How to Write a Business Plan
Free Resources http://www.businessplandirectory.net/
A plan for your small business is useful if you want to focus yourself and get an overall picture of what you have to do in order to build your enterprise. On top of that, a good business plan is an absolute must if you want to convince institutions or individuals to loan money or invest in your business. One way to organize your business plan is to compose it like an informative news article, explaining the “who,” “what,” “when,” “why, and “how” of your business.
Who are you?
Write about your background and previous experience in your field. Tell about your notable accomplishments, and about your partners and staff. If your company has been in business for some time now, then write about your “track record.” Explain what your company has already accomplished and give an idea of how it stands in relation to competitors in your particular field of business.
What are Your Products or Services?
What are you producing or what are you going to produce? What are your products or services? What kind of revenue will these activities be bringing in or what is the expected range of revenue once the products are launched? Answer these questions giving a complete picture of the principal activity that you are engaged in or will be engaged in during the timeline of this business plan.
When Will things Happen?
If you have a new start-up business, this section of the plan will allow you to explain the steps that are needed to set-up your business and make it fully operational. How much time do you need? When will the business be up and running? If you are have an already existing business, it is useful to place somewhere in the plan a list of targets that you want to achieve and give approximate dates as to when these targets can be reached.
Where is Your Business?
Where are you located? Do you work at home or do you have business premises? If you have a business location such as a store or factory, then explain about the size and capacity of this establishment. What is the business climate like in your area? Are there significant competitors and what are your prospects of competing in this market? Answer these questions as best you can and give yourself and would-be investors a clear picture of where your business is situated geographically and with relation to your overall market.
Why are you in Business?
Explain why your particular enterprise, product or service is needed. What can your add to the already existing area of business that your are entering? What need are you going to fill? The answers to these questions are particularly important for investors looking for opportunities in emerging businesses and emerging markets.
How will it all Happen?
Your sales and marketing plan should be outlined in this section. Explain how you intend to establish your product or service and what steps you will take to create or expand your customer base. How will you finance the start-up and/or expansion of your business? Explain the source of your funds whether you have existing loans or liabilities. How much money do you need to raise in order to get realize your overall plan for the launching or expansion of your business? Explain how you are going to translate your business idea into a living reality.
Take a look at your planned business or your existing business from the perspective that has been outlined in this article, and write a concise business plan. It will help to bring clarity to your operations and convince investors and lenders to participate in your enterprise.
Question about business plan
What is the best business plan software to use?My husband and I are creating our business plan and we want to know what is the best software for us to use?
Other than the SBA and SCORE, what are some practical tools we can use to build our business plan? We have heard of Palo Alto's "Business Plan Pro", is there anything better out there?
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According to the book “The ABC's of Writing Winning Business Plans: How to Prepare a Business Plan That Others Will Want to Read — and Invest In” http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0446694150/powerhomebizguid by Garrett Sutton, below are some tips to make a winning business plan that can get funding:
- Money follows management. Investors look first at the people involved in the company. If you are just starting out and don’t have relevant experience, investors expect to see that you have an experienced team of advisors and employees helping you in the business.
- Make sure you “sell” the one reason your business will become profitable.
- State clearly the strategies you will employ to get the word out about your business. Your business plan must show how you will leverage the Internet, public relations, viral marketing, and other strategies to attract customers.
- Present realistic estimates of the time, energy and costs of building a successful business. Do not underestimate or overestimate revenues. While investors know your numbers are simply guesses, they want to see that your numbers are within the “range of reality.” Be careful of your financial statements: this is one area where you can easily lose credibility if presented poorly.
- Benchmark similar companies to show that you’ve done your homework and researched the market.
- Your Executive Summary is your calling card. If it is not a winner, investors may not even read your entire plan. Emphasize your own as well as your team’s track record in the Executive Summary.
- Before sending your business plan to lenders and investors, send it out first to a few in order to get feedback. You’d want to correct your plan if someone tells you that you’re way off mark, rather than have a potential investor tell it to you and lose the chance to get the funding you need.
