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A boat rental business is a lucrative venture but requires an in-depth understanding of the running of the company. It is a unique business and needs a unique environment to start a business. If you have a passion for the seaside or boats and other water adventures, then this is one business venture you have to consider. Also, if you have the right eye for running a business, then you can take advantage of the needs of people in the coastline to make good money.

However, it is not as easy as buying a boat and putting up the rental sign. You will need to consider getting little knowledge of the business to make the venture a success. And for that purpose, we have put up concise guidelines that you should follow to help you start and run the business effectively.

1. Research about the boat rental business

The first step you should take in starting a boat rental business is to research about the company. You can find out details about the industry from experts or those that have been in the business for a long time. You can also search for resources online that will provide you with more details about starting the business.

Check out the setup of other boat rental businesses offline and online. You can contact the owners of similar companies, interview them to learn more about the industry and its requirements. Nowadays, with the Internet, you can easily research any topic online, but it is ideal for getting a first-hand assessment of the structure of the business. For someone that has a passion for the coastline and has been around boats, it is easier to grasp information about the company. But as a business-minded person that sees the potential of the business and wants to invest in the industry, you may need to use your business acumen in understanding the needs to set up the business.

2. Finding the right market for the boat rental business

The next step you should consider is the right market for your business. As we have said earlier, the boat rental business is unique, one that you can only operate on the coastline. It is impossible to run this business where there are no waterways. So the first step in finding a suitable marker for the company is to locate a coastline.

Now that you have succeeded in considering some coastlines where you can pitch your business, you should consider some other factors like:

• The population density of the area, for it will be a waste of resources to pull the business in a densely populated place. The higher the population, the more likely that you will get people to patronize your boat.
• The tourist attraction is another factor to consider. When looking for a suitable coastline for your business, you should consider places with a high tourist population. These sets of people will always want to take a boat ride on the waterway, especially when there are beautiful sites along the river beds and fantastic scenery.
• It would help if you also considered the security of the waterways, so you do not risk the lives of your customers. Some places are risky where you cannot take a boat ride safely due to war, kidnapping and piracy. Avoid those places for your business becausethey are a risky investment with low patronage.
• An understanding of navigation, reading maps, and weather is essential in riding the boats. With such knowledge, you can avoid going on a trip when there is rosy due to water tides in the region.
• You do not necessarily need to know the technical and knowledge to navigate a boat through the water channel. You can hire a local who is familiar with the waterways or get a good navigator and boat technician for the business.

To sustain the boat renting business and make a profit, you have to understand that the company can only work in a unique environment. Use the outline stated above to determine the best location to set up your boat renting company.

3. Write a business plan

Writing a business plan is essential for any business. A business plan for your boat rental business will contain the following:

• The scale of the company which will determine the number of boats you will put up for rent. For a small scale business, you may be considering from one to three boats. And for a large scale business, you will own a fleet of boats, and you may consider getting your dockyard.
• The aim and objective of the business, which is essential to you as the owners and the employees.
• The business plan will also contain the capital and the expected expenses of the business.
• How you intend to make a revenue should be clearly stated.
• Recurrent expenses such as salaries, rents, maintenance and other recurring costs.
• Including other miscellaneous aspects of the business.

4. Get a business name

It would be best if you got a business name for your boat rental business, and this is one of the easiest parts of the company. It would be best if you researched a suitable name for your business and its availability. Check if the name is available online for you should consider the available name of your website and social media handles. As soon as you register the business name with the appropriate authority, it would be best if you immediately bought the domain name before you go forward in setting up other aspects of the business.

5. Capital to start the business

The next step is to consider the cost of starting a boat rental business. It is costly to start the company even if you are considering starting with a boat. Starting small may require you to start with one or two boats rather than a fleet of boats, and this may be costlier than most start-up businesses.

