BUSINESS STRATEGY & PLANNING
Business Plan
The business plan is the foundation of your investor package. However, most entrepreneurs are too busy with other priorities – such as developing products, finding customers, and recruiting a team – to prepare a compelling business plan.
A further advantage of your roadmap is that, ideally, it changes with your business. It’s considered a living document, but despite its adaptability, there are basic elements the Small Business says any plan should contain. They include:
Executive Summary:
A snapshot of your plan. This will be the last thing you write, but possibly the most important, since many readers will stop here if they’re unimpressed. If your company is a startup, focus on your background and experience as well as that of any partners to show the underpinnings of the company, the agency says. If you’re better established, make sure to include details such as when the business was started, the names of the founders and their roles, how many employees you have, and where your operations are situated.
Company Description:
Explain what your company does and how it stands out from competitors. List major customers as well as markets you plan to target in the future. You’ll want to include competitive advantages, such as expert personnel like the whiz-kid coder you just hired, or location: Perhaps your floral shop is next door to an all-night wedding chapel.
Market Analysis:
It’s crucial to understand the market you plan to enter. Find out who your competitors are, analyze their cash flow and profit margins, and research technological developments in the industry that might be game-changers. Part of describing your customers is a general awareness of how much they spend and when. For instance, Black Friday got its name because it kicks off the lucrative Christmas shopping season that moves many retailers into full-year profitability. If your business is grappling with a similar challenge, you’ll want to be sure you have the resources and cash flow to withstand operating at a loss for 11 months out of the year.
Organization and Management:
Spell out the details of ownership, including investors and show your organizational chart. Specify whether your business is a sole proprietorship, partnership or corporation, and if it’s the latter, what type.
Service or Product Line:
What do you sell, how will it help your customers, and how often will they need to replace it? The answers to those questions can be crucial factors in business sustainability. Include any patents or copyrights you own.
Marketing and Sales:
The best idea in the world won’t take off if you don’t let your potential customers know what you have. Are you going to rely on word of mouth, promotional discounts or advertising? Remember, your method will have to be tailored to your market. New York businesses are famous for paying people to stand on the sidewalk promoting everything from discounted pizza slices to bargain jewelry prices, but that doesn’t work nearly as well in cities without a high volume of foot traffic.
Funding Request:
You’ll want to include how much you need right now as well as how much more you might need over the next five years. A critical point is how you plan to repay borrowed money to creditors (if you opt for debt financing) or, alternatively, generate returns for investors. Both will want to know how you’re spending their money and when they’ll see a payoff.
Financial Projections:
If you need funding, provide realistic forecasts that show how you plan to generate future cash flow. Unless you’re borrowing from your parents, your funding sources will want to know. It’s easier if you can show recent financial statements and base your projections on those, since that will give lenders an idea of how realistic your numbers are.
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Pitch Deck
A pitch deck is a brief presentation, often created using PowerPoint or Keynote, used to provide your audience with a quick overview of your business plan.
You will usually use your pitch deck during face-to-face or online meetings with potential investors, customers, partners, and co-founders. Sometimes you will use your deck to present your business in front of a larger audience, perhaps at a pitch competition or angel group meeting. Other times, a potential investor may ask you to email them your pitch deck, so it needs to make sense without being accompanied by your verbal delivery. Different situations will require different styles of pitch decks.
A number of authors, venture capitalists, startup founders and evangelists have created different versions of what they consider required elements to successful pitching presentations. Most of them agree on the following:
- Problem
- Solution
- Product
- Market Size
- Business Model
- Underlying Magic
- Competition
- Better/Different
- Marketing Plan
- Team
- Traction / Milestones
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Financial Modelling
Your financial projection is your business plan in numbers. Many entrepreneurs find that preparing a financial forecast is the most intimidating aspect of developing a business plan. Even MBAs who have studied finance and accounting can have trouble figuring out just where to start. We can help.
Whether you are starting a brick-and-mortar small business or a high-growth tech venture, we can help you prepare a financial model appropriate for your specific situation.
Our financial modeling process will distill the essence of your business into a manageable number of core assumptions and cause-and-effect relationships so that you can distinguish between what’s important and what isn’t.
Some of the other key features of our financial model are:
- Income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement.
- Monthly details with quarterly and annual summaries.
- Assumptions are color coded, documented, and organized by category.
- Extensive error checking to help spot mistakes quickly.
- Create a PDF of the entire model in just one click.
- Operating expenses grouped by department.
- Key ratios such as revenue per employee so you can benchmark against industry standards.