Here are some resources that can help you write your business plan:
- SBA Business Plan Basics http://www.sba.gov/starting_business/planning/basic.html
- PowerHomeBiz.com Creating a Business Plan section http://www.powerhomebiz.com/startup/businessplan.htm
- Entrepreneur.com Writing a Business Plan section http://www.entrepreneur.com/bizplan/0,7253,,00.html
You may also want to review some sample business plans to see how it actually looks like:
- Bplans.com http://www.bplans.com/sp/businessplans.cfm
- MOOT Corp Business Plan competition winners
http://www.businessplans.org/businessplans.html
- VFinance – View hundreds of real business plans in pdf format. http://www.vfinance.com/home.asp?bps=1&ToolPage=bps_main.asp
- Business Owners Toolkit Sample business plans and information on how to create a plan. http://www.toolkit.cch.com/tools/buspln_m.asp
- PlanWare Planning software and information. http://www.planware.org/
- Virtual Business Plan Walk through the design of a business plan. http://www.bizplanit.com/vplan.html
-SBA Business Planning Guide http://www.sba.gov/starting_business/planning/basic.html
- Small Business Advancement Center http://www.sbaer.uca.edu/business_plan/businessPlan.pdf
- Sample Business Plan General planning guide created by the Canadian Business Service Center. http://www.cbsc.org/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=CBSC_FE/display&c=GuideFactSheet&cid
- Business Plans Index – A subject guide to sample business plans and profiles for specific business types from Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. http://216.183.184.20/subject/business/bplansindex.html
Some recommended books are :
- Business Plans Kit for Dummies
- The Complete Book of Business Plans : Simple Steps to Writing a Powerful Business Plan
- Writing Business Plans That Get Results : A Step-By-Step Guide
- Business Plans For Dummies®
- Your First Business Plan : A Simple Question and Answer Format Designed to Help You Write Your Own Plan
A business plan is more than just for financing, it provides structure for 1 and 5 years. If you happen to either save in one area or overspend. The first 5years are crucial you may go almost one year without showing a profit.
Here are some other things you might want to consider:
How are you listed? Sole Proprietor, S Corp, C Corp LLC
How are you doing your bookkeeping, receipts, invoices. are you adequately staffed?
Do you have the right insurance in place?
Legal Counsel? Document review, handle questions at an affordable price?
Marketing advice?
Human Resource questions answered?
Free listing to get your company the exposure needed from others?
If you need a resource or website to help let me know? I just want to make sure you have a good chance to succeed.
thank you very much sir
Andrew Miller’s video on Business plan layout and writing tips
Helpful video. Inpiring and informative. Does anyone know any good business plan competitions to enter? Has anyone heard about the launch together business plan comp? Is this the first year they are doing it? I love the video they have on the website. Someone should post it on here. Comments appreciated
Good and to the point video Matt. Definitly will use it again for reference towards build my buisness plan outline. Thanks!
Go to http://www.sba.gov , http://www.score.org or http://www.bplan.com for instructions on how to write a business plan and sample business plans.
A business plan does not guarantee a businesses success. However, if it is a well written business plan then it will provide a good platform for the success of your business.
You wouldn’t build a house without a plan right? Well, with business its the same thing, planning provides the foundations that you can then build your business upon.
I am a business consultant, and have an excellent track record working with business and start-ups performing market research analysis. I have been doing this for 8 years, with extensive experience in compiling data in report and project form and highlighting the impact to your company (financial, demographic, survey, research). My rates are very competitive, and my pricing is set with long-term relationship in mind.
Business Plan includes but not limited to following:
?Executive Summary
?Demographics & Market Research
?Marketing plan
?5 Years financial projections
?Payback period analysis
?SWOT Analysis
?Stress Test
?Risk Assessment
?Return on investment analysis
?Ratio analysis
?PowerPoint Presentation
I have several references from satisfied clients available, whom I have assisted over the years as well as samples of previous work, including financial analysis, and business plan forecasting. I look forward to hearing from you and perhaps working with you in the future.
Thank you for your time and consideration
Karar Hussain
Projects & Business Consultant
Cell: 773-782-6714
karar45@gmail.com
Visit http://www.sba.com That will lead you to examples of plans already that have been written. There are programs available that allow you to fill in blanks and answer specific questions and the program will produce graphs and a completed business plan. Your business sounds like the one I'm building. We should talk and exchange some other ideas.