Let’s consider the cost and maintenance of a boat to determine our start-up capital. Depending on the type of boat you may want, the price for a new boat may range from $1000 to over $20000. And you will have to add the cost of setting up navigation, maintenance, gas, installation of equipment and other expenses that will arise in buying the boat. Furthermore, you will consider payment of staff, tax, permits, rent or building of dockyard, storage of the boat and other expenses. Considering all these factors, the capital of starting a boat rental business may range from about $2000 to over $5000. And from these expenses, you can see that it is a capital intensive business and may require you to take a loan from a financial institution or find some other sources of money for the business start-up.

At this stage, a good business plan will help you secure a loan from top financial institutions for the boat rental business. You can find a business plan format online or get a professional to help you with these services.

6. Permit and certification to operate the boat rental business

For your boat rental business, you will require the necessary permit and certification to start the business. In your research about the company, you would have gotten information about the required licenses and papers you will need to operate this business legally.

You will need a permit to operate in the waterway, and you can obtain this from the necessary government authority. They will need to check your boat and other equipment required to ensure that you can operate safely on the waterway before granting you the permit. The permits from the authorities are to ensure safety in the waterways and security of the passengers.

And another requirement is that you have the necessary certification to ride your boats on the waterways. If you are going to hire drivers to ride the boat, they should have the driving and safety certification to operate a boat. And if you are going to be the one driving the boat, then you will need to acquire the required certification that will allow you to ride on the water. Every location has its laws and regulation guiding the need for certification to ride. Some of the requirement might include:

• Certification for driving a boat.
• Safety certification
• Diving certification
• Lifeguard or other personal safety condition.
• Water code certification
• First Aid certification
• And other required certification

Note that these types of certification may differ with your location, so in your research about the boat rental business, you should put the requirement of these certifications into consideration. It would be best if you also considered the fact that the permits change and you may need to renew these permits from time to time. In getting your permit, you should also consider mooring rights and other forms of storage and facilities that you will need for the business.

7. Get insurance for your business

You will need insurance to cover the risk of the boat rental business. Getting the right insurance for the company might be confusing with the numerous forms of risk associated with the business. Still, you can go for general insurance to cover your business liability. Before getting your insurance, you should ask those that are experienced in the business and carry out your research on the kind of insurance you should take on this particular business.

In taking your insurance policies, ensure that your boats are insured for damages, theft and accident. Then your customers should be made to sign documents before using your facilities that they are liable for the safety and other precautions. Without insurance, you run the risk of placing your business at the risk of crumbling with one incident away.

Find a suitable insurance company to cover such rental business, and they will help you with the required insurance packages. Note that you may not be allowed to operate in some countries without the necessary insurance policy. When starting up the business, get your insurance papers in place before taking your first tour in the waterways.

8. Obtaining the equipment for the operation

It would be best if you took your time to list out the equipment you will need to run the business smoothly. Find a reliable online shop that can offer you all the gears you will need and pick them off your list. Getting brand new equipment might be expensive, so you may want to get some used equipment to reduce the expenditure. You may want to consider different types of boats depending on the flow of the water in your locality. Or rather, you may consider getting a mix of other kinds of boats considering the need of the customers.

To save money, you can consider buying used boats and other equipment if you find quality used products. You can find used boats and other related equipment on online or auction shops, but it is vital to determine the quality of the products.

Other equipment you should purchase for your boat rental business include ropes, life jackets, maps, paddles, compasses, fishing equipment, buoys and any types of equipment that may ease sailing.

9. Hiring workers for your boat start-up business

In hiring workers for your boat rental business, there is a need to consider those that love being in the water. Workers will need to be passionate to give customers a fantastic experience, and it is essential they have some knowledge in the industry which will reduce the cost of training them to fit into the business.

It would help if you also considered hiring people with the right certification to legalize your operation further. A safety and health officer will also be needed to ensure that you meet up with the requirement to finalize the approval of your business. Again when setting up a recruitment exercise, place the advert to vicinity in the location to get workers close to the set up of your business.

10. Set up measures to increase revenue

In your business plan, you have to analyze the revenue strategy of the boat rental business, and this primarily is the renting of the boat to clients. Now, we have to list and discuss some of the ways you can make money with your boat rental business:

• Providing water rides for tourists and guiding them through some of the unique places in the water channels.
• Offer parties, group tours, private tours, expeditions and for this, you will need to acquire local knowledge about the place.
• You can also offer chatter services with your boats.
• Also make money for training people to ride boats, canoes and other activities in the water.

