How to write a Business Plan, Business Plan Template

If you have an idea for a business the first you should do is to write it and start making some draft plans, if you use an advice service such as Business Link it and have a rough outline of you business it will be far easier to provide support and advice.

Depending on the type of funding available in your area you may be eligible to access financial support in order to assist you in planning stage and assist you in raising finance.

Business Start-up - Complete Business Start up provide information and resources for people seeking to become self-employed. The site contained a wealth of practical points on the planning and execution phases of working for yourself.

A business plan can contain a variety of different sections,

How to write a business plan - Executive Summary

This is a brief history of your business, who you are and what you do, this will be the first section any potential investors or banks will look at and has an impact on whether the reader continues.  For this reason you should ensure sufficient time is spent on this section ensuring that all the relevant information required is presented in a concise and structured manner and that the reader is engaged.

How to write a business plan - The Business

In this section you should clearly describe what the businesses main function is and who is responsible for ensuring operation, a history of the business along with the experience of key personnel presented is vital for you to inspire confidence of the businesses success.  Not having the required experience is likely to identified as a negative towards the success of your business, a copy of current CV‘s is always a recommended in your appendices.

How to write a business plan - The Product/service

Here you need to identify clearly what it is your business offers and what is its unique selling points (USP) are and how your product or service will fit into the market.  It is important to be clear so that anybody reading your plan has no illusions with what you plan to offer and is clear on your idea before progressing through the remainder of the plan.  It is good ideas to include a SWOT analysis for more information try http://www.businessballs.com/swotanalysisfreetemplate.htm.

How to write a business plan - Market Research

This is an incredibly important part, not only for your plan but for the success of your business, you should plan and implement sound marketing strategies and document your findings and how this supports your plan.  There are a number of techniques for doing this from developing prototype products and forming focus groups to evaluate them to competitor analysis looking at what your competitor does and how they do it and at what cost.  The strength of this research will greatly affect the confidence and support generated to the reader and therefore crucial, asking a couple of friends or family would not be by any means adequate. (It happens!)

How to write a business plan - Finance

A big stumbling block for a large number of would be start-ups where they have not been able to generate sufficient capital to get their idea off the ground.  Wherever possible you should try and invest money from your personal wealth however small an amount as this demonstrates commitment to you business, if you are unable to do this then it is worth trying family or friends as this can be a cheaper method of finance.
There are a number of grants and government backed loans available to new businesses and it is worthwhile taking some time to research this avenue, there are a number of organisation that will assist you with this as it can be time consuming and complex.  For information contact Business Link.

Banks will lend money, they just might be a little more cautious to who and for what, for this reason it now even more essential that a clear business plan is presented, this does not necessary mean a huge 500 page document that no one is unlikely to finish but a document that clearly identifies where the business is now, what it wants to achieve and how it will achieve this supported with sufficient evidence.  If you have some form of security it will usually be easier to access credit such as property etc.

For our checklist when starting a business click here

There are a variety of financial documents you should include in your business plan, these include:

• Cash flow Forecast

This identifies what you believe sales will be and the associated costs that those sales will incur i.e. rent, utilities, wages etc.  It is usually a good idea to include a target scenario and a worst case scenario, this will inform the reader of how the business will cope if you do not meet your targets and may influence any lending decision. It is important that you explain any projected income and costs and that they are not just figures ‘plucked from the air’ because if your figures do not add up it will be noticeable and could have a negative impact.

• Profit & Loss Account

This summarises what you expect the profit or loss to be at the end of year 1, 2 and 3 and it is not unusual for this to be the first document to be looked, this does not mean you should make it look spectacular because this would also quite likely make your targets appear unrealistic and not instil confidence into the reader.

• Balance Sheet

This summaries the assets and liabilities the business has and potentially will have at the end of year 1, there are a large number of software programs out there who will calculate all this for you once the cash flow forecast has been completed. 

For a copy of a cash flow forecast along with a P & L and balance sheet in excel format please email us where we will happily forward one to you until the business downloads section is operational.  To email us click here.