Hi Adam, more videos are on the way shortly to help demystify the process..
Most people have two balls neither of which are crystal!
You should not be looking for predictions unless you business is fortune telling. Americans call it forward looking statements and we tend to say forecasts or estimates.
Estimates I feel is the better term.
If you are doing it for your own benefit it would best to be conservative, alternatively you could do two or three with different scenarios. Excel will come in handy here. A very succesful friend of mine said he always calculated his interest rate as 3x the current bank rate for his estimates. I am sure you understand the concept of discounting future money flow. No one can predict things like future orders but I am sure your partner will have his own ideas and will adjust your forecasts to his own. It is difficult,as you say to predict future statistics from websites (all you can do is go from historic data from your data logs, and it is difficult to get this sort of information from competitors. See Alexa rankings?However, as you know once you get visitors/sales the numbers can only go up if you keep developing the site as you have done in the past. Don't skimp on the investment. If you are in a competitive environment you really need to "go large" with your injection of capital.
A website is a bit like mail order. There is a correlation to the number of orders to the funds invested.
But I am sure you know all this.
We hav just raised £2m for a local directory website. The company will be looking to raise much more money in 6 months time.
How much money/access to money has he? It may be better to tailor the money to the plan.
Read Transcript The primary value of your business plan will be to create a written outline that evaluates all aspects of the economic viability of your business venture including a description and analysis of your business prospects.
You should look at this website: http://www.hunterforjob.com/
Before you dream, please hear me out. Do a business valuation to make sure the business is worth what you are going to pay. There is no easy way to value a business, please consult professionals to do a due diligence to make sure the business has potential in the future.
The business plan or in your case a marketing Plan consists of a narrative and several financial worksheets. The narrative template is the body of the plan.
The real value of creating a business or marketing plan is not in having the finished product in hand; rather, the value lies in the process of researching and thinking about your business in a systematic way. The act of planning helps you to think things through thoroughly, study and research if you are not sure of the facts, and look at your ideas critically. It takes time now, but avoids costly, perhaps disastrous, mistakes later.
This business plan is a generic model suitable for all types of businesses. However, you should modify it to suit your particular circumstances.
You will be judged by the quality and appearance of your work as well as by your ideas.
Good luck, do not under estimate the advantages of professional help, especially in the beginning, but finance institutions also like to see some of your own input in the presentation.
Keep in mind that if your potential business doesn't contribute to the betterment of mankind…grants are hard to come by.
Also, SCORE is invaluable in that old school retired business people give you advice and direction.
And last but not least, the SBA stinking blows. They tout how they help small business, minorities, women, etc…
but from personal experience, you need to have mass collateral to get SBA backing.
I went to open a salon. I had an immaculate business plan that I developed with SCORE and the Small Business Development Center at the local level. My credit score was 780. I owned 2 houses with approximately $100,000 equity between the two of them. I had over $60,000 in savings, a 401k, iras, stocks, bonds, etc. Net value far exceeded what was "required". I didn't want to use my savings or refinance my houses to open a salon. I wanted to borrow $125,000.
Because I was not buying the building in which I opened my salon, I was turned down by 10 stinking banks – all telling me that if I'd buy the building (yeah right…it's a huge strip mall) that they back me because THEN and only then, would they feel as though I had the proper type of collateral to make them comfortable. Oh – and they would only lend me $250,000 or more toward buying the building to establish my salon. WTF?
Long story short, I used my own savings for my buildout, leased my equipment and told the SBA to freaking bite me. Been in business 5 years, I paid off all my leases after 2.8 years and myself back the buildout money the following year – and all profit is now mine.
When I first started my research and my business plan, an accountant told me that less than 1% of all businesses that ask for SBA backing get it. I didn't believe him then, but after being 86'd by 10 top banks, I believe him now…Phuck the SBA.
If I can do it on my own, anybody can.
Nice & Helpful video.
Glad you liked it, shortly there will be more being added to help start-ups and early stage businesses..
The best thing you can do is speak with your accountant or a business consultant and they will help you write this part of your business plan.