Always find services that you can offer with your boat, and you may also consider ferrying from one point of the water to the other end.

11. Pricing and the competition

If two aspects are vital to the success of your business, then it is the competition and your pricing. Please get to know the competition in the area, the services they offer and their pricing, and this information are vital to helping you get a competitive edge over your competition. And to get an edge over your competitors, then you should consider lower prices than what they offer or better services to attract customers.

12. Marketing and promotion of your boat rental business

Setting up the boat rental business is a challenging task, then getting people to patronize the company is another different ball game. You have to create awareness and much buzz about your business, so your boat will not be hanging out there wasting money.

Now that you have considered the perfect strategy in locating your business in areas where it will catch attention, like close to where tourist visit with a high population of fun-loving people. You have to consider how to beat your competitors and reach out to the people. We are going to Consider some marketing strategies, both online and offline, to help boost revenue for your business.

• Giving out flyers and using banners

You are a start-up business, and we must find ways for tourists and fun-loving people visiting the waterside to know about your services. Get a graphic designer to design a catchy banner to place in strategic places to create awareness about your business. The banner will be big enough, with sharp graphics and images to first catch the attention of people who will be interested. On the banner, try to state some of the features that give you a competitive advantage over the other boat rental businesses in the locality.

You can also distribute flyers in targeted locations like airports, rail stations, bus stops and other points where you will find tourists coming into the city.

• Word of mouth

Word of mouth is as old as a reliable way of advertising your services to other people. It is simple and less expensive ways of getting the message across about your quality services to others. And a start-up business like yours needs a good customer experience to attract more customers.

You can achieve this by treating your initial customers to get the best experience with your boat rental services. Give them all they required, including reasonable discounts and they will come back and tell more people about their experiences. Ask them to drop feedback on your platforms and other customer reviews forums about your services. A satisfied customer will always come back and tell people about your services.

• Build your online presence

With the use of the right keywords, people can easily search for services online. Now imagine tourists searching through for a boat ride in your locality online, if you do not have a website or social media presence, they will not be able to contact you. Nowadays, tourists book for their boat rental services online ahead of their trip.

You should build a website for your boat rental services, where customers can catch a glimpse of the offers available. Create a form for the booking of boats and other services you have.

Also, in building your boat rental services website, you should consider keyword research and using a location for your platforms to appear on quick search online. Interested people may use locations and keywords such as boat rental services to search for such services when planning their travels and location. It will be easier for your services to turn up on online searches with the use of these specific keywords.

• Social media marketing

This is another critical area of marketing that will get you directly involved with targeted customers. Social media marketing has become essential because it brings you closer to those who are interested in renting a boat and visiting a location close to you. These platforms allow you to share images, videos, text and other messages format of intonation about your business.

The social platforms also provide a quick way of Interacting with your audience in real-time. You can share real-time voyages on YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook to your audience. And this will spice up their interest in a boat ride when they visit your location. And these messages can travel far, reaching the global audience and expanding your business.

• Blogging about your business

The boat rental business is suitable for creating a blog to people that are interested in such topics. This is an excellent avenue to share your knowledge about boats, the adventure that your rental services will ensure on the waterways and much more. The business is niche related to those that love water adventure, so blogging will be a reliable way to draw traffic about your business.

You can also promote your Website by allowing customers who have used your services to share their stories on your blog. They will further share these contents with their friends and family, which will also promote your business and services. Creating a blog is easy and free, and you do not need to hire a professional to upload images, videos and write contents about your business.

Conclusion

The boat rental business is a time, and resource-consuming company and one has to be ready for the long haul. It is entertaining and fun, allowing you to have fun while you make money. And also you get to meet interesting people along the way. It’s a capital intensive business but profitable in a high populated density water region that attracts visitors.

Automotive

Tags: Automotive business ideas, boat rental, Business ideas