. Consultants collaborate with clients to understand financing options, shop for the most advantageous loan rates and terms, compile the required financial, tax, and personal documents, and chose a lender and accept a loan.
We help clients avoid predatory lending practices and discuss the financial risks and realities of taking on loans to fund a business. When possible, we leverage existing relationships with lenders to ensure clients are referred to trusted sources of capital.
● Conduct diligence and business valuation
● Better terms and conditions
● Capital structuring, raising, and planning
● Consolidation options
More than just marketing, our consultants find the root cause of revenue decline or stagnation and create a plan for the client to improve top-line performance. Market analysis, product, and service pivoting, B2B and B2G networking, and similar ideas are explored to be sure clients are offering a viable product at a competitive price to the right market.
● Exploring B2C, B2G, and B2B opportunities and markets
● Finding, understanding, and responding to RFPs and RFIs
● Corporate and government customer research, identification, and acquisition
● Connecting with corporate and government buyers
● DUNS and SAMS registration
Our legal team includes expert attorneys who can assist clients with specialized legal services such as—review and drafting of business contracts, legal liability assessments, formation of business entities, trademarks, commercial leases, drafting and negotiating stock purchase and transfer agreements, asset purchase agreements, employment compliance, notarization and more.
*Currently for Ohio organizations only.
SBC offers real-world guidance for small and medium sized manufacturers to improve the quality of their products and overall business performance. In addition to developing production quotes and responding to RFPs, our manufacturing consultants assist with manufacturing process improvement efforts, production scheduling, critical path analysis, preventative maintenance planning, and many other tactical improvements in production.
SBC’s manufacturing consultants also assist with revenue generation, contract acquisition, and organizational planning to foster growth and expansion as well as production efficiencies.
Several of our consultants live in rural communities and act as a resource for farmers on a range of topics. They can contribute valuable data, opinions, and suggestions for improving their client's products, services, and/or business practices regarding Flat Based and HTA contracts, have an understanding of how the Chicago
Board of Trade works, Beef and Hay production, Row Crops and Crop seeding obtaining contracts at harvest time, government set-asides, and tax write-offs.
Many of our discussions begin with a review of the client’s website and social media channels. Most of the time, our clients need significant support in this area, and this is something SBC is enthusiastic about as a website can help small businesses increase flexibility, control, branding, and credibility in their market.
Consumers are more likely to buy from a business with a branded website than one that only has a social media page (or nothing at all). A well-designed website is the destination for all conversions online. Marketing, advertising, and social presence all need to lead somewhere, and that place should be a website.
Our consultants map out and identify the correct social media channels for the client’s target audience and assist in creating digital marketing campaigns to ensure effort and resources are effectively expended and that the efforts are driving sales. These include:
● Social media setup and implementation
● Social media audit, recommendations, and implementation
● Logo creation
● Creation of a full marketing plan
● Market research and analysis
● Competitive landscape analysis
● Pricing analysis (compared to the market)
● Google My Business setup and management
Our consultants work with business owners to help with strategic staffing, hiring, promoting DE&I in recruiting, and hiring practices, developing employee handbooks, developing, and implementing policies and procedures required to scale, and many other aspects of finding, acquiring, and managing the company’s human resources within the financial realities of a small business.
● Employee contact review
● Employee handbook creation
● Employee handbook review, recommendations, and implementation
● Compensation package creation
● Compensation market research
● Employee recruiting
● Employee retention programs
● Succession planning
● Employee training

We offer a range of consulting services, including:

Need a customized solution for your organization or project?

Interested in SBC Consulting hosting a workshop?

We can help with those, too. Reach out to christy@sbcfirst.com or click Contact Us below.

Testimonials

"Grow America partners with SBC to support the deployment of capital readiness programs across multiple states. Their ability to scale quickly, adapt to different regional needs, and collaborate with our team has made them a reliable partner. They understand how to help small business owners navigate the path to accessing capital and how to help partners meet their deployment goals."

Joseph Gray, Managing Director of Entrepreneurship, Grow America (formerly NDC)
"At Partner Community Capital, we hold our service partners to high standards. SBC plays a serious role in meeting them. Their ability to connect with and support rural entrepreneurs is exceptional. They’ve helped our clients become more capital-ready, more confident, and better equipped to pursue meaningful business growth."

Martin Jenkins, CEO, Partner Community Capital (Central and Southern Appalachia)
"SBC has been a great partner in our work. Their diverse and skilled team of consultants enables us to extend our reach efficiently and effectively. Their data reporting is unmatched, and our clients consistently report high-quality learning experiences with actionable deliverables from their team."

Adam Kenney, Chief Program Officer, Bridgeway Capital (Pennsylvania, West Virginia)
"SBC has supported ECDI across Ohio, from our Women’s Business Centers to our contractor- focused initiatives. Their flexibility through virtual delivery has allowed us to serve multiple cities efficiently and take on large-scale, multi-year projects with confidence. As embedded partners in some of our most impactful efforts, they’ve brought consistency and scale to our statewide work and have earned their place as a long-term partner."

Steve Fireman, President & General Counsel, ECDI (Ohio)
"In managing national initiatives backed by Fortune 500 partners, I’ve seen the difference between a typical service provider and a true delivery partner. SBC is the latter. They bring structure, reliability, and deep understanding of how to operate at scale, without sacrificing the personalized support that small businesses require. That’s a rare combination, and why they have the reputation they do in the small business lending and support community."

Jill Badger, Senior Program Officer, LISC (National)
“SBC provided critical support when we needed it most. Their structured intake system, reporting methods, and large, capable team created a strong working relationship and integrated easily with our systems. They helped us cover more ground, meet reporting needs, and ultimately serve more entrepreneurs through our center, advancing our mission and impact.”

Jada Riley, Program Coordinator, Maryland Business Opportunity Centers
"The SBC team helped us coordinate statewide consulting services while also entering data directly into our native systems. That may sound small, but it saved our administrative office time, reduced service deserts, and helped us maintain consistent quality across the entire SBDC network."

Jon Myers, State Director, Indiana Small Business Development Centers (SBDC)
"I’ll be honest, at first, I wasn’t sure how an out-of-state provider could support our clients. But SBC showed up like they were right down the hall. They knew our systems, respected our clients, and helped us manage overflow without disruption. They’ve been a lifesaver during tough seasons of increased demand and pressing administrative needs."

Juliana Bolivar, Center Director, Troy University SBDC (Alabama)
"When our centers faced a surge in demand and limited internal capacity, SBC brought relief. Their team was ready to go, already equipped with systems and training to integrate into our programs. They made it possible for us to keep showing up for the entrepreneurs who needed us most."

Devanny King, Director, Womens Business Centers of Kentucky