Business Plan Basics – 101
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Recently I have been working on business plans, and I did them a few times before, after some trial and a lot of error I decided to give my best basic overview of how to put a basic business plan together and why it would be useful.
That main purpose of business plan is gather all your ideas in one place and communicating it to another person, so the best thing is to think about it as dialog, you want to answer every possible question that person may have, be thurough and don’t just try filling it up.
Everybody has all the details to a business plan in their heads but they don’t put it all down on paper:
- What the company is going to do?
- What problem is it going to solve?
- How big is the market?
- What are the sources of revenue?
- What is your exit strategy for your investors?
- What amount of money is required?
- How are you going to market it?
- What kind of people do you need?
- What are the marketing risks?
- What are the technology risks?
- What are the execution risks?
Have somebody else go over and critique it then fix the points you missed and keep on going over it. This is just a simple way of putting all your ideas and motivation down on a piece paper and communicate it to another person.
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July 9th 2007 at 8:58 am
what fun ^_^
*stars the post*
however, i still think entrepreneurship is not for me
July 9th 2007 at 9:34 am
tell me mark i wana know where the best shawerma is
July 9th 2007 at 9:49 am
The great thing is that there are plenty of websites that can guide through creating a business plan (feasibility analysis/report). And like you said a lot of people have it in their heads, and it is much better to write it all out and have someone go over it. Thanks for posting this.
July 9th 2007 at 9:59 am
I did a couple of plans – on my own and of course of my best friend “Google”. It is good i agree and it’s a good opportunity to get your mind working and trying to learn and it doesn’t hurt to be prepared for new market ventures
July 9th 2007 at 10:26 am
Nice, simple way of looking at it.
I would also add these :
- What are the projected cash flows?
- What are the projected/targeted returns? Here I’d also add some ratios, maybe EPS, IRR or ROE?
- Who are your competitors and what share of the market do they have?
July 9th 2007 at 11:11 am
very helpful.. we were actually constructing one yesterday…
and btw.. nice suit in earlier posts..
July 9th 2007 at 11:45 am
Day by day my resepect to you and interest to your blog grows as it becomes my source of information everyday.
P.s If you need apartner to establish your business you can count on me.
July 9th 2007 at 4:06 pm
Laialy: You would be surprised working on it is lengthy but the end result is fantastic!
zahed: your a shawerma!
N: Very true, and they are very useful for sure! I just got these stuck in my head!
Nana: yup, google is fantastic! Its always good putting ideas down!
1001: those are very good, and it depends on the type of business for sure! Some of the financial information is more then what a normal person can go. If you can convince them with normal ideas and you have really looked into then this would be great.
Beyond Q8iya: happy it could help! And thanks, I really enjoyed wearing the suit!
Mohammed: I’m happy the blog can provide you with information! I’m working with a few partners with business ventures and if anything else comes up I will be posting that up!