Key Areas Of A Business Plan

The key areas of a business plan includes the following. Find out how defining each can help your business.

Executive Summary - While it's the last thing you will write, it's the first part of the business plan. This part summarizes the main highlights of the rest of the sections.

Company Description - This is a high level overview of your company, products or services, types of consumers, and competitive advantages. Ultimately, think of it like what you would tell someone in an elevator ride about your business if you wanted them to invest in it. Also known as an                                                                                   extended elevator pitch.

Market Analysis - This is your research about your industry and target market. If you haven't formally defined your target customer, this will help you do so.

Operational Plan - This covers the day to day operations of your business, from location and hours to inventory and accounting. As you go through this, you can make sure that each of the vital processes in your business are running as smoothly and efficiently as possible.

Organization & Management - This tells people about the main players in your business - who owns it, who manages it, etc. It will help you define all parties involved with the foundation of your business so everyone has a clear understanding of where they fit and who does what.

Products & Services - This is where you describe the products and services offered by your business. You should think about them from your customer's perspective. It will help you to better sell your products and services once you've defined them using this approach.

Marketing & Sales - This is where you layout how you will reach your target market, identify prospects, and sell your products and services. While composing this section, creative marketing and sales strategies might emerge.

Financial Projections - This is where you really dig in and figure out how much your business will make over the next five years. As an established business, you will include historical data and be able to make your predictions based off of that. Coming up with these numbers could be a huge motivation boost and keep you working towards a specific goal as opposed to just seeing what happens.

Funding Request - This is the part of the plan where you define your outside funding needs and exactly how you plan on using those funds as well as pay them back. Even if you're just investing your own money into your business, this can help you really focus your spending so it is all allocated and documented properly.

As you can see, creating a business plan can be a huge eye-opener for your business, no matter what stage you're at.