Start, build, grow & scale your business in Kenya.
Practical guides, compliance guidelines, business tools, and business documents to help you run your businessβstart, build, grow, and scale profitably.
Preview Kenya's Essential Business Tools
See live calculations for payroll deductions, commercial invoices, official registration fees, and statutory deadlines before you use them.
What do you need to figure out today?
Pick a free tool to get instant Kenyan numbers and ready-to-use documents:
Check Staff Deductions & PAYE
Calculate exact net take-home pay, NSSF Phase 4, SHIF (2.75%), Housing Levy, and PAYE tax in 10 seconds.
Business Registration Cost
Find out the exact government fees to register a Limited Company or Business Name without overpaying brokers.
Business Invoice Generator
Add your logo, physical address, client KRA PIN, Bank, M-Pesa Till, 16% VAT, and 5% WHT. Zero platform watermark.
KRA & Statutory Deadlines
Never miss the 9th (PAYE/SHIF/Housing) or 20th (VAT). See every deadline so you never pay KES 10,000+ penalty fees.
Turnover Tax vs. VAT Checker
Find out if your sales qualify for 3% Turnover Tax (TOT) or if you are legally required to register for 16% VAT.
True Cost of an Employee
Calculate the actual cost to your business after adding employer NSSF matching and 1.5% Housing Levy to the gross salary.
Around 7 in 10 Kenyan businesses close within three years. Almost never because of the product.
They close because of the things around the work: cash running out, late client payments, surprise KRA fines, or licences nobody explained. We give you the exact numbers, tools, and steps so your business survives, avoids fines, and grows.
Where a business actually gets stuck
Every stage has its own trap. Find clear, step-by-step guides for where you are right now:
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Registration and licences
BRS, the county Single Business Permit, sector approvals. One clear map across the portals that assume you know the others.
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Money in, money out
Cash flow, records and pricing. Eight in ten businesses run short on cash, most on paper. The tracking that fixes it.
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Tax and KRA
PIN, VAT, turnover tax, filing dates and the reliefs owners miss. Plain language, penalties avoided.
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Legal and compliance
Contracts, data protection and intellectual property. The paperwork nobody explains until it costs you a dispute you could have avoided.
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People and HR
Recruitment, contracts, performance and payroll. The legal minimums most small employers only learn after a dispute.
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Technology and AI
CRM, accounting software, M-Pesa integration, and where AI actually saves a small business time instead of just sounding impressive.
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Getting and keeping customers
Over half of businesses never advertise. Getting found, a WhatsApp-first sales flow, and follow-up that stops leads going cold.
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Funding and credit
Why banks reject SME loans, what lenders really assess, and the SACCO, asset and invoice finance routes around them.
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Running and scaling
Your first hire and the labour-law basics, building systems so the business runs without you, and growing without breaking it.
Find it for your industry
All industries →The licences, county permits, and compliance risks change heavily by sector. Pick your field:
Latest Business Guides & Systems
Real operational how-tos, statutory tax walkthroughs, cash flow frameworks, and customer acquisition playbooks written specifically for Kenyan business owners.
How to price products and services in Kenya: margins, taxes, and beating price undercutting
Competing on lowest price alone kills margins and exhausts founders. Here is how to factor 16% VAT, 5% Withholding Tax, and operational overheads to quote profitably and win high-value Kenyan clients.
How to manage cash flow and stop losing money: the survival playbook for Kenyan MSMEs
Most Kenyan businesses fail not from lack of sales, but from running out of cash while profitable on paper. Here is how to fix the 30-to-90 day payment trap, plug hidden margin leaks, and build an operating cash buffer.
How to get and keep customers in Kenya: from first 10 buyers to predictable revenue
Posting on social media and hoping is not a strategy. Here is how Kenyan businesses reliably acquire corporate and retail customers, close the trust gap, and stop customer churn.
How to register a business in Kenya: structures, costs and the order to do it in
Registering a business in Kenya runs on eCitizen through the BRS. Here are the structures, the real fees, and the exact order to do things in, from name search to KRA PIN to county permit.