A business plan’s table of contents is presented just after the cover sheet, giving a full overview of the sections within the plan. Why, you might ask, is a table of contents needed if the plan is intended to be read straight through, from start to finish, by its audience of potential funders? The reality is that readers will often want to jump around during and after their reading of the plan if they become engaged enough to consider it an option for funding.

Looking at Strategic Fit

Readers will be concerned with the strategic fit of your business concept. Strategic fit is how the activities of your organization work in concert to contribute to your competitive advantage. For example, if the competitive advantage discussed in your competitive analysis describes building a premium brand based on high quality, discussion of coupons and rampant discounting in your marketing plan may not jibe. In a sense, all of the aspects of your business must build towards achieving the competitive advantage you mention. There is good reason for readers to flip back to this section as they examine the rest of the document.

Comparing Numbers

Another reason why readers may jump around is to compare the numbers you present in the financial statements and financial summary at the end of the plan with the methods and tactics you detail earlier.  They will look to see that, in their understanding, you will be able to accomplish what you say you will within the level of expenses you describe. They will also want to check that your revenue projections are reasonable given the market size and specific customer target markets you detail in your industry and customer analysis sections.

Preferences of Individual Funders

Different individuals reading your plan will have different backgrounds and expertise. They may feel most comfortable evaluating the section of your plan related most directly with their expertise (such as marketing, operations, finance, or human resources). For this reason, your plan must make it easy for readers to jump to any section they see fit. While the section may build upon ideas discussed in previous sections, each should also stand alone to a certain extent.

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A business planning template can be an invaluable tool for a first-time entrepreneur or any entrepreneur working in an unfamiliar business sector. Using a template that is specific to your business sector can shortcut the work and formatting you have to do significantly. Here are three steps to make the best use of a template.

Read Through the Entire Template

First, read through the entire business plan template to understand the guidance it gives which you may make use of. Read both the sample text and financials and all comments and instructions given by the creators to help you along. By reading the template through, you get a sense of what the finished product might feel like and what type of work you must do to get your plan to this level.

Adjust the Financials

Before you do any writing, work on the financials to make them consistent with your plans. Enter your startup costs (after you have researched them) cost of goods sold, operating expenses, and revenue projections. The financial model with the template should help by automatically updating the financial statements of the plan based on the changes in these basic drivers. Check that the financial results (profit, return to investors, and cash reserves on hand) are appropriate for your business before moving on to the next step.

Customize the Plan

Next, customize the text of the plan starting with the company overview, working through to the end of the plan, and ending with the executive summary. As the executive summary pulls from every other section of the plan it is always best written last. Be sure that the language you use is entirely your own. Use sample text from the business plan template only as guidance to the tone and type of content you should use. Refer to guidance within the template to be sure you are fulfilling the purpose of each section as you write.

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Naturally, there are questions as to how to start writing a proper business plan and how much information you should include. Although this topic can be looked at in its most minuscule detail, today we’ll limit our discussion to 5 items that are essential to a well written business plan. We’ll cover additional aspects in future posts.

The logical starting point to any series of questions is who, what, how, why, and when. Because they’re a great beginning they’ll work very well as our outline for the 5 common features found in outstanding business plans. To start, it’s fairly obvious that any potential investor or partner will want to know who you are before they decide to invest in your enterprise. Your experience as it relates to the business you’re establishing or operating, who you will be bringing on board and their relevant expertise will set the ground work for how you fit within your industry.

While your “who” may be a little lengthy, your “what” will encapsulate the pure essence of your venture. What does it aim to do and what purpose will it serve? Your Executive Summary should express this in a few sentences as this is where investors will go to find an quick snapshot of your proposal. The rest of your business plan will elaborate how your experience and your overall goals make your project or business a bankable idea. Here’s your opportunity to highlight all of the research you’ve conducted on your competition, market base, revenue projections and the amount of funding required. Investors expect you to explain these aspects in complete detail.

The next section you’ll include is “why”. “Why” entails an honest assessment of the risks associated with your venture. No matter how excited and passionate you may be about your project, playing devil’s advocate allows you to think outside of yourself and see what a potential partner or investor may think of your concept. This is something you definitely want to bounce off a few seasoned people. There’s no better way to identify and strengthen weaknesses you may have overlooked or underestimated. While this acid test is in no way a pleasant experience (no one likes it when they rain on their parade), mature and accomplished business people understand that it is an absolute necessity when trying to identify the potential pitfalls and failings of any undertaking. You want to always hope for the best but be prepared for the worst.

