How to Write a Business Plan
Wednesday, 19 February 2020
A business plan serves as a key strategic tool for all types of entrepreneurs. With a good business plan, you will be able to focus on certain aspects of your business and will not miss any important step. If you write a business plan, you will be highly likely to hit your short-term and long-term goals. Also, it is worth noting that a business plan can help you get funding for your project. Investors will not be ready to fund your business if they cannot gauge the capacity of your business to succeed. In this piece, we will cover some tips that will help you write a business plan that delivers results.
What Should be Covered in a Business Plan?
Business plans can be written in many different formats. However, certain items must appear in the document. They include:
- An executive summary of the business idea
- A description of what your company will do
- A presentation of your analysis of the market
- The structure of your management
- The products and services you will be selling
- Your plan for marketing your products and services
- The amount of money you need and the period within which it should be disbursed
- Your targets
The Length of Your Business Plan
If you are making a business plan specifically to pitch your idea to investors, then you have to be very careful with the length of your document. Generally, you should ensure that it takes less than 15 minutes to skim through. If you find that it takes longer than that, you should try to summarise the less important parts. You should also divide the document with subheadings to make it easier to skim through.
Counting the number of pages may not give you the best representation of how quick it is to skim through the document. Some business plans may have images, graphs, and other types of content which take up space. Such documents may be easy to go through, even though the pages may be many. That being said, a small business should have a business plan of between 5 and 10 pages, excluding images and graphs.
Your Business and Your Product
The core of your business plan is the product and service you are selling. Anyone invested in your company will need to understand why you think you will be able to sell the items better than other businesses in the niche. Include information on the disadvantages of the businesses in existence and how you will overcome any existing issues in the industry. Make sure you carry out thorough market research and present your findings in a straightforward manner.
Conclusion
With the rise of the internet, you should be able to start a business easily. Services like Shopify can help you launch your business quickly and start earning good money in a short period. You should consider writing a business plan to root out any errors in your thought process. Also, this document can help you get a loan to launch your business.
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