For every successful business, there is a pre-made Business Plan and an idea associated with it. Without perfect business planning, the chances of growing your business will be too low.
Also, once you read this article till the end, as a part of a gift, you will be rewarded with Business Plan templates for absolutely FREE.
There may be a case that you have all the points to start your own business, but it’s essential to have a written Business Plan digitally or physically.
So, in this step by step process, I’ll show you how quickly and easily you can create and write the business plan that will take you to reach higher and higher.
Top 12 Elements for making your perfect Business Plan
In each kind of business, whether its to raise money or grow your business or anything that corresponds to your profits, this top 12 elements will work.
1. Executive Summary
This section consists of a paragraph or two where you will have to explain what your product is.
Do not add too much detail to your business here. You will get a chance to get into more information in the following elements.
In this element, try to make the reader understand what your product is and a little bit about your vision for the product.
2. Your Product or Service
This is an element where you will have to be more precise about your product.
Since your business can be a physical product or maybe a service, so you will have to explain in detail what the product is and what your business is all about to get into the initial stages of perfect business planning.
Is it a website ? or a physical store?
A widget or a mobile app?
Why should the company exist?
Does it entertain?
Will it make someone feel better?
Does it teach something?
What is the benefit of this company/organization?
Does it solve a problem for a section of society or any people in the world?
All these questions should be well clear in this section and should help the reader understand why your company needs to exist in the world.
3. What stage are you in?
Again in this element, you should ask the below questions:
Are you in the idea stage? Or have you started?
If started, then are you in the prototyping stage or pilot stage or production stage?
Do you have some business revenue and a team?
So, there is no need to mention too many specifics here but help the reader to understand where you are in the process of building the company.
It is ok to be at any stage currently, even though you are at the planning stage.
Some of the biggest companies in the world like Amazon, Nike, Puma, Coca-Cola, etc. have, at some point in time, been in the planning stages.
The primary purpose of this section will also help the reader gain context and perspective.
For a perfect business planning, try to showcase the main attributes of your business:
- Where
- Why
- Who
- What
- How
- When
These attributes should be well clear for your business as it will help you to grow at a much faster rate.
4. What is your market size?
For a perfect business planning, this 4th element of the business plan i.e. identifying the market size is essential.
You will have to identify your market size for your business.
This is the dollar amount of the industry you are targeting. Some industries are enormous, and some are quite small in terms of revenue.
You have to show here the reader that you understand what your addressable market is and whats its market size.
If you are building a company that sells something very niche, your market size may be small, but if you have a company that has multiple niche or high revenue specific niches like computers or cars, your market size is in the many billions and is obviously very large.
This section also shows to the reader that you have done some due diligence and understand your business landscape.
You can learn in detail how to effectively determine the market size here.
5. What is your target market
As a beginner, it is straightforward to think that everyone can use your product, but that would be a BIG MISTAKE.
There are usually one or two demographics that will be a better fit for your business product.
Also focusing on a particular consumer base should also help you target your product usability efforts and marketing campaigns.
Generally, in the beginning, if it’s possible, try to understand who will be the best kind of target user for your business.
You can have a detailed look on how to find your target audience here
6. How will you market to your target users?
So, there are many ways to actually market a product or service.
Each business in the world requires a perfect business marketing strategies crafted with the basic understanding of the business and the consumer.
What kind of marketing strategies will work for your business?
Marketing is the lifeline for every business planning and so like in the case of yours by which you will get more and more customers.
But many people do not know or understand how to market their business beyond creating flyers, handing out business cards, and posting about their business or Facebook or Twitter.
Try to make yourself very clear and put all the ways through which you will market your product to the target audience, whether its a B2B business or B2C business or any other form of business.
7. Your Monetization strategy: how will you make money
This is the most critical and crucial point in every business, i.e., how will you monetize your business and start making money.
So, in this element, you must showcase how, why, and when there will be transactions that will bring you the revenue in your business.
What will be your marketing strategy, or already do you have a sufficient revenue stream?
You can learn more of how to make profits in a business here.
8. Unit economics overview
This is arguably one of the essential elements of a real business plan outline.
In this section, you will outline the details of each transaction, estimate how many transactions you can expect, and understand your financial model.
This is the early vision of profit and revenue forecasting for your business.
Do not ever start a business without really thinking through this section. Its the MOST Important.
This can be one of the most challenging sections of the business plan, so here I’ll explain to you some examples.
Example: Imagine you are opening or selling a sweet store and products. You sell the products for a specific price, but it takes you some amount of time and money to produce, market, and sell the items while incurring costs like paying your employees and rent.
So there is revenue and expenses both simultaneously. Expenses are more comfortable to count because most of them are fixed.
Your job is basically to find out the number of items you need to sell in order to
- Break-even
- Turn into profits
- Reach Your Goal
9. current team
Give a brief background of each of the members of your core team and showcase the current size of the team.
A bonus point for mentioning how big or small you want to grow the team moving forward in your business.
It’s Advisable to mention the below members in your business.
- CEO: Chief Executive Officer
- CFO: Chief Financial Officer
- CIO: Chief Information Officer
- CMO: Chief Marketing Officer
- COO: Chief Operating Officer
- Or any other Important members in your team
10. Your competition
In today’s scenario, business success is always achieved by bench-marking with your competition.
So in business planning, It’s essential to understand and note who are the other players in your business niche. They would be your main competitors.
They are to be respected, understood, and try to learn as much as possible from them.
You need to understand why they are successful and their shortcomings too.
Whenever they fail, maybe a perfect opportunity is there for your business to pick up in the market and differentiate from the competition.
Initially, it would be difficult to be better from them as they already have deep roots of that niche in the market.
So better to be a little different and unique so that the audience knows and remembers you.
Try to list all the possible points for competing with them from moving forward.
11. Previous investors and funding
In this element, give an overview of who has invested in your company so far.
If not invested, try to put up, all the possible sources where you can get the right investors along with the time you need to spend in it.
Depending on who will be reading this business plan for yours, you can show here the relevant sensitive information for your business.
12. What is the goal of your business
So this is the last element where you will have to put up the goal of your business.
What is the main goal and objective of your business?
Are you raising money?
Are you hiring employees or already hired?
Do you have a running team?
Are you just gathering your thoughts on paper?
Usually, when you provide your business plan to some other person, you are seeking something from them. It may be he is an investor, and you may need funds for your business.
It is an excellent idea to showcase inside your business plan what it is that you are seeking.
This will help the person know that the business is purely professional, and there would be more chances for him to be convinced.
So these are the top 12 elements that should be strictly followed for a perfect business planning.
Top 4 Business Plan Template
Now we are at the end of the article, we are really happy that you like the article and you have completed till the end.
So as a completion gift, we provide you with top 4 FREE templates.
You can download the top templates from the below FORM.
Once you fill the above form, you will be sent with a test email for confirmation. Once confirmed, you will be redirected with the download link.
I am sure you will like the templates. In case of any issue, or any doubt, do drop your comment and we will answer all your doubts as soon as possible.
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