Now, “when” is also essential to the overall scope of your venture. Be sure this section answers the following questions: When are you prepared to take your idea from the initial planning stages into full scale development? By when do you need the required funding? Ideally, your answers should be represented in the form of a timetable which displays critical deadlines and milestones that need to be reached.

A final word of advice. Don’t jump the gun. You don’t want to risk souring investors and funding sources by putting something in front of them that’s still raw. Take your time and refine your business plan so that it accurately reflects the breadth, scope, reach, meticulous planning and brilliance of your project. Remember as well to run your spell-check a couple of times and to verify that your grammar is spot on. This is your chance to tell your story. Don’t blow it with poor spelling or grammar (you laugh but you have no idea of how many poorly written business plans we have to suffer through).

That should cover it. In the next few weeks, we will continue to look at the business plan and other aspects of your project package. Of course, if you think you would benefit from the assistance of a professional firm to put your package together properly we’d be more than happy to refer you to highly respected firms in our network that”ll handle everything from writing your business plan to preparing feasibility studies to drawing up your PPM. We look forward to getting your feedback on other topics you would like to learn more about so please don’t hesitate to drop us a line.

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If you write a business plan only as a sales document, using it to get buy-in from investors, you are missing a great opportunity to create a document which works both for these external parties and your own guidance. Follow these tips to make sure your plan serves both your needs and their needs.

Don’t Keep Two Sets of Books

When creating the pro forma financial statements and revenue projections for your business, you should be optimistic, but realistic. This allows you to use the same numbers for your business plan and your personal targets and goals. If you are truly planning for different targets than those you tell funders about, you run the risk of becoming confused between these different sets of expectations and even misspeaking during talks with potential funders.

Address Risks

By carefully addressing risks that your business will face in your plan, you serve the needs of both funders and your own planning down the road. Funders will be happy to see you acknowledge the potential downsides for the business as long as you think creatively about how to eliminate or decrease the risks wherever possible. Doing this work becomes part of your company’s risk management plan which you should regularly update going forward.

If you ignore or downplay risks you do yourself no favors. You can actually begin to believe these risks don’t exist when you ignore them long enough, making you ill prepared to face them when they come up in reality.

Schedule Your Launch Phase

By planning not just for the costs involved in the launch phase, but for the timing of when you must accomplish the many tasks of the business launch, you will serve an important management task while making your plan more impressive to readers. The operations plan should detail the major milestones of the launch phase, and if your schedule is more detailed than needed here, it can be included as an appendix to the plan. Funders will be glad to see an example of your ability to juggle the many tasks involved with launching. As months go by, you can use this document to check your own progress and make sure you are on track to keep the launch date you have scheduled.

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Writing a startup business plan from scratch means doing a lot of needless work. Why not get a head start by jumping off from the work of experienced business plan consultants? Using a business plan template is a sure way is a sure way to avoid all of the work of setting up and laying out your business plan, allowing you to just get started with the meat of your plan.

What is a Template?

A business plan template is an outlined or sample business plan presenting all of the major sections for your purposes. Some templates are more or less generic, created to serve as many kinds of businesses as possible with customization. Others are sector-specific, using sections and language appropriate for opening a restaurant or a day care center, for example. These take a lower level of customization if they match the sector you are operating within.

Templates can be purchases online from business plan writing and consulting companies. An experienced company can put valuable guidance in the instructions of the plan. If done well, the effect is like having an advisor sitting next to you and coaching you through the drafting of your plan.

Financial Model

In addition to presenting a layout, style, and formatting appropriate for a plan that is to be presented to funders for consideration, a template should provide a financial model which can cut significant time off the preparation of the numbers of the business. This may come in the form of an Excel spreadsheet with pages for each financial statement and financial summary required in a standard plan. Once you enter your business specifics, like startup costs, the type of funding you will seek, the ongoing cost of goods sold and other expenses, and revenue projections, the financial model will generate the rest of the financials for you. Any changes you’d like to make after that point can be done in one spot and then populate through the rest of the spreadsheet, making this a very flexible model.

You can spend days learning the accounting basics needed to create financial statements in this way and then days rigging a spreadsheet like this. By using a template with an automated financial model, you have the benefit of a virtual accountant working with you to take your projections and spin them into presentation-ready financial statements. For the low price of a business plan template, this is extremely valuable